Gator Gals

Motherhood

2010-05-10T08:30:00.003-04:00

Motherhood is the hardest and most rewarding opportunity that God gave us. Thank you to my hubby for providing the funds to run this household so I can take advantage of the opportunity that God gave us.

Warm Hearted

2010-02-15T09:49:00.002-05:00

All is well with Wendell's heart. No Blockage. Thank you Lord for this opportunity to start eating better. No more candy bars for lunch. :P

Thank you to all for your prayers.

Wendell gets a heart check for Vday

2010-02-14T20:33:00.002-05:00

I guess it's only me posting on this site now, my girls have both gone and left me to find my way in the blog world alone! Bethany can now be found @ Beeunique and Brittany can be found @ Forrest and Brittany.

On our home front -- Please pray for Wendell, as he will be having a heart cath Monday morning at 5:45a.m. The Doctors need to prove that his heart is in good shape. I already know that he has a very good heart. :) I'll let you know what they think.

Learn something new every day

2009-12-02T16:15:00.001-05:00

So as most of you know my absense from the blogging and facebook world lately has been due to me being grounded or as my mom calls it "spending some quality time with Mom and Dad" haha. Truly that is what it has turned into. While I have been grounded and disconnected from the facebook and blogging world I have come to realize several things. I have enjoyed the time that I have been able to spend with my parents while I was grounded that I would normally spend on facebook talking to friends and seeing what everybody was up to. While our talks might not have dealt with anything substantial or noteworthy it was just the fact that me and mom got a chance to sit down and relax during the day and talk about the day's events and what's going on at school. Those short daily conversations have helped tremendously in the process of gaining trust and respect from them.
I have come to realize in the past couple of weeks that, despite the typical teenager's belief, my parents do know what they are talking because they were once 16 and wished for the world at their fingertips and know how it is. Although at times I may be frustrated with them about being grounded for the little stuff that "other" kids dont even get in trouble for I know that they are just looking out for me and they want the best for me. So Mom and Dad I'm sorry for times in the past and in the future when I have a 'tude with you because I dont think you are being "fair" and grounding me. :)

My parents have been so good to me. Yes I have been grounded but Mom has realized my honest effort to be better so she has begun to meet me half way on alot of things. I have finally reached the right path in school with grades, and with my friends. They have been awesome and so understanding about hanging out with my friends. I have realized that the more I talk with them and am up front and honest with them about what is going on with me and my friends the more I will be allowed to do with them and the more they trust me.

This year has been such an awesome year and I have realized ALOT of valued lessons. I have formed many friendships with people that share the same values and morals as me. I have come to understand the true meaning of a friendship. :)) Pictured above is me with the Childers (my "2nd family" ) I have become really close with the whole family and I know that Jeffrey has got my back if I ever need a "big brother" to stick up for me at school and Abby has been my little sister to have our girl talks and of course me and Aaron have become super tight at the football games! :)

One thing that I have always had a problem with is PATIENCE. I have never been a real patient person and its a constant battle for me. But as of late I have realized that you should never give up or settle something less than the best just because it might take a little effort on your part to get this thing. In the past I have just settled for what I can get and not what I really want. But what I have been settling for isnt exactly the best thing for me. But I'm proud to say that I have not settled for the "scum suckers" when there is a "sword fish" out in the sea waiting for me. :)) haha. Momma would be proud of me for using her analogy!

Me and Westlee :)

Below is a bunch of spirit week pictures from several months ago that I realized that have yet to post on the blog! Sorry! :( So here is a short version of all my pictures! haha. There is alot of event that I have simply left out because if I gave you a detailed story of every event that has happened since i last posted you would be reading for days! haha. Which I'm sure everybody has much better things to do with their life than sit here for hours on end and read my blog! haha. :)

All of us in Physics on Cowboy and Indian day

Cowboy and Indian Day with Jeffrey at lunch

Me, Westlee and Karlo on Cowboy and Indian Day

Sports Day

Me and My "brother" and "sister" on Sports Day :)

Pirates and Princess Day. Yess Jeffrey is wearing a crown! haha.

Cameron is crazy! Of course he would dress up as Cinderella on Pirates and Princess Day hahaha

Police, Firefighter and Doctor Day

Gotta love my football buddy Aaron! haha :)

Me and Karlo

We get a little crazy on CRAZY blue and white day! :)

haha Joe as The Blue and White Joker

Me and Katie! I love this girl! :)

Abby spent the night with me on Thursday night so we could get ready for Crazy Blue and White Day together. We had so much fun as you can see! :)

Me, Abby and Jeffrey!

Here are some random pictures from different stuff that has happened! :)

Me and Morgan at Grandma's house petting the horses!

Me and my sweet not so baby boy! :)

Me, Kels and Rach

The girls had a sleepover at the church at the meeting! We had a blast and of course loved attacking Gary with pillows haha. :)

Me and My Crazy White Girl.

loveher! :)

Just an update on my amazing school's football team! :) We are currently ranked #2 in the state and this Friday will be going into the 4th round of 6A playoffs! :) We are awesome I'm not gonna lie! I'm proud to say I'm a Blue Darter! This was the score board of last weeks game at Dr Phillips. This was after the FOURTH overtime! During the 5th overtime we scored again and intercepted the ball from DP and took the win! :)))) You better watch out we are going all the way to state! :)

Oh My Word! My Dad is pathetic! He spoils his "granddog" so much! I'm scared to see how spoiled grandkids will be when they are around their Papa Bear! haha. :)

We took Olivia to Build-A-Bear for his 2nd Birthday! I dont know who had more fun me or her! haha. I love that place! :)

We have been so blessed with such a wonderful pastor! Our church has grown so much in spirit and in numbers since Elder Nunley came to our church. (I'm not at all saying that he is the reason is growing dont get me wrong. :) I'm just saying that the Lord is using him to help Little Zion.) Elder Mark has some of the sweetest grandkids you will ever meet. They will just melt your heart! I love walking in the door at church and seeing their sweet innocent smiles as they come running up to you to give you a big huge hug! :)

Just a random picture of Ms Olivia that I love haha :)

Me, Westlee, Katie and Markus went PuttPutt and then back to my house to watch movies. We had a great time! :)

Well that's all for now! Until next time Love yall! And if I dont post before the holidays but I probably will Merry Christmas! :)

Life is good

2009-11-16T07:32:00.001-05:00

One thing I know for sure is life is good and weekends are tooooo short.

Rachel's Challenge

2009-10-01T20:52:00.002-04:00

This past week my parents and I got the opportunity to go to Rachel's Challenge. For those of you who have never heard about Rachel, she is one of the people who was shot and killed at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999. Rachel was a 17 year old who was a strong Christian and believed that she could change the world with small acts of kindness.

The Rachel’s Challenge presentations are given in schools and communities by family members as well as other speakers. They tell of Rachel's short life and her unfortunate death. During the presentation, they showed the back of Rachel's dresser, where she had traced her hands and written these words "These hands belong to Rachel Joy Scott and will some day touch millions of people's hearts" Rachel had written this 4 years before her death. Little did Rachel know that all her hopes and dreams would come true and that she would touch millions of people's hearts with her strength.

Rachel wrote an essay shortly before her death and stated "I have this theory that if one person can go out of their way to show compassion then it will start a chain reaction of the same.” After her death, the family recieves millions of emails from friends of Rachel's as well as complete strangers, expressing how Rachel had done just that. Rachel always looked for people who weren't in the "popular" group and became their friend. One story her uncle gave was of Rachel walking through the halls at school one day and two guys were picking on a disabled boy so Rachel ran in between them and stopped them. After her death, the disabled boy emailed the family and told them that if not for Rachel he would have committed suicide that very night because he had been planning on it prior to Rachel becoming his friend. Rachel standing up for him, gave him hope. This is just one case of Rachel's kindness and compassion for others. Can you imagine the hundred other stories that the family was emailed of people that Rachel helped? (this was Rachel's journal that she wrote in everyday. She had her many thoughts written on the outside of her journal. Such as "I will not be labeled as average")
That horrible day at Columbine, Rachel was the first one that the two student gunmen approached. After firing one shot at Rachel, which hit her in the leg, the two gunmen asked her if she still believed in God and she simply stated "You know I do!". The gunman then fired a fatal shot into Rachael's head. I ask myself, When it really comes down to it, am I strong enough in my belief that I would proudly say yes like Rachel did? Rachel, as well as many others who died at Columbine High School that day, showed extreme courage and weren't going to deny their faith in God, even if their life depended on it. On the same note, in the assembly at school, (now remember I am in a public school so the government has a say in all that goes on and what can and can't be said in our school) Rachel's uncle, who was representing Rachel's Challenge, wasn't able to say what the question Rachel was asked. I think that is very sad. What our country has come to that we aren't even able to speak freely about God. I can't even begin to explain how hearing Rachel's story and hearing about how she has changed so many peoples lives simply by being their friend.

Rachel's brother Craig was also at Columbine High School the day of the shooting and witnessed two of his friend be shot and killed right next to him. Craig said "...her love for people was less conditional than anyone I knew... It didn't matter to her what you looked like or who your friends were. Another thing I liked and respected so much was that she made it clear... what her beliefs were". Our schools would be so much better if there were more people like Rachel. I know personally for me just in the last several days I have noticed myself judging somebody by the way they are dressed or the way they act and I have stopped myself because like Rachel's uncle said there is good in everybody its up to you to look for it. He also said if somebody wants to find something wrong with a person they can but in the same way if you want to find something good in somebody you can also do that! Rachel's Challenge has had a huge impact on my life and has showed me that one act of kindness can change somebody's lives. I really felt that I should share this with you. If you want to know more about Rachel's Challenge go to http://www.rachelschallenge.org/

5 months ago

2009-09-06T15:26:00.000-04:00

Its crazy to think that it has already been 5 months since my big sister got married to the love of her life. So this post is for you B and Forrest!

Brittany,

Before you start reading this you might want to get your tissues out. haha :) These past 5 months have made me realize that yeah we had our tough times together but that is what made us who we are today! I miss you so much! I love when I get to spend time with you whether in Plant City or at our house in Apopka. You have been by my side for 16 years and still to this very day are at my side when I need my shish! :) You have had a huge impact on my life in ways that I cant even begin to describe. You have always been the one that I looked up to as my sister, best friend as well as a sister in the church. I always love going back and looking at pictures of us over the past 16 years growing up.

From the day I was born, you were always wanting to make sure that I look my best :) aka My Fashion Advisor :)

We have always worn our colors with pride. :) Our daddy raised us up right!

You were the best big sister, always teaching me new "big girl" things.

I will always remember the time, that me and you got sent to our rooms because we were having just too good of a time together laughing. :)

I loved the days when I got to go to the same school as you. And of course you cant forget the wonderful first day of school pictures every year! I miss those now!

You were always filled with smiles and encouragement whenever I had a big accomplishment in my life.

The day you graduated was one of the biggest days of your lives. Thought you would never make it through! haha JK. You went through high school with the most positive outlook on life and you may not have realized it then but every move you made I was watching you because you were the person that I looked up to.

You were there for me when I need a big sister to make me look "pretty"

You were always willing to be my model for our many random afternoon photoshoots we had. :)

We got a little crazy some times! :) You were always keeping me laughing even when I wasnt in the best mood!

You have been so awesome in including me in all of your wedding stuff.

Thanks for giving me the best brother-in-law I could ever ask for!

I love you B! Thanks for being the best big sister!

Happy Birthday!

2009-09-03T16:57:00.005-04:00

Happy Birthday to my favorite brother-in-law, Forrest!

This post goes out to you man! Love you! Hope you have an awesome time turning 22 for the fourth time! haha. :) You are the best old man! hehe. Sorry you know I had to bro! lol

You are such a goof ball and are always making me crack up laughing at the crazy stuff you do.

You have become the brother that I never had. And thats for sure! ;)

Check back in a few days for a special post dedicated to Britt and Forrest! :)

A week of amazing family and friends

2009-08-14T19:05:00.013-04:00

So a few weeks ago, I was able to finally spend a week in Plant City with my awesome sister and my even more awesome brother in law! Sorry B nothing against you its just ya know Forrest is my bro! ;) So anyways, I will give you a play by play of each day that I was done there.

On Monday, I went to Chuck-E-Cheese with Britt and the kids she nannies for and then after that I spent the rest of the day with my Borrowed Big Sister Kelly, and my man Jim and of course you cant forget my sweet baby boy Joshua! I had a great time! I enjoyed just hanging around the house and watching Joshua while Kelly got some stuff done. It's such an awesome experience to be a part of a baby's life and watch him grow. I remember when he couldn't even hold his head up by himself for pictures, and when he just got to where he could hold his bottle and now his crawling and eating solid food and clapping and the whole shabang! Where has the time gone! Joshua you arent supposed to grow up that fast! Your Aunt Beffie says you have to stay a baby you cant grow up and become a teenage that thinks they know everything! haha. ;) It was so great to talk to Kelly and have a great conversation about what I was going through. Our conversations really hit me hard and made me realize that maybe mom was right all along! hehe. ;) Sometimes all it takes is someone else to say what your momma has been saying all along for it to finally click and for that lightbulb in your head to cut on. :)

Me and my hero Barney :)

Bella is so cute!

I Love Joshua so much! He is my sweet baby! :) I'm proud to be his "aunt bethany"

So Monday night, a bunch of us met up at Pizza Hut for dinner and then headed over to go bowling. We had a great time even though the mean old manly lady.......person/thing kicked us out at 9 because there computers werent "working" Oh man I wont even try to begin to explain that one! haha.

Us after bowling. (kelly and sister suzy didnt get in the picture)

ahh! I love this picture! It looks cool!
On Tuesday, Kelsey and me took a tour of downtown Plant City and got some awesome pictures! I had so much fun just spending the day with my girl and catching up! She has been nothing short of a true friend ever since we became close. We are always cracking up laughing at each other and the stupid stuff we do. I love it when we can just look at each other and pretty much know what the other one is thinking. lol Here are some of my favorites from the day! Check out the link to my facebook at the bottom of the post, where you can view all of the pictures from the week!

Country girl.

Small Town Girl.

& Classy girl. :)

On Wednesday, I spent the day with my shish (aka my sister) and went to work with her. We took the kids to the Splash Zone that they have in Fishhawk! That place is so awesome! I always love hanging out with Brittany! It reminds me of old times and our shopping excursions! :) Dont cry B! haha :) I love you and miss you! I only wish that we lived closer to you or hey I wouldnt mind living 5 minutes from you! That would be great too! ;) The Splash Zone. Its awesome :)

On Thursday I hung out B again and went shopping with her and then that night I got a chance to hang out with Justin and Jared. I always have a good time when I am hanging out with them! They are like my brothers and I always know that they have my back! I didnt take any pictures that night. :-/

On Friday, well we didnt do much on Thursday I guess! We went out to the barn and got to see Delilah and I rode her. Brittany didnt want to get dirty so she decided to just watch! lol :) Some things never change! ;)

Me and Lexie. :) Me on Delilah :)

Here is the link to all of the pictures from my summer that I spent in the Plant City. Enjoy. :))
As for me I start school on Monday so i'm not sure how much blogging I will get done when school starts. We will have to see.

Summertime at the Ulmers

2009-07-14T19:56:00.016-04:00

So it has been forever since I posted. That means that this post will probably be long. I will try to give a quick summary of all of the happenings in the Ulmer House.

July 3rd was quite an eventful day in numerous ways. To begin with it was Mom's birthday so Grandpa took me and mom out to Gaylord Palms for the day to have lunch and walk around and take pictures. We got to the gaylord palms and was blown away by the amazing scenery and waterfalls. We ate lunch at a really nice buffet. It was amazing! Then while mom and grandpa sat at the table and talked I went around and took pictures of all the awesome stuff they have! It is such an awesome place to learn how to take pictures and work with angles and shadows! Later in the post you will see what I mean when I show some pictures of the day that me and Kayla went to Gaylord Palms and took pictures of each other.

So back to Mom's birthday! After I was done taking pictures I went back to get mom and grandpa so we could get some pictures of us together. As we went to take a picture the day took a sudden turn for the worse when my grandpa fell backwards and hit a rock and his defibulator shocked him back to life. Wow that was.......well i dont even know the words to describe what all emotions and thoughts were going through my head at that time! Long story short the ambulance came and took him to the hospital and he got some stitches and 2 days after he was back home to normal life going 90 mph. (I guess that's where I got my hard head from lol ) They always say that you want to make your birthday memorable well Mom can deffinitely say that she had a memorable birthday without a doubt! :)
I love this picture!

One of the numerous waterfalls.

Yummo!

Me helping Mom attempt to eat her ginormous birthday ice cream sundae deliciousness they brought her! lol

The birthday girl.
So the next day, we swung right back around and got ready for 4th of July and everybody coming over. We had a great time all together. As time goes on it gets harder and harder for everybody to get together except on holidays so its always good when it does happen. While we missed Forrest because he was working we did enjoy Brittany being able to come down for the day. I love spending any chance I get with Brittany! I miss her so much and when I'm away from her I dont even realize how much I miss her but when I'm with her it all comes flooding back and I realize just how much fun it is to be around her. I love you B! :)

I thought this was a cool picture of the fireworks that we were shooting off and then the bigger ones that the neighbors were shooting off in the background! :)

Anytime we are all together we always break out the Wii.

If you want entertainment just have Britt play somebody in boxing. you can count on Britt to give you a good laugh. She gets so into it! Those of you who have witnessed this can relate with me.

Jeff came over for 4th of July too! :)
The next weekend I went down to Plant City and got to spend some time with Brittany and mom shopping and I also got a chance to hang out with Kelsey! I love hanging out with her! She is such a great friend and sister! She never fails to make me smile! We went to The Pottery Patch and it was really fun! It was great to catch up with Kelsey but at the same time being doing something. :)

Here is my "masterpiece"

We had to get a picture of the two of us before the night was over of course :)

Okay so moving on the next event in the Ulmer house, me and Kayla (a good friend of mine that shares the passion for photography as me) went to Gaylord Palms for the day and learn so much. we took each others pictures and learned all about angles and shadows and all that photography mumbo-jumbo that makes the picture "pop"! :) So I have posted my favorites below but if you want to see all of them check out my album on facebook with all the pictures from that day. :)

We also took a weekend trip to Valdosta, Georgia to visit momma's family! I always love going up there! Its so relaxing just to sit out on the porch on the swing in the oh so wonderful Georgia heat! ;) We had a great time! Once again I wont bore you with all the details because I still have ALOT more to blog about! haha.

Yeah my crazy Aunt Cheryl.

Daddy holding Peyton. He didnt want to "break" her because she was so tiny! :)

Me and Trey.

We have always been pretty close growing up but i think as we get older we get closer and closer! I love messing around with him he is like my little brother!

Little Union's meeting was also recently. As always we had an awesome time up there! Ahh I could sit here and write out every detail that I can remember but if I were to do that this post would be EVEN more lengthy that what it already is. :( Check out the album if you want to see the pictures from the meeting. :)

Last week I went to Rock Springs with Kendra and Jeff and met up with a bunch of old friends that I went to elementary school with at my private school but hadnt seen in years. It was great to see them! We had alot of fun! This kid is crazy!

I love Kendra! She has been nothing short of the greatest friend and has been right next to me when i need her. :)

Me and Kendra.

This past week I spent down in Plant City! yay! :) I had an awesome time and it was a much needed visit! There is no greater feeling than to be able to freely talk to with brothers and sisters in the church about things you are going through in your life at the time. I have been blessed not only to have such an awesome church family at my home church, Little Zion, but also to have such a strong and amazing church family at Little Union. Special thanks to Kelly for your girl talks! You rock Borrowed Big Sister! :) Love you! There is so much that happened when i was done there so i will probably try to dedicate a whole post to the week later on. But for now here are the pictures from the week for you to look at. As if you didnt already have an overload of pictures from me to look at. ;)

Oh one more thing and I promise I will done! In the past few months Little Zion has been extremely blessed! Elder Mark Nunley is such a blessing to our church. You will not find a sweeter man than him. We have also had 3 new members at Little Zion. Please continue to keep Little Zion in your prayers as we continue to serve the Lord as well as the other central florida churches that are searching for a pastor. Also I know of numerous people who I love so much that are looking for jobs right now so please keep all those that are trying to support their family in your prayers as well.

Nothing Like Primitive Baptist Singing in the South

2009-07-02T19:42:00.007-04:00

A certain sister of mine, not naming any names lol, has told me that it has been forever since I have last blogged. So I'm blogging now to make my dearest sister happy! :) love you B!

Singing school was amazing!

End of story.
There is no other way to describe it! It is a week filled with singing, fellowship, and FOOD! :) lol. I had such an awesome time! I met so many new friends that I will keep in touch with until next year as well as caught up with old friends.

Let me tell you one thing, after a week at Harmony Highlands you may be completely exhausted that you could fall asleep at the drop of the hat and sleep for a solid 5 hours. But you also come away from the week with priceless memories, new friends, a full belly and you begin the countdown till next years singing school! :) If you have never been to a singing school I highly recommend you go to Harmony Highlands next year!

This isnt from singing school but we stopped in Valdosta, GA on the way up and visited with Mom's family some. :)

If there was a "Daddy of the Year" award to give out, Silas would be the one to get it. (well after my dad did. haha) He is so sweet with his little girl Jolee. She has her daddy wrapped around her finger. :)

I love this picture for some reason! We werent posed or anything! Anna just caught us off guard! :)

This is an awesome picture! That is all there is to it! :)

Me and Hannah being dorks! :)

Me and my sweetheart Jolee Bug! She is so adorable! I cant believe that I have watched her grow into the outgoing little girl she is!

Me and Anna.
I am so glad that I have gotten to know her. Over the past two years we have been able to become close friends and it was great to finally get to see her again after so long.

Friday afternoon, a bunch of the "big kids" had some time so we all sat down and talked with Brother Charles Kitchens about what it was like when he was in the war. He had some awesome stories to tell I wish we had more time to hear some more!

An attempt at getting a picture of the girls dorm

This would be typical Austin and Bethany! :)

It just wouldnt be right if I left Alabama without getting a picture of me and Jolee doing her "silly face". For those of you who dont know Silas, T and Jolee, Silas is a very proud daddy and loves teaching Jolee new things and this face is one of the numerous things that she does! :)

I'm so glad that I got to meet the Nelson family.

This was on Saturday morning! Me and Mary John realized that we had gone ALL week without one single picture so then we were forced to take a picture before I left. You know you are true friends when you dont care if you just woke up 30 mins ago, havent had a shower, and dont have any makeup on AND you still get a picture together! I love Mary John so much!

I am deffinitely making plans for next year!

Happy Father's Day Papa Bear! & Picture Update

2009-06-17T17:06:00.009-04:00

I love you Papa Bear!
You are the best dad I could ever ask for! From the day I was born you have done nothing but show me love and support in all of life's journeys. Without you, Momma probably would have turned me into a proper citified girl with class. hmmm...what a thought! :) I love spending time with you and I will always remember the random stuff you would do or say just to make us laugh...and it always worked! :) It's the small things in life that matter. The days when you took me and Britt out to Nelsons for the day when we were little, the afternoons out at our nursery playing in the peat piles, the times we had listening to you sing and howl in the shower and just the other day when you found out the meaning of "shabby chic" and I asked you if your shirt was shabby chic and you told me "No it's fly!" :) Years down the road when I"m grown and have kids of my own I will tell them these stories about their "Papa Bear" and all the good times we had together. As I move on up the ladder of life I hope that we continue to share many more priceless memories. I love you Papa Bear! Happy Fathers Day!

I also want to give a shout-out to my Borrowed Dad, Brother Sonny Miller. :) I love you as if you were my actualy blood related family. Thanks for being the best BD anyone could ever be. :)

Okay so as most of you know me and momma will be going up to Alabama next week so I know that I way behind on posting but I'm super busy with packing and cleanin that I dont really have a chance to give a detailed description of all the stuff that has happened in the Ulmer house lately but I do want to post some links for those who dont have facebook so you can see some pictures of stuff that has happened since I last posted!

Sweet 16

I had a great time and thanks to everybody who came.

Pictures from My New Camera

I am now the proud owner of an Olympus E-500. I love it! My Grandpa gave it to me and its awesome!

Olivia and Paul

This is what i spend most of my summer days doing. watching these two adorable kiddos. I love them!

Disney with the family

I know I posted about Disney already but if you want to look at all the pictures just click the link.

Weekend visit to Plant City

Our visit to Plant City a couple weekends back.

Winter Gardens Annual Meeting

It was a great meeting and Elder Charles Kitchens was very blessed at the meeting to speak for us. All the young kids hung out afterwards to that is what the pictures are from.

Sorry I had to be so brief in the post. :( But I will deffinitely post more after I get back from Alabama and singing school.

Crazy Times in the Ulmer House

2009-05-12T20:00:00.000-04:00

Okay, so I realize that I am way behing on blogging but things have been so busy around here that I havent had a chance to blog! But I know that the longer I wait the more there will be to blog about so the longer it will take to write the blog. So for times sake I'm just going to briefly tell you about things that have been going on but mostly this post is to show the pictures. lol

As I'm writing this I just realized that I havent even posted the pictures that I took of Rachel and the Miller grandkids from when I was down in Plant City for spring break. So I have put together a montage so you can look at them. I have them all up on facebook so if you are interested in looking at them all you can click the links below to look at them all!

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

So after things "settled" back down after the wedding,(I use that word very lightly seeing as how things are yet to get settled back down) I finally got a chance to hang out with my Apopka friends. It was great to finaly be able to chill with them after turning them down all those weekends because I was up in Plant City. (Disclaimer: For my Plant City crew, I love yall to death and I love every time I get to hang out with you! lol. But I gotta show some love to my Apopka crew some time! lol ) A group of us went ice skating and had a great time. :)

(Me, Mia and Kendra ice skating)
(Me and some random guy that I got a picture with. lol Just kidding. This is my best friend Alex. We have been through alot together over the year ever since 3rd grade. He is like my brother and I love him to death! )

So as some of you know, I have moved on up in the tech. world and I"m now a proud owner of a purple cell phone! I love it! It's so pretty! :) lol. So the picture below is from my cell phone. We were bored and just messing around at lunch and me and Aaron took a picture. He is such a goofball! :)

(Me and Aaron at lunch)

A few weeks back, my family as well as my best friend Alison went to Disney for the day. We had a blast spending the day together. Being with my sister and Forrest for the day made me realize how much I do really miss having her around to talk to. :( But I was glad that we got to catch up for the day.

(The family at the Magic Kingdom gate)

(Britt, Forrest, Me and Alison in front of the entrance to Magic Kingdom)

(Waiting on Britt and Forrest to get there)

(This would be me and my crazy brother-in-law after riding Splash Mountain)

(An attempt to take a picture of the picture that they took of us on Splash Mountain)

(On the Winnie Pooh ride. Oh man Forrest is such a dork! )

(Me and Forrest being ourselves. lol )

(I love my sister!)

(Me and Alison stopping to take a picture)

(Britt and Forrest)

(Britt and Forrest at the Speedway)

(Me and some weird girl that I call my friend driving on the Speedway lol)

(At the Country Bear Jamboree )

(Me and Alison being goofs as always lol)

(Me and Alison exhausted after an amazing day at Disney)

So last week in my Biology class, we got to dissect a shark! It was awesome! The average girl that would scream and would never even want to touch a dead shark much less cut it open. lol But whoever said I was the average girl? :) I didnt post the pictures of the shark after we cut him open because I know that not everybody would like to see the insides of a shark but if you are interested in seeing them let me know and I will gladly email them to you! :)

(Me and Bree holding up the shark before we cut it)

So in only a few shorts day, this girl will be 16! :) I cant wait! So of course you only turn 16 once so why not make it memorable. I'm having a Sweet 16 survivor themed party! It's going to be alot of fun and I get to see some of my really good friends who I havent seen in what seems like forever! :) So as soon as i get a chance I will post pictures from the party!

Here Comes the Bride

2009-04-23T19:43:00.000-04:00

So I have finally gotten a chance to post the wedding pictures.

Just wanted to thank everybody who helped out to make the big day possible. We were so blessed to have so many friends who were willing to help out in any way possible. Special thanks to Kerry, Sister Beverly, Kelly, Kenndall and Aunt Becky and the girls for helping set up everything.

The rehearsal dinner was Friday night. There were so many people there and we had a great time! The acutal rehearsal went well too. But I pretty sure that the reason you are reading this blog isnt to hear about the rehearsal dinner. lol.

So I will get to the reason that at least 5 people have been checking our blog at least once a day since the wedding. :)

The wedding was so beautiful. It was such a special day for myself as well as the many people who were blessed to know Britt and Forrest and know that the love they share is the most precious love on earth. Over the months of their engagement I had grown to love Forrest not only as a brother-in-law but as a best friend who has always got my back!

The day started off with all the girls getting ready over at the townhouse. Jesse came over and did Britt's hair and makeup and all the girls spread out in the living room and did each others hair and make-up. We had a blast getting ready just us girls oh well and Papa Bear! :)

We headed over to the church after we were all ready and put on our dresses and got ready for pictures. While the groomsmen took their pictures, I took Little Miss Allie (the flower girl) into the church to help her "practice". She was so precious! Once she got to the front of the church and had no more flowers she would look at me and say "just one more time". I got a laugh out of her one time when she got 3/4 of the way down the aisle and she went to reach for some more flowers and there weren't anymore. Her facial expression was the most adorable thing ever. She just looked at her basket then back and me and had this look of shock on her face. It was so stinking cute! :)

By that time, it was getting closer to when people would be getting there for the wedding so we had to go back to the cry room and wait until the wedding started. Most of you know me pretty well (some maybe a little too well lol) so you know that I'm not the type of person to be content with staying in one room and not being able to know what is going on outside (some may call this nosy but I like to call it highly interested in the lives of our people. lol) So anyways to be confined to the cry room for over a half hour was pure TORTURE for me to say the least. lol. But we were very creative about ways to past the time, such as playing games, eating Cheerios (thanks to the genius mind of Morgan for thinking ahead! lol ), and listening to Allie sing "Joy to the world". I have included the video that we took of the girls in the cry room before the ceremony and Allie singing. It's so sweet!

Sister Kerry Johnson gave us the to ahead to get ready to walk down the aisle. All of the sudden, a wave of nervousness and at the same time excitement rushed over me that my sister is getting married! I seriously think that the bridesmaids were more nervous than Brittany was. :) The wedding was great! It was such a sweet ceremony and several times I found myself starting to lose it but then I regained my composure and kept my eyes on Elder Tommy Green because I knew if I looked at Forrest and Britt for more than a second I would lose it again! lol. Before I knew it, me and Adam were walking down the aisle and the ceremony was over. It went by way too incredibly fast!

After the ceremony was over the photographer, Steve Wilson, (which we highly recommend if anyone is in the Tampa area and looking for a photographer) did an excellent job of getting all the pictures taken.

Once all the pictures were down we went into the church and entered the reception and the bridal party was introduced by Silas Ford. He has been a family friend of ours for years and has watched both me and Britt grow up. I knew that it would be a task to get around to everybody that was at the reception and say hey but I didn't know it was going to be that BIG of a task. lol. So I'm sorry if I missed you at the wedding, I was not try to be rude I just simply didnt have nearly as much time as I would have liked to so that I could go around and talk to all of the people that I hadnt seen in forever! Then the thought came to me that I still had to do my toast to Britt and Forrest. I was so nervous about giving this toast. I had written my toast several months before the wedding that way I would have it down on paper. I made it through with only a few stumbles as I tried to recollect myself and hold back those tears of joy. Brittany however didnt manage to hold it together for my toast as well as Adam's toast. lol.

Once the reception was over, we had so many people stay and help pack up and clean the church. The process went by so much faster with the help of all our family and church family. After the church was cleaned, the young kids heading back to the Abernathies house to eat some pizza and some good ole PB fellowship. Since we were going to Little Union the next morning for church, I just stayed at the Aber's house that night so that mom and dad wouldnt have to drive back to pick me up that night. We had a great time just staying up talking and getting caught up.

( haha. Abel is such a cutie. )

(Me and Justin after jumping on the moon bounce.)

(Me and Jared hanging out at the Abers)

Coming Soon Pictures

2009-04-13T21:34:00.002-04:00

Wow! Just when I thought I knew all the ways to love someone, the Lord showed me yet another way to love.

I have found out what it really means to love your children. This week, for me, has been a new flood of emotions. (For all you parents with married children, you know what I mean.) Our daughter married the man of her dreams. Brittany's daddy and I have prayed for Forrest all of Brittany's life. (We just didn't know what his name was.) We prayed that the Lord would send her a God fearing man, a man that could be strong but gentle, a man that would love her as much as we do. Forrest is just that young man. It is very difficult to trust someone else with the well being of your children (no matter how old they are :)) Forrest has made it so easy for us.

My heart is overflowing this week, because I believe that the Lord has blessed our daughter and her new husband with a love that is rare. They have been blessed with a love that can overcome ANY obstacle. They have been blessed with a love for each other that can only be obtained in a Christ centered relationship.

Thank you Lord for showing me this new love. The Love for a son-in-law.

PSS: For those of you that have asked, Bethany will post wedding pictures as soon as we can. We should get them this weekend. :)

Going to the Chapel Part 1

2009-04-01T21:38:00.012-04:00

This past week was such a blessed week. Every day was filled with lasting memories with people that I love so much!

So this is part 1 of my Spring break and some little thing that happened on Saturday. ;) Hm...I cant seem to recall what happened off the top of my head but I'm thinking that my sister got married! lol. :)

My spring break started out with Mikey's birthday party! It was alot of fun and it was great to finally hang out with everybody again.

(Me and Jordan getting ready to play ManHunt)

Me and Mom drove down to Plant City on Monday morning and met up with Rach and Hannah. We went out to the barn and had a great time taking pictures! I left my flash drive that has the pictures that we took at the barn at the townhouse in Fishhawk so i dont have the pictures to post on here right now but I will post them next week when I get my flash drive back! :)

Monday night a bunch of us met up at Dusty's baseball game. That was alot of fun to get together and hang out for a little while. After the game, we went up to Beef o Bradys and got some dinner. As always we were laughing the whole night and made lasting memories.

(Me and Justin at Beefs)

On Tuesday I went over to Kerry's house and got a chance to take pictures of the Miller grandkids (aka Abbey, Brady, Lindsey, Brooke and Joshua). That was such a great learning experience for me. Once again, the pictures I took of the kids are on my flash drive so I will post them later on next week. After we got done with pictures, me and Kelly and Joshua went back to her house and I watched Joshua so Kelly could get some stuff done around the house. Then we headed back over to the church and helped Mom and Britt set up for the wedding.

(Mom and Kelly working on the screen)

(Britt and Sister Beverly setting up the tables)

(Mom and Aunt Becky working on the candlelabras...or however you spell it lol)

(Becca working on setting up some tables)

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday were filled with setting up the church for the most part. We had so much help and were so blessed to have such great church family and friends that jumped at the chance to help with the wedding.

(Rach fixing up some candy dishes)

(The cute Hershey kisses roses that Sister Phillips was so thoughtful to make for the reception. What a cute idea. )

Thursday night was the bachelor/bachelorette party. Britt and Forrest came up with the idea of going to play laser tag! It was a hit and we had a blast! It's so funny to compare the competitiveness of the girls vs the guys. :) FYI 1 hour is plenty time to play laser tag, in fact after an hour you will be so worn out that you will find yourself dragging your feet. After laser tag, a bunch of us went up to the Cheesecake Factory and ate! It was so good!

(Above and Below are pictures of everybody at the Cheesecake Factory after playing Laser tag)

On Friday, the Ulmer girls went and got their nails done. That night we went to the rehearsal dinner. Man oh man was that rehearsal long! But we had a blast! :)Then Saturday was the big day! But I will have a whole separate post for later this week about the events of Friday and Saturday! I'm trying to get all the pictures from people who took pictures for us so I can post the best ones! :)

Last Shower Before the Big Day

2009-03-23T17:03:00.007-04:00

(Joshua is such a ham! I could eat him up!)

This will be my last post before the big day. These past couple of months have been so hectic around here but I wouldn't change that for a million dollars. :)

(Layne was Britt's helper for the shower. )

The pantry shower was this past weekend at Kerry and Matt's house. Sister Kerry, Kelly and Kimberly did an awesome job! Every thing was adorable, even down to the cupcakes with a strawberry on top that was covered in icing and looked like a dress.

(Me and Kelsey.)

We had an uninvited guest at the shower! There was some sort of snake that was outside of the house. Luckily Justin and Jeff were there to save the day and take care of it! They had way too much fun playing baseball with that poor thing! lol.

( This would be the snake being attacked by a Playmate plastic golf club. lol As you can see, we didn't take to well to the uninvited guest lol)

(Justin and Jeff taking care of the snake for us. While the girls stand at a safe distance well besides little miss adventure girl Brooke. haha.)

I think its safe to say that Britt and Forrest wont have to go shopping for at least the 1st month they are married because they got so much stuff for the pantry all in one day! :)

(I love his blue eyes!)

Later that day, the "crew" met up at the Varnums to watch Twilight. We had a great time hanging out, as we always do! It was such a nice day out so we went outside before dinner was ready and the boys threw the football around while we took pictures and just talked and had a good time. We ate some dinner then we watched Twilight.

(Me, Kelsey and Rach)

(Me and Kels goofin' off while the boys were playing football)

Disclaimer: Yes I realize that there are more pictures of Joshua on here than there are of Brittany! But I just couldnt resist! He is so stinking cute! :)

Well only 11 days until the Big Day! :) We have got a busy week ahead of us! We will be in Plant City the whole week so the next post on here will be in a few weeks when my sister is no longer Ms Brittany Ulmer but Ms Brittany Sumner! :)

Its Always Better when we're together

2009-03-17T17:41:00.002-04:00

This past weekend, the Ulmers spent yet another weekend in Plant City. When I say "yet another" I dont mean that in a bad way at all. I LOVE going to Plant City! It's my home away from home! I look forward to going there on the weekends and I absolutely positively cant wait till the week of my spring break when I am down there for the whole week for the wedding. :)

So anyways, Saturday morning my family went to Salem for their annual meeting and heard a wonderful sermon from Elder Brantley. I was glad to finally meet Elizabeth Brantley at the meeting. Then that afternoon we went over to Hebron for the shower. We had a great time there and they got alot of nice things. Saturday night a bunch of us met up on the Ice Sports Forum and went ice skating. We had a blast! As some of you may have heard we had a few falls and a minor cut on the finger but all in all we were laughing and having a good time the whole night.

After ice skating, the boys decided that they were still hungry because it was 9:30 at night and they hadnt eaten since lunch time haha. So we headed over to Red Lobster and hung out some more. I can't tell you how grateful I am to have such awesome friends who I can depend on.

The whole group after ice skating

Gotta love the many faces of Kelsey. lol

Me, Kelsey and Justin after ice skating. This a cute picture and ya gotta love the loser in the picture! :)

Me and Kelsey

Me and Elizabeth taking a break from ice skating for a picture

Me and Liz being dorks smashed up against the wall.
Next weekend is the Pantry shower at Sister Kerry's house. I love showers! :) Then "the crew" will probably wind up doing something that night. So as always expect pictures next week hopefully! :)

Back In The Day - 6 of 6 Bethany Style

2009-03-10T17:06:00.011-04:00

Well I was tagged by Kelly to do the 6 of 6. So here is what you are SUPPOSED to do.

You take the 6th folder in your pictures folder and then take the 6th picture in that folder. Post it and tell us all about it. Then you get to tag 6 people.

However being the OCD photographer that I am. I dont actually have a 6th picture for my 6th folder. I have folders inside folders inside folders and so on. I told Kelly this but she said that it was just an excuse and I should just post a random picture I like and tell about it. So here ya go Kelly! :) Not only am I going to post a picture but I'm going to up that and post several that all show the changes that have occured over the years to various friends and family of mine. :)

Over the years, both myself and Britt have changed so much. She always had a compassionate personality and was looking out for her "little shish"and keeping me out of trouble as she still is to this day. :) Where as we might have both changed our physical looks we have both remained the same little girls with a heart full of love for one another that we were years ago

when boys had "cooties" :)

I have known Alex since 3rd grade and throughout the years we have become best friends and are always here for each other. He is such a goof ball and is always making me laugh. These past 2 years, Alex has shot up and he went from being the same height as me to now where I feel so short when I'm next to him. lol :)

I have known Aimee since I was born and she has always been 2 houses down from me if I needed her. Now only a few years later, Aimee is a senior in high school and planning for the future and we are still the best of friends. She is like a sister to me.

Every time I see Little Miss Jolee she has taken one more step towards becoming a young lady. I wish that I could find and scan the picture of Jolee and Silas when Jolee was only a few weeks

old but I'm not sure where it is. :( She is full of personality and deffinitely her Silas's daughter. :)

Cheesin it Up

2009-03-09T16:43:00.006-04:00

This past weekend I went out to Grandma's house and hung out with Morgan and Olivia and Greg. We had alot of fun and got some awesome pictures! :)

This is probably one of my favorite pictures from the day! I love how the tire swing is like a frame for the picture.

I have always wanted to try out some pictures on an old car.

Morgan on the car.
She is so photogenic. :)

haha. I love this picture! Morgan is such a goof. I had no idea that she was making faces down there I just thought that she was sitting down there. :) It turned out adorable.

Me and Morgan again.

Morgan took this one of me and Olivia.

I told you she is photogenic! :)

Me and Morgan goofing off in the woods.

Me and Bear Rooster on the golf cart

This weekend we will be in Plant City for another shower. :) So as always I am going to try my best to keep the blog updated with all the wedding stuff coming up that way I dont fall behind and then wind up with an overload of posting after the wedding. :)

One Girls Dream

2009-03-05T18:48:00.004-05:00

Just wanted to do a quick post with some pictures. I have been able to sign out the schools yearbook Nikon D40 several times in the last little bit and I absolutely love it! I cant wait till I get enough money to buy my own Nikon D40. :)

This is one of my really good friends Alison. Before this year I have never had a friend who loves photography as much as I do, but now I can gladly say that I have found two people who are crazy about photography like me.
Me, Kayla and Alison (the photograph freak trio) went up to the school last night and cheered on our Blue Darters JV lacrosse team. We were freezing but we had alot of fun taking pictures and cracking up laughing :)

This girl is such a ham! :) She is so sweet and I love playing with her! This was after we rode her bike.

Here is a shot from the softball game that I went to. I love how the team huddling up is out of focus.

I went over to our neighbors house and sat with her for a little while and got caught up on all the latest. Mrs Helen and Mr Joe are quite possibly the sweetest people you will ever meet. So anyways back to the picture :) This is their dog Earney.

Since I last posted Brittany has gotten all 4 wisdom teeth taken out. That was not the best experience but Forrest was the best and was by her side before mom and dad could even get up to come help her. I love you Forrest and I know that you are going to be the best husband for my shish! :)
(Dont kill me for putting this picture up Britt! lol I love you!)

While looking for my old point and shoot camera in the laundry room, I found my dad's old camera that he used "back in the day" Its amazing to me to see how much tech. has advanced since my dad was just a young little guy. :)

With only 30 days till the wedding, things are getting crazier and crazier each day around the Ulmer house. With each passing day I get more and more excited about being able to share this special day with my one and only shish and the best brother-in-law in the world Forrest! :)

Showered with Giggles and Smiles

2009-02-25T16:13:00.008-05:00

So this past weekend me, Rachel, Rebecca and Aunt Becky hosted Britt and Forrest a shower. I'm not sure whether we had more fun at the actual shower or prior to the shower when we were setting up. :) The shower was great and had an awesome turn out. As always I took "just a few" pictures to capture the memories. :) I'm not sure how much I will be able to post for the next little bit due to the fact that in less than 40 days my Big Sister will be walking down the aisle and saying I Do!!!! It seems like just yesterday that she was a freshmen in high school and I was in the 4th grade standing in front of the fire place for our first day of school picture. :) Where has the time gone? I can't express how grateful I am to have Forrest as my brother-in-law.

Well 1 shower down 2 to go! :) Hopefully I will get a chance to post those pictures before the week of the wedding but if not I will most deffinitely be posting a bajillion posts after the wedding.

The gift table and the bride and groom chairs.

Rach made the groom chair as a last minute idea. She is so creative when it comes to this kind of stuff!

Above is the gift table centerpiece as well as the groom chair

Both of these Rach came up with and made.

Britt and most of her bridesmaids

(the ones that were able to make it. We missed you Casey and Morgan!)

Britt and Forrest with Nini and Pa

We were so glad that they were able to make the drive here for the shower. Thanks!

The blanket that Granny Georgia made for Brittany when she was a little girl.

One of Great Grandma's old cookbooks

Silas was an intense Bingo player.

So was Pa. :)

I love this picture of The Fords! :) Silas isn't proud of his little girl at all! lol Cant you tell?

Britt and Forrest

Here are a few random pictures that I have not posted yet.

This is my Yearbook class.

I got to take some pictures of one of my really good friends, Shanna. She wanted some senior pictures done so we went outside during Yearbook one day and took some but unfortunately they didn't turn out that great because we didn't want them to look like they were at school. lol. But I'm so excited because this Saturday I'm going to meet her up at Cranes Roost and take some more pictures of her. :)

Also I just found out last night, that next month I will get to see Anna Porter and her family. I'm so happy that I get to see them again! That is so awesome that they are only staying like 10 minutes away from my house. :)

I'm going to a softball game tonight to take pictures for yearbook. So if I get a chance I will try to post some of them on here sometime this weekend.

On Top Of the Mountain Part 2

2009-02-17T18:32:00.006-05:00

Here are the rest of the pictures from the meeting that were taken on Kelsey's camera.

Me and Little Ms Abbey

See No Evil. Hear No Evil. Speak No Evil.

I love these girls.

The same group picture I posted on the other post but this is a better version.

I love Jim!

Me, Justin and Joshua.

Little Man Joshua

Kels.

Working Hard? or Hardly Workin?

Me and Sara

I love this picture!

Jared playing Physiciatrist at Forrest's house

On Top of The Mountain

2009-02-15T16:51:00.005-05:00

Things has been rather hectic around here and I’m not anticipating any change in speed until after April. But at the same time I am having the time of my life and I wouldn’t ask for anything else. From now until April pretty much every weekend is planned out with either church meetings at Little Union or Wedding stuff. :] I know that April 4th will be here before I realize it so I’m just trying to make every moment last. :] It’s hard to believe that another year has come and gone and Feburary is here again. It's unbelievable at how much things change within a single year. And how close you can get to know and love your friends within that time. Words can't express how grateful I am to have such an awesome church family not only within my church but also at my "Borrowed Church" haha. (Little Union)

As most of you know this past weekend was the Florida Fellowship Meeting at Little Union. I always love this time of year because there are so many people there and you get to meet a lot of new young kids as well as fellowship with the old friends. Once again we were blessed to have any awesome meeting with great preaching and as always some lasting memories. Unfortunately after the awesome weekend you are fastly made to come back to reality. :( I wish every weekend there was a church meeting where we could meet new people and fellowship with other PB's around the world.

A girl can dream cant she? :)

This would be my partner in crime Jim! haha

Jared and Jeff
Me and Justin

Abbey had my camera while we were singing in between services.

A bunch of us singing in between services.

Most of the young kids on Saturday afternoon

Me and Rach

The boys playing football

The girls posing for a picture

Me and Kelsey

I will post more pictures later. But they are on Kelsey's camera so I don't have them right now. I also have some pictures of some horses out at my Grandparents house that I will be posting later. :)

Until then I love yall and thanks to everyone who made this past weekend awesome!

Bringing in the New Year the Right Way

2009-01-05T17:34:00.010-05:00

I have been so very blessed to have a group of church friends who I have taken on as my 2nd family or as we like to call ourselves "Borrowed Family" My family spent New Years this year in Plant City at Little Union. As much as I would love to post about every little detail from our trip, I'm not finding enough time to do that with finals this week :( So I figure the least I could do was put up the pictures for the non-facebookers of the world to see. :]

The Group just chilin' after playing some games

Me and Justin.

I love this picture of Abbey.

Just another random photography idea from the crazy mind of yours truly. :]

I love Abbey! She is so sweet!

Me and Kels.

While I was down there I also got the chance to take Joshua's pictures. Well a few of them. :]

These two were my favorite of them all.

They are raising him up right! :]

I edited these two and made them look pretty cool with black and white effects.

Me and Kelsey also went to Cowboys on Friday but unfortunately we didn't get any pictures there. Then we went to Strawberry Palace and met up with Justin for lunch and we all went back to Kelsey's house to hang out and see her cows. I had a great time and I can't wait to do it again really soon! :]

I did get a couple of shirts at Cowboys! That I absolutely love! :] So I figured I would take a picture of them for ya'll to see!
Well that is all I have time for now. Hopefully my next post will be longer. :]

Oh by the way,

Who are the National Champs Again?

Oh yeah that's right! The Gator Nation!

Go Gators!

Just a little shout out my one and only Borrowed Dad and Jim! We missed you at the meeting! It just wasnt the same with out ya'll! :]

Major Update Time

2008-12-30T15:50:00.009-05:00

Well lets see since the last time I posted so much has happened. I know I promised to post pictures of the engagement party but time has flown by since I have been off break and the things I need to post about has been piling up on me. So this is going to be a pretty lenghty post with alot of different events in it. :] So here I go!

Every year, my Uncle Kenny host a Christmas Brunch the Saturday before Christmas. We look forward to it every year. :] This year we got to meet Matt's crazy dog.

Matt trying to get Izzie to swim. :]

She loves the water but it was pretty cold. :]

Once she got in you could hardly get her out. haha

She loves splashing the water and making bubbles then trying to eat them. lol

Uncle Kenny feeding Izzie, Nova and Sugar on "the Magic Carpet"

This year we decided to open our present on Christmas Eve. Seeing as how we all knew what that present was before hand, we were ready to get our game on and start playing the Wii right when we sat down. :]

This would be my "Britt you are kiling me here with the suspense! Lets forget about the video camera and open it already!" face. :]

Finally the moment I have been waiting for!

Me and Forrest setting up the Wii.

We also had the gift exchange for the Ulmer family. This year we just drew names for the grandkids. We had alot of fun as we always do. We also introduced White Elephant into our get together this time.

My White Elephant I got. It was a Chia Shrek. :]

The really cute thing Grandma got. It has 7 polar bears and each one of them has one of the grandkids names on their stomach. :]

Brittany and Forrest got this door knocker that had an "S" engraved on it for their townhouse.

That was really cute. :]

I also got to take pictures of Landen who just turned one. He is so funny. I had alot of fun taking pictures of him and hanging out with Denise. Here are a few of my favorites for you to see. Denise I'm still editing some more but I just wanted to put these on to let you see some of them. :] I will let you know when the CD's are ready. :]

He is such a Big Boy!

We had to take this one because Denise is a gator and Steven is a Nole. :]

You will see below that Steven had a seminole shirt for him to wear but he doesn't have any Gator stuff to wear that fits him. So I knew that we had tons of Gator stuff so we came back to my house and took a few of him in Gator stuff in my yard. :] They turned out adorable.

haha. I love it.

Oh Man! This slide was a challenge for him. After going down head first (he was determined to do it even though Denise said not to) he just didn't seem to want to go down the slide again. haha.

He is such a Goof Ball!

Reading to Curious George.

Lovin' Curious George.

The Best of Both Worlds.

Landen and His Red Wagon.

Ridin' in the Wagon

That face cracks me up. :]]

My Christmas Break has seemed to fly by. Going into the break I had made all these plans to hang out with friends and go all these places, then before I knew it it's a couple days before New Years and none of the plans have been followed thru with. So Monday my friend Kendra came over and we hung out all day. I had a lot of fun with her. We took so many pictures.

Some how I always end up hanging from the tree. lol :]

Me and Kendra.

Kendra loves photography just like I do. So this is one that she took of me. I love it.

I love this one of my eye.

I knew that I had to get caught up on blogging now because if I didn't now I wouldn't be able to. Well tomorrow we are leaving to head up to Plant City for their New Years meeting. :] I can't wait to see Joshua and take his pictures! We have a lot planned in a short amount of time so there will deff. be a post about all of these events after we get back. :] Until then, I hope yall have a happy and safe New Year! :]

Sing of His Wonderful Story

2008-12-15T16:54:00.002-05:00

As Christmas time comes around, I can't help but look back on all the wonderful things that my family and I have been so blessed to have. Although at times I may think that I have to have that new Nikon D40 :] or that new purse that I have been watching, you come to the realization that there are kids out there who are wondering if they are going to make it to Christmas Day because they have a terminal illness. One of my teachers told me about this organization that provides kids with terminal illness with one last wish and they can visit the theme park that they have built on site and play for the day. Give Kids the World accepts volunteers so I figured that I would love to do that this summer. I just thought I would let everybody know about it so if they wanted to check it out and help volunteer there.

Here is a picture that I took that I thought ya'll would like to see. :]

Since I last posted FCA hosted a Christmas Movie Night at the school. We had a great turn out and I'm just so grateful that although the world still trys to keep the Lord out of school we can still meet together and bring the Word Of God into our schools.

I will post pictures of the engagement party later this week (hopefully).

Only 1 more week until I"m out of school. :] Then it won't be long till I am down at Little Union and getting to see that sweet baby Joshua. :]

It's great to be a........

2008-12-07T20:14:00.002-05:00

Florida Gator!

The Ulmer house was one happy place after that game. Silas we are very sorry for your loss but I will say that Bama deffinitely made us work for the win.

National Championship Here We Come!

I tell you what every time I hear Tim Tebow talk to reporter I'm extremely amazed at how he nevers fails to put all the glory on God and whenever he is asked about a certain play he always tells about how he couldn't have carried out the play without his team mates. It is such an awesome thing to have a guy who is such a huge role model for alot of people that is a solid Christian person.

On another note, Poppa Green we are really beginning to think that you don't like us anymore and don't want to see us. :] So Poppa Green if you are out there reading this we miss seeing you at Little Zion every other week and would love to see you some more! :]

This past couple weeks have been rather hectic! I"m not sure if I had posted about Apopka being in the playoffs but we were! Yes WERE! :[ I'm sad to say that we lost this past Friday in round 2 of the 6A playoffs! I had to babysitt that night so I couldn't go but Dad still went and gave me numerous updates during the game. :]

I know that this post was very scattered and random but I've only got a short amount of time to post. We are getting ready for the engagement party on Saturday so it's going to be pretty busy around here the next week. I will post pictures in a couple weeks but until then I probably won't be posting!

Dedicated to my One and Only Borrowed Dad

2008-11-18T12:25:00.010-05:00

I have made a promise to the beloved Borrowed Dad. He told me this past weekend that he was very lonely on the blogger world because we haven't been posting. I was planning on posting the engagement pictures that I took of Britt and Forrest but she didn't want them to be on here until they have been shown at various events for the wedding. But my sister has posted the blooper pictures for ya'll to see.

This past weekend, we went down to Little Union for their meeting. We had a great time. On Friday night, my family went back to Forrest house where we were spending the night (Thanks man for letting us stay in your crib for the weekend!) then Justin and Isaac came over and brought RockBand. We had a alot of fun making fools of ourselves. :] Me and Papa Bear also found some time to shoot some darts on the dartboard. That has become a regular activity for us everytime we go down there. :]

On Saturday, we went to church for the morning service and then we stayed for the afternoon service which was the ordination service of two deacons. After service a lot of people went over to the Varnums and hung out and enjoyed some great fellowship and I'm thinking that there just might have been a Gator game on while we were over there. :] We had service Friday night and then after service once again we found some time to play some more RockBand with Justin, Jared and John. We tried so hard to get Papa Bear to play but he just really didn't want to show everybody up. :]

As some of you know, this April I will have the honor of taking senior pictures of Rachel. I'm so excited I absolutely can't wait. If all works out we will be able to get some awesome shots that really show off Rach's personality at the barn and around the horses. :] I'm also ecstatic about Joshua finally being here and hopefully being able to find a time to take some pictures of him and the proud parents. :]

In the past several months I have found myself developing a very special bond with the people at Little Union. I count them as my family or as we call each other "borrowed family". :] I'm really looking forward to the next little bit and hoping to enhance my photography skills.

Also I'm hoping that all goes well this weekend and that my friend (the one that is in the picture with me above this) will have 2 new baby horses. (I know that's prob. not the right technical term for them but that's what they are. Sorry if I offend any of you horse obsessed girls out there. aka Rach, Hannah and Sara. :]) Hopefully at some point I will be able to go over there at take pictures of them because that would be an awesome experience for me and would be so much fun to ride them well not the ones that were just born but the older ones. ha. :]

This Friday Apopka has it's first play-off game against Timber Creek. As always me and dad will be there cheering them on. :] I think that's about all for now. I will try to blog more for you BD. I'm telling you all the good stuff happens on Facebook. You just need to get Kelly, Kerry or Kimberly to help you set up an account and your name be Borrowed Dad. :] Man oh man let me tell you, you would be the coolest Dad, Poppa, Borrowed Dad and Borrowed Poppa out there. :]

What is Trust?

2008-10-31T10:35:00.005-04:00

I don't think that I ever really understood the true meaning of trust until now. Trust, as I know it today, is when someone ask to take care of something that very dear to your heart, something that the Lord gave you to care for and to love. Forrest has asked Wendell and I to trust him with Brittany's care. Wow! I think, by now, you all know that we have given them our blessings. We are so happy for Brittany & Forrest. We believe that the Lord is working in their lives.

Addition to the Blog

2008-10-21T21:24:00.004-04:00

Forrest and I have created a new blog to update everyone on our engagement and the beginning of our life together. Take a look at it if you get a free minute.

We love you all!

Thank You Lord for my New Brother-To-Be!

2008-10-21T20:05:00.007-04:00

Brittany Nicole Ulmer,
It seems like just yesterday that me and you were little tykes in the bath tub just a giggling and having the time of our lives. My how times have changed, while we are still giggling and having the time of our lives the subject of the excitement has changed dramatically. It’s hard to believe that my shish is getting married soon and will be out of the house. I’m not sure if reality has fully sunk in yet as far as the fact that I will be losing my “full time fashion advisor” but I will also be gaining one super fly brother-in-law. I couldn’t ask for a better brother-in-law than Forrest. You are more than just my sister you are my best friend. I know at times we would fight but when it comes down to it I’m really going to miss fighting with you or maybe just having the ability to. :] You mean the world to me and I know that you will always be there for me even though you are going to be married. You better expect at least one visit each month from me. :] My life wouldn’t be the same without you and I’d be lost without the little stupid and corny things you do to me every day. You are such a huge role model in my life. I have learned from your success as well as your failures. :] We have had so many priceless “you just had to be there” memories in the 15 years of my life. From the first few breaths that God blessed me to take to the many car rides with the windows rolled down singing at the top of our lung going down the highway, you have always been the best sister a person could ever ask for. I will forever hold these memories close to my heart. I look forward to many more memories together as we welcome Forrest into our family. I love the both of you and thank you for giving me the brother I’ve
never had.
*B

A Little Shout-Out to Forrest,
Thank you for being the best big brother! I’m so happy to have you joining our family!

Show that Darter Pride

2008-10-17T16:17:00.012-04:00

Well this past week was Spirit Week at Apopka. So for those of you who don't know what that is! It's basically a week where you can wear random stuff that you would most likely be laughed at if you wore on a daily basis. For those non-facebookers out there, I also got my braces off this week. :] So to say the least it has been one crazy hectic week around here.

The first day of spirit week was Safari Day. Which unfortunately I don't have the pictures of that because they are on the yearbook camera at school that I had for the day. :[

The next day was Wacky Tacky Day! Oh man did we see some wack-o people that day. I wore a Tennessese Hat, Noles Shirt (being that both of those are oh so tacky ha.) then well you can see what else I wore. I always seem to have at least one teacher every year that is a huge football fan like my family and they are either Those Nasty Ole Noles or Ohio State fans. So this year Mr Hall is relentless on me and he looks forward to picking on me and at least once a week he plays the Nole chant or whatever that hideous thing is as soon as a walk in the door. I tell him it doesn't effect me I bleed orange and blue and the only chant in my head would be the Gators! :] So of course I had no choice but to wear that shirt on Wacky Tacky Day because after all it's perfect because they are tacky.

Me and Christi
Me and Emmalee. My Spanish Buddy.

Sports Day was on Tuesday. Tuesday was the big day that I got my braces off. :] So I couldn't go as crazy as I wanted to because I went straight from getting my braces off to school and I didn't really want to go to the ortho with my face all painted up. ha. :] However that didn't stop me from showing my gator pride. :]

Tuesday night was Powder Puff. This a game that happens once a year during spirit week. The junior girls and the senior girls play each other in flag football. Of course the seniors win every year! ha.

haha. The guy cheerleaders for the night.

Me and Mikey after the game.

All of the boys painted there stomaches for the game. They are dorks. :]

We didn't have any thing on Wednesday because it was PSAT. :[
On Thursday we had celebrity day. I didn't dress up for that day because once again I had an ortho appointment right before I went to school. But I did get a few pics of me and other people who dressed up.

ha. Laila is so funny. She dressed up as Madea from the Diary of a Mad Black Women.
Me and Mikey. I'm not sure what he dressed up as but I got a picture. ha.
haha Me and Jordan. He was James Bond or maybe it was Brad Pitt? I forgot which one but it was one of those. :]
Karlo was the dude from Pokemon. I"m not sure what his name was. :]

And yesterday was the much anticipated Crazy Blue and White Day. I look forward to this day every year. I made some shirts for me and my friends. They were so cute. My best friend is the varisty kicker so we put his name on the shirt and said "We get a kick out of #31." And then Tyler Darlington is in our class so we put him on the shirt too. "#79 will hold the Darter Line."

Me and Elise
Me and Tyler. ha.

I love these people get crazy!

Me and Shanna.

She is pretty much like my twin. I'm going to miss her next year!

Me and Regine.
She has been so helpful when I don't know what to do in yearbook.

Me and Aimee.

I love her. She is so genuine and caring. We have known each other since birth and I'm really going to miss those car rides with her to school in the morning.

Friday Night was the big game against Winter Park. We had a good time as always. We also were glad to have Forrest come and watch the game with us while Brittany babysat. :]

Me and Kaitlyn.

She is so sweet. She came up to me when I was down by the concession stand and she was like don't leave me alone so then she came up in the stands with me. :]
The three amigos. :]
After the game we got a picture of all of us and Alex and Tyler. :]
haha. Us and the backs of our shirts but you can't really read them in the picture.

Me and Alex (aka A-Catt) I love this kid. He cracks me up!

Tonight is homecoming. Please be in prayer for everybody going to homecoming. I am not going this year instead I'm going over to the Bankson's for a homecoming alternative. It's going to be amazing and I can't wait! I will post pictures of it later on.

Word Wall --- Word Wall

2008-10-07T20:43:00.003-04:00

For all of you word wall fans Bethany's new word for this week is

FLY.

Fly used in a sentence = You are so Fly!

(For us old goats, it means you are sooo cool) :-)

The Lord has been so good to me

2008-10-06T21:02:00.000-04:00

As most of you know a couple weekends ago, I went to Tampa to take pictures of my 2nd family (Kelly and Jim). We had an awesome time and I am so glad to have people like them in my life. Joshua is going to have some pretty "fly" parents. (for those of you who don't know what fly means maybe that can be momma's next word of the day :] haha.)

We had a few set backs before we go to the park to take pictures. Such as my shoe conveniently breaking while eating at Subway so we had to go to the Dollar Store next door and buy me some shoes. lol But hey I did get some pretty sweet shoes out of the deal and cheap too. :]
We got to the park and right away Abbey and Brady wanted to go the park and play so we did that for a little bit. Then we headed on over to the actual garden part of the place. It was so beautiful. We got some really awesome shots that day. I learned so much from this experience seeing as how it was first pregnancy photoshoot as well as my first actual photoshoot of kids. Boy was that interesting. I learned that every other picture has got to be a silly one. But hey that's ok everyone has got to a little silly. I think the kids (partically Brady) get that trait from their dad. :] But that's just a guess! ha.

After we got done with the photoshoot, we went back to Kelly's house and took a couple of pictures in the baby's room. Then before we knew it was time for me to get ready and go with Kimberly to the church to help her "set up" for the shower. When I say "set up" I mean hold Lindsey. :] The shower was really good and there was some really awesome stuff there. It was a great time of fellowship.

Saturday night, we went back to the Sumners house to spend the night. We had a really good time. Thanks so much to the Sumners for letting me stay at your house for the night. :] Of course we watched a little football. :] The next morning we got up and went to Hebron. I often take forgranted the many friends that I have made at various church meetings. I'm so thankful to have these people in my life. My friends at school always ask me what my plans are for the weekend and for a while there my answer to them every time was I'm going to a church meeting. They always ask me Don't you get tired of traveling every weekend just for church? I tell them I love it and it's the life! I wouldn't have it any other way. If it wasn't for those countless weekends on the road I wouldn't have the friends I do today that I can count on and many of whom I consider family.

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

I could post all of the pictures onto Blogger so I just made a montage instead. However if you want to see all the pictures or want to see them bigger just click the following links in order to view them from my facebook album.

Spezzano Photoshoot

The Shower

Now on to the adventure of this past weekend. Forrest came down on Friday night and the 5 of us went to Apopka's football game against Edgewater. We really had a good time. We won of course. :] Although during the first half we were getting a little worried about it because Apopka wasn't playing their best but then amazingly after half time and after Coach's "talk" in the locker room we came back out and ended the night with a win. (A close win but still a win haha)

On Saturday, me, Britt and Forrest went up to watch the Gator game at Gators. We had a really good time. Then we came back to the house and Forrest and Britt had a little jam out session which Britt previously blogged about. That night we went out to eat at Cracker Barrell with the family.

On Sunday morning we got a call from my aunt saying that Granny was in the hospital so mom and dad went up to the hospital to go visit her. Me, Britt and Forrest then went up to Winter Garden PBC for church. It is always great to visit with old friends. Please keep Granny in your prayers while she undergoes more testing in the hospital.

Please be in prayer for my friend who is going through a really tough time right now. Every day I just tell her that the Lord truly blessed her to not be at the dance studio at the time that this horrible thing happened. We truly have to be careful about the people we are around not only our friends but just teachers or instructors that we have. You never know if they can take advantage of you and make you lose something so precious that you can never get back. It has really opened her eyes as well as mine to the fact that it can happen to anyone of us.

Jammin'

2008-10-06T09:35:00.003-04:00

We made our first musical debut on Saturday for an audience of 3. woo woo! It was quite a duo, if I do say so myself! We may not sounded like rockstars but we were definately having enough fun!

Republican or Democratic -- How can do tell?

2008-09-28T21:09:00.002-04:00

I found this story on "This and That" blog. I loved it. Hope you do to.

The Republican Fisherman

A woman in a hot air balloon realized she was lost. She lowered her altitude and spotted a man in a fishing boat below.

She shouted to him, 'Excuse me, can you help me? I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don't know where I am.'

The man consulted his portable GPS and replied, 'You're in a hot air balloon, approximately 30 feet above a ground elevation of 2346 feet above sea level. You are at 31 degrees, 14.97 minutes north latitude and 100 degrees, 4909 minutes west longitude.'

She rolled her eyes and said, 'You must be a Republican.' 'I am,' replied the man. 'How did you know?' 'Well,' answered the balloonist, 'everything you told me is technically correct, but I have no idea what to do with your information, and I'm still lost. Frankly, you've not been much help to me.'

The man smiled and responded, 'You must be a Democrat.'

'I am,' replied the balloonist. 'How did you know?'

'Well,' said the man, 'you don't know where you are or where you're going. You've risen to where you are, due to a large quantity of hot air. You made a promise that you have no idea how to keep, and you expect me to solve your problem. You're in exactly the same position you were in before we met, but, somehow, now it's my fault.'

Preview Just For You

2008-09-28T20:06:00.003-04:00

Here is a quick preview of a few of my favorite pictures from the weekend photoshoot with Kelly, Jim, Baby Joshua and then also Abbey and Brady. :]

I have so many favorites apparently and I realized that I was posting pretty much all of the pictures so I had to stop myself until I actually edited them. :] I have many more favorites but I will have to edit them and post them later.

Thanks so much BBS (Borrowed Big Sister) and "My Partner In Crime" Jim for letting me take pictures of ya'll. Also thanks so much to Kerry and Matt for letting me take pictures of your adorable children. :]

Where has the time gone?

2008-09-25T19:06:00.006-04:00

Well since the last time I posted so much has happened. This year has flown by. This post is a combination of alot of things that I have yet posted about but have promised people that I would.

The first would be the FCA back to school bash. I'm really glad to have become a part of FCA (fellowship of christian athletes) this year. I have met so many new people through FCA who I have grown to love and cherish their friendships. I'm truly blessed to have found these people who are not out doing bad stuff.

My family laughs around my house because I am the Communicator for FCA which means that I am supposed to let everybody know about upcoming events by calling them or through myspace. They always say well they got the girl for the job because she does love to talk! Is there anything wrong with that? :] lol. .
I was so glad to see so many people turn out to this event. We truly had a great time and everyone went home knowing that you truly can stay out of trouble but still have a good time
Since I last posted, Brother Silas Ford has been down to our house for the weekend and brought along Jolee and Kyle K. We were so glad to have them staying with us. Of course I always love any time I get to spend with my Jolee Bug. She is so smart for her age. And Oh Boy is she a big help? She loved helping with the dishes. As I was laying down with her in my room reading to her, she was looking up on my wall and said "There's Jolee!" (She talks in 3rd person alot! :] haha) I was confused at first but then I realized that sure enough on my wall there was a picture of me and Jolee from Harmony Highlands 2 years ago. Now you try to tell me that that girl isn't a genius? :] We had a wonderful time with them. Next time we just need to get Tara down here too but maybe you can leave your antidepressent dog at home. :] ha.

As most of you know, our family is huge football fans. :] Whether it's the Gators or the Blue Darters! For all of you Florida High School Football Followers out there! That would be the 6A school that is currently #2 in the state. :] I"m not proud at all!

Alex Catron talking to Coach D and Coach Anderson. He is the kicker and he is a sophomore. He is such a crazy kid and I love him to death. He has truly been blessed with such a great gift.
Christi is my football buddy. She is one of the few that I sit with at the game that actually know what is going on and don't just stand up when everybody else is cheering. :] I"m not saying anything bad about those people. I used to be one of those until recently when I have started watching the Gator games with my daddy.

Last week, our football team traveled up to South Panola, Mississippi to play their football team. South Panola has not lost a game in more than 70 games so we went into the game knowing that if we were going to win we had to want it real bad and fight for it. Seeing as how we couldn't go to the actual game we all went over to the Bankson's house that Friday night to watch the game on ESPNU! Yep that's right ESPNU! How cool is that? I bet you your high school didn't play on ESPNU! Alright but anyways, I heard from the grape vine (aka Uncle Hugh) that South Panola was known in all of Mississippi. In fact that they are called the "University of South Panola".
It was such a neat experience to sit in front of the TV and be able to yell out your friends names as you saw them run down the field. It was a very intense game but we never lost hope for our Blue Darters. :] The final score of the game was 28-18. Unfortunately we lost but went down fighting for the Blue Darters. The following Monday all the talk around campus was the football game, even the teachers would get started talking about it in class and before they realized it they were already 10 minutes into class. :]
I tell you something my dad cracks me up at the stuff he says sometimes! I do feel for him sometimes being the only male in the house but that's ok because he gets to have his "guy talk" when Forrest comes down for the weekend. That way he actually has someone to talk to about football that actually knows what they are talking about. :] So Forrest thanks for being Papa Bear's football buddy! :]

In less than a month now I will no be "grillin' it". Which means that I will not have any braces! I'm so excited! :]

I'm also very excited about this weekend and the photoshoot with Kelly and Jim and the baby shower. Look back for pictures because I am deffinitely going to post those pictures. :]

Thank you, Honey!

2008-09-22T12:58:00.015-04:00

Thank you . . .

. . . for always being Christ centered.

. . . for choosing me as the only one to share all your hopes, your dreams, and your deepest fears with.

. . . for trusting me with the things that are most important to you.

. . . for loving me, even in the times that I'm not so lovable.

. . . for not giving up, when things get hard.

Thank you . . .

. . . for being strong and gentle at the same time.

. . . for being the head of our household, even when I am not as understanding(agreeable) ;) as I should be.

. . . for not being mad, when I ask you to check the doors one more time, just because I'm scared.

. . . for protecting me from the things that I never saw.

. . . for not being perfect, because that makes us a perfect match.

. . . for not sharing my imperfection with the world.

Thank you . . .

. . . for being the best father to the two wonderful children the Lord blessed us with.

. . . for allowing me to be a stay at home mom without feeling guilty.

Well . . . just, thank you for being you, the man I fell in love with, the husband I love more today then I did the day we married.

Thank you for the most wonderful 26 years.

Happy Anniversary, Wendell

Jesus Take The Wheel Redneck Style

2008-09-17T20:36:00.004-04:00

I recently found a video that you must watch. It is made by Tim Hawkins he is absolutely hilarious. I knew that I had to let all my fellow bloggers watch it and enjoy a laugh with me. I"m not sure how to post a video from youtube onto blogger so for now you will just have to click the link.

Now sit back and enjoy Tim Hawkins parody of Jesus Take the Wheel. I present to you Cletus Take the Wheel.

Scroll down to view Momma's previous post about the Word of the Day. :]

New Word for the Word Wall

2008-09-17T15:56:00.003-04:00

Who says that you can't learn something everyday? Our children are always coming up with new words for us to keep up with. So for those of you that don't have the resources, for new hip words ;), I thought I could share them with you all from time to time. The word for today is . . . . .

Poser

Someone who is trying to be something that they are not.

PS: If you are hip enough to know the word already, please just play along. It makes us old folks feel better. Sydney : ).

Just Fishing

2008-09-08T16:46:00.001-04:00

I think it's about time that dear ole' mom gets into the blogging game. I have been a bit reluctant to post. Unlike most of my fellow bloggers, our children are now older and easily embarrassed by their uncool parents:D. (Did I get that smile right?).

I now have something that I would like to share. In fact, our children have encourage me to share something that we have had a lot of fun with. For those of you that know me well, you know that a love to use analogies to teach our children. I find that most of the time you can make your point a little easier. Well here is my analogy for courting or dating or whatever you want to call it.

LIFETIME MATE FISHING

The basic rules of Mate Fishing 101.

DETERMINE THE TYPE OF FISH

The steps below are only effective while fishing for a lifetime mate. Fishing for a weekend mate is not recommend. This method can only lead to diaster.

1) CHOSE THE RIGHT POND

Fish only from the right pond. The water source always determines the quality of the fish.
There are many ponds out in the cold world. Some of those ponds have become polluted by the world. They may yield undesirable fish, be careful. Also, while fishing in the right pond watch for the undesirable fish that have made their way into the right pond but don't like the clear waters of this pond. BE CAREFUL!

2) STAND ON THE BANK

While fishing, you must always keep your feet planted firmly on the bank. DO NOT GO WADING. Wading may cause blurred vision which would prevent a good fisherman from seeing hidden danger.

3) OBSERVATION

While standing on the bank, observe the fish as they swim. Take your time choosing the right fish. Observe the habits of the fish from day to day. Remember good fisherman have learned to wait for the right fish. It also imporant, at this time, to ask a wiser fisherman for help.

NOTE: If a fish jumps on the bank, during this step, gently guide that fish back in the water. This is probably not your fish.

4) CHOSE YOUR BAIT

Once you have located a fish that looks good to you. It is time to bait your hook. Use caution when choosing your bait and hook. Remember catching a quality fish requires quality bait. It may take a little time to hook a good fish, be patient.

5) FISHING

Once you have hooked a fish, draw it closer to the bank for further observation. Do not bring it on the bank yet. Keep in mind that the fish and the fisherman must be able to see each other clearly during this step. The fish and/or the fisherman may look different upon viewing closer. This step may take some time.

6) FISH SELECTON

Sometimes a fisherman hooks the wrong fish. It may take some time before you hook the right one for you. It is possible to hook a good fish that is not your fish. If you find that this is the case, use caution and gentley release the fish back into the pond. Also note that lifetime mate fishing should always be taken seriously. Seek wise council. This is not a catch and release sport. (Someone could get hurt.) You may see this fish sometime the the future.

7) CATCHING THE FISH

Once you determine that you have hooked the right fish. You may ask this fish, "Do you agree that we should swim together forever". If your fish responds with a hardy "I Do". You may then move to your new pond together. This is the beginning your new life with your very own fish. You will find that the process is well worth it.

Extreme Makeover: Apopka Edition

2008-08-26T17:50:00.004-04:00

So I'm in my second week of school now and Lord Willing it will be my first real week of school as a sophomore. As most of you know, this year was the first year of our new school building. Along with a new building we have had many other changes occur this school year. Orange County thought it would be a brilliant idea to change the start times for middle school and high school. So now we start at 9:30 and don't get out of school until 4:00. Which in no way am I complaining about starting at 9:30 but along with being able to sleep in comes the part that I"m not so happy about which would be getting out of school at 4 then doing homework and eating supper about an hour after you get home from school then you pretty much just start the whole cycle over. Man these morning football practices are bad not just for the players but for everybody. We don't want no stinky football players in our class. :]

Another thing that has changed at our school is the fact that there is only one cafeteria. There used to be a 9th grade cafeteria on 9th grade campus so they didn't have to walk so far and then the Main campus lunch room. But this year to cut down on budget (i'm guessing) they have only one lunch room. Which I really don't think is bad but boy would I hate it if I had to make the walk over from 9th grade to main for lunch everyday. :]

I can understand why they have to enforce this next rule but it is still a bummer for the good kids who don't abuse it. We are no longer allowed to wear hoodies to school. There has been several incidents where kids have vandalized the school and then put their hood on in order to hide from the camera and also pretty much an every day occurence would be the "If I pull my hood up the teacher can't see my earphones in my ear." It just stinks that the group of kids who don't follow the rules have to ruin it for everybody else. So now I don't have any jackets to wear to school because all of mine are hooded, even my apopka school jacket has a hood!

Well now for the less depressing part of my post. Our new school is really nice! It's 3 floors high and I"m proud to say that I learn in the building that is now the tallest building in Apopka. People not even the hospital is taller than our school. They had to get permission from the City of Apopka in order to build it that high. Well that just shows you have small good ole Apopka is. :]
The Chorus room is so nice. It has nice big practice rooms. For those of you who don't know what those are, they are rooms that are sound-proof and you go into them and close the door and whoever is in the class can't hear you. Our school has got some high tech stuff now. We have these new projector things that are hooked up to the computer and you can watch TV on them. We also have a gadget called the Elmo which is something you can use to project a piece of paper onto the wall instead of having to make a transparency like we used to do back in the day. :]
In between classes as you are walking down the hall, if you look to your left you will see the remains of the old Apopka High School while it is being demolished.

I'm loving my classes. I'm especially loving yearbook. I love most of my teachers and all of the people in my classes. The second week of school and I'm already known as the "Over Achiever" in my English class. :] Hey what can I say I learn from the best ,aka Britt. :] Speaking of English class I already am failing in that class. jk. Mr Hall is a HUGE Seminole fan. Yep theres trouble in the herd. :] So of course any chance I get I will be representin' them Gators! :]

My Spanish Class is awesome! I love Senorita Lowe. :] She is my type of teacher. She makes up songs and dance in order to help you learn Spanish and we pretty much talk in Spanish the whole class, so for me personally I am learning alot quicker than what I did last year in Spanish 1.

My Algebra 2 class is most deff. going to give me a run for my money this year but I think I can handle it with a little help from my shish. :] I have Biology which is going pretty good. We haven't really done any exciting labs yet just doing the basic rules and stuff that you have to go over before you can do labs. I am taking Darter Company this year which is a business like envirornment where we have our own workstation and every morning you come in and you check your email for you deadlines for the day from Mrs. Sims. Then it is up to you in order to complete them. Mrs. Sims is like the boss and then we are her employees. We have 3 classes that we can choose from which are AOT, Web Design and Digital Design. I chose to do Web Design that way I can eventually be able to build a website on my own for my parents business or Little Zion. I'm really excited about that class. Next I have World History which I was never a huge history fan but I guess I will have to suck it up for the year and do it whether I like it or not. Finally I have yearbook. This class is so much fun. We just decided on our theme for the yearbook and what pages we are assigned to do within in the yearbook. I'm so excited about getting to be a part of this. So that is what is going on in "The Big Potatoe" (that is what Apopka is called) and my sophomore year in high school! :]

Excuse Me Fay Please Go Away!

2008-08-22T17:04:00.008-04:00

For those of you who are fellow Floridians and are reading this blog you know exactly what I mean about Hurricane Fay. I think Fay pretty much covered the whole state at some point this week. We started school on Monday then we had of school on Tuesday, which was a complete waste seeing as how it didnt even rain the slightest bit until around dark that night. We had school on Wednesday and Thursday, which by the way were far worse days to be at school than Tuesday was, then the next thing we know we are getting a call from OCPS saying that due to drainage problems we will not have school on Friday.

Now most of you would probably think that I would be so happy about that. But nope as most of you know by now I'm not your average child :] I was bummed because when it comes to school I need and want to be very structured and be on a specific schedule. But with all these bad weather days we haven't even had a full week of school yet. As a matter of fact since we are on a block schedule system I have 3 classes that I have only been to one time this week and that was for less than and hour time period. It's driving me crazy. I will blog more about the school later which I will get some awesome pictures of our new school for you to see.

Now to the hurricane/tropical storm part of the blog. We are pretty high up in elevation where we live so we weren't too concerned about flooding. However the retention pond across from our house which hardly ever has water standing in it was full and then overflowing into the woods across from our house.

Man if only I had a waterproof camera so I could have gotten a picture of me, Britt and Papa Bear going on an "adventure" while it was pouring rain. :] It was quite a site. For those of you who have not been "privileged" enough to see me and Papa Bear during a storm you are missing out! ha.

Me and Papa Bear are pacing the floor the whole time. We can never just be chill and act like a normal person and read a book or sleep. :] But I guess that is the ADD kickin' in. :] While the two of us are dying to go outside and see what all is going on Mom is inside staying dry wondering why here crazy family is outside. Britt was the "Official Rain Gauge Checker". Every hour Britt went out to check how much rain we had gotten. Meterologist Brittany is now reporting that in the past day and half we have gotten a recorded 12 and half inches of rain at the Ulmer household. :]

Then we have the puppies who are completely opposite from each other. Libby on one hand loves the rain while Betsy hates it. Bless Libby's heart she had to go outside last night so bad but it was pouring so she held it in as long as she could then we finally decided that it was lost cause to try to get her out so we just took her out on the patio. So this morning I get up and walk her and I thought that we had a slight break in the rain so I took her out real quick well little did I know that right when I get out there with Libby and she is all the way on the other side of the yard and gets scared when it starts to pour so I have to run out in the middle of the yard to get my baby who is sitting under the tree waiting for someone to come to her rescue.

To sum this blog up, I will just say that it's never dull at the Ulmer household. Especially when we are all at home and stuck in the house. haha.

Breaking News in Spring Hollow!

Reporters (aka Me and Papa Bear) just got back from taking a look at a sink hole. That's right a sink hole just opened up in the front of our neighborhood. So we decided to walk down and take a look for ourselves. Of course you know me I would never leave you guys out of the loop so I brought my camera. I got a picture but it's not very good so I will have to go back tomorrow when it's daytime to get a better picture. Well on the way back we got soaked. The bottom dropped out and well just take a look at this picture and see for yourself. :]

Supernanny's Encounter with Monkey Joes

2008-08-12T18:17:00.008-04:00

This post is dedicated to those who think that a 15 and 20 year old can't be a kid every once in a while!

Today me and Britt headed up to Monkey Joes with the kids that she babysits for. There were 5 total today. WhooWee was I tired? :] Now Britt doesn't usually watch all 5 of them at the same time but since summer is almost over and the kids love to play with each other they met up so they could play for the day while Britt watched them.

I usually don't babysit with her but since I knew that she was going to have her hands full. Not that I thought that she couldn't handle it if anybody could handle 5 kids it would be my sister. I had alot of fun today with the kids. Thanks for letting me help you out B!

I'm not sure who had more fun. The kids or Me? At first I just stayed outside of the moon bounces and all that stuff because I thought I was too big! But then I saw other people that were older than me on it so I finally "gave in" to the kids and told them I would get on with them.
Everyone in the moonbounce

Miss Brittany, Ben and Megan

I finally got everyone to look at the camera.

Britt said we looked like a bunch of caged monkeys.

The kids loved the video games.

Miss Brittany says "Now your silly faces, guys"

Happy Birthday Tori!

2008-08-05T16:40:00.004-04:00

This past Saturday was one of my best friends birthdays. So Tori had a birthday party on Monday that went on into today. On Monday night I went over and hung out with the girls and did some good ole planning as to what pranks we could do to Mikey while he was at band camp that night. Well we were still thinking when Mikey and Josh got home so we told them to go in the pool and swim. :] Long story short, they didn't buy it. So me and Ragan went out and swam with them while Tori and the rest put sparkles in his bed and all over his room, sprayed his room with old ladyish perfume and put a barbie doll head and sparkles inside his band case so he would open it up the next day at band camp and find it. :]

Preston is so cute! He wanted to go in the pool with us so bad!

Me and Preston. This is his surprised face.

Tori and Preston blowing out candles. Preston loves blowing out candles so we sang happy birthday to him too! :]

Me and Mere giving Zoey a bath in the sink. ha.

haha. No caption needed. Me and Tori jumping in the pool.

All of us jumping!

Facials, Finger Painting & Fondue

2008-08-03T21:34:00.022-04:00

Close your eyes and think of gooey green face cream, hot pink polish, chocolate fondue, chick flicks and laughter. When a permanent smile is on your face you will feel what we felt.

This past weekend we had the pleasure of entertaining the "Tampa" crew at the house. I personally enjoyed every minute of the weekend and wish I was back covered in a mud mask gabbing the night away or floating down the river! Thank you guys for coming, you all are welcome at the house anytime!

Now for a visual snack of the weekend's events!

.....before & after the facials....

Sara

Hannah

The Whole Gang

My Crazy Whirlwind of a Weekend Part 2

2008-07-28T11:36:00.005-04:00

So here comes the 2nd part of my crazy weekend. I also posted on the Little Union Meeting if you want to go back and read that as well.

When we got home, the kids were in the pool. So we just chilled around the pool. We had alot of fun. I just sat outside with my girl Aunt Cheryl and caught up with her. Then it got supper time so me and Aunt Cheryl went to Publix and picked up some drinks and chips. On the ride there I she was talking about all this stuff she was going to do to try to embarass me in front of my friends. Luckily I didn't see anybody I know. :] I love my Aunt Cheryl to death.

Me and Jolee chillin by the pool being gangsta. :]

Disclaimer: Yes I do realize that the camo hat I'm wearing is a Georgia Bulldog hat. However is was part of the joke with me and Jolee because she was wearing her Georgia hat and my Gator purse.

haha I love this girl! She is crazy!

Me and Trey

Momma just had to mention to Trey and Jolee that I hate swimming in the pool at night because I always hear noises outside the screen. So of course what do they do when they hear that? They beg me to get into the pool every 5 seconds until I finally realize the only way that they will stop asking me is if I go in with them. So I decided to live on the edge for once (haha for those of you who know me I'm pretty much always living on the edge, especially if you were to ask Britt lol) and go swimming with them.

All in all we had an awesome and crazy weekend.

My Crazy Whirlwind of a weekend Part 1

2008-07-28T11:14:00.007-04:00

The Weekend started out with the Little Union Meeting with Brother Tim McCool. Though many trials (no lights or AC) were thrown in our path, the congreation was not discouraged no matter how hot or dark it got. He was blessed to preach a wonderful sermon on burdens by the use of candles on the pulpit. After services, we went over to the Millers, formerly known as Borrowed Dad, and fellowshipped some more.

Sister Miller

Britt, Forrest and oh yea you can't forget Comet. :]

I love this dog. I was going to steal Kyle's baby to sleep with me and Britt but I didn't want to make Kyle cry. lol jk :]

Then on Saturday morning, Brother Tim was yet again blessed to preach another sermon on the principle that You should leave things better than you found it.

Classic, Classic! Haha. I love the parents to be! They are my flying buddies 4 life!

Coming soon is "My Crazy Whirlwind of a Weekend Part 2" which is when things get crazy around the Ulmer house with Aunt Cheryl and her crazy family from Valdosta. :]

It's About Time.

2008-07-16T21:15:00.001-04:00

I have finally took the time to update my photography blog. Most of the pictures I have already posted on here. But if you get a chance I would love for you to go on over and take a look.

Above is a picture that I edited of me and Laura from a previous post about the beach.

It's always better when we are together

2008-07-13T19:45:00.008-04:00

We had such a wonderful time at our meeting this past weekend! Elder Hugh Sanders is such a wonderful man and preacher. He will forever be Uncle Hugh to me. Let me tell you, he is so fly! :] Syd you have have got one cool dad! haha Luv ya and missed ya girl! Thanks to the Sanders family for letting us steal your dad away for the weekend! We sure did miss you guys!

Jim doing the Bethany Face & Justin...well being Justin. lol

Dear Ole Unlce Hugh talkin'. (Hmm..who would have guessed that Uncle Hugh would be talking. lol) & Me and My Buddy Harry

Me and Mary & Isaac trying to do my face. lol

Me and Rach aka The Green Girls lol & Me and Abel and I would seriously marry this kid if he was my age

Picnic at the Ulmers

Me and Rach are like two peas in a pod! :) Like PB&J.

Me and Sara

ha. Harry jumpin in the pool. & Justin washing his hair. lol

As you can tell we had an awesome time!

Sunshine & Smiles Part 2

2008-07-13T17:13:00.003-04:00

Well to begin with I had a wonderful time with one of my best friends Tori! She is such an awesome, good Christian girl but knows how to have good clean fun! Every time I'm with her I'm always laughing and smiling. She has recently died a strip of her hair pink for a camp that they go to every year for the week then dyes it back. So no to all you photoshop savy bloggers i didn't edit that picture on photoshop that is her real hair i just did some magic on my camera and bam the only thing in color was her punk strip in her hair.

As most of you saw at this past meeting at our church, Britt and myself got a little sun! Well maybe A LOT of sun but that isn't the point lol We went to the beach with Britt's friend from High School who has a sister my age. We took a day trip down to Cocoa and visited with them. We had a blast!!!!!!

We went boogie boarding, kayaking, swimming in the pool and just relaxing in the sun. (Thus the sunburn lol) I was in the water the whole day. Me and Laura were out then catching those waves while waiting for Britt and Jessica were out kayaking. Which I will speak on Britt's behalf was a BEAST! :) She said that when she was out there she could see so many jellyfish all around the kayak.

I will try to get the pictures from the meeting up if not tonight I will make it my goal to do it tomorrow. Then I will be caught up with posting.

Sunshine & Smiles

2008-07-07T10:50:00.001-04:00

Well a lot has happened since we last posted so i'm going to try to take this post to update everybody.

Rock Band at the Boys

A couple of Sundays ago, we went out to eat with the family at Reb Lobster for Rach farewell dinner. For those of you who didn't know she is now in Germany studying abroad so please keep her in your prayers. Then the cousins decided that we should go see a movie so we set out to go see a movie but all there was to see was Kung Fu Panda and Wall-E, which had both already started. We then set out for the dollar theatre down the street only to find out that all of the movies had started 30 mins to 1 hour ago and there wasn't another movie starting unti 10 or so that night. So that plan back fired so we decided to go back over to the boys house to play Rock Band. We had a blast. Let me know our family has some hidden talents in the music industry. Especially Mitchell! Man oh Man can he hit those high notes. lol.

Puppy's First Swim

During this past week, I was in the pool swimming around and realized that our puppy Libby has never been in the pool. So we brought her in and she is a pretty good swimmer unlike her sister, Betsy. Every time we get in the pool Betsy goes crazy, shown in the video below. She will bark and bark as if she wants in but then when you go to get her in she runs away from you. Here is the video of Betsy by the pool. If you haven't had your laugh for the day here it is.

While on the subject of our sweet puppies, Libby has recently become very fond of a chicken that makes a noise when you sling shot it across the room. It is the funniest thing. She is determined to get to that thing. It makes me laugh at the stuff she has done to try to get it down from Grandma's kitchen counter. lol

Hopefully, I will have another post coming up this week as well as maybe another video of Libby and the chicken. For those of you who will be down in Florida this weekend. Little Zion would love to have you come and fellowship with us at our special meeting with Elder Hugh Sanders.

(Syd- You don't know how bad I wish you could come! You will be missed this weekend girl!)

Red, White & Blue

2008-07-06T22:11:00.006-04:00

I can not believe it is already July! It seems like just yesterday I was planning the summer away. I feel like with every passing month the days turn into seconds. Does life ever settle down? Where has the time gone.....Who Knows?

We had our annual Fourth of July hoopla with the whole family. It was just like always. We ate more food than what should be humanly possibly and laughed harder than ever before! The only thing different about this year is that we added AIR SOFT guns. I think the adults enjoyed them even more than we did!

Aunt Becky shooting above and Daddy below

My Holiday Creation...Yum O!

2008-06-25T22:20:00.001-04:00

"To laugh often and much, to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded."

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Shopping's as easy as One, Two, Three

2008-06-19T14:53:00.004-04:00

I didn't have to work today so Bethany & I decided to go on a shopping expedition. We got some great buys! (For all you gung ho deal finders out there- check New York & Company, Gap and Bath & Body Works. They had some fabulous sales!) Here are some outtakes from the days events! I hope you enjoy them : )

Debuting the new do!

Classic "Shish" Style

Bethany can not go ten minutes without eating

so she just HAD to get pretzel sticks from Aunt Annie's!

Scrape, Paint, ZZZZzzzZZ?

2008-06-18T19:10:00.004-04:00

Today we had a church workday! We went down to the church on the intent to scrape all of the chipping paint (for those of you who have been to our bathrooms you know what I'm talking about) and prime the bathroom. Well we did that plus a little extra! Oh Man We are Over-Achievers let me tell you buddy!

Here is the conversation between me and Grandpa after I caught him "working"!

Me: Grandpa What are ya doin'?

Grandpa: My eyes are restin'.

(He then gets up and begins to act like he is going to draw on Grandma's face who is also "letting her eyes rest.)

My Oh My How I love bonding with my Grandpa! He has such a sense of humor if you get to know him. We had a wonderful bonding session today that including feeding Bob the Bird and his mate some bread and G'pa teaching me how to feed them and get them to come to you (Bob the Bird is the name that me and him came up with for the birds because the name fits so why not. ha) as well as picking songs from the PB hymnal and seeing if I had them on my iPod and then playing them on my iPod docking station that was right next to the sound system so we could hear the music all throughout the church. Oh yea We, the Ulmers, are resourceful.

Happy Father's Day!

2008-06-14T21:07:00.002-04:00

To my one and only Papa Bear,
Daddy-O you have always been there for me when I need ya to be. You amaze me with your wit and your quick gangster come backs. :) You make me proud to call you Papa Bear! As much as I may be embarrassed about your “odd” things you do I honestly don’t know what I would do without you and would be lost without you in my life. I love the moments that you sing/howl in the shower and we can hear all the way in the living room, the Sunday morning karaoke sessions with Carrie Underwood and the many priceless moments and giggles from the backseat of our road trips. You have always been there for me whether it was taking me to the store to pick something up or taking me to the many football games and standing out in the rain so I can stay and watch the game. Even at this very moment as I’m writing this blog I love you for the way you act all sneaky and try to take a peak at what I’m writing and then when I tell you to go away you give me that little grin of yours. :) So here’s to the padre who has provided me many giggles and grins throughout my life, Happy Father’s Day!

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

There is also a very special person who may not be blood related to me but I considered to be such important role model in my life that I will forever have a special place in my heart for. Most of you know this wonderful person that I call Borrowed Dad. :)
Borrowed Dad you are such a special father like figure to me! You always make me smile when I read your comments on our blog. I’m glad to call you my Borrowed Dad! It is such a great feeling to know that I have such a kind and thoughtful brother in Christ to be there for me.

Okra, Creamed Corn, Fish Ponds & Clay Roads

2008-06-12T19:58:00.011-04:00

Brad & Courtney's sweet baby boy, Colt Wesley Fleming

Saturday Afternoon on the Farm

Feeding the Cows
At the Fishpond

and finally...Photo Op with the Family in Cairo

These are pictures that will remind us of the countryside in years to come!

You and Me = Trouble Times Three

2008-06-09T21:28:00.018-04:00

It's plain and simple- we, the ULMER'S, have issues! We ventured out Friday afternoon to Cairo, Georgia for Tired Creek's Meeting. I love road trips with my hip and happenin' Papa Bear. Bless his heart, he listened to our own rendition of karaoke ALL the way up! (Blue Suede Shoes, Jailhouse Rock, Country Road, and a few more of the gangsta persuasion)

We made a routine stop for gas at a station in Thomasville and attempted to start the car and failed miserably! Yes, that is correct 30 minutes away from the church my car dies (temporarily -of course). After a portion of the family laughed hilariously, a very sweet man helped us. He worked at the shop next door, checked our battery and diagnosed it as a DEAD SHORT. Within the hour, Zorro (my beloved Santa Fe) was bandaged and healed. With the Lord as our pilot we made it to church that evening only a few minutes late.

Daddy Overseeing the Mechanic

Bethany stopping for a photo op...SURPRISE, SURPRISE!

The weekend in Cairo was a much needed distraction from our every day affairs. I'm glad I went and appreciate the warmth felt by our dear brothers and sisters in Christ! While away from my beloved Florida, we also got to visit with our family in Valdosta. (Stay tuned for details in Bethany's post)

Here's a quick shout out to Aunt Charlotte, the most fly G Mama around, Thanks for our session! It was like medicine for the soul...Amoxicillin for Strep Throat.

Classic Bonding

On the Way Home

Want to go on a trip where you get a new battery, replace 2 tires and do everything you would NOT imagine? Join us! We are booking reservations for our next adventure at this very moment. Hurry, space is limited : )

It's hard to believe that a year has gone by

2008-06-03T19:47:00.014-04:00

(I have posted pictures of the past weekend as well. So if you are looking for those just scroll down and you will find them.)

A Day in the Life of Bethany at Apopka High School

Well today was my last day of school. It's crazy to think that a year has come and gone since I have been in high school. It kind of uplifting yet in a way sad that 1/4 of my high school years has come and past already.

For 1st period I have my engineering magent class which is Intro to Info. Technology with Mrs. Kampe. I really liked this class because I learned a lot of new stuff about programs I can use for web site and all that jazz.

Me, Michelle and Mrs. Kampe

Me and Tuttle

Me and Michelle. We were the good kids that did work so we could have fun after we were done.

In 2nd period I have AP Human Geography. Mr Mellon is an awesome teacher. We work really hard for the whole year but after the AP Exam we just relax and watch movies. I have grown to be such close friends with alot of the people in this class.

Mooser eating popcorn

The 4 amigos

Mr. Mellon

The Class

Aww! I'm going to miss this crazy kid named Karlo!

Me and Mooser.

Karlo wearing Mooser's pink jacket.

Well if you notice I"m missing 3rd period and that is because I really am not that close to alot of people in that class becuase it's Spanish with Mr. Moss. I have a couple people who I"m close to in there but I already have pictures of them in other places so yea. There is Mason but it was exam day and it was way too hot in that class to take pictures. lol.

So Now is my 4th period which is Mrs. Anderson's Geometry class. I love Mrs. A. She is such an awesome teacher. We had a blast in her class this year which you could probably tell from previous post from Pi Day and Kite Day.

Savannah with her drawing on the wall.

Our school is getting demolished so she let us write on her wall. It was covered with writing and not only just the walls but the floor too.

Me and Shelby

haha. A-Catt is crazy.

My Oh My now for Lunch. We have some pretty crazy lunches. But we have a blast.

Mikey and his peanut butter honey mustard sandwich. Yea I know Yuck!

Me and Mikey

This is what lunch is like everyday. We are constantly having to guard our food to make sure nobody steals it. lol

Alright he got his food burglar under control now for a picture. Which is blurry but hey life isn't perfect.

Yea those would be the lunch stealing culprits. lol

5th period English Class with The Haff.

I have made so many close friends in this class. We have fun in class and Mr. Haffner is an awesome teacher. I am constantly laughing at Jordan being retarded or The Haff try to be gangster or telling kids to stop kissing behind his portable.

Me and Jordie-Poo :) This kid cracks me up.
Jabari! He is such a cool kid. He is my buddy. Today he came up to me and gave me a hug and was like Bethany I'm going to miss you! He is by far the sweetest funniest kid. :)
Me and Mr. Haffner. Right before the picture was taken he was saying oh wait let me get my good side! :)

6th period I have Chemistry with Mrs. Soto. This class is fun with labs I just don't like everything else. lol.

Me and Steph
Jeff, Kyle and Wade
Me , Steph and Elise.

Now this last part isn't in my every day life at school. But we decided to go to Taco Bell today because we got out at 11:30.

Me and Josh aka J-Smooth

McMikey and McBeth. lol

That is my new nickname from him.

What time is it?

SUMMER TIME!

(for all you High School Musical fans out there lol)

And yet again another weekend of wonderful memories

2008-06-03T19:21:00.008-04:00

We had such a wonderful weekend. We also had a special visitor with us on Saturday, Ms. Olivia came to church with us and boy is she a ham. She had everybody behind her distracted. She is so adorable when she smiles that you can't help but not watch her and play with her.

Justin and Princess O.
All of the kids and Jim

No I take that back It's just All of the kids. lol.

I'm very proud of Jim he has been practicin' the face. :]

Isaac the Great and Harry the Mummy
Harry the Mummy
Sofie makin' sure that the mummy doesn't escape.

More pictures of Princess O coming soon on my photography blog.

Too Much To Do In Too Little Time

2008-06-02T08:28:00.003-04:00

I only have 3 days left of school well 2 1/2 days considering the fact that I have already been in school for an 1 1/2 hours. (Yes I know I'm a rule breaker... getting on at school in computer class. I'm such rebel when I blog at school and tell my teacher about blogs and she looks at them. lol ) Which along with those sunny summer days fastly approaching comes 3 full days of stressful high school final exams. So needless to say I'm giving it my all these last three days in order for me to have a summer. :] The hardest exams are yet to come tomorrow so please be in prayer for me as well as all the other kids struggling to make the grade. :]

I know that there have been several people checking the blog since the weekend for pictures of the meeting and Princess O but I"m sorry to say that those people will have to keep on checking for a little while, at least until Wednesday. Once my exams are over I will make it my first mission of the summer to post the pictures because I have probably one of the best photography pictures that I have taken so far to show the blogger world. I'm really happy with the outcome of the picture. But then again the subjects of the picture can't help but make it cute. With Princess O and my amazing sister the picture is bound to be fantastic. :]

Along with pictures from Little Zion's meeting I will also post pictures from my last days of school and all that jazz so you will get to see the pictures of all the crazy people that I call my friends. :]

Bethany's Summer Plans

Become a better photographer (which I have gotten quite a few people who have been willing to let me take pictures of them so I can learn. I'm ecstatic about doing a shoot with Kelly and Jim and Baby Spezzano in the tummy, the Dean's kids and Sister Martha Anderson and her grandaughter)
Go to the Abernathy's house and have a girls sleepover and perhaps take some more pictures of the barn and the horses where Rach works.
Hang out with friends
Drive!
Oh yea and work for National Geographic as a photographer. Don't even get me started on all those plans which include having my own jet, marrying Tim Tebow, starting an orphanage, etc... It's quite detailed. If you want to know more about that just ask Britt she knows all about it. lol. I'm constantly building on this plan so it is always changing and getting longer and longer and more details as the hours go by especially with all these road trips to churches with hours in a car with the ones I love so much and nothing else they can do but to listen to me. lol jk

Happy Birthday!

2008-05-18T21:13:00.000-04:00

My baby sister has grown from a giddy little girl to a maturing teen in the blink of an eye. She amazes me everyday. She has blossomed into a chatter bug! There are times when I just listen to her thoughts and ideas and wonder why I never thought of such a thing. Her mind has become very innovative and extremely OUT OF THE BOX! She has plans for everything now- plans for Austrailia, her summer house, private jet and even photographing for National Geography!

I am confident that which ever avenue Bethany choices to pursue in the future that she will do it with great diligency, poise and grace. Her future is an open book full of possibilites.
Bethany's charisma and passion for life are a true inspiration. No matter matter what she is faced with, she does it with her all! Here's to the girl who brightens my day. You are beautiful on the inside and out. I am proud to call you my sister!

I am thankful to have you in my life! I love you, B.

My Oh My How Things Fly By.

2008-05-09T15:46:00.006-04:00

In the past week or two I have been musiced out (if that is at all possible), I have been to both the Band and Chorus Concert at school as well Seussical the Musical at the middle school. Because I have not been keeping up with my blogging at I should have I will not post ALL of the pictures from all of these events. However feel free to check them out on Facebook. For those of you that don't have Facebook but still want to look at them I will link to them later so you can still see them.

My day started out fun. We had kite day for Geometry. We had to build kites and then bring them in today and try to fly them. So we spent 2 hours out on the football field "trying" to fly our kites, playing football, softball, eating and of course taking pictures.

Then nothing out of the ordinary happened in 5th period then I got to 6th period anticipating getting my yearbook and finding out the election results. Which of course just to torture us poor students both were done at the end of the long 2 hour period. ha. I constantly found myself turning my head to check the time to see if it was ten minutes before school got out so we could find out who won.

When I heard Ross Black come over the announcements saying "Pardon this interuption...." my heart jumped and I got nervous but excited at the same time. And as if they hadn't tortured us enough already the didn't say the results for sophomore class council because I was on main campus and most of the upcoming sophomores are on 9th grade center so they didn't announce it on main. I was going crazy. Long story short my friend got ahold of somebody who was on 9th grade campus and said that Brandon Hightower had won president.

I am a little disappointed that I didn't win but I soon realized that this now just gives me more of an opportunity to be more active in FCA next year where we are in strong need of leaders if we want to be able to keep the strong band of good Christian peers together that we have this year.

As I promised earlier I do have pictures of my election posters for the ones that wanted to see them.

Now unfortunately for the tear jerker part of my day. As I got in the car after school my mom told me that Little Nate Ferrell has not recieved good news this week. As I read Ambers post, tears started to roll down my cheek. That is certainly not the news that Brother Jay, Sister Amber and the girls wanted to hear but I know that Our Great Redeemer will guide their sweet family through whatever they go through in the future. Please be in prayer for the Ferrells in their time of need and that they might find the strength they need.

Dancing in my PJ's

2008-05-03T14:49:00.003-04:00

It's been awhile since I last blogged so I thought I'd give a little update. My summer has been great. (all 7 days of it) I have been walking around the house singing all day!

Zip-a-dee-doo-dah
Zip-a-dee-ay
My, oh my, what a wonderful day
Plenty of sunshine headin' my way
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay

I started my summer job last week and love it! I am nannying for a lady who has the sweetest chunk-a-munk around town. We play, go on walks, blow spit bubbles and rock ourselves into a deep slumber. It's fun, entertaining and often times adventuresome! I have a feeling it's going to be a great blessing throughout the next few months.

That's all for now folks, I'm off to make more merriment!

It is with great sadness..

2008-05-01T08:46:00.002-04:00

that I must tell you that I have a new computer. Now most of you would be like Oh Awesome! But no it's not my computer crashed yesterdayand we restored it but in the process of restoring I had to erase my computer completely. So I have no pictures or anything on my computer. Luckly I have uploaded most of my pictures to facebook so i can at least save them onto my computer again. They won't be the best quality but they will still get the point across. :]

So if you have any pictures please email them to me so I can get my computer back up and running "bethany style" haha.

And the saga continues...

2008-04-30T13:58:00.003-04:00

Today was absolutely the best day! I made 3 shirts for Mikey, Jordan and Me. They loved their shirts as well as everyone else did. :] I only wish that I could have made more shirts for other people that said they would have worn a shirt! :]

I now have about 4 people who are passing out stickers for me. I found that today I would walk down the halls and people passing by would say Oh I'm voting for you Bethany! Now realize I have never even talked to these people before but because of my "staffers" they are voting for me now! So a special thanks to Ashley, Andrea, Mikey, Jordan and Michelle. I love you guys!

I will keep you updated on the latest and greatest news!

Until then, continue to keep the elections and the canditates in your prayers and that they might act in a way that God might have them to.

Lesson of the Week: Take the High Road!

2008-04-29T17:25:00.002-04:00

If I have not yet posted on here about my plans to run for president of Sophomore Class Council, then I will do so now! This week is campaign week at school. So I am having a blast with it. My posters are awesome! With the help of my family and the great mind of Aunt Becky I came up with the slogan “Vote Bethany! She’s the perfect fit!” Now let me rewind a minute in order for you to get the slogan! The theme to all of my posters is a puzzle piece. So now that we have got that understood, my parents went up to school and so graciously helped me out in a huge way and put up the posters on Friday (I couldn’t do it because I was already in Alabama whenever we were allowed to put them up).

So Monday at school was kind of tough because of all the politics that are involved in elections between the candidates. Let’s just say that people weren’t exactly follow the “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you!” When I got home from school, I told my mom about what some of them had said and done to me and my stuff and she just told me to take the high road. So come today I was ready to face another day of ridicule, much to my surprise I was not in fact I had the completely exact reaction. I had a number of friends that were ready to be walking advertisement for me! When I got to lunch today, I had several people at my lunch table who more than willing to help me out in whatever way they could. So I took them up on that, Mikey said that he would wear a shirt for me if I made him one, well at first someone said that they should dress up in “a Bethany costume” and walk around and I told Mikey he HAD to do it and he was excited. Ha. Then Jordan said that he was my “manager” and started handing out buttons, stickers and flyers to everybody. He even just ran down the hall putting stickers on random people and yelling Vote For Bethany! My friends mean the world to me! I never really had high expectations for my friends to help, yea I thought they would vote for me but I never thought they would put out that much effort to help campaign for me.
Just keep me in your prayers this week and that I may not take anything said to me to heart and that my friends will be there for me to guide me through. I know that what happens, happens for a reason. If it is not best for me to win then I believe that God will lead me away from that path. No matter the outcome, I will take with me a great experience in life and will have learned a great lesson. I now know that your friends are your friends for a reason they are there for you when ever you need them even if it puts them out of their way a little bit. However if I do win I will be ecstatic and will take the opportunity and lead the Class of 2011 to the best of my ability. I know that it would be a great opportunity to make a better outlook for class councils and to shine like a star and set an example by the way I act in a Godly Christian manner.
I will post pictures later of all my posters and campaign stuff as well at a picture of my and my 2 campaign staffers with our shirts on. :]

Nolors and DD. ;]

2008-04-14T16:28:00.003-04:00

(This is my favorite from the weekend. She was intent on watching Buddies.)

This past weekend, Silas and Jolee came and stayed with us for the weekend. It was an absolute joy to have them stay with us. Jolee is such a smart girl and adorable at that. She loved our puppies and was inseparable from them the whole time she was here. In fact, as we were leaving to go to church on Sunday we were pulling out of the driveway and Jolee said Bye Bye Puppies! She was so cute!

(Ms. Jolee and her nolors )

As I previously mentioned, we have a family friend who is my age who has MS and is having hard times lately. He has been able to go to school like everybody else up until now and has been excelling in his classes and enjoying them like any other kid but recently he is having to be out of school and is in need of prayers. It is always hard to see someone your own age to go through such a hard time. Be in prayer for Bradley and his family as they are having to be with him at all times.

Wooh! What a week!

2008-04-12T13:01:00.009-04:00

Sorry in advance for the randomness of this post! ADD tends to do that to me! :] Also the fact that I went to bed at 12 last night. :]
This past week has been super busy and crazy. Relay For Life was last night and Freshman Class council had a tent set up. So of course we had all the last minute stuff to do (which was pretty much everything) last week. :] I was about to pull my hair out last week but I will let you know that indeed all of my hair is still intact, at least last time I checked. lol So anyways back to my point. We had a really awesome time last night despite the craziness of it all. It was very inspirational and moving to see everybody from small town Apopka come out and support the Cure for Cancer. I must go back to cleaning before Brother Silas and Jolee get here. Oh yes they are coming down for the weekend to stay with us and Brother Silas is going to preach for us tomorrow. I think Daddy is the most excited about it because he gets to see his baby girl Jolee. :]

Spiderman....Spiderman.

Me and Ragan
Me and Trevor

We used to best buddies in when we were little kiddos one the playground at recess and i hadn't seen him since 3rd grade and then he was at Relay with his club who was set up right next to us.

Mr. K getting pied.

Joe always havin fun even before getting pied in the face. ha.

Tori ready with enthusiasm to pie her brother, Joe, in the face. :]

As you can see, Tori did just that.

Me and Paulette.

Another TCS kid that I haven't seen since 3rd grade that I saw last night.

Me, Tori , Ragan and the HeartBeat Boys

I just love this one of Mrs. Sanders and Riley during the Silent Lap.

Me and Emile

He was my favorite of the HeartBeat Boys!

"...and it's all small stuff"

2008-04-09T12:35:00.002-04:00

A Lesson in Learning to Live in the Present Moment

"To a large degree, the measure of our peace of mind is determined by how much we are able to live in the present moment. Irrespective of what happend yesterday or last year, and what may or may not happen tomorrow, the present moment is where you are -always!" - Don't Sweat the Small Stuff

I have had a really hard time this week being content with the present. I was selfishly concentrating on the future and what it has to hold rather than soak up the day at hand. In doing so, I overlooked the blessings I have today -in the now! I had lost sight of my sweet Savior, supportive family, endearing friends and precious memories that encircle my life. After changing my thought process I emerged into a more satisfied state of mind. I stopped taking for granted the "on the go" lunches with my mother, movie night with Daddy, dinners with the family and late night chats with those I care about.

Take a brief moment today and pay attention to those things that you don't normally notice.

Movie Night

2008-04-06T14:55:00.016-04:00

We had a great time on Friday night at the Ulmers! Every once in a while I will have a movie night and attempt to actually watch movies but that never happens we always wind up either playing a game or having a dance off.

While we were waiting for everybody to get there, who else shows up but Ms. Brittany (known by the blogger world as my sister) and three little munchkins also know as Ms M, Little Man Evan and Jacky. :) That was certainly a surprise but Britt didn't want to miss movie night and not see all my friends so she decided "hey I'm only a short walk from the house and the kids have energy! We will walk over there!" So they show up at our door and stay over for a little bit. They provided much entertainment for us through the night. So thanks Katie for lending us your kids for the night. They thought they were so cool hanging out with the big kids. Jack loved Libby and anytime he got he would give her a kiss. No not just a kiss an open mouth to mouth kiss with the dog. Oh yea it was funny! :) He was also very fascinated with my friend Jordan. We would often see him just staring at Jordan it was the cutest thing. :]Unfortunately I don't have a good picture of Jack kissing Libby.

Right away Evan wanted to do an art project so Britt got out paper and pencils for him and he wanted scissors but due to the past circumstances with Ms. M and her hair :) she decided that we don't "have" any scissors.

Me: (as Evan was looking and examining my dad intently) Evan who are you going to draw now?

Evan: That grey haired guy!

At this point everybody thought he said great hair but no indeed he said grey hair so we were all cracking up laughing at that.

Ms. M is the cutest thing. She wanted to see both mine and Britt's room. After going into Britt's room she quickly came out and asked me if I remembered when she watched Britt's fish. :] Then she went into my room and saw my necklaces and wanted all the girls to wear them and was pretty instant on that. I told her that they would wear them later and she said well Ok that is fine with me! Now that I have told you about the entertainment for the night. Let me tell you about what we had plans to do all along. Like I said earlier you would think that Oh a movie night what movie did you watch? OH no not at our movie nights, yes we have all intentions to watch movies when we start out but for some reason things never go that way.

Instead we went outside on the patio and played GameCube. After everybody went home well minus Tori, we just laid down and talked until about 2 in the morning and at that point we knew that we had to force ourselves to go to sleep because if not we wouldn't want to get up in the morning. Then we wouldn't have enough time to take pictures. Which boy oh boy did we get some cute ones, I uploaded them below so you will be able to see them.

Neither of us wanted to get a shower so we just decided to both wash our hair together. :] Notice the curious puppy looking over the side of the tub. That is the cutest part of the picture I think.