My Take on Wordless Wednesdays

I’ve seen some other blogger friends do a series of posts called wordless Wednesdays.  All they post on that day is pictures.  Well, here is my take on that tradition.  We will consider this our contribution to Cam’s Heisman campaign.

The Fab Believes In Auburn And Loves it

Photo: The Fabulous Stephanie and Jamie

Well, most of the Fab loves Auburn.  Some of the fab fourteen went to that other school in a city that starts with a “T” and a few others went elsewhere. 

All but two Auburn Fab alum came to join us last weekend as we tailgated before and after the Georgia vs. Auburn game. We missed you Allison M. and Amy.  (If you don’t know about the Fab, you can read about our special friendship here).

Photo: (left to right) Stephanie, Allison, Jennifer, (me) Abby, Hartley, and Jamie

We started our morning with a yummy round of mimosa’s.  Then we played games, ate great food, visited, laughed, and just had an overall great weekend.

Oh, did I mention our husbands were also there with us?  We had a giant co-ed sleepover.  Everybody piled into Judd’s parent’s tailgate house.  It was just like our slumber parties in high school except this time we let the boys stay too.  :)

Everybody got a big laugh out of our neighbors game day bus.  They use it to transport people to and from their house and the stadium.

The girls and I split ways just before the game because some of us had tickets and others did not.  Judd and I went to the game.  It was so much fun!  Our tigers won. In fact, our tigers have won all of their games this season!!! 

After the game, Auburn’s quarterback , Cam Newton, came running all the way across the stadium to thank the fans (his Auburn family) who have supported him over these past few weeks.  A compilation of season highlights was played on the jumbotron (aka: AUHD).  Click the video below to watch the highlights.  While the video played, the seniors (who had just won their last victory ever at home) also ran around thanking the fans.  If you know me well, it is no surprise that I had full crocodile tears running down my face as the seniors and Cam celebrated and thanked their AU family.  They have given us such a great season.  We are so proud of them.  It’s great to be an Auburn tiger.  I truly believe in Auburn and LOVE it!!!        

Student Warriors

What are you doing today to thank a veteran?  Are you planning to do anything at all?  If  not, you should.  It’s not hard.  Veterans are all over the place.  They are easy to find.  Just smile and thank someone you see with a veteran or military sticker on their car, or call a grandparent, aunt, uncle, etc. who you know served in the armed forces, or attend a Veteran's Day parade, or if you can’t do any of those things, you can thank a veteran right here on this little blog. 

 

Photo: My brother, Bryan, at a flag ceremony in Iraq

My plans include thanking my brother,  SSG Bryan Tull.  If you don’t know another veteran to thank, you can thank him by leaving a comment on this post.  I’ll forward the post to him to make sure he sees it. Big brother’s aren’t known for reading their little sister’s blogs you know.  Ha. 

Photo: Bryan and me at a pre-deployment family dinner with his unit.

Photo: Bryan (second from the right) with other members of his unit

Bryan is a current member of the Army Reserves.   He has served two year-long deployments in Iraq.  I am so proud of him and remain in awe of the sacrifices he has made to serve our country.  As a student warrior, his deployments have interrupted his undergraduate college education so many times, not only for his trips to Iraq, but for state-side trainings in California, Maryland, New York, South Carolina, Mississippi, and even Vancouver (yes, I am aware that Canada is not exactly within the states, but its not in the Middle East, so I am including it here).  :) 

Photo: Bryan, in Iraq, with the General who awarded him his most recent promotion.  You can read about it by clicking the link.

Bryan is approaching  a much deserved graduation this coming year.  We are all so proud of his perseverance.  Today, our family has plans to honor my dad (who is also a veteran) and Bryan during a lunch at Dreamland BBQ.  It’s one of our favorite places.  Then we are going to attend the Veteran's Day parade in downtown Birmingham.  Tonight, since Bryan is a student warrior, he and the other University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) students who are active members of the armed forces will be recognized at the East Carolina vs. UAB football game.

Photo: Bryan paying tribute to fallen soldiers at a Memorial Day Ceremony in Iraq.  Please note the hysterical mustache.  His unit was having a contest to see who could grow the best mustache in one month.  They called it mustache May.  Ha.  If I remember correctly, Bryan won.

I was amazed when I started thinking about both of our college careers.  We both started undergrad the same year.  Bryan was at UAB and I was at Auburn University.  Our country has literally been at war my entire adulthood (since the year we started undergrad, 2002-2003 school year.)  It’s shocking when you think about it like that.  Bryan is undoubtedly one of many student warriors at UAB and across the country.  He and so many other young service members have committed to putting their lives on the line for us and our country while continuing their schooling.  They deserve our thanks today.

 

Photo: Fellow soldiers and Bryan (right).  Just a day at the office.

All I Do Is Read…

I saw this for the first time several days ago.  I knew it was something I wanted to post on this blog.  The perfectly timed allegations, distractions, and slander towards this tremendous player, Cam Newton, are getting to be too much.  How about the media spread positive news rather than aide each other in their efforts to report unreliable news resulting in a character assassination of an outstanding young man and athlete?

Watch this video.  Do you think Cam Newton lacks integrity?  Please.  Oh, and by the way, he has been volunteering at this elementary school since he arrived in Auburn.  He dreams of opening a day care center and helping children in need.  This video was made before the most recent mud slinging.

War Eagle!

On the Day of Halloween…

…our pumpkins expressed our love for Auburn University.

My pumpkin featured the face of the cutest mascot in all the land—AUBIE.

Judd’s pumpkin wasn’t his usual ornate, “mr. architect with fine motor skills pumpkin,” but it was still cute.  His pumpkins usually blow me away.  This year, however, Judd was on a conference call for most of the afternoon.  He didn’t get to spend quite the amount of time on his pumpkin that I spent on mine.  He quickly and cleverly got his point across with his jack-o-lantern though.  :) W-A-R       E-A-G-L-E!!!!

 

 

On the Day Before Halloween…

…our house was haunted with ghosts and was crawling with spiders.

I used one pack of glittery spiders from Wal-Mart to add a creepy effect around our house.  I put the spiders in our candles.  See below.

 

As you can see in the photo below, I also used the spiders on our mantel.  The spiders were paired with bleeding candles.  The rest of the mantel decor consists of a ghost village I made in 2005 for our first Halloween as a married couple and a vase filled with orange berries and curling willow branches from my mother’s yard.  I spray painted the branches black.

In this post, I will share how to make the ghost village.  It looks great with candles behind it.  The flame of the  candles gives the appearance of ghosts floating behind the doors and windows.

I got the idea from a magazine years ago (I can’t remember which one).  To make the village take four pieces of black construction paper and fold them in half.  Unfold the paper and use each half as a different house.  Use an X-Acto knife to carve out any shape of windows, doors, and roofs that you like.  It is hard to tell in the photos but some of mine even have shutters and doors.  Next, use a glue stick to adhere yellow tissue paper to the backs of each opening.  Embellish with cut-outs of ghosts and pumpkins.  When finished, fold each house slightly and place them next to each other.  Put flameless or regular candles behind the village to add a spooky appearance.  Store flat and reuse year after year.

In keeping with our scary decor, I covered the wine bottles in our bar area with Halloween labels I printed from a website.  I printed the labels on regular printer paper and rolled tape behind each corner.  I gently stuck them over the existing labels on our bottles.  Hopefully, they will be easy to remove when we are ready to put our house back to normal.

Click here for the site with the labels.

By our front door, I filled frames with vintage trick-or-treat photos I found online.  These pictures were also printed on regular paper. I plan to store them all in a file folder and reuse them next year too.

In our guest bathroom, I used another one of Martha Stewart’s ideas.  Martha put a ghastly reflection in her mirror.  I thought it was too cute.  Once again, Martha’s way of doing things was too time consuming for me. 

Click here for Martha’s Ghost Directions.

            

My ghost (shown below) took about 1 minute to create.  I used a white window chalk marker I already had that was left over from a sorority function years ago.  I just freehanded a ghost shape in our mirror leaving space for its eyes and mouth.

Next, I added a few more accessories to create one scary bathroom.  :)

This was another photo I found online.  I mounted this little witch over the artwork that is normally hanging in our bathroom.  She’s my favorite of the vintage looking pictures.

Only one more Halloween post to go.  Whew.

On the Second Day Before Halloween…

…our candles began to bleed.

[I meant to continue on with my countdown to Halloween.  Clearly, I was unsuccessful.  I’ll try to wrap up all Halloween posts ASAP.]

Bloody candles  are another wonderful Martha Stewart inspired idea.  Martha’s candles (below) appear to be bleeding while lit.  You can read her way of making them here.

Or you can read about the way I made them on this post.  The directions are simple.  Light a red candle and hold it upside down over a white or cream candle.  The red wax will run down the cream candles to look like dripping blood.  My candles are shown in the photos below.

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To make the candles without making a huge mess, I used the end of my scissors to create slits in the top of a shoe box.  I poked the candles in the slits.  The box held the candles while I poured the wax.

Also, on the second night before Halloween my whole family followed the yellow brick road to a costume party.  I was told to go as Dorothy.  The night before, after I got out of class, I drove over to mom and dad’s to help mom make my Dorothy costume and my ruby slippers.  We had so much fun.  Mom made my Dorothy dress in one night with no pattern.  She always amazes me. 

For the ruby slippers, we took a pair of her old pumps and spray painted them red.  Then, I applied glue and some really spectacular Martha Stewart glitter from Michael’s.  In person, they really look great.

We didn’t take pictures until after the party.  At this point, our costumes were a little worse for wear.  Judd went as the tin man.  For Judd’s costume, I spray painted a plastic automotive funnel and some poster board with metallic silver paint.  I used chrome duct tape to piece his costume together.  A red felt heart was the final touch.

My brother, Bryan, and his wife, Laura, went as the wicked witch of the west and the scarecrow.  They cleverly used a hula skirt cut into strips as straw for Bryan’s costume.  Also, they pinned a regular witch hat to look like the the one the scarecrow wore in the movie.

  

My parents went as the wizard of Oz and Glenda the good witch.  Mom made a badge that read, “I’m Good.”  It was really cute.