Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Easter

We had an amazing Easter! I have always loved easter. Growing up I loved the new dresses, sunrise service, breakfast at church and Easter egg hunts at my grandparents. Such good memories. Now that i am older I still love all that stuff but I really love the reason for Easter. I used the 40 days leading up to Easter to deepen my prayer life and focus on the sacrifice that was made for me. ( I also gave up chocolate, which I do every year) The Good Friday service at my church was amazing and really put the weekend in perceptive for me. We also enjoyed all the Easter egg hunts and the Easter bunny.

Daddy took John Thomas to the Easter egg hunt at his school, I had to work, and Daddy didn’t take any pictures. John Thomas came home with candy, prizes and crafts so I believe it was a good time.

Easter weekend we had an egg hunt along with brunch and kids service at church. John Thomas had a blast!!

I love love this little boy!

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No shortage of treats and prizes!

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Easter day was church, brunch and egg hunt at the country club and a beautiful day spent outside. So thankful!!

Easter Basket was a huge hit! especially the hungry hipo game and dinosaur swim trunks.

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on a walk, Ohio really is pretty in the spring077

Friday, April 18, 2014

Road to the Elite Eight!

The best part about this whole journey was to watch the crazy amount of hours my husband puts into his job pay off and being able to be a part of it. I am so thankful we were able to travel with the team and watch history be made. Dayton loves their basketball team and supported them so much! Flyer fans took over Memphis, even ESPN was reporting how it would be a home game for Dayton because of the fans.

The first night we arrived we got on the bus and had a police escort to the hotel. It was crazy! There were two cars and at least 10 motorcycles. They escorted us everywhere we went. Dinner the first night was about 5 blocks from our hotel and we had an escort, the arena were the games where held was less than a half of a mile and we had an escort.

Memphis was a great place to be, warmer weather and plenty of stuff to do right around our hotel.

John Tomas loved the ducks at the Peabody! Loved! Every morning at 11 a red carpet would be rolled out and the ducks would get off the elevator walk the red carpet and get in the fountain. The entire process would take maybe a minute and there would be around 300 people watching. The first day I stayed and let him watch the ducks until 12:30 he thought it was great:)

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One of the restaurants had goats running around outside:)

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A bakery in Dayton sent good luck cookies to Buffalo and Memphis before all the games. It is the same bakery that made John Thomas’ birthday cake. His face says it all – SO GOOD!

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Before the Dayton Stanford game. i had to wake John Thomas up from his nap and he was not happy about being at the game. HA. One day he will appreciate it more:)  089

He requested the same picture to be made:) and proceeded to eat popcorn like a dog (his words)

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WE WON! On to the Elite Eight. Dayton had not been to the Elite Eight in 30 Years! Lots of celebrating!!

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We were waiting for Tommy in the back after the game and I thought this was an appropriate picture. Tommy coached at FL for several years and one of our best friends is an assistant there now. I sent it to our FL friends too. 103

John Thomas had a buddy on this trip. The academic advisor for the basketball team has a little girl, Kennedy, JTs same age so they had a blast together. We spent one rainy day at the children’s museum. They loved it.

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I love when he actually request pictures with me. I am always the one requesting which 95% of the time means he doesn’t look at the camera. But when he ask he will tell me to look at the camera and say cheese:) so this blurry, bad lighting picture makes me happy.

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Before the Florida game

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One of my best friends, Stephanie, came from Arkansas to cheer on the Flyers! On Wednesday Stephanie and Brad came down, watched our game on Thursday. Friday she drives back, drops off her husband and gets her 16 year old son that wanted to come for the Saturday game. What a good mom and friend!

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Unfortunately we lost but the guys played a great game and everyone was so proud! After the game you would have never guessed we lost because all the fans were still cheering for the guys. It was a special moment. So proud of the team.

I think this sums up how we all felt by the end:)

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Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Road to the Sweet Sixteen

I am so proud of the team and my husband for making it to the Elite Eight! We had the best time supporting the team and I am amazed at how the community supported us. All the Dayton games had the highest TV ratings, Dayton was the most tweeted about school (even Obama sent out a tweet), we were on the cover of so many newspapers including the New York Times. Crazy!

Selection Sunday we found out we would be going to Buffalo for the first round. John Thomas wakes up Monday morning running a fever and feeling awful! I took him to the dr to find out he has pneumonia! My child who is 3 years old, who had never been on an antibiotic, has pneumonia. The team was flying out Tuesday for Buffalo. The dr saw us again Tuesday morning at 11am and cleared us to fly out with the team at 2pm. Needless to say the first few days in Buffalo were rough! Poor JT didn’t feel good. Tommy stayed in a different room than us so he could get his work done. Rough start to our trip. On the positive side Little Tommy was able to fly to Buffalo to meet us. The whole family got to experience the first round of the tournament together!

Our first night in Buffalo we had an amazing meal! I finally got John Thomas to eat something – ice cream :)

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The team on the way to the first game, against Ohio State

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GAME ONE – DAYTON VS OHIO STATE

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Enjoying a little popcorn :) JT had zero interest in the ballgames! He enjoyed snacks and Ipad. I am sure it will be different in a few years.

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A friend sent me this picture that was in the paper, you can spot me and my belly at the end of the row

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We beat Ohio State! Big, big deal here in Ohio. The media went crazy. It was so cool to be a part of it.

We spent a lot of time in the hotel room in Buffalo. John Thomas and I rented movies and went to the mall with the other women on the trip while the guys worked. It was too cold to do anything else!

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29 weeks pregnant

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GAME TWO – DAYTON VS SYRACUSE

 

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Waiting on press, interviews, etc. after games. The guys eventually became bored too and helped John Thomas with his games.

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After the win against Syracuse we came back to Ohio on Sunday to prepare to go to Memphis on Tuesday!

Kennedy was so happy to us (and vice versa!!)

 

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Memphis update coming soon!