John Camps Out For Chick-Fil-A

Many of you already know how much John LOVES Chick-Fil-A. He eats lunch there almost everyday and knows everyone in the store by name. We were even sent an invitation to attend Premire Night last night. Premire Night is an invitation only event in which they do the ribbon cutting, give tours of the new store (including a behind the scenes in the kitchen), raffle off prizes (John won an I Love Chick-Fil-A t-shirt), and give away tons of free food. It was kind of neat pulling up to the parking lot last night and having to show our special invitation to even step foot on the property.

Tomorrow is opening day...6:00 am. Chick-Fil-A has a tradition of giving the first 100 people in line a year's supply of chicken sandwiches. However, in order to be one of those 100 people you must camp out overnight to reserve your space. So John packed up his stuff and went out at 8:30 this morning to reserve his spot. He is number 48. I later found out that several people camped out last night in order to get a spot and the last spot filled up at 3:45 this afternoon.

Since Trent got out of school early this afternoon Grammy picked him up and took him to see daddy. Ella and I went before church so we could get a few pictures to remember this event...even thought it is a weird one.


The staff at Chick-Fil-A has taken really good care of all 100 customers. They provided them with lunch this afternoon and dinner tonight. They also have supplied the bottomless glass of tea and water. There's going to be an ice cream party, karaoke, and a DJ later this evening. If you will notice in this picture John is picking up his dinner...it's not very often that you get to walk through the drive-thru to get your food. Even Ella got to have a bag.

No joking - this is only half of the Chick-Fil-A "Camp". John said a lot of the people here are college students but I did see several dads with their kids. It was definitely a crazy sight.

It is supposed to get into the 40's tonight. Hopefully, he will stay warm.

Dogwood Festival ALMOST Rained Out

Saturday was a busy day for Trent. The morning began with a fishing trip (see the post below) and ended with the Dogwood Festival. It appeared that it was going to be a fairly nice afternoon for a parade. The weatherman did say there was a possibility of scattered thunderstorms in the evening but everything was clear after lunch so we decided to go ahead to the parade.

There we were...sitting out on the side of the road, complaining about how hot it was, Trent and Ella are having a great time playing with Dylan and Sydnie. Then it starts to get a little gray over in the distance. We figure it's nothing to worry about and the parade will be over and done with before it starts to rain. BOY, WERE WE WRONG! All of the sudden, without even one tiny rumble of thunder as a warning to seek shelter, the skies open up and the rain pours. Luckily, we sit in the same place every year and there was a porch of a local business available for shelter. After standing there for 10 minutes the rain dies down and we walk the 2 blocks back to Aunt Rinkie's house.

Well, the parade started 30 minutes later than expected but the show did go on (and I found out from Aunt Rinkie that the Dogwood Festival has only been canceled 1 time in its longstanding history). Here are a few pictures of our second try. As you can see, Ella is not at all excited about being back with the possibility of getting rained on again.


It was nice to have the umbrella for shade. It got very hot after the storm.

Trent and Ella's cousin David, Sydnie, Dylan, and Trent wait for the parade to start.

Trent's Fishing Trip on Saturday

Trent had the opportunity to go fishing at the Children's Home on Saturday morning with some other children from church. Although he did catch anything he did have a lot of fun so here are a few pictures for you to see.

Nationals Scrimmage

So here's the story...

Monday night was supposed to be Trent's first official baseball game of the season and it was to be against the other East team(Nationals). Unfortunately, Monday it rained all day long so his game was postponed until later in the season. Tonight was supposed to be a regular practice night but it quickly turned into a full uniform scrimmage.

On Tuesday, we got an email from Coach B that one of the Nationals players was moving out of town this weekend and Monday's game was the only game he was going to be able to play with his team before leaving. So it was decided that tonight we would scrimmage the Nationals in uniform to make it feel like a real game. It was a great game and Trent will miss his friend Reese. The neat thing about Reese moving is that they are relocating to the Atlanta area so we will be able to visit him this summer! Here are a few pictures and video clips of tonight's scrimmage.

Trent was very excited because he got to be catcher for the entire game!

Trent up to bat against his dad the pitcher.

This is Trent at 3rd base . His friend Reese is the 3rd baseman.

An action shot of Trent playing catcher.

Trent and Reese after the game. We will all miss Reese!

Ella is enjoying this season because for the first time she has other girls to play with while the boys are out on the field.

This is a clip of Trent covering Home Plate and ending the inning.

Trent was just full of doubles tonight!

This was the last play of the night!

Dixie League Opening Night

Tonight was opening night for the Dixie League baseball teams. Check out the pictures and short video from the Av's game. Unfortunately, it rained off and on, before and during the game. We left at the end of the 3rd inning. On the good side, the rain stayed away while the teams were being introduced.

Trent's First Scrimmage

Tonight was Trent's first opportunity to play an actual game of baseball. His team scrimmaged another East team. Here are a few pictures and videos of the game.

Trent was right back in one of his favorite spots to start the game! He played catcher for 2 innings.

These are a few pictures I took after Trent's first hit. The video clips are at the bottom of this post. Notice that John is in charge of the pitching machine. Trent LOVES when dad's pitching. If you get a chance, ask Trent about his line drive past dad's head at practice last week!

It's soooo exciting. With t-ball and one year of coach pitch under the belt it's finally making sense to Trent. You must always be ready to run home!

This picture is from the end of the game. Trent's teammate AJ finished the game in a grand fashion...he made a home run at the last at-bat. It was really awesome! Coach Brad is telling them what a great job they did and GETTING READY TO PASS OUT UNIFORMS!!!! Trent's team will be called the Giants and team colors are black and orange. I've never seen such a bright pair of orange socks! The best part of this year's uniform is that they have the boys' names on the back!

Here are video clips of Trent's first at bat and running to each base. Sorry I had to break it into several clips but the blog never would've been able to upload a 5 minute clip.

This is Trent's second bat that I recorded in the stands.

This is a video of Trent playing catcher.

Last Night's Trip to Bruster's!

Since Daddy was not home last night we decided to go to Bruster's after dinner. It was a beautiful evening so we celebrated the warm weather with ice cream!

Here is a BEFORE picture of Ella with her chocolate ice cream cone.


That would be a pink sprinkle stuck to Ella's forehead.

Trent was very excited about his Purple Dinosaur ice cream which he ordered on a sugar cone and then promptly dropped into a bowl so he could eat the cone first.

Trent Attends Scout Day at VT

I know that Pops, Purson, and Abby (especially) will not be very excited about this post. So those three people might just want to bypass the following pictures...they could be harmful to your mental health Abby!

Because Trent sold so much Scout popcorn this fall he was invited to participate in a special "Scout Day" today at Virginia Tech. Mommy and Trent left Ella at home with Emily D. and drove all the way to VT. Daddy was not able to go with us since he was at Aunt Frances' memorial service. Upon our arrival we went to check in and Trent received his offical VT Boy Scout hat. Then it was off to eat some lunch before the opening.

We started out at Cassell Coliseum and then went to Lane Stadium to participate in several hands-on demonstrations. Here are some pictures from the hands-on experiements Trent got to see and do.

Putting together some robots with other scouts.

Trent had to build a boat that could float marbles and he could only use a plastic bowl, 2 small paper cups, 1 large paper cup, and a piece of aluminun foil. He also had to make sure that the marbles didn't touch the blue part of the bowl. The boat he developed was able to float 24 marbles.

Trent was able to see VT's "self-driving" SUV that won 3rd place in national competition. We had to take this picture just for Pops.

Following our visit to the South Endzone we went on a tour of the athletic facilities. Our tour began Cassell Coliseum. We were taken through the Hall of Fame and were shown all the behind the scenes areas.

Here is a picture of Trent taken in the room with all the football trophies (the room has an official name but I can't remember what it is). This room looks down on the practice field and out towards Lane Stadium.

One of the first things we saw when we walked into this room was the large Hokie Bird. We actually took this picture to show Sarah...she was the person in charge of making the original prototype and was the artist for one of the Birds showcased in downtown Blacksburg.

Before walking out towards Lane Stadium I stopped to take this picture for Abby. I believe it's probably the only thing on campus having to do with UVA. This banner, sent to campus after last year's tragedy, hangs in the foyer of the athletic building.

Finally, it was out to the stadium. We were able to spend some time playing on the practice field before walking through the tunnel to the stadium.

Our final stop of the day was English Field to watch the Hokies baseball team take on the University of Maryland. Unfortunately, it was getting cold so we left during the 3rd inning. Trent and Mommy had a great time during "Scout Day" and we hope that we get a chance to go again next year!