Pictures from December Festivities

Sorry for the picture overload....these are some of the pictures from our Christmas festivities this year! As you can see, I was one busy girl!

Me and Hannah at the Chapter Chicks Book Club Christmas Tea!

Our first annual girls Christmas Party! The theme was scarves! We did a "white elephant" style exchange and then learned new ways to tie our scarves!!

Jeremy and I hosted our first big Christmas Party - here I am with the "Fab 4" - Kim, Carl & Josh

Some of my work BFF's - Kim, Leah and Hannah

My BFF's - Jenna and Jessica! We were reunited for the party!

I had a blast performing in the Really, Really Big Christmas Show at Second Baptist Church! I was a towns-person (dancer) and it was so much fun! Especially loved meeting new friends and spending lots of time with one of my favorite friends - Joy (front row, far right)!

Me and Leah! So glad we did the show together!

J and I's attempt at a family photo! Eh...not so much.

The same weekend of the show, we hosted my Louisiana side of the family for Adams Family Christmas. Here I am with my dad, and brothers, Jack and Hall!

The couples posed by the tree! Meet my beautiful sister-in-laws, Katherine and Misti (Katherine is due with the first baby for the Adams family in April - and it's a GIRL)!
I set the table all fancy for our Adams Christmas Dinner! So much fun!
A close-up of the place settings
Ahhh.....let's all take a moment and drool over my Christmas present from J! He totally outdid himself this year and completely surprised me with this Tory Burch purse! I wanted it, but never in a million years did I think he would get it for me... I teared up when I opened it. I'm in love...Me and my FIL at the Ford Family Christmas Eve Party!
Jeremy and his brother Kevin (they got matching paintings from Collin & Melanie for Christmas...we later found out it was a "joke" gift from their wine and painting night...whew!)

Me and Brayden (our nephew and godchild) hanging out with Pops :)

Brayden loves for you to read to him! And he loves his Uncle Jeremy!

And, I'll leave you with pictures of our house all decorated for Christmas! J did a great job with the lights outside!

Love our Christmas tree!

Hope you all had a blessed Christmas!
B

Well, hello there....

I know you don't want to hear any lame excuses about my lack of blogging lately, so I won't bore you with them. I will give you a run down, however, of what I've been up to lately, and just some of my random thoughts! Then, I'll follow up with some pics over the next few days!

- Christmas with the Adams' family (hosted here at our house) last weekend; lots of cooking, catching up and laughs!
- Christmas with J's family in Baton Rouge this week; lots of fun, gifts, parties, people and great memories! A little exhausting....
- Performed in the Really, Really Big Christmas Show at Second Baptist Church and had a blast! I'll post pictures of it, it was such a moving experience and I got to hangout with/meet really great people!
- Hosted our first Christmas Party at the house and it was SO fun! Lots of fun stories from that night, and got to show off our new casa to our friends and family!
- Training for the 1/2 marathon still (absolutely NO pictures will be posted of it) - farthest run so far is 8 miles....less than 40 days to go! Boy, is it a lot of work and time!
- Obsessed with reading on my new Kindle (I think I'll actually have my book club book read before our meeting this month!)
- Studying to get my CDL....don't laugh! Someone has to drive my cheerleaders to away games, people. I'll be spending the better part of my week, unfortunately, at the DPS.
- Also obsessed with scarves....my answer to the daily dilemma of "what necklace should I wear"
- Also majorly obsessed with the Tory Burch purse J surprised me with for Christmas! L-O-V-E it! He got lots of brownie points for that one!
- Loving the color gray this season - it just seems to go with everything!

....more to come, later.

Continued to be blessed beyond measure.
B

So, I've been MIA

I really do want to keep up blogging, not that you can tell from my absence here lately! Let me tell you where I've been, though if you know me at all, you can probably guess the first two!

1. SBS Cheer! Football season is in full swing, so that means Friday night football games, pep rallies, volleyball games and daily practices! It's been a great year so far! I'm obsessed with my 15 girls and truly feel honored to coach them daily!

2. LSU - it's been a wild ride so far (except for tonight's Auburn loss...boo)! We've had fun traveling to BR for games!

3. I'm applying for provisional membership to the Houston Junior League. Apps are due Monday and I'm finalizing my signatures today. It's quite a process!

4. Training for the 1/2 marathon! It's really changed my life & schedule. I go to bed pretty early now so that I can be up for my 5 a.m. weekday runs. It has really changed my life more than I expected - my eating schedule is different, I peak in energy earlier in the day - its been fun!! I ran a 5K this morning, which was great!

5. And, I've been sparsely keeping up with our lovely house and seeing friends and family! Excited for another 2 weekends to be in town to do more of this!

Happy Fall!
B

Where did August go??

Is it really the end of August? Sheesh! That means its practically Christmas (at least according to Hobby Lobby it is!). Here's a glimpse of what we've been up to this month:

Hanging out with family and friends at White Linen Nights!

We went to Denver for Jeremy's friend, Quinn's wedding!
It was beautiful! Another pic from the fun wedding weekend!

Other miscellaneous August activities:

• I GOT INTO THE HALF MARATHON! Yes, you read that correctly! I'll be running 13.1 miles in January! I'm so nervous/excited! I've been training since May, and ran my first 3 miles this past weekend and it went great. I seriously felt like I could've kept going (but I was happy to stop!). I'll keep you posted on my progress!
• Football season has begun! SBS started last Friday and LSU begins this weekend! We'll be heading to Atlanta for the Chick-Fil-A kickoff game (LSU vs. North Carolina). I'm SOOOO excited!!! Geaux Tigers!!!
• I got great news last night - my brother and his wife are expecting their first baby!! Soo excited to be another Aunt! Come April 2011, I'll have 5 nieces/nephews! Holy Moly!
• We had the chance to spend QT with our Compass friends this past weekend and had such a great time out at Cedar Creek! We love our St. Luke's friends!! They are such a blessing to both of us!!
• Work has been CRAZY busy - but I love it! I have the opportunity to work on major SBS events this year, and though its been stressful, I really enjoy the satisfaction of knowing you planned something thoroughly and it all goes well! I like it :)
• What am I reading? I read several books in July (The Alchemist, Bitter is the New Black, Heart of the Matter, and Perfect on Paper). My favorite was Perfect on Paper - a great chic lit book with a lot of heart! Loved it! Book Club is reading a book about the Salem Witch Trials...not sure about this one yet, TBD!
  
• What am I watching? Drop Dead Diva! Tell me you are watching it!! Best show ever - the lead actress has this uber confidence that is so compelling! I love it! Too bad the season finale is sitting on my DVR from last night....
• What am I not doing because I'm blogging? WORKING!! Gotta go people, duty calls!

Love, love!
Brittney

Where I've Been...

So, I haven't posted in awhile, and that's because it's Back to School (and Cheer) time! It's super busy around SBS right now and I'm loving being back in the swing of things!

Last week, I took the girls to cheer camp at A&M (along with the JV and MS coaches who are fabulous) where they racked up loads of awards, as always! Between the three squads, we had 8 all-americans, 2 staff nominees, the TOP BANANA (which in the UCA Camp world is considered the top prize), multiple first, second and third place trophies and 12 spirit sticks! Whew! It was a great week for SBS Cheerleading!

Here's a pic of the JV and Varsity girls for this year - aren't they beautiful?!? I so didn't look that good in high school. I'm just saying...

Our Mexican Siesta

We took a break from settling into the house - read: unpacking boxes, moving heavy things up and down the stairs, doing major yard work in the heat of July, etc., etc., etc., and went on vacation to Playa del Carmen, Mexico. We went to an all-inclusive resort for 6 days and had a great time! By the end, we were ready to get back and pick up where we left off on the house! I never knew settling in could be so busy (or expensive - seems like I'm at Target, Lowes, Pier One, BB&B, or Container Store at least once a day)! Shopping is such a drag....er, wait, who am I kidding?!? It's a blast "having" to spend money to "get settled in the house!"

Back to the point of my post. We had a great time on the trip. The resort was really nice (except for the food - we are pretty spoiled with yummy Houston food). We had lots of pool time to get super brown (or red), did a bike tour, took dance lessons, went to the beach, sailed a Hobi sailboat, drank fruity frozen drinks, slept an insane amount of hours, explored Playa del Carmen, played bingo (and yours truly won in a three-way tie; to determine the winner of the tie, we had to do a dance off, and drum-roll....I won that, too; I think the move that sent the audience over the edge was when I danced and rapped the words to Ice, Ice Baby....oh, yes I did!). Anyway, here are a few pics from the vacay!

I love the Caribbean!!! One of the (many) things Kenny Chesney and I have in common :)

After dinner one night - curse you man behind me for ruining my cute picture (and he's copying my pose - how rude)!

Jeremy out in the water!

After playing in the pool all day!! The resort had a fabulous pool the size of umm...I don't really know measurements, but the size of a really large pool!! It had two swim up bars, a bridge to get from one side to the other, a massive waterfall, fountains, two hot tubs and plenty of lounge chairs and cabanas. Amazing!

We went into the city of Playa del Carmen one day to explore the town - wasn't too much to see, but I posed by this "authentic" Mayan ruin just to feel like we were seeing something historic! What-ev-er!!

I made some time for water aerobics while we were there!! I'm the big girl in front doing a terrible high touchdown (and I call myself a cheer coach?!?) But, hey, isn't the pool pretty??

Here's my mention to you (again) that the food at our resort was TERRIBLE! We even ordered room service once to see if it was better, and it was...TERRIBLE! Here's evidence that they even messed up a pizza! Yuck! So, my worries of gaining lots of weight on vacation were over when we realized the food wasn't worth gorging on (except for the cinnamon sugar french toast at breakfast...mmm...now we're talking....)

The view outside our room! Ahhh....the peacefulness of vacation!

That's about it! We had a great time, but now its back to reality for the Ford's.
Hasta la vista!
Brittney

PS: I forgot to mention to you that I left one important item at home - my strapless bra! 85% of the clothes I took to Mexico were strapless, or required a strapless bra! UGH!!! I had to be creative with safety pins - a la Dallas Cowboy cheerleader style - until I found my strap perfect (yes, they work) at the bottom of my makeup bag. But, seriously, I forgot the most important undergarment a girl needs in the summer, and I was unable to wear a few outfits. I even tried to wear my bathing suit top as a substitute, but that didn't work. Major fail, Brittney. Major.

Settling In...

We have officially moved into our new home, and we love it! We are busy, busy trying to get settled. It's exhausting, but really fun. We absolutely love our new house! It's right where we need to be!

Can't wait for all the memories that will come while we are living here - we've already celebrated an anniversary here (our second one was on Monday, the 12th). We feel so blessed!