What do you get at an annual weekend get together of 6 high school friends and their families? 13 children 4 and under (ages 4, 3, 3, 3, 2.5, 2.5, 2, 1.5, 1, 1, 1, 1, <1) Check out 5 Minutes for Mom for more Wordless Wednesdays!

Even though the Steelers don’t play until Sunday afternoon, football season kicked off in our house last night. We had our Live Draft for our Fantasy Football League last night. The kids were in bed a half hour before their bed time tonight with no story or teeth brushing as we had a 7:45 draft time and were both scurrying to research and formulate our plans right up until it started.

Updated with new picture from today below Today I get to celebrate two of my favorite things… Chick-Fil-A and Football. :-) Today, Chick-Fil-A is giving away their new chicken strips (which, by the way, are delicious, and my hubby and my new fav menu item) to anyone who visits their store wearing a football logo. Check it out here for more details. You better believe that all 5 of us will be sporting our Steelers pride at Chick-Fil-A today when we stop for lunch on our way back from our annual Labor Day get together.

I hurt my toe this week. Really Badly. As in, it’s not a pretty picture, all black and blue and bleeding. Gonna lose the nail. See I told you it wasn’t a pretty picture! I realized this week how much I take that little toe for granted. Until it started hurting, I didn’t realize the impact one little phalange could have on the entire body. (I also didn’t realize how many times a day my feet are stepped on by my kids).

Here are the top 10 reasons why my family loves to go camping. 10. It’s cheaper than a hotel ($20 a night versus $150 a night) 9. Smores! 8. It ensures that the ground will get the water its been deprived of all summer long. 7. Beautiful views 6. Togetherness (look how cozy our beds look in there…we almost always wake with at least one kiddo snuggled up next to us)

Jessica has a fun carnival where she helps keep us bloggers real. The deal is you gotta take pictures of the assignment as is, no tweaking for the cameras. This week she wanted to see “how we roll” as in what our vehicle looks like. The funny thing about this is that when I saw the assignment I thought to myself, “how lucky for me I just cleaned the van out last week when we got back from camping.

Remember back in high school when you were positive that you were going to stay BFF with your group of girl friends? You were positive you were going to marry your high school sweetheart… When I was in high school my friends and I dreamed of growing up, getting married, and living in the same neighborhood. While that dream didn’t exactly pan out, our friendship has remained strong. And 5 of the 6 of us actually went on and married our high school boyfriends.

Yesterday my son called for me to, “Come quick Mom and look, she’s so cute!” … I think he’s got a good eye, don’t you? For More Wordless Wednesdays, check out 5 Minutes for Mom.

Despite the fact that I lack a green thumb and raise suicidal plants, I still attempted a garden this summer with my kids. Some may call me a hopeless optimist, to others I am just naive. But, my oldest two children were particularly excited about this new venture and I didn’t want to let them down. This April we planted a row of peas, a row of green beans, a row of pumpkins, two tomato plants, and two pepper plants.

Sorry for not posting a post race synopsis yesterday, in the words of my dear sister in law, I was “too tired.” The race was a blast! The weather was gorgeous and the views were beautiful. My favorite was running down Main Street in Annapolis looking down at the harbor. It was incredible! The first 5 miles I felt great. I kept up a steady conversation with Karen and at each mile marker would scream out with glee.