San Diego Chargers

On Sunday, November 18th Matt and I went to see the San Diego Chargers play the Jacksonville, Jaguars in Jacksonville, FL. Matt traded our Florida Football tickets vs. Tennessee to get the Charger tickets. Surprisingly there were many Charger fans. We sat in a section of Charger fans. On the way out of the stadium we got harassed a little because the Chargers lost. We were sad, but the game was still fun. On the way home we stopped at Scott and Lindsay Diley's house for dinner.

Kevin, Valeri, Keegan and Finley visit us

Sorry it has been so long since I've posted anything on the blog. The camera broke and Matt and I had to get another one. So now I am back in business. :) We lost all the pictures that were on the old camera, so here are the pictures from the new camera.

Kevin and Valeri, Keegan and Finley and Valeri's parents and sister spent the night at our house. They were driving from Minnesota to Miami to spend Thanksgiving with Valeri's family. We had a quick visit, but it was great to see them.

Keegan is in first grade and he loves writing numbers. He is in the "600 club" at school, meaning he has written the numbers from 0 to 600. His goal is to reach 1,000 and once he gets to 1,000 he will write them backwards.

Matt and Kevin went for a run together on campus.

Here is the family on Charger Game Day!! Keegan does not have his shirt on because he let me borrow it becuase Matt and I were going to the Charger's game in Jacksonville. Matt and I went to the game after going out to breakfast with Kevin and Valeri and kids.

Guster Concert

For Lisa's birthday, Bob surprised her by taking her to a Guster concert. Matt and I met them there and surprised her. The Guster concert was on campus and outdoors. The weather was incredible and by the time the concert started the temperature was in the 60's with no humidity. Lisa did not know who she was going to hear. She kept asking questions to sneak the answer out of us. Lisa was looking around to see if there were any clues about who was playing. It was so funny because Bob was wearing a Guster t-shirt and she never caught on.

Lucy and Dustyn joined us as well. We all brought dinner and blankets and enjoyed the awesome weather waiting for the 1st band to play.

In trying to take a group picture, Matt had to sneeze. He tried to hold it in, but couldn't. This picture was caught just at the right time, as I was laughing at him for sneezing.

This picture is much better.

This picture was taken when Lisa realized that she was at a Guster concert!! Bob and Lisa have been to several Guster concerts and this was very special for her to be here for her birthday. Bob had even taken her to hear Guster on one of their first dates.

The concert was awesome. It was neat to be so close to the stage. My favorite part of the concert was the bongo drum player. He was amazing. He would throw his whole body into his playing. Bob told us that one time he met him and he tapes up his hands becuase they get bruised from the playing.

Jacksonville Marine Corps 1/2 Marathon

On Saturday, October 6th Lisa and I ran the Jacksonville Marine Corps 1/2 Marathon. It was truly a memorable time from start to finish. Matt and Bob did not come with us and Lisa and I were determined to complete the whole adventure on our own.
We left Friday afternoon in the pouring rain and drove to Scott and Lindsay Diley's house, outside of Jacksonville. We had a great time hanging out with them and we ate a big meal of pasta to get ready for the race. Scott prepped us with directions of how to get to Alltell Stadium for the start of the race.
When we woke up on Saturday morning it was dark, thundering and lightening and raining. We drove to the stadium without getting lost, which we were so proud of! Before the race started we were already soaked. We had many reasons to just quit and drive home, but we stuck it out.
The race was really fun and took us along the St. John's River in Jacksonville and then along the River Bank and Landing and then back to Alltell Stadium. The race ended in a park across from the stadium. In order to cross the finish line we had to run through a 50 yard strip of solid mud, since it had been raining so much. Our shoes were coated in the mud. I did not have th best attitude about the mud and really did not enjoy the finish line because I was so mad that my sneakers were ruined. But I was excited to finish the race. I guess the end of the race fit the title of the race, Marine Corps. Anyways...just as we were walking back to our car there was a man from the race who was hosing off everyone's sneakers. I was so grateful.


Just stretching after the race. It finally stopped raining just in time for us to drive home!


Here is the running shirt we got. It is not my favorite shirt so I figured I better take a picture with it now since I may not wear it again. LOL. We completed the race in 2 hours and 10 minutes. Not bad for having 6 miles be your longest traning run.

Here is our soaking wet sneakers after 2 hours plus of rain and then getting hosed off. You can also see our wrinkled and prunned feet from being in wet socks for so long. I think Lisa's feet were worse than mine! We did get really cool Marine Corps cofffe mugs.

After the race we went back to Scott and Lindsay's house and showered and then went out to lunch. Lisa and I then drove home. We had so much fun and laughed the whole time. God blessed us with a great weekend and a great time together. We celebrated later that evening with pizza and individual pints of ice cream!!

Way to go Lisa and Christen. We were so proud of ourselves.

Here is Scott and Lindsay. They bought a house in Jacksonville and are redoing several different rooms. Here is the work they are doing on the bathroom. It really looks great!

Show me your thunderbolt!

I just thought that this picture was too cute. This is Keegan and Finely our niece and nephew, Kevin and Valeri's kids. Every Sunday for breakfast on Charger game day Keegan and Finely have blue milk and eggs and sing the Charger song.

Florida vs. Auburn

The Gators played Auburn at the Swamp Saturday. It was the night game (8pm) on ESPN. The weather was absolutely amazing; 70 degrees with a slight breeze. To start the game there was a fly over and the noise was so cool. ESPN had the camera that is hooked on cables and gets the cool view over the field. It was neat to watch it move. You could see the ESPN press box because it was lit up in lime green.

We tailgated at the Law School since Caleb and Emily have a parking pass for that lot. Matt was so excited to grill and he marinated brats all day in his homebrew beer. He grilled me an amazing burger. I love his enthusiasm! Bob joined us, but Lisa had a work commitment to go to. She was missed.

Here is Bob and Ben at the game.

If you look closely on the orange "F" you can see Mr. Two-Bits. He lead the crowd in the routine cheer; "2 bits, 4 bits, 6 bits, a dollar, all for the Gators stand up and holler." Who knows what in the world a "bit" is, but Mr. Two-Bits has been doing this same cheer forever. He doesn't even say anything, but the crowd knows what to say. He has worn the same yellow shirt and tie since the 70's.

To celebrate our 4 year anniversary, Matt and I went to a Red Sox game in Tampa Bay. We've been planning this excursion since July. We knew that baseball in the fall, right before playoffs would be awesome. As the baseball season continued along and the lead the Red Sox had over the Yankees went from 14 games to 1 1/2, our excitement for this game was huge.

Before the game we went to dinner at P.F.Chang's. Would you expect any other place? I ordered my favorite Chang's spicy shrimp (mild) and Matt got Kung pow chicken. We got lettuce wraps too. The food as usual was amazing. Hopefully this will satisfy our P.F.Chang's fix for a while.

After dinner we drove to the ball park, Tropicana Field. We left an hour before the game planning on seeing batting practice. We did not have tickets and were going to buy them at the gate. The traffic for the game was ridiculous. They did not have a good plan to get the stadium and we waited for 1 hour and 30 min. in traffic just to park. While we sat in the car we saw hundreds of Red Sox fans waiting as well. They seemed to out number the Devil Ray fans. Sweet!! We ended up parking far away in some sketchy lot with 1,000's of other cars. We felt a little better parking next to a Jaguar because if someone was to steal a car, ours was not the nicest.

Our seats were in the upper deck, but for $13 a piece who can complain. They were pretty good! Matsusaka was pitching which was neat. Plus the ballpark is unique as it is indoors. I was actually cold at times. The game was great, but the 9th inning was the best. The Red Sox came back from behind to win 8 - 6. Jason Varitek lead off with a home run and then Dustin Pedroia had a base hit single and then Lugo hit a 2 run homer. The place went wild. Everyone was cheering "Let's go Red Sox!" as well as "Yankee's Suck!" It was so neat to be there. The game got over at 11:30 pm and then Matt and I drove 2 hours home. We stopped for Dunkin Donuts iced coffee for the ride home. It was a great anniversary excursion!! Well worth the wait.

I took this picture of "Tek" earlier in the night, not knowing that he would lead off the comback hitting in the ninth inning.

When we got home from the game at 1:30 am we were greeted by this giant frog. I thought it was funny.

Dave and Joetta came to visit us a couple of weekends ago. They came Saturday night and we went out to dinner at Laredo (a Mexican restaurant in Starke, FL). After dinner we went to a debate on campus between a Christian and an atheist, "Is Christianity based on a lie?" It was very interesting. Sunday morning they went to church with us and then we went out to lunch.
It was a quick visit, but we had a great time.

Joetta has been knitting and made me a scarf. I love it! Aren't the colors beautiful?!

Gator football season has begun! We went to the first game of the season, against Western Kentucky. For all the home games this season, Matt and I decided that we are going to bike to campus instead of drive the 3 miles. Each game we get to sit with Bob and Lisa and Zach and Kristy (if they're not at a UCF game). This takes some getting used to considering last year there were like 15 of us at every game.

For the Western Kentucky game Bob, Lisa and I tailgated with Matt's college HHP (Health and Human Performance). His building is right next to the stadium and Pita Pit sponsored the tailgate so there was free food. Plus there were clean restrooms and A.C.!! It was fun. Next week we'll tailgate with Emily and Caleb back at the Law School like last year.

Here are some of the pictures from the first game. We definately miss the Cunninghams, Tanis, Millers, and Dileys.

If you aren't a Gator than you're Gator Bait! It's great to be a Florida Gator.