Tripp

Friday was one of those days.

One of those days you pray never comes...

but then you get the phone call at 5:30am and you know something's not right.

On Friday, February 25th in the wee hours of the morning,

Chris' cousin Tripp died suddenly.

He was 22 years old.

We spent this past weekend in Birmingham with family. 

Got there as fast as we could on Friday and stayed as late as we could on Sunday.  Now is definitely one of those times where you wish the distance between family was shorter.  We did not want to leave.

Tripp's memorial service is going to be at Mountain Brook Community Church
at 2pm on Wednesday, March 2nd.

Ricky David "Tripp" Norris, III


Update:  For more information, here is a link to the obituary and an online guestbook.  You can also search facebook for the group "in memory of Ricky David Norris, III."  Many of his friends and family have posted stories and pictures of him there.

Ladies and Gentlemen...

Ladies and gentlemen, this is Chris blogging this fine evening.  This is the first ever blog that I have written, but after up-loading some of these pictures, I decided I should detail a little about a truly phenomenal trip that I went on this past weekend.  

The pictures speak for themselves, but I will detail some of the most fun things from this past weekend.

The trip was up to the great and non liberal NYC with 3 of my close college roomies.

The greatest film director of our time, Cameron Crowe that is (director of my favorite film, Almost Famous) once said that the right song can sum up any event in our lives.

Ironically, when I got home from work today, my ipod (on shuffle that is) started playing a great and obscure song from my Elton John Collection, "Friends" (lyrics in italics below).

It made me think of how many truly incredible friends that God has blessed me with along the way.

Although, let me be honest....it was very hard for me to leave my wife for 5 consecutive days.

The longest length of time that we for sure have ever been apart.

I hope the day will be a lighter highway
For friends are found on every road
Can you ever think of any better way
For the lost and weary travellers to go

Making friends for the world to see
Let the people know you got what you need
With a friend at hand you will see the light
If your friends are there then everything's all right

It seems to me a crime that we should age
These fragile times should never slip us by
A time you never can or shall erase
As friends together watch their childhood fly 

Is there any shot better than the one above, straight from Times Square?

Probably not.  Although my good friend, the Nurse (owner of the Lawn Butler Knoxville and the man on the far left below) was hoping to see a bit more green grass in NYC.

He was slightly depressed until we saw a small patch, about 2x2 in the NY Times building.

His spirits were then lifted. 

"Anyone up for a little 2:00 AM slice of Cheesecake?"

One man responds..."I AM! I AM!"

And, then he proceeded to jump into bed with his HEALTHY slice of cheesecake.

I am pretty sure that we each consumed close to estimated 5,000 calories per day.

PS...the man below, Mr. Thurman, was our incredible tour guide. Mr. Thurm, AKA Appalachian Trail, used to live in NYC, therefore we got the LOCAL treatment.  

So, TGI Friday's in Times Square was not where we dined each night.

HALLELUJAH!

To sum up the below picture, one must look up Webster's definition of DROOPY.

: drooping or tending to droop

\Related to DROOPY

Synonyms: bowed, bowing, declined, declining,descendant (also descendent), descending, drooping,nodding, hanging, hung, inclining, pendulous, sagging,stooping, weeping

The below was the shot that we took in front of Central Park.

I can crack on myself in all of these pictures and say, NICE SCARF....

By the 5th day, I'm pretty sure it was slightly sticking to my ever growing facial hair.

This was a shot I took from the rail over looking Central Park and the rest of the city.

I had to take a shot in front of this sign in honor of my ever so lovely wife.

This is actually how I spell her name, say her name and her name is listed in my cell phone.

Somedays, I forget that her real name is not Jules. 

The shot below was when we decided to trek across the Brooklyn Bridge in about 20 degree weather with a wind chill of around 10 degrees.

But, the view from up top, was really mind blowing.

I had to have Mr. Kehne himself, whose heroes are Warren Buffett and Dave Ramsey, take a solo shot in front of Wall Street to show how ecstatic he was to finally see his 'heaven on earth.'

The picture below I thought captured that excitement for sure. 

THE END

Note from Jules:  Don't I have the best husband ever?  I'm so glad he had the opportunity to go on this trip, but boy am I glad to have him back home with me!  Hope you enjoyed!

the Past and the Future

That's Chris walking towards the movie theater to see "Just go with it." 

{side note:  It's a great movie!}

Granted, the picture is blurry and may not be my best example of what I'm going to tell you, but it'll do.

One of my photography goals this year is to:

Take photos of things that are new. 

What we think is awesome now will one day be *vintage.

Fashion...  Technology...  Places...  and even People...

It's weird to think that one day the iPad will be totally out of date.  But when you think of where we came from...  car phones and cassette tapes...  it's easier to visualize a future that is totally different than our present.

In the meantime, let's enjoy what's new.

and one day we'll have something funny to show the youngters.

*******

Now - I'm off to go pick up the Mister! 

He's been on a guys trip to the Big Apple and should be arriving at the airport soon.

I sure have missed that man...

Waffle House on a Sunday morning..

After church one Sunday, Mr. Connell and I had lunch with three of our favorites -

Hunter, Emily, and little Liam.

and since lunch = breakfast when you're out of church by 10:30am...

...We choose to dine at the Waffle House.

Breakfast of champions.

Two men catering to one small child's every food desire:

{Liam did not leave hungry.}



The company and conversation was lovely.  The table was full of plates piled with food.  Random music played from the jutebox.  Liam danced along.

{Happy family = Emily + Liam + Hunter}

{Mr. Connell and me}

We love impromptu lunches with wonderful friends!



Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day.

Couldn't have been better this year.

Mr. Connell and I had a romantic evening at home together.

  

He brought home yummy chocolate covered strawberries...

 ...and a beautiful bouquet of white daisies.

And then made a delicious meal for us to dine on.

Best husband.  In the world.

Things I noticed from this photo - 

1.  Does anyone need any tostitos?  We still have four bags left over from the super bowl party.

2.  There couldn't be another thing on our counter.

3.  Anyone spot the littlest Valentine?!

4.  Chris is a stud.

5.  The counter is clean now.  Just FYI, Mom...

Me and our furball:

Best chicken casserole ever.

Somehow food always tastes better with ones you love.  Unless it's really bad.  Then it's just bad.  But this casserole = yum!

My new Valentine cd Mr. Connell made for me played in the background.  He put some great songs on there.  Including the new "I Do" song by Colbie Caillat.  You should listen...

And just when you think the love is over...

these babies come in the mail!

Chris purchased some fuzzy slippers for me!  So comfortable, they're like walking on clouds.  

I love them!

So glad I married my best friend.

Happy Valentine's Day!  xoxo!

Volleyball

Happy Valentine's Day {yesterday}!  Mr. Connell and I had a perfect low-key Vday.  He's the best husband in the world.  I, however, haven't uploaded those pictures yet, so I'll update you on part of Sunday's activities...

This past Sunday was the perfect weather for setting up the volleyball net and calling our Bible Study friends together.  Drew and Laura have been inviting us over for fun Sunday afternoons and we love it.  It's casual and easy.  We're a bunch of adults playing fun games in perfect weather.  Babies are running around and everyone is mindful of where they are.  People rotate in and out for whatever reason: to entertain the chitlins, to soothe crying babies, or to check the oven that's full of yummy food for dinner.  A little competition comes out amongst couples.  We keep conversations going and laughter abounds, while music plays in the background.

{That's Chris about to wham bam that volleyball.}

While they were all playing, I was for the moment snuggling with this lump of perfectness:

Five week old baby Joel.

Wrapped in a blanket to prevent the chill from the wind getting to him, he was snug as a little bug. 
Content as he could be.
So was I.

After volleyball was over, the gang moved inside and the guys started playing Rock Band.

PS:  Check out that sunset through the window!  So pretty!

Little Kaitlyn came back from visiting the grandparents.

{Allison, Matthew, and Annie}

Liam practicing his mad drum skills...

It didn't matter who was playing.  Liam was helping.

Baby Joel came back to see me towards the end of the night...

Such a fun group of friends!

Thank you, Drew and Laura, for opening up your home (and pantry!) to us! 

We love easy Sunday afternoons.



A little blogger tutorial for you...

I think I figured this out!  Or at least I figured two things out.

Blogger is easy, but I don't think it's easy to design as your own.  Granted, that may because I don't know computer lingo very well.

Either way, here are a few new steps I've taken lately...  The free storage for my photos on blogger was at it's max, so it was either pay or figure out another way.

Lesson 1:  If you want larger photos (which I definitely did), widen the width of your blog.

Under blogger, go to design and then choose template designer.  You can then just slide the arrow around to make your blog what you want it to be.

Lesson 2: Don't upload your photos directly into blogger. 

(Or you can until your site is full...  your blog is your preference!)

Rather, upload them to Photobucket (or another free photo hosting site) at whatever size your blog will hold. 

Once in Photobucket, you'll see html codes below each picture. Right click on the direct link and copy...

...return to your blogger post, click on the "upload a photo" button, and choose upload from URL. Once the picture pulls up, save, and return to edit your post. 

You'll see your photo just as before! After that, you can still make it bigger or smaller, depending on your tastes.

Hope this post helps someone else out there with blogger!

PS:  I've been updating past events...  you can check them out here, here, and here if you're interested! 

xo!

the beard

I love a man with a beard.

Especially that man...

xoxo!

Chris' 30th celebration

Mr. Connell turned 30.

He once told me his favorite way to spend his birthday was with friends and family.

So, friends and family it was.

The Friday before his birthday Chris' parents hosted a surprise birthday party for him.  We gathered as many friends and family as we could and piled them all into one house.

He had so many sweet people turn out to celebrate him.

People + Kate sporting one of the Chris heads I made for the event

Chris' parents and I had been planning this for a month
{yes, I made myself wait until only a month out to start planning}
and we were so glad when it all went down without a hitch.

Chris knew the two of us were going to dinner that night, but I'm sure he became suspicious when I told him he had put on a blindfold.  And then I know he became more suspicious when I said as we were leaving our house "wait, there's a strange truck in the neighborhood.  Stay here.  I'm going to check it out."  {My Cousin Chris accidentally came to the wrong house!  Luckily he was redirected just in the nick of time.  It was fun though when Cousin Chris asked where the birthday boy was and I was able to respond "oh, he's sitting in the car.  Blindfolded."}

Mr. Connell knew for sure where he was when I lead him up the front steps at his parents' house.



Sister profile alert, a happy Mr. Connell, a happy mother watching on, and River baby eyes + his pretty mother:

PS:  Sister Beth came from all the way from M'town solo for the party and brought a hot in the crock-pot cheese dip!  That's how awesome my little sister is...



Some of the party crowd {AKA: some of the most fun people you'll ever meet}:

Yegi and River



Emily C., Laura, Katie, and Allison

Side note:  Most of these photos were taken by that fancy lady on the left - Emily.  She was so sweet to bring her camera to help me document this party for Chris.  We love these photos!

(However, I am unsure who took that one of the four of them.  It obviously wasn't Em C.!)

me, Mr. Connell, Derek, and Melissa

Another side note:  Melissa took a bunch of the fun birthday cutting cake photos. 
Basically, if EmC didn't take it, Melissa did.

I try to surround myself with good picture taking people.  :)

Back to the fun party go-ers:

Chris and Chase

Fowler, Matt, Rebecca, Kealan, and Sarah

Katie, Natalie, and Chris  {Anyone see a resemblence?}

Cousin Jenny and I

For dinner, we dined on Buddy's barbecue.  Several friends and family made appetizers {BIG THANK YOU} and Natalie made her yummy beans.  We ended up having plenty of food for the evening, but it was hard keeping everything replenished on the table!  We found lots of buns and sauce after the crowd was gone.

And for dessert...

Mr. Connell's 30th birthday cake:

It was a two-tiered square Red Velvet cake.  {Red Velvet is one of Chris' top favs!}

and it SO YUMMY!

Made by Sugar Dumplings {find her on facebook if you'd like!} in Maryville, Tennessee. 

We totally recommend her.

After T. and Andy helped me light all the sparkling candles and we sang the good ol' birthday song,

Chris was ready to blow them out.

Funny enough, the candles refused to be blown out...

There were a bunch of them and I'm wondering now how many we actually put on there.

Picture taken right before the cake was destructed as we were removing all those candles, star whirls, and silver balls.

Still up for question - are those silver balls edible?

Soon after this Melissa put the camera down and she and I ended up with fingers caked in Red Velvet.  That cake was worth it though!

Once that pretty cake was mutilated, Yegi, Kate, and I couldn't get downstairs fast enough to play like Kim Kardashian on the Just Dance 2.

All of us playing (I've tried to make sure there is a picture of everyone who danced that night):

There was a crew of us who played for a long time!  I love that this game brings people together and is always entertaining.

Part of the audience:

Laura, Drew, Emily, and Michael

They hung in at the party for the long haul!

T. and Natalie had three baby photos of Chris blown up for the occasion.

He's changed a bit, don't you think??  But wasn't he the cutest? 
(In my book, he still is!)

Our Connell family posing between Chris' other two baby photos.

T. and Natalie were wonderful to help pull this whole party together.  They worked so hard and opened up their home to many friends...  It was just perfect!

PS:  Check out Mr. Connell's little baby bootie on the left...  It's changed a bit since then, but it's still one of his best assets.  :)

Emily and I modeling Mr. Connell heads.  {Love her!}

Thank you to all of our family and friends for making this such a special night for Mr. Connell!  It meant a lot to me to see you there in celebration of him and I know it meant a great deal to him.  We really appreciate your presence there, any food you brought, the laughter that came, and - most importantly - your friendship.

We are truly blessed with the best friends and family.

Happy birthday to you, my darling Mr. Connell!

I am crazy about you.

And yes, if those of you are wondering...

30 is still frisky!