Updates on the big news, more big news, and a Don Gallo pic!

First, thank you for your kind words and for sharing in our excitement!

It has meant so much to us.

YES!  Our big news is that I am pregnant and we're expecting our first little Connell baby February of 2012.  It's pretty surreal and if I wasn't nauseous most of the day, I may not even believe it's true.  It took us about 9 months for our plan to meet up with the Lord's (a story I want to share eventually), so even though just about everything I eat requires mental reactiveness to not throw up, we are very thankful for this little blueberry.

Our baby is the size of a blueberry {possibly a raspberry or a kidney bean} right now.  The baby is so tiny, but you can still see that little heart beating.  It is truly amazing.  As we watched that heart beat on the monitor, God's hand in this became beautifully evident.  He is knitting together a baby who will be entrusted to us... all within the darkness of my womb.  The magnitude of the gift he has given us is still sinking in.  All the while holding the hand of the man I love and watching that little beating baby heart made another part of this girl's dreams come true.

Needless to say, I cannot wait for another ultrasound! 

Until then, God gets to be the only one watching the baby grow.

You also might have read about our other news {not as big as baby news, but still big}, the Connell's are moving!  Our house is on the market.  It's a decision we made for our little family even before we knew a baby was already in the making.  As fate and circumstance goes, the same day I got the little positive pregnancy result(s) our house made it's debut on the Knoxville market.

This area is where Chris and I call home (we did however talk about the pros and cons of moving east towards my family), so we're planning to stay in Knoxville.  We have one of the best realtors, Allison Clemmons of Connell Properties, and she's making this process as easy as possible.  Though I dare say keeping a clean house in the throws of morning all day sickness is a bit of a challenge, but luckily Mr. Connell is the best, most supportive man in the world.  I am so blessed to get to do life with that man.  House photos to come.

and because all posts require photos...

{Kate, Seth, Mr. Connell in the shadows, Melissa, Derek, Joe, and Carrie}

The last time Mr. Connell played at Don Gallo I left my big camera at home.  (I think it was the pregnancy.)We had to make do with the cell phone for those great friends in support of the big musician!

That's about it on our updates!  I've been a little lacking here {you can thank the blueberry}, but I'm hoping to make more appearances sooner than later.  Thanks for being here.  :)

xoxo

Our BIG news! (and the letter I wrote to Mr. Connell)

It's true!  Mr. Connell and I are expecting our first little one in February.

We could not be more thrilled!

xoxo

Don Gallo {& Chris' upcoming music gigs!}

Friday night Chris played a few diddies out at Don Gallo.

He hadn't played since last fall, so this was a great way to help kick off summer.

I cozied up with the cousins, Yegi, River, and Chris, 

to share some chips with little River man.

Doesn't he have the greatest eyes?  He loved listening to Chris play, especially over his Daddy's shoulder.

Chris and Yegi invited about 20 of their friends and even reserved a table.

{Seating can be tough when there's a country music star playing!}

It means a ton to us when people come out in support of Chris!

Thank you for being there!

Baby Hadley.  Who's not such a baby any more!  

She's actually going to be the big sister {at 17 months} to twin girls.  

Children of all ages love hearing the music.  

Watching Chris and dancing is always better when you're in the front of the stage.

I guess unless the mood strikes you right when you're in the middle:

That's Sydney girl breaking it down.

Hands on the ground and feet in the air.  She gets her moves from her mother.

Chris is in the business though of appealing to all walks of life {not just families with small children}...  

See that table full of men?  It was guys night.

This guy has some pipes on him.  What I love is that he doesn't care I'm there with a camera in my face.  He's the butter to my bread and when your butter can sing that well, bread's gotta take some photos.

Here's my friend Allison talking to her baby Joel.

She had no idea I was paying any attention to her.  

and look at Joel's eyes.  Such adoration.

He is such a cutie pie!

Al - I know this picture of Syd is blurry, but I couldn't stand to delete it!

After even the "guys night" group was gone {who let me sit with them even though I was a girl!},

I amuse myself with taking more pictures of this handsome man.

It was pretty much dark outside, but the lights from the porch gave me just enough glow on Mr. Connell.

I love it when it gets dark and he's still playing!  He played for four hours this night.

Speaking of him playing, 

Chris will be out at Hardin Valley Casa Don Gallo tomorrow night!

and...  he'll be at the Powell Casa Don Gallo Saturday night!

Two nights in a row!

Come out and join us - you're always welcome.

xoxo

Here's a fun little secret for you

I got these cute cupcakes for our last small group meeting.

Perfect for a bunch of girls.

We had a whole variety of butterflies and flowers.

They tasted divine! 

Especially with the buttercream icing.

My secret {which was told to me by my friend, Emily P.}:

They came from Sam's Club bakery.

and sure enough they were 30 cupcakes for $13.99,

I thought someone was going to get me for stealing them.

What a deal!


PS:  My sweet friend Mary did a blogger spotlight on me!  Go here to check it out.
Thanks again, Mary Lynn!

My main *squeeze is back to entertaining!

this Friday, June 10th

Casa Don Gallo in Hardin Valley

starting around 7ish

It's true and I can't wait!!

Hope to see you there!

Visiting Beautiful Baby Cole

Restaurants around Fort Morgan

Hello Fancy Pants!

This is my last vacation post.  And since the vacay ended mid-May, I figure you'll be glad to know that.

We're not really the type to cook at night while on vacation {let's be honest, we don't cook too much at home}, so part of our fun is finding great places to eat.

Enter in our first night's restaurant = Lambert's.

Chris had actually eaten here back in college on a spring break trip and he knew I'd love it.

It's also known as the "Home of the Throwed Roll."

You read that right.  They throw rolls.

Softball size balls of delicious-ness and as many as your heart desires.  Hot out of the oven.

The food was like a Cracker Barrel on steriods.  It was some of the best food EVER!  Servers even walked around with "extra" sides like the fried okra you see on the napkin.  Oh, and apple butter...

We took home two boxes full of leftovers and had them the next day.  and the day after that.

I've asked Chris to bring me back here for each anniversary and birthday.  He said the 9 hour drive may present a problem.

I do believe there will be throwed rolls in heaven.

Let's move on to the next evening...

Our love filled 2nd anniversary!

We decided on The Beach Club, which was minutes from where we were staying.  It was delicious as well!  More of a higher-end restaurant {as compared to Lambert's} and a classy place to eat our anniversary dinner.

We traveled on the third day to Daulphin Island.  Once Chris' favorite childhood restaurant was proven to be gone, we googled restaurants in the area and randomly chose Barnacle Bill's.

The outside didn't give away too much, but we decided we loved the place once they had popcorn shrimp on the menu {on the child's menu, but they special ordered ours right up to an adult plate}.  We definitely got lucky with this place!

The last night we were there, we went to a place recommended here.

Lulu's.

Lulu is the sister to the very famous Jimmy Buffett.  She's built a restaurant on a huge open porch surrounded by a giant sand box and an adult size rope's course.  This whole area is made for entertainment.

There was a small wait when we got there, so we headed over to the open kitchen where these two were doing their own cooking demonstration and cookbook signing.

It was very entertaining!  So entertaining we waited an hour longer than necessary because our buzzer malfunctioned and never went off.  In case you're wondering, their cookbook is called "Just Married and Cooking."

There's live music every night at Lulu's and we love live music...

This band was great!  Right up until they took a 30 minute break in the middle of our dinner.

Luckily, it was recommended to us by a local {while we waited} to get Lulu's specialty, cheeseburgers.  That's just what we did!  We were definitely hungry by the time we ate.  {Mr. Connell would like for you to know that the burgers were grass fed beef and he wasn't crazy about them.}

That's it for the restaurants we ate at around the Gulf Shores!  We lucked up and really enjoyed each one of them...  Now that we've talked about food so much, I'm off to get dinner!  :)

xoxo

Fort Morgan

This weekend has been very full!  1.  For those of you who said your prayers for my cousin, Jenny, and her baby, everyone is perfectly healthy!  Thank you!!  2.  Today is my mother's birthday, so happy birthday to the best mother I know!!

*******

On our last day of vacation, Mr. Connell and I wanted to check out the actual Fort Morgan.

The fort was completed in 1834, but wasn't actually used until the early 1860 in the Battle of Mobile.

Because of the 30 years between building and being used in battle, it was already outdated.

The soliders were defeated very quickly.  It wasn't really used after that.

Now it serves as a historic area for tourists like ourselves to travel around.  The fort itself is built in a star formation, almost as if it's sunken within a rolling hill.  That picture above is of the waterless moat between the outer wall and the interior of the fort.

Brick corridors lead through big open rooms.  It was the brick that I loved the most.

There's Mr. Connell again looking out over the middle of the fort.

I'm pretty sure he was also wondering when I was going to be ready to go {even though he remembers much more of the history of it than I do}.

The stairs we took to get back down were terribly tall and narrow!  I just pictured men being forced to run up and down them for whatever reason and I wondered if any ever fell down or off them.

Fort Morgan was definitely interesting to see.

We were glad we got to tour it for half price {$3/person}, but seeing a part of history is worth it.

Hope you've all had a great weekend!!

xoxo

Mom's birthday

Happy Birthday to my precious mother!

We celebrated Mom with dinner out

and dessert at our house...

I couldn't love her any more than I do!

xoxo

The Ferry to Daulphin Island

When Chris was younger,

he vacationed with his family on Daulphin Island.

It's a little island right off the Gulf Shores and he's told me so many fun stories about it.  Since Fort Morgan {our vacay spot} was only about 25 minutes away by ferry, we couldn't help but see what the island looked like now with a trip on a ferry ride.

Ferry rides are fun!

There really isn't much to them...  They cram as many cars together on one barge and ride off.



For both rides, we couldn't get out of our car because of the tight squeeze, but some people would walk around.  I was content just snapping pictures from the car.

It was pretty wild just sitting in your car and seeing miles of water to either side of you.

It doesn't look like it, but those oil rigs are huge!

Daulphin Island was beautiful. 

It was a low key beach town with about 1300 residents.  I didn't take any pictures of the beach, because the beach house Chris' grandparents owned had been washed away by a hurricane.  Even the place Chris used to love to eat at closed down.  Things do change in 20 years I guess!  We did enjoy our self-guided tour of the island.

And just to prove we had been to the island,

Chris bought a t-shirt and I bought a Christmas ornament.  :)

xoxo

The Gulf Shores

For our 2nd Anniversary,

Chris and I took a vacation.

We scheduled the whole week off of work, packed our bags, and hit the road for the Gulf Shores.

For this vacation we took our whole Connell family...

Our little furball, Macy!

We were a bit concerned about how she'd do with a 9 hour car ride, but we couldn't have asked for a better passenger.  I think she was just glad to be with us and that we hadn't left her at home!

and, yes, if you're wondering, that's her car seat.  Safety first, my friends!

This allows her to see out, which prevents her from running back and forth on the seat and jumping up to look out the windows.  Worth the investment to us!

The Gulf is beautiful.

Our trip couldn't have been timed any better.  The weather was in the high 70s, low 80s the whole time and there was hardly anyone on the beach.  We went in mid-May, which is prior to school being out and before peek travel time.

You can imagine we did a great deal of relaxing on this trip.



Macy loved burying her face in the sand. 

I would try and wash it off, only to have her do it again and again. 

So, sandy face it was!

See those oil rigs out there?

I was a bit surprised you could see them as well as you can, but Chris said that was pretty normal.  They're really far out - the flatness of the ocean is deceiving. 

There didn't appear to be any effects of the oil spill that I could visualize.  However, I did find little stains on the bottom of my feet after long walks.  After examining it, the stains did appear to be oil that had mixed with sand.  It wasn't bad though and it wouldn't prevent me from going again.

Family picture taken by self-timer on someone else's beach chair on one of our long walks

We all loved our long walks down the beach.  It was peaceful and quiet.

Just one thing:  I love that man.

and I really love holding his hand walking on the beach.

Chris and I looked at all the beach houses
and imagined what it would be like to have one of our own.

Macy just ran around, smelled everything, and loved the wind in her hair.

One tip for my manually shooting friends:  Increase your aperature for sunbeams (as compared to a sun blob).  The higher your aperature, the more prominent your sunbeams!

The furball.  Running in the wind. 

And in just about all of my pictures because she loves running ahead.

That picture above is the only evidence there were other people with us on the beach.

See the tent?  Those people caught a shark in the water on our first day.  A shark!  About 4 feet in length which they caught from the beach.

I was shocked.

Luckily, one of the wives assured me that the bait was at least 300 yards away.

THE BAIT?

That was the beginning and the end of my ocean swimming adventures.

I chose to be more of a land girl for the rest of the week. 

Macy agreed.  She didn't want to be mistaken for shark bait either.

Can you spot the little black dog?

I know I jokingly told you about our beach bungalow here.

It was such a good place for us to stay!  We rented from Harris Properties.  They were very efficient and helpful  The house was just liked it appeared to be in the pictures from their website.  It was clean {that's the important part to me}.  In reality, it's the same size as the blue on the on the right.

This one has this lovely porch:

Right on the beach!

We just loved it!  Overall, we were very pleased with our cute beach bungalow.

Last, but not least, the morning at the beach:

My aperature was set lower, so the sun gave off more of a warm glow rather than beams.

Beautiful the glow was...

...especially as it glistened off the water.

I'm leaving you for now with that picture of Macy and her beloved ball. 

We had left it outside overnight and she found it as soon as we went for our walk that morning.

I'll be back though with more vacation pictures very soon!

Vacations with those you love are priceless.

xoxo

PS:  Say one big prayer for my cousin, Jenny! 

She delivers her third baby tomorrow.