Happy Birthday Barb & Bev!

First off I have to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my big sisters, Barb & Bev, who have always been such good role models for me (well, most of the time) ;) They are multi-talented, always fun to be with, and most importantly, great moms/daughters/sisters/friends.

I also want to give a shout out to my niece, Amy, and her little girl, Lilly, who both had birthdays this past week. HAPPY BIRTHDAY GIRLS!

This is one of my favorite pictures of Lilly from Kellie's wedding -- dancing with Heather.

Hope you all have/had terrific birthdays.

Eleni, My Hero!

I finally finished the book "Eleni" Sunday evening. What a story!

It's a true story written by Nicholas Gage, an investigative reporter, who returned to Greece to find out exactly what happened to his mother, why she was murdered during the Greek civil war in 1948, and his search for those responsible for her death. He tells us the story of his childhood, the horrors of war, the torture his mother endured, his escape in the night (along with his sisters) from the Communist guerrillas who occupied their village, and the ultimate sacrafice Eleni made for her children.

In March of 2007, I went to Greece with my mother and sister, Bev. During that trip we had the privilege of being escorted by my mom's Greek cousin through the mountains, passing village after village very similar to the one where the book takes place. Our destination was the village where my grandfather grew up. It was during this trip that my mother purchased the book and said she wanted each of her daughters to read it. It is the best account of what happened to my grandfather's village during WWII and the subsequent civil war. It was so easy to visualize the story after seeing the small villages scattered throughout the rock-covered mountains of northern Greece. So many things described by Gage seemed to be exactly what we saw on that special day we spent with my mom's cousin. We felt as though we had stepped back in time. We saw peasant women with their long black dresses and scarves and shephards tending to their flocks.

He showed us a cave like the ones in the book, where villagers hid, and he told us how his family also fled in the darkness of night to save his sister, Katarina, from being taken to become a soldier.

Finally, we stood on the land where my grandfather tended sheep. It's a day I will never forget.

Thank you Mother, for the trip of a lifetime and the opportunity to get a better understanding of our Greek roots. I will bring the book home with me at Christmastime so another one of my sisters can read this amazing story which is so similar to that of our Greek relatives.

Girls Day

Katie and Maddie came home for lunch Saturday. After lunch, Kellie joined us and we hit a couple craft shows (one great, one not so good). Maddie used to go to craft shows with her mom back in Kansas, so she really enjoyed having the opportunity to get away from college and hang out with us. After a fun afternoon looking for good deals at the craft shows, we stopped at Mable Slab for a little treat. YUMMM!

We made a quick stop at Kellie's to say "Hi" to Chris and Pogo and to borrow their new Guitar Hero game, then headed back home. Here are Katie and Maddie with a few of their purchases. They found these cute snowmen for only $3.50 each. Maddie's mom collects snowmen so she got her one of each size. Katie got two with the TU colors, one for her and one for me.

Their girl day continued after we got back home. Another bunch of girls came over from TU and they all had movie night (P.S I Love You) which required a box of kleenex they all shared. They enjoyed pizza and hot apple cider, then headed back to the dorms.

Except for the fact that OSU was spanked by #2 ranked Texas Tech in football, it was a good day. OU picked up another win defeating Texas A&M and TU had the weekend off.

Kellie's Old Boyfriends

Last night Kellie headed up the turnpike to Wichita, Kansas to meet up with her old boyfriends, HANSON, AAAAAAH! She went with her friend, Julie, and they met Kellie's old Wichita friend and college roommate, Kristen. Here are the former roomies with their Hanson glow. :)

IKE, TAYLOR & ZAC - AAAAAAAAA!

After a fun Friday night with the girls singing along to all their old favorites, they stayed at Kristen's house and then headed back home this morning. If you're interested in hearing one of their oldies, here's a link to the video Kellie took of them singing "I Will Come to You." http://www.vimeo.com/2191500

Kim & Chris, while you're there, check out the chicken dance video from the wedding.

From Obama's Speech

As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, “We are not enemies, but friends…though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection.”

As Forrest Gump said, "That's all I've got to say about that."

VOTE!

Today Katie & I planned to go vote together. Luckily we realized before we went and stood in line that Dave & I had not changed our address for our voter registration so we had to vote at the polling place for our old address. Katie, being a first-time voter, had registered with our new address so she had to go somewhere else.

Kellie & Chris went to vote at 7:15 this morning and were out in about an hour. Dave voted mid-morning and it took him about 1/2 hour. I voted about 2:00 and then again went with Katie while she voted about a half hour later. No, I didn't vote at both places. :) We were both in and out in about 10 minutes. Here she filling our her first ever ballot.

Just after she inserted her ballot into the machine.

Walking out to the car about 10 minutes later with our "I Voted" stickers.

What better way to cap off our voting afternoon than with a nice mommy/daughter trip to Kohl's. Fun!

No Perfect Seasons

We started out early yesterday morning for our trip to Fayetteville to attend our first TU football game. The weather was perfect. Traffic was awful, especially as we got closer to the University of Arkansas. There were police and roadblocks everywhere, so we couldn't get to the address which was the destination for our tailgate party. After driving around and around, we finally just parked and walked about 2 miles to the tailgate party, which was in the backyard of a little house occupied by a bunch of college boys. We were welcomed by Mike, a nice guy Dave knows through business who gave us the game tickets. He told us "the beer is cold and the chili is hot." We were the only Tulsa fans amongst the big group of Razorback fans and did get some trash talk and had to listen to their hog calls, but it was all in good fun.

After a nice cold beer and brat, we walked to the stadium which is set in a beautiful part of Arkansas. Unfortunately, Tulsa's dreams of an undefeated season dissolved in Arkansas. They started off horrible, had a great comeback, then couldn't do anything in the last quarter and ended up losing 30-23. The Golden Hurricane had been off to its best start in more than 60 years and was climbing up the national rankings, but they couldn't convert three chances from inside the Arkansas 7 with less than a minute remaining. :(

It was quite a show! Here the hogs are coming out of their snout as the band played, the cheerleaders cheered and the fans screamed.

Their band was great and fun to watch. Here you can see the blue TU section of fans and a little bit of how pretty the setting is at the University of Arkansas.

If you have never been to a college football game, you really should try it sometime. It's such fun. The stadiums and crowds are huge and the atmosphere is exciting. We were the only Tulsa fans in our section, but it was still fun. Dave has this ability to strike up conversations with strangers anywhere we go. Although we didn't sit with the people from the tailgate party, there were plenty of friendly Hog fans around to exchange friendly banter with.

While we were at the game in Fayetteville, Drew was at the Oklahoma State game in Stillwater, Kellie & Chris were at a wedding and Katie was at a sportsbar with her roommate and her dad watching the game on PPV. They left at halftime, so I kept them up-to-date with text messaging.

Even though TU lost, it was still a great weekend for Oklahoma football. OSU clobbered Iowa State 59-17 and the Sooners crushed the Nebraska Cornhuskers 62-28. Now the three big Oklahoma college teams are all 8-1.

Meanwhile, deep in the heart of Texas, it was a showdown between #1 Texas and #6 Texas Tech. Texas Tech won, which creates a wide-open race in the Big 12 South in the final month. OU needed Texas to lose to create a four-team logjam near the top of the Big 12 South race.

Never in a million years would I think I could be so into college football. BUT I AM!!