a little brown hoodie never looked so cute...

i challenge anyone to find a cuter little girl than than this cutie pie in her little brown hoodie...i can't stop looking at this pic, so i thought everyone else would enjoy gazing at my precious princess juliana........might be time to head back to north carolina for some hugs!!

see no evil...speak no evil...hear no evil...

...or something like that...haha...we went and spent a few hours with jo today and what do you know...i still possess the powers of persuasion when it comes to getting people to do whatever i ask them to do...all for a pose...lol...take that, clayton!...hahaha...just wait to see what i'll have you doing next time!

all together we make a family...

just wanted to post this pic we took over the holidays...jules had a viral upper respiratory infection and an ear infection, but we didn't know it yet...poor baby...had a wonderful christmas...missed geoff & heather though...family time is getting hard to come by...gotta make the most of it when everyone's together...

a little ambitious...maybe...

so, i told myself i was going to keep my running routine the same all this week to get back in the swing...i walked about 2 miles, ran 1...today, as i set out for my walking warm-up, i thought that my 1 measly mile yesterday was a far cry from the 3 i was running, with ease, before i got lazy and stopped altogether...so i figure i should go ahead and tag on a little, just for good measure...

after i got back and about died...(haha)...i got in the car to see what i had done...about the same for the walk...2 miles for the run...geez, it seemed like waaaaaaaay more than that...hahaha...i did ok...but it kicked my butt...feels good, though, now that evening is here...much more in the mood to do some weight training...

picking up cori from the airport tomorrow...please pray for her and the kiddos...she'll be missing her mom once she's back and tries to get back in her normal everyday routine...

and remember adrienne and juliana...jules is noticing that daddy isn't there...big daddys' girl...pray for a & jules' girl time together to be sweet...

on the road again...

so, today i started running again...i don't know what happened from my fitness routine that was so great a couple years ago...well, i do know, but it's dumb...haha...so here's what i know...

a) getting in shape when you're (ahem...) "older" requires a major shift in your lifestyle...

b) wrapping your mind around the new lifestyle works wonders...also requires a new wardrobe to accommodate the new smaller "shape"...

c) once you're in "shape"...fit...feeling really good...DO NOT, under any circumstances, let up...slack off...or otherwise take a break in your routine...

d) caving in to c) as references above will, under ALL circumstances, lead to almost irreversible laziness...which in turn will lead to the pounds creeping back on...which adds to the laziness...which in turn results in having much more of a "shape" than you want to have...

e) reverting back to b) as referenced above should not take 2 years!...

so...2 januarys ago we decided to surprise my parents for the new year...it was fun...both my sisters were there...we just sat around and visited...and ate........(that'll come back up later)...everyone ooo'd and ahhh'd about my new "shape" and how much smaller it had become...at that point i was enjoying a size 6 and counting backward...the first day or two i didn't get on the treadmill...now, mind you - both my parents and my sister had one, so there was no inconvenience involved in using one...(insert more eating here)...by the time the end of our 6 days was up, i had not touched a treadmill, eliptical, or even put on my tennis shoes to walk, much less run...

i get home, eh...i'm not really worse for the non-fitness routine i had kept...didn't really notice any difference in my clothes...so i stay a little on the lazy side for that next week after we got home...oh wait...did i say the next week?...oh, i meant the next YEAR...i put myself back in the do-nothing routine so fast i didn't even notice it...i did, however, notice the clothes not fitting so great...little by little...but i had a few things from "previous days" so i just wore those...

ok, enough...fast forward to today...well, last week...laziness is tiring...now that i'm officially retired, being lazy takes up too much time in my day...so i'm back in a routine...working out...just started running again today...feels good...

we're going to birmingham again in a couple weeks.......i WILL be on the treadmill every day!!!...

better late than never...

ok, so it took me 5 months to finally post the pics i took last time we were at myrtle beach...i took over 400 pics while we were there, so i finally got unlazy enough to go through them all and only pick a few to post...from getting up at 0'dark hundred to get this sunrise pic, to walking around brookgreen gardens in the hot sun for hours -

here are just a few of my hundreds......

ocean, sand, statues and flowers...

a little more...