Snow Day!!

Last night before we went to bed I heard on the news that we may have snow during the night. I didn't really think it would happen because in the south we never get snow when they say we are going to. When Jamie came home around 1am he woke me up and said it was snowing. Around 3am when he went to bed he said that it had quit and that nothing had been posted about school yet. When my alarm went off at 5:45am I immediatly looked outside and I couldn't see the road in front of my house and I knew there would be no school. That's all it takes around here to shut the entire city down for a day. I turned on the tv and my prediction was correct and school was cancelled. I went back to bed and around 8am my kids come and wake me up and to say that there is no school because it has snowed outside and they want to go out! I got up and got them all dressed in their warm clothes and sent them out to play.



I stood at the door and took my pictures because it was way to cold for me!! After they came in I fixed them hot cocoa and they had warm showers. We did not go anywhere today!! We stayed inside and enjoyed our snow day!! If I had not gone to Gatlinburg this weekend I would have been ready to pull my hair out by now because they have been out of school since Thursday at 11am!! Back to work and school tomorrow!!

Gatlinburg with friends and no KIDS!!

During the summer while we were swimming at the Tracy's pool she asked Summer L, Rhonda, and I if we would like to go to Gatlinburg in January with no kids. We all thought that it was a great idea, but we were not sure if we would be able to work out babysitters. After Christmas we all got the plans in line for our sitters and we were all going!! I couldn't wait, I was counting down the days. Jamie and I have not been on a trip without children since before I had Zachary. We left as soon as everyone was dropped off on Thursday afternoon. Karson went home with a friend from school, Andrew went to Aunt G's house, and Zachary was all by himself at my mom's. Karson would be joining Aunt G later on that evening. Anyways Summer and Brandon picked us up around 2pm and we were off. I am not a big fan of riding with anyone else, because I like to be the one doing the driving but Brandon did a great job and only scared my once or twice in the mountains with snow on the ground. We arrived in Gatlinburg around 4:30pm but had to wait on Rhonda and Tracy to arrive so we went around getting ideas of stuff to do for the weekend and then we stopped at the Corningware place to get a pan for Nana, but ended up finding some good stuff for us also!! After Rhonda, Michael, Tracy, and Brad arrived we went to have dinner at an Italian place nearby. After dinner we returned to the house, put on our pj's, and the girls put a puzzle together, while the guys played wii.

We stayed up way to late talking and got up very early the next morning (except Brandon). Aren't you supposed to sleep in when you go on vacation with no kids? Around Lunchtime on Friday we left to eat lunch and go to Adventure Quest. This place was awesome with a mirror maze, blacklight golf, and a lasor challenge.

Brandon had been talking all day about skydiving so we stopped at the indoor skydiviing place and watched but he decided that $30 was too much!! We then parked in Gatlinburg and walked around. I don't know what we were thinking because it was cold, cold, cold!! We had to go in every other store just to stay warm, and when we say a frozen fountain we decided to go eat dinner and go to the house. We had dinner at a BBQ place, and returned to the house to play Catch Pharse.
I had never played before but it was great fun!! Again we stayed up to late and got up way to early again on Saturday but Tracy made it okay by fixing us breakfast. Again we lounged around until lunch and left to go eat at Krystal's (aka the laxative burger), then we spent the rest of the afternoon shopping.
It was so much better without kids to take in and out of stores and strollers to push in between isles. After shopping we found some taffy and went to play Lasor Tag. Jamie beat all of us!! When then went to have dinner at TGIF's. It was great. We returned to our house one last time to play Phase 10!!
On Sunday morning we got up and went to the Apple Barn for breakfast and more shoppping and returned home to our children, who were very happy to see us. We had so much fun and made some great memories together. To quote Tracy "we had too much fun, too much food, too much cold, and too little sleep! Wouldn't trade it for anything!"

Happy Birthday!!

I would like to wish my very good friend Rhonda a very happy birthday. Thank you so much for putting up with me and my crazy ways. I am so glad that we have become such good friends. Here's to you..

R:Rarely on time:)

H:Honest & Hardworking

O:Organizer of many events (Sunday school socials, ELC consignment sale, children's sunday school crafts, vbs preschool crafts, just to name a few)

N:Never afraid to ask, (once called Walmart to ask if we could return unsused hamburger meat!)

D:Dedicated to her kids, work, husband, and friends

A:Always wearing a smile:)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Photo Tag

Okay so I thought I would get in on the photo tagging. Anyone can do it!

Here are the rules:


1. Go to your 4th picture folder


2. Use the 4th picture in the folder


3. Tell us about your picture!


4. Pass it on!

Here is the 4th in my 4th...

This is a picture of my children sitting in our garage painting some wooden cars that they got for Christmas in 06. It was on of those presents you hide and hope they never find, but on this day (summer 08) they did and we put on daddy's old shirts and let them paint. They turned out beautiful but we never did get around to actually putting them together after the paint dried!!

Happy New Year

Looking back at what 2008 means to the Martin family:

In January Jamie's grandmother had a stroke and was very sick for several months before she finally passed away on March 18th. We loved her very much and have missed having her around this year for Christmas.

In March Zachary turned 4 years old and Jamie and I celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary. Our nephew Ryan also turned 2 in March.

In April we welcomed our 2nd nephew Jeremiah into our family.

In May Andrew graduated from Kindergarten and Karson finished second grade. I can't believe how big they are all getting.

In June we enjoyed being out of school and doing fun things as a family like going to the aquarium in Georgia and the kids went to several fun camps at the church.

In July we spent a week at the beach with my dad and my brother and sisters. It was the first time in several years that my dad had all of his children together at one time. We had a great time!!

In August we again returned to the happiest place on earth Disney World. My dad went with us and had to come home on the second day but we still managed to have a great time together as a family. I can't wait to go back in March for spring break with to of my good friends and their families. This month Karson started third grade, Andrew first grade and Zachary started his last year at Anderson Mill Rd ELC. I can't believe he will be going to K5 this year.

In September I turned 27 years old. We also started renovating grandma's old room in our house for Karson. Little did we know that 4 months later we would still be working on this project. I hope to finish in the next month and move onto another project! We also welcomed our 3rd nephew into our family Clayton Michael McGraw.

In October Karson turned 9 years old, and we be double digits next year. Wow!!
I also managed to pull off the first surprise of my lifetime on my wonderful husband who turned 30 years old this month. It was the only time I had ever kept a secret from him!!

In November Andrew celebrated his 7th birthday at Chuck E Cheese. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with all sides of our families.

In December we had a great Christmas and my kids like always got way too much.