The Biggest Loser

I'm sitting here watching The Biggest Loser Season Finale. They are so inspiring! I have never been able to watch a whole season until this year. Now I can't skip a week because I'm so addicted to it. They are amazing and look SO good.

Life has been a little crazy lately. Chad has been in charge of the track team all by himself for the last month and a half so I have been helping him as much as I can by helping him with office work, going to the track meets, doing pretty much everything around the house, and making sure he is eating and getting some rest (as much as possible). I just have one question...why is our grass growing like crazy when I am in charge of cutting it. I am just beginning to learn about gardening and taking care of the lawn, but I don't think this is normal. We have been getting ALOT of rain lately, but no one else has grass that is growing out of control.

Last Thursday Chad took 4 athletes to Knoxville for a track meet and was supposed to be back late Friday night to take another group of runners to Ole Miss on Saturday morning. Some bad weather came across the area and they postponed 4 of the races until Saturday, so that left me to take the athletes to Ole Miss by myself. Luckily, Chad has two former athletes helping him out right now and they were able to come with me. I woke up at 4:15am on Saturday!!! We left about 5:45 with me driving a 15-passenger van! Yes, that is right! I drove one a few weeks ago, but that meet was only about 45 minutes away. We did not get home until almost 12:00 that night, so it was a very long day. On Sunday I took a really long nap and somewhat recuperated. I just don't know how Chad does it every weekend.

This weekend they are running at Georgia on Saturday. They are leaving on Friday afternoon and I have the day off, so I will go with them. We are taking a bus, so it will be a little easier. They do not run the next weekend, but a recruit may be coming into town. The weekend after that is Conference in Missouri. I will take off Thursday and Friday to go with them. After that, things will calm down a bit.

By the way, we finished our Crown Financial Ministries class. I started keeping very accurate records of our budget on our laptop and then it crashed a few weeks ago!! We lost everything including our taxes, which I had already done, but not filed yet. How frustrating!

The computer is now fixed and I got our taxes redone and filed last week.

We only have 5 more weeks of school until summer and I can't wait.

Through all of the business and difficult times, God continues to draw us closer to each other and give us strength when we don't have any left. We are learning to be content in all circumstances and fully trust in Him.

Tara

Spring Break

Chad and I were both on spring break this past week. It was much needed and at just the right time. Although Chad still had to work throughout the week, we were able to get alot of work done around the house and manage to relax some, sleep alot (OK, I did this more than Chad), and spend some quality time together before the athletes come back and track meets start up again. In the beginning of the week my mom and Roland came to visit. We ran some errands on Saturday while Chad was at a track meet. On Sunday we took them to church, went shopping a little, and prepped the kitchen for painting. Yes, I said painting! On Monday we painted the kitchen a beautiful green color. They left on Tuesday morning and Chad and I painted our "sitting room" which we are turning into our study. I could not have gotten that much done without mom and Rolands help! Thanks! Here are some before and after pictures:


The kitchen before painting. Check out the lovely diamond pattern. While someone spent alot of time on it, it was just not us!

Another picture of the kitchen before painting. The eat-in kitchen area is a gold/tan color if you can't tell.

This is our "sitting room" before painting. As you can see it is a lovely DARK burgandy. While it might be nice for an A&M fan, it was not for us and much too dark for that small of a room.

Mom an I are painting a coat of Kilz on the sitting room walls before painting them.

Chad decided he would help us. He is taping the walls up before painting.

The "sitting room" with a coat of Kilz on the walls. A work in progress.

Here is the kitchen after painting, but still a mess. Looks much better!

The final product in the kitchen-a dark sage green.
The eat-in kitchen. How lovely!

The sitting room. It is a little lighter than the kitchen, but you cannot tell here. Now we notice other changes that we need to make because of the beautiful wall color. We'll start with the couch, it has to go! We will turn this room into our study and are currently looking for a black desk to go in it's place. That beautiful plant and lamp need to go too!

Wow! What a difference. Now we just need to find another place for the exercise ball.

While the painting really lasted until Friday after we did all the touch-ups and got everything picked up and put back in place, it was well worth it to see the difference it made.

The rest of the week was filled with doing taxes, running errands, going to doctor's appointments, and working (for Chad). Chad's parents are coming into town tomorrow and we are planning on cleaning our siding and pressure washing while they are here. Look for that update soon! I will try to take lots of pictures.

Tara

Busy, Busy, Busy

I'm sorry it has been so long since I have blogged. We have had alot going on lately and there is just not enough time in each day. Here are some of the things that have been keeping us busy:

1. Crown Financial Ministries
We are taking at class at our church called "Crown Financial Ministries." It is a 10 week class that looks at what scripture says about money and being a good steward of God's money. Along with each week's Bible study there are also worksheets to complete about debts, budgeting, life insurance, ect. Although the class hs not gone as in depth about finances as we thought it would, it has been very beneficial in teaching us that it is not our money, but God's money and we must been good stewards with what He has given us.

2. House Improvements
Although our house was built in 2000, we are trying to make some small improvements in hopes of increasing the value when we try to sell it. We are extremely SLOW at this because our opinions seem to be on opposite ends of the spectrum. While this can be very frustrating at times, God is teaching us patience and how to compromise.

3. TRACK SEASON
Track season is here! Samford had their first outdoor track meet last Saturday and will have one almost every weekend until the middle of May. It will be a very long few months, but I hope it goes by quickly. Needless to say, Chad is VERY busy and spends lots of time working in his office or at home. That leaves me to take care of most things around the house on my own. While it is very tough, God knows what we can handle and He seems to give us time to spend together just when I don't think I can take it any longer.

I'm going to try hard to blog more regulary, even if nothing exciting is going on in our lives.

Tara

President's Day

It was a quiet weekend around the James house. Chad left for an indoor track meet at Clemson University early Friday morning and did not get home until about midnight on Saturday night (Guess what I was doing when he got home? Yes, that's right, I was fast asleep!).

On Friday night I watched The Waitress with Keri Russell. It was a weird movie!

On Saturday I worked on getting some of the house organized, but I sure do have a LONG way to go still. We are still trying to combine/mesh all of our "stuff" and it is really hard. Also, we are trying to decide what color we will paint our kitchen and sitting room. We decided on a sage green, but we have MANY shades to chose from. I narrowed it down to 10 from about 40 or 50. I definitely have a favorite, so I'll have to see if Chad agrees. We are going to paint on our Spring Break so we need to chose a color soon.

On Sunday after going to church we went to visit some friends from college who also go to our church, James and Heidi Drake. They had a baby so we wanted to meet him, James Isaiah Drake, and he is precious! I forgot my camera so I don't have a picture of him. She let me hold him for a long time and I loved every minute of it.

Today I was out of school for President's Day and it's just so nice to have a 3 day weekend. I stayed busy running errands and managed to rest a little.

Tara

Surround Sound Rocks!

We finally hooked our surround sound speakers up last weekend. Instead of running the speaker wires through the walls, we decided to tack them up on the outside of the wall right under the crown molding. Although we thought this was the easy and fast way, it still took us 5 hours. Wow! I guess we will get faster once we learn how to be more handy around the house. It was cheaper and did take a lot less time than running them through the walls. Here are some pics.

Tara

Happy Valentine's Day!

Chad took me out for a nice dinner at The Olive Garden on Tuesday night before Valentine's Day to celebrate. We did not want to wait until Thursday and have to fight the crowds of people. I went to work out and called him when I was finished. He normally isn't finished with practice by that time, but he answered his phone and said he wanted to take me out for a surprise Valentine's Dinner. I went straight home to take a shower and get dressed because I was so excited. He came home later with some pick roses and a very sweet card. We had such a wonderful quiet dinner full of conversation, which we have not had much of lately. I, of course, ordered chicken parmigian, which I LOVE, and ate way too much salad and too many breadsticks. It was so nice!

Here are my roses:On Valentine's Day we decided to have a nice quiet night at home. We made pizza on french bread and watched Survivor, one of our favorite shows. It was even more exciting because we got to watch it with surround sound, which we set up the weekend before. I also made Chad some heart shaped muffins. I gave him a nice white button-down shirt, red tie, and black suit pants to go with his suit jacket I bought him for Christmas. Now he has an entire black suit! Hopefully he will get a chance to wear it soon.

Heart-shaped muffins:

Happy Valentine's Day!

Tara

Getting Old

Chad and I decided we are getting too old to stay up late. We got back from the track meet about midnight on Saturday night and could barely keep our eyes open. I think I was worse than him.

We left on Friday to drive to Nashville with some of the athletes that had to compete early Saturday morning. Chad drove a 15-passenger van and there were 14 of us in it with all our luggage and barely any luggage room. We were pretty packed and I can say I was very glad to be the coach's wife at that time because I got the front seat. I did feel a little bad, but I think I have earned that privilege and REALLY did not want to give it up. I felt better the next day when I talked to Mrs. McWaters (the head coach's wife) and she said she would have done the same thing.

We arrived at the hotel in Nashville about 9:30 pm, had a brief team meeting, and went to sleep because we had to wake up at 5:30am the next morning.

The meet got off to a slow start with just the 1600 M. and some field events starting that morning. After a few hours many other teams began arriving including the rest of the Samford team that left Birmingham on a bus that morning at 6:30 am. I kept busy with brief moments of rest in between Chad asking me to do some "favors" for him. I like to refer to them as "duties", I mean can I really say no?!?

We left the arena about 8:00 pm to drive to the other side of Nashville for dinner. After dinner at Atlanta Bread Company and a little ice cream at Maggie Moo's (Cinnamoo Bun...YUM), we began our trek home in the van with only 6 athletes since some of them decided to ride back on the bus. It was alot more pleasant since we weren't as crowded.

The drive back was pretty rough, I could have been asleep in 2 seconds except for the fact that I did not bring my pillow and I was trying to be a good wife and keep Chad from getting tired. So, I talked to Chad as much as possible and kept looking over at him every 5 seconds to make sure his eyes were open. We finally made it back to Samford to drop the athletes off, got my car, returned the van, and zoomed home as fast as possible to get in bed. Needless to say, we slept really hard that night because it was a LONG day!

On Sunday we each took a nap to finish recuperating from the long day on Saturday. I just don't see how Chad does it every weekend. Luckily, for most of the track trips they take a bus so he doesn't have to drive and can sleep on the way home. Overall, it was a fun trip, but I think I will have to choose just a few meets to go to each season.

Tara

A Coach's Wife

I'm sitting here in the Tennessee State University arena watching Samford's first indoor track meet. It's so great to be a coach's wife, this is now my weekend life. I really do enjoy it because I get to relive the glory days of running and be with Chad, even though he is NOT himself at the meets because he is so focused and busy. I just have to get used to asking him questions at least 3 times before he answers and making sure he is eating and drinking throughout the day so that he does not pass out. Also, I have decided that I am his personal errand runner during the meets. I just do whatever he asks whenever he asks. I was amazed to learn that they have wireless internet access throughout their arena!

Let It Snow!

Here are a few pictures of some snow that we got on Jan. 19th. Chad woke up early that morning and I slept in (what's new?). When I woke up I immediately looked outside because I knew there was a good chance of snow that morning. It was snowing!!! It was so great, even for the little amount of time that it lasted. Chad went to Samford that day to meet with some track recruits and was able to get some pictures while he was out. They are beautiful!

Tara

Our First Christmas Together

We had a wonderful first Christmas together. It was really nice to be together the whole time and not have to leave each other. This picture is of us showing that it is our first Christmas together. As you can see, Chad is really excited and into the picture.

We went to my mom's house for about a week. My grandparents, two aunts, brother, sister, and brother-in-law were all there for Christmas. It was really nice for us to all be together because we have not all been together in so long. This picture is everyone that was at my mom's for Christmas.

Katie's parents live about 30 minutes from my mom's house and she was there for Christmas. Leah and Rick were back in Atlanta for Christmas after moving to Seattle. We all met at the Dawsonville outlet mall the day after Christmas for lunch and a little shopping. It was good to visit with them and for us to all be together again.

We went to Chattanooga after Christmas and for New Year's to celebrate with Chad's family. While there I celebrated my 29th birthday. Mark's (Chad's uncle) birthday is on Dec. 31st so we celebrated together and shared an ice cream cake. Unfortunately, we were so busy having fun that we didn't take many pictures in Chattanooga, but we had a great time as always!

Once again, we had a great Christmas! We were so fortunate to be able to see so many of our family members. We look forward to many more exciting Christmas' always together!

Tara

Our House at Christmas

Here are some picutres of some of our Christmas decorations..

We had alot of fun decorating our house together for the first time and putting many new ornaments on our tree. Chad still thinks we need more ornaments, but I think it looks great just like it is.

Tara

First Time Blogger

Well, we've decided to enter the world of blogging! I can't believe we are actually doing this, but we especially want to be able to share pictures with all of our family and friends. I can't promise that I will be great at updating regularly, but I will give it my best shot. We hope you enjoy it!

Tara