Happy Birthday, Brian!!

11 months and 8,000 family birthday posts later we arrive at the second to last family birthday of the year, and perhaps, the most anticipated post by one, Brian Garrett. That's right, today is my big brother's birthday. I searched high and low, on facebook and in boxes of pictures at Mom's house and I could not find one good picture of the two of us together.

Here we are on Brian's 18th(ish) birthday where he got the latest in personal music players, a walkman. Neither of us are looking at the camera and Jeremy is overacting...fail.

Look, he was nice enough to let me try it out, but now my cute little face is blocked by his big ole hands.

This one had potential, but Brian isn't looking forward, my face is cut off and I can't decide if that is a homeless person's dress I'm wearing, or a nightgown (judging from the food left on the plates, our family tradition of birthday breakfast and my continued dislike of getting dressed before noon, I'm going with nightgown).

Perhaps God knows that a photo containing two such good looking faces would turn the world upside down or maybe neither of us sits still long enough to get a good shot. Either way, this travesty needs to be remedied tout de suite. Check back around Christmas time when Brian and I will be featured in the first ever Unfiltered Nonsense redemption photo.

Happy birthday, Brian!! I love you!

And......I'M BACK!

Back in business with a new computer at home so now my absentee posting will be for other reasons.

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving.

Welcome to the jungle, Sammers

This post is just a touch late, but I can still justify the timing if you hang with me here.

Jeremy & Trisha welcomed their first born into the world on Thursday, Nov. 18th and named her Samantha Jane Garrett. While the doctor delivered her two weeks early she still weighed in at an impressive 7lbs 11oz, 20 inches.

Though not readily apparent on this blog from a timing standpoint, I was beaming with excitment over the pending birth and timed my arrival to the hospital perfectly. All the grandparents had gotten to hold her and she was primmed for some "Lulu time."

Here I am telling her she looks just like me.

About 10 seconds after I started holding her the nurse took her away from me to check her blook sugar levels again. Long story short, they ended up putting her in to the NICU :(

I went back on Saturday with my sister Kim and Sam had clearly had a visit from Papa Garrett during the night because she had already pulled out her feeding tube once. I could just hear him say "Ok Sam, wanna see that lady out there run in here really fast? Just give this a real good tug."

Here's a picture of Daddy trying to teach her how to eat and breath at the same time so she can leave the hospital. It's a classic Garrett family problem, we just get so excited to eat breathing becomes non-essential. I mean, her Uncle Brian was so into eating a Thanksgiving dinner once he broke into a sweat :)

This is just a really cute picture of Grammy loving on her 7th grandchild.

So after being in the NICU for a week Sam decided she was done with that place, pulled out her feeding tube for a second time, started eating like a champ and went home with Mommy and Daddy today!

Congrats Bubba & Trisha! Love you all!!

Full of GLEE...again

This clip makes me super excited for Glee tonight and reminds me that I hope NBC brings back "The Sing-off" between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

You may now return to your regularly scheduled day.

Music Monday

I bought an Eric Church cd last week in my preparations for the long trek home again this past weekend. The entire cd is a winner in my books, but today I'll be sharing the latest single/video, "Smoke a Little Smoke."

It's probably my favorite song to blare in my car with fully functional bass and speaker system. It's just icing on the cake that Kasey Kahne makes an appearance in the video.

Enjoy.