Golden Birthday

Yesterday was my "golden" birthday.

I turned 28 on the 28th.

It was just another day

but I soaked in all the love without complaint!

We celebrated our birthdays this year

with about as much enthusiasm

as we did Valentine's Day,

which is not much!

I had a wonderful day

full of some of my favorite things!!

Blake got me a sweet card,

balloon,

a delicious Great American Cookie Company Cake with chocolate icing only

and some Barbasol shaving cream!!!

(the shaving cream is b/c that's all I used before we got married when he started making fun of me for using mens shaving cream....so I stopped using it;

I guess he felt bad but I just LOVE the way it smells!)

One of my Lubbock friends invited me to lunch.

It was so nice of her to think of me and to visit with those girls.

I loved hearing from all of my friends

that I do not get to talk to often enough.

I love nothing more than catching up with old friends!

I had my 2nd day of bootcamp

which is not the best way to spend your birthday.

However, it was nice to eat the cookie cake without guilt

because I knew I would work it off!

After Blake got out of class,

we went to Cardinals to look for some new tennis shoes for me,

to no avail.

(the search will continue today)

And we topped the night off

with supper at .........

Jason's Deli

(told you we were super romantic!)

It was delicious.

It was the only place I could think of

where I could get everything I wanted for a reasonable price.

It was very relaxed,

delicious

and enjoyed!

So until next year!

Thanks for all the birthday love.

It was so great to hear from everybody.

cmg

Blake turns 31

The sweetest,

most precious person in the world turned

31

today!!

So we celebrated,

much to his chagrin,

all day long!!!

It was fabulous.

We started with a blueberry muffin for breakfast

(and yes, every meal involved a candle,

you only turn 31 once people!)

Per the birthday boys request,

Cane's for lunch

(and yes he got a delicious lemonade!)

And his final request of the day,

Marble Slab

(and I did not complain!)

Happy Birthday

Blake Edward!

I hope you day was as wonderful

and special as you are.

We love you,

Caddie Mae

RHETT

george henry

Party Favors

This is RHETT's party favor

he handed out to his friends for coming to his party.

Such a great little host!

(although he tried to eat them all before his guests arrived!!)

Hope everyone had a great weekend!

cmg

RHETT's 4th Birthday Party

Here is the birthday boy

with one of his many new bones.

He had such a great day!

First he and momma went for a long walk

in the beautiful weather.

He LOVES going on walks.

He then came home

and napped while he waited for his party to start at 3pm.

And good thing he napped

because they played for 2 hours straight!!!

Dan feeding them peanut butter

His peanut butter, carrot doggie birthday cake;

It was an absolute hit!!

Here they all are getting some birthday cake.

His guest list included:

Ali and Tucker Batista

Bailey Graves

Waffles Rapier

Denver Disser

george henry didn't know what to think about all of the dogs

so he stayed hunkered down in his "hide out"

This is a picture of RHETT right now.

I think (atleast hope) that he sleeps well tonight.

He had such a good afternoon with all of his friends

helping him celebrate his 4th birthday!!

Thanks everyone for coming!

cmg

So Excited

I got this adorable cup in the mail on Saturday

from one of my best friends and roommates from college.

Umm,

of course I will!!!

So excited for Mikki and Justin.

cmg

Mardi Gras Texas Style

Blake and I thought it would be fun

to bring a little Mardi Gras to Lubbock.

We had SO much fun

and I'm pretty sure everyone who came did as well.

We got these precious cups made for people to drink out of and take as souveneirs

I got all my decorations in Shreveport during Christmas

as you can't buy MG stuff out here

Nelson was the official greeter and

bearer of the beads

Mom had these precious hand towels made

(there was another one but I forgot to take a picture)

Getting everything set up

We made everything ourselves

and it if I must say so myself,

everything was delicious.

Our menu consisted of:

Chicken and Sausage Gumbo

Red Beans and Rice

Crawfish Elegante

Havarti Cheese Dip with Triscuits

Vegetable Tray with Ranch, Hummus and Spinach Dip

Sausage and Cheese Plate

Chips and Queso

Beingets

King Cake

Hurricanes

Beer

We put all the drinks outside

I sadly forgot to take a picture of the outside set up

so this will have to do.

Our friends the Higleys

were SO nice to allow us to use their tent

(it rained all Friday and Saturday up until the party).

It worked out beautifully

and made the flow of the party so easy.

The drink station was to the left

and the beignet station was to the right.

We had chairs lined up all along the sides,

lights strung from the top,

a table and chairs in the back

with a propane space heater.

And now some party pics:

Blake, RHETT and I

(george henry would appear every now and then but preferred under the bed)

Keaton, Paul, Brittany, Barry, Holli and Holly

Reeder, Mike, Mary Lou, Jill, Shawna and Blake

Roman, Lauren's mom Marsha, Eric, Lauren, Lauren's roommate and Gus

Lauren's brother, Zach, Reeder, Jason and Jacob

Jake, Matt, Stu, Joe, Marc and Zach

Kristen, Vicki, Hilary and me

Jill, Marc, Dan, Blake and Zach

We had an absolute blast

but could not have done it

without the help from our wonderful

friends and family.

So thank you,

thank you,

thank you!!

We are already looking forward to next year.

cmg

Unwelcomed Guest

There are no pictures to accompany this post

as I was too scared to even be in the same room!

So yesterday evening

between 7-8:30pm we noticed george henry acting strange,

very strange.

He was sitting a little distance from the foot of our bed

just staring at the bedskirt,

refusing to move or take his eyes off the bed.

Blake went to a Camaroonian birthday party at 10pm

and I decided to get in bed,

but first I sat on the floor with gh to ensure him nothing was there.

So I sit on the floor,

give him a few strokes,

and say "see henry there's nothing there"

as I lifted the bed skirt up.

But much to my surprise I was greeted with a

"rawhwhwwrah"

(it was a terrible shreking sound but not very loud)

I freaked out threw the bedskirt back down

and bolted out of the room.

Until I realized I had plugged my phone in beside the bed

and I had to call BEG pronto to get home and help!

I call BEG

and his first response is

"well get the headlamp and see what it is"

Uh, no thanks!!

You can do that.

And so he did.

And was greeted with another meow

from a pregnant, grey cat!!!

Our family of 4

came super close to becoming a family of 15 last night.

Thank goodness gh was on high alert.

Blake thinks he and this lady are friend.

He can't be the babies daddy

because gh was neutered when he was a kitty

(and hopefully our vet was a bit more accurate than the Chimp Haven one!)

So after some coarsing the cat came to Blake

and he was able to pick it up

and put it back outside.

I've never seen this cat before.

I guess gh invited her over,

through his secret cat door he has,

and then realized once she was here

he wanted her gone asap!

He spent till about 11:15pm

standing at the foot of the bed hissing.

All the while,

RHETT's sitting next to him wagging his tail

(Bless RHETT's heart. He had NO clue there was an animal in the house #clueless)

I can't make this stuff up people!

Thankfully our family of 4

is still just 4 this morning!

Hope everyone has a great Thursday!!

cmg

Valentine's Day 2012

This is Tech's daily newspaper,

the Daily Toreadors

Valentine's Day newspaper

and yes, this is my husband

quoted in the "What are your Valentine's Day plans" section,

hahahaha!!

So after our $12 meal at Rosa's for Taco Tuesdays

(we are so romantic)

we ate on this little guy I made especially for my Valentine

and looked at these beauties from my sweet husband!

We are gearing up for this weekend's party

and our houseguest

so we rested up and cleaned up!

The romance was overflowing at the Garrett's

this year as you can see, ha!

Hope everyone felt the love yesterday!!

cmg

Sneak Peak

Some of the decorations for our

Mardi Gras party this weekend....

Laissez les bons temps rouler!!!

Check back next week for party pics.

CMG

Snow Day

After a night on the town with friends last night

we slept in till 11am.....

and it was FANTASTIC!!

But when I opened the backdoor to let RHETT out

I was greeted with SNOW

and lots of it.

He, of course, wanted nothing to do with it

but after some bribing (making Blake go with him) he went out for a second.

Playing in the snow

We all bundled up this evening

and headed over to the park

which is absolutely beautiful covered in white

RHETT hates all the packed snow in his paws

but adamantly refuses to wear his cute

booties the Cooks gave him for Christmas.

Maybe (hopefully) if the snow keeps up

we can bribe him into wearing them

as the clean up around the house would be so much less.

YAY for snow days

(especially when they are on the weekends and can be enjoyed!)

Wings

Blake's parents gave him a pack of

different wing sauces for Christmas.

We decided to try them out this past Saturday.

We had so much fun!!

We did 2 of each

so that we could taste them all.

What was left!

They were all delicious, really.

There was 1 that neither one of us cared for

but not enough to throw it out!

But they were all HOT.

We've got lots of wings and sauces left over

so we will do it again in a few weeks.

Here's to fun Saturdays at home.

Birthday Month

The Garrett's

get super excited when they get presents

that they know the recipient will enjoy.

So,

when our presents for each other

arrived a month early

we didn't even think twice about waiting

until our actual birthdays to open them.

Blake did such a good job wrapping my present =)

We don't have cable so this was the best gift EVER.

It is the ONLY thing I miss about cable.

Blake has 16 ounce Mason Jars

and was really wanting some pint size so....

Yay for the birthday month!

RHETT will be 4 on the 26th

Blake and Rebecca will be 31 on the 27th

and

I'll be 28 on the 28th!!!!