Pacers v. Mavericks

We went to Indy for the weekend (last weekend 3-20) and took Austin to his first NBA game to see the Pacers and Mavericks. Him and Bryan are both Bulls fans first, of course, but they do like several Mavericks players as well, so that's who we were cheering for. (Yes, we were a little in the minority being at a Pacers game, but oh well...) The whole game was really close which made it even more exciting, and the fourth quarter was back and forth with the teams tying it up with 1.1 second to go! One of Austin's favorite players, Dirk (don't ask me to spell his last name!) ended up hitting a last second shot to win the game for the Mavs. Pretty exciting night!

Austin in his Bulls hat showing where his true loyalty lies.

Pacers warm-up

Happy Birthday Austin

Austin turned 14 on March 7th which means the REAL count down to driver's ed and the day he gets his license is on. At least for him... That is all he talks about! He can not wait till next school year when he gets to take the classroom portion of driver's ed the 4th quarter of his freshman year. (They certainly do things differently than when I was in school!). He's actually been counting down for several years already, but he has amped it up quite a bit lately--picking out what he wants his first car to be, what he wants on his license plates, and on and on and on and on! UGH!!

Austin, Tanner, and Jerrod

The older Austin gets, the harder he is to buy gifts for (I'm not sure if this means he's incredibly spoiled and doesn't need anything or what), but the last couple of years all he's wanted for his birthday is to be able to pick out whatever he wants. So we declared the 7th "All-About-Austin" Day and took him shopping for whatever he wanted. He never goes too crazy, and he got just what he wanted. We kind of kept things low-key after that because we've had enough of the all-out, crazy birthday celebrations. He had a couple friends stay over and they joined us at our family lunch (for 20!) the next day in celebration of his birthday. (Yes, lunch for 20 may not be considered 'low-key' to some people, but technically for our families it is because we had several people missing.)

Austin has become a huge fan of Tapout and UFC fighting (not something I will ever understand!). This was one of his favorite shirts he got for his birthday.

I'm back!!

Not that I 'went' anywhere, but I have definitely been neglectful in updating my blog! Not intentionally and not out of lack of things to post... just a lack of hours in the day!!

So, since the holidays we have been pretty busy. There are going to be several gaps, but I'm going to try and get everything caught up in a nutshell.

So the 7th/8th grade concert band played for the 7th grade basketball state tournament this year. The kids were almost as excited about doing this as if they were actually PLAYING in the tournament theirselves. It really was a big deal. This is them getting ready (again... sorry for the poor photography! I certainly did not miss my calling there!). Austin plays trumpet. He's standing in the back row.

And, there's Austin (5th from the left) blowing his little heart out. The band sounded great!! It was the first time they actually played "The Star Bangle Banner" for an audience. I was really impressed! I guess all that ear-deafening practice does pay off! They also played several upbeat songs (couldn't tell you the name of them) before each game and at each half-time. This was their second concert since the holidays, and they have one or two more before the end of the school year.