Shooting Hoops!

Basketball season is here and as a Tennessee fan, well, basketball is our hope out of the gloom of the failed football season we are currently experiencing in Big Orange Country. In the spirit of the basketball season, Emma-Caroline is now a member of her own team called appropriately enough, "The Hair Bows!" Emma-Caroline and many of these sweet little girls have had little or no experience with the game of basketball. Today we had the kick-off jamboree which featured two 10 minute mini games. Although the girls did not win either game, they had fun playing their very first games and also learned a lot in the process. I am excited to watch these sweet little girls play and learn the sport of basketball from a very wonderful coach, Mr. Bob Bowman. Go Hair Bows!

 

 The line-up!

 Two sweet girls ready to play!

 Getting the game strategy from Coach Bowman.

 Eager listeners!

 Sweet girl!

 Clarifying her position.

 A smiling and enthusiastic Coach Bowman!

 Game one.

 Smiling the whole game!

 Pep talk!

 Our Basketball player #16!

 Waiting fo the second game!

 Go Hair Bows!

Good Job Girls!

A Wrinkle In Time

One of my earliest memories I have as a child is sitting with my mom or dad and listening to them read me a story. I think I must have asked my mom to read me the same story book over and over again when I was four years old. I still have that book and I remember the exact way the words sounded as they rolled over my mothers lips like a whimsical song coming from a music box.

 In kindergarten, I remember the very first book fair that I ever went to. My mom had given me a dollar to spend and I bought a Clifford book for 95 cents. I still have that book too which is a first edition in the series.

 Another one of my favorite things to do as a little girl was going to the bookstore or library to pick out a new book to read. I remember the very first time I got a library card while visiting my Granny Bea in Mississippi. It was so magical to me to be able to check out books and take them home to read! On trips to the bookstore, I got to not only pick out a new book to read, but also a new bookmark for my book! I loved all types of books from Little Golden Books to the Little House on the Prairie Books to Nancy Drew. And yes, I still have ALL of my childhood books. My favorite book of all then and now is Little Women. Of course I still have the original copy I got when I was a girl, which has tear marked pages of where I sobbed for the very first time over the words I had read in a book.

  Books are wonderful transports which allow us to travel to other places, times, situations ,etc. as well as remind us of our own time line of life. Recently I was taking out the board books from both of my girls rooms in order to make room for the books they were getting as older children. While I looked through each of the baby books my girls had enjoyed, I remembered how they would sit curled in my lap listening to the stories. Each of these little books is special to me and my girls too and will be kept for future generations to enjoy just as my girls enjoy my childhood books today. In this day in age of Kindles and Nooks and i-Books, I still prefer the old fashioned paper editions of all of my favorite stories. Books will always hold a special place in my own wrinkle in time.

Flowers for November

In the past years of owning a home, one in Austin, Texas, and one other home here in Knoxville, I have had flowers; seasonal flowers, and flowering trees and shrubs like crepe myrtles and dogwood and azaleas. When we moved to our current home, I had no idea what I was inheriting in the way of flowers and other beautiful garden scape plants that showcase their beauty at various points in the year, even winter! I have posted about our coral maple and our yellow tail dogwood and our hydrangeas, oh the hydrangeas! We are blessed with not only these beautiful colorful shrubs and trees but also a plethora of many other plants. I will meekly admit that we have a service through a wonderful neighbor who owns a landscape business that maintains our gardens. Yes, I can say that the Avery House does come with gardens and it is quite necessary that we have help in maintaining this lovely gift that we inherited with the purchase of our home. I have recently started referring to the Avery House as the Avery Cottage. Not only does the house's architectural features lend itself to a cottage feel, but also the house's array of gardens give nod to that feeling of cottage as well. Howie recently asked me to photograph yet another one of our many flowering plants, the camellias, which our at their peak right now in November! We also have hydrangea that are still in bloom! Can you believe that?!? Please enjoy the following capture of our flowers for November.

Halloween 2012!

Halloween or All Hallows Eve is one of my favorite holidays to celebrate. I take the approach of a more fun celebratory tradition as opposed to the sinister version practiced by some. I think that the history of Halloween is interesting. You can read about the history of Halloween here. At our church we calibrate All Hallows Eve with wonderful Bible readings and beautiful music that seem to invoke the celebratory nature of Halloween.

 We had another wonderful celebration this year and brought along a friend to attend the All Hallows Eve service and fun afterwards at the Halloween party and trunk or treat.

 This year, Emma-Caroline and Sophie chose to dress as the two latest featured Disney princesses, Merida from the movie "Brave" and Rapunzel from the movie "Tangled."

  On Halloween night, we enjoyed a neighborhood soiree with lots of neighborhood friends and Emma-Caroline and Sophie's Godparents, Patrick and Anna. We hope you all had a wonderful Halloween too filled with lots of happy trick-or-treaters and candy too!

Finding Grace in the Middle of a Corn Maze

 Yesterday morning I awoke to my almost 17 year old dog, Lucy, scratching at the door to say she wanted to go out. After several attempts at ignoring her as well as a few unpleasant thoughts that passed through my head, I begrudgingly got out of bed murmering to myself resentful words. It was 5:45 am after all and Saturday, so why should I be pleasant. I stomped downstairs only to find that it was cold outside and rainy. I do not like being wet and cold, who does? The morning ensued with me attempting to change my attitude towards my untimely awakening by baking muffins for those who still slept soundly in their beds and by getting a jump start on the morning laundry and house work. As I attempted to bake the muffins, I dropped two eggs on the floor (which I have never done before) and then gritted my teeth as I angerly cleaned up both messes. I was certain I would not prevail in my attempt to change my attitude from bitter and resentful to chipper and accommodating. In my odds, I was also scheduled to go to the corn maze and pumpkin patch with the choir group in the cold rainy weather which I was certain would also produce lots of mud. I crossed my fingers, to no avail, that the pumpkin patch excursion would be canceled with the rain. I arrived at the church with a semi-smile on my face and greeted the parents waiting with a very curt, "I do NOT like rain and the pumpkin patch," when they laughingly told me it was the best kind of weather to go to a corn maze. After boarding the bus with six eager little friends, my attitude towards the trip began to slowly turn as I chatted with our music director about the early '90's and times when we both remembered the Tennessee Vols being on top of the SEC instead of on the bottom. As the van crossed over the Tennessee River making it's way towards Maple Lane Farms, I felt myself allowing a gradual attitude change. We arrived at the corn maze, purchased tickets and made two groups, one of boys and one of girls. With the girls leading the way, I entered the corn maze eager to get through it and to move on to the next activity. As we wound our way amongst the tall spent corn stalks, I felt myself actively thinking about my group's next strategy in our attempt to find our way through and out of the maze. With each step closer to the goal coupled with the laughter of the four little girls in my company, my attitude grew brighter until I realized, "This is fun and I am actually having a great time!" Yes, it was cold. Yes, it was rainy. Yes it was muddy. But I was actually having a great time!

 It was then that I realized the grace I had been granted in an attitude adjustment from God. I often say it is of no consequence that Jesus said, "Let the children come to me and do not hinder them, for the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as these." At the beginning of the morning my world was glum because of my own uncomfortableness of the way life was presenting itself to me at the given time. My attitude was dictated by my inability to see past the inconvenience of the dog and the hassle of the broken eggs and the uncomfortableness of the cold and rain and mud. It was not until I became a "child" once again and allowed myself to become an active participant of the corn maze that I was granted grace from God that allowed me to see his Kingdom through the eyes of the very children I was privileged enough to spend the morning with. My facebook status for the morning became,"I am always humbled when God grants me and attitude adjustment. I was grumbling about the cold rainy weather and going to the corn maze this morning. Sure enough I have had the best time with these choir kiddos from Ascension. The smiles and laughter of children sure does put everything into perspective. I am blessed and privileged to be with these friends this morning!" I went on the trip to the corn maze as a chaperon to the children who were with me. Little did I know that I was the one who needed the chaperon on my trip to see God's Kingdom in the middle of a corn maze.

The Nearness of God

There have been times in my life when I felt God's presence with me with every breath that I took knowing that his very Spirit was what powered my being. There have been other times in my life when I wondered where God was and why I felt so alone and heavy burdened. Why is that? The only difference in the the times of my life in which I felt the nearness of God completely and when I felt the absence of God is simply my own state of mind at the given time of the situation. I have learned in my life that in all reality, God is ALWAYS there whether I feel his nearness to me or not. It is at times when I feel the urge to be super in control of every. last. detail. of. my. life. that I feel very distant from God. I am too busy checking off my to do lists, vacuuming my house a hundred times a day, folding the laundry, cooking meals, writing lesson plans, preparing for next week, month, year . . . that I tune God out as if his voice were the intermittent sound of the air conditioner turning on and off. In those times of realizing God was there but ignoring his gentle whisperings, my life felt full of tension, stress, strife . . . but yet, I WAS in control, right? Along with ignoring the gentle whisperings of God, I also ignored those feelings of stress my body was undergoing until . . . SNAP. . . my body said, "ENOUGH," you can not go on in this way any longer. You NEED to stop!!! But how? How could I stop? I couldn't let all the balls in the air come tumbling down for no one else to pick up. It was up to me to keep it all going, right? I think at times we have all felt this way. It is not until our bodies become broken that we stop and listen and realize that our spirits are broken too. We wonder and we cry out, "Oh God, where are you?" We don't hear him at first because we are too engulfed by our own feelings of doubt and pity. As the sobbing turns into a quiet whimper, we begin to hear IT. We begin to hear the whispers of God saying, "I am with you. I have always been with you. Come to me and I will give you rest." As I have grown older, I recognize the signs sooner that I am trending towards doing it all my self and tuning God out. I recognize the empty feeling I begin to feel as I systematically become more like a well oiled machine rather than a human being with the capacity to stop and enjoy life as I go along. I have learned that God's whispers are really in-your-face shouts of life in everything that occurs around me from the quiet stillness of the early morning to the loud boom of construction on the neighbors house behind me. All of the world that we encounter from nature to human beings have a piece of God in them. It still takes my conscience effort to tune in to God and his nearness all around me. It doesn't ever get any easier to make that effort to recognize God in all that I encounter; but it sure is worth it!

iPhone cameras and Instagram

After my 365 project, I felt a great need to NOT take photos anymore. Of course, I have continued to snap away with my Nikon D90 and still enjoy photography. What I suppose I needed to take a break from was the editing and the posting of my photos as well as sometimes the "burden" of my heavy DSLR hanging like an albatross around my neck. Enter the iPhone 4S into my life early in 2012 and my life has been transformed. I will not say that a phone camera takes the place of a DSLR. It just simply can't touch what a DSLR camera has the capacity to do. However, when you are out walking around New York City, shelping your heavy DSLR and gear and you feel like your arm may go numb from the weight of all the stuff you are carrying around, well, the iPhone camera with the aid of Instagram comes quite handy and actually produces some pretty nice photos to boot. In reality, the type of camera a photographer uses is only part of the equation. The other part comes from the eye and skill of the photographer.  Now, I am not attempting to say that I am the best and most gifted photographer out there, far from it. What I do say though is this, in photography, it is more important to use what you have on hand and attempt to capture the best image that you can while enjoying the experience that you are capturing over having really awesome equipment that you may  or may not be able to capture a good image with and/or weighs you down to the point that you are somewhat miserable because of the equipment that you are hauling. Case in point, I chose to not take my DSLR on our pumpkin patch excursion this past weekend. Instead I captured our trip using my iPhone and Instagram. I was happy not to have my DSLR hitting my hip every time I reached down to get a pumpkin and I think I couldn't have gotten any better images like the one above even if I had had my DSLR. I still love shooting images with my D90, and no, it has not started to collect dust; however, sometimes, depending on the situation, it's very nice to have a lighter alternative to capture the moment at hand.

Maple Lane Farms

We have been yearly visitors to the pumpkin patch since Emma-Caroline was a baby. The Knoxville and surrounding area has many wonderful farms and pumpkin patches and corn mazes. We have been to at least four different ones, however, we think the Maple Lane Farms corn maze and pumpkin patch is the best that we have visited. Today we ventured out to Greenback, Tennessee for our annual family trip to the pumpkin patch. It was a beautiful sunny day and we took full advantage of the mild weather for our pumpkin patch excursion.

 The girls found a spot in the middle of all these pumplins that was perfect for a photo op!

 Aren't these the two cutest little pumpkin farmers you ever saw!

 Beautiful sunflowers, perfect for photos!

 I can't believe how clear this photo from instagram is! I love it!

 The girls thought these were so much fun. I secretly wished i could take a set or two home with me!

 Emma-Caroline has grown so much since her first trip as a 1 year old to Maple Lane Farms!

 Sophie was an infant in a baby Bjorn on her first trip to Maple Lane Farms!

 Making our way through the "Monkey" corn Maze!

 Emma-Caroline found the perfect little pumpkin! She later dropped it and broke it's stem off which led to many tears and a second pumpkin.

 A little pumpkin for a little punkin'!

The two prettiest pumpkins in the patch!

It's Great to Be a Tennessee Vol!

The University of Tennessee, my alma mater, is a great place to be on any given Saturday during the fall when the Football Vols are at home playing some other opposing team. Regarding football, there is nothing quite as amazing to me than watching the Tennessee Volunteers run through the Power T with Smokey the real blue tick coon hound leading the pack with an unmistakable howl! It's electrifying and there is no place I would rather be at the given moment. This football season has gotten off to a wonderful start. It seems the lull of a few slow years in our football past have been put aside and the fans have been energized with a fierce passion for the TN Vols! Today, ESPN College Game Day has returned to Rocky Top giving the fans an extra treat. With a win against the Gators, we'll be singing "Good ole Rocky Top" into the wee hours of the morning! Go Vols!

A Party Fit For a Puppy Princess!

Our new little puppy Macy (aka Macy Belle) has been a wonderful addition to our family. She came to us in June and we were told by our vet that she was between 7-9 months of age. We decided that we would celebrate her birthday on the first day of September. This past Saturday, Emma-Caroline, Sophie, and I threw a party fit for any poochie princess and invited Macy's best puppy friend, Lilly Belle, the pocket beagle, to help celebrate. Lilly Belle was accompanied by Mary Caroline, Emma-Caroline's bff. Emma-Caroline planned everything for the perfect party for her puppy from the doggie friendly cake, to the party favors, to the doggie party games. We all had a wonderful time and most importantly, I had some happy little girls. Emma-Caroline may have created her own Pooch Party business. It was quite a lovely celebration!

Macy's puppy friendly birthday cake from River Dog Bakery

Emma-Caroline and Sophie with the birthday girl.

BFF's both human and canine

Proud birthday princess!

 Lucy, our reluctant birthday party guest.

 Singing happy birthday to the the birthday girl.

 Mary Caroline and Lilly Belle

 Lucy, being a little more civil.

Happy to be eating birthday cupcakes for humans!