Remembering...

God Bless America, Land that I love!

New Mountaineer Entrance Video

Mountaineer Football Season is HERE!

It's that time of year again......Mountaineer Football time! It started out as a pretty day to attend the first football game of the year vs. our in-state rival, Marshall University. Morgan proudly donned her new cheerleading outfit and drug out her pom poms for the game.


We were happy to have Aunt Lola stop by the house for the weekend before the game. Morgan had a fun time playing with Lola.

She's got all the cheerleading poses down pat!

Morgan and her cousin, Shannon

The first tailgate of the year was great! Above are the younger tailgaters, who had been going strong since 8 AM!

At the game, Morgan and I both had our first Zul (frozen lemonade) of the year. It was HOT, HOT, HOT outside! Morgan didn't feel like posing for a picture.

Singing the National Anthem

Silly Girl

The game was sloppy, and had 2 severe weather delays before being called due to weather. Our 'Eers came out victorious with a 34-13 win to start the season. Morgan and I left before the major weather came through, but Patrick stayed at the stadium through a total of 4 hours of weather delay.

We are excited about the new season with a new coach. And we are looking forward to better weather and another Mountaineer victory next Saturday! Let's GO Mountaineers!!!

Kindergarten, here she comes!

I am a little late on this post, but Morgan started KINDERGARTEN last Thursday, the 18th. Yep folks, I said it. Kindergarten. Big School. For the next 13 years. And she LOVES it.

All the angst I had about her transitioning to the new school was for nothing. She went in like she had been going there for ages, and really enjoys school. She likes to take her backpack to school every day, and eat hot lunch, and carry a lunch box, and the list goes on. She's excited about learning. I just hope this keeps up.

Don't you just love her in that uniform? She looks so grown up! To stay current on the happenings of our little lady, be sure to check out her blog. Lots of pics of the first day of school and a video there too.

Enjoy this video of her walking into the school. You can tell she was really excited to be there!

July Recap

July seemed to come and go so fast I blinked and it was already August. We were a busy bunch this past month, running all over the place, as usual.

We started July in Washington DC with my brother and his wife, my parents (who were in for Morgan's birthday), and my Aunt Pattie and cousin Matthew. July 1st I got to go to The Kennedy Center to see the musical Wicked!. It was an AMAZING show, in an amazing theater. Saturday we spent the entire day in the city, seeing all of the monuments, spending some time in Arlington Cemetary, and walking, walking, walking! I think we walked 20 miles that day is seemed. We ended our evening at the Capitol City Brewery for some good food after a long but very fun day. Sunday some of our family went back into the city to spend some time at the museums. I was too tired and sore from walking the day before, so Mom, Dad, and I went to pick 15 pounds of blueberries at our favorite orchard, and spent the rest of the day lounging around. The 4th of July we drove home and spent the evening in the house. No fireworks for us this year.

The next week Morgan had a play date with my mother's cousin's daughter's son (whew!) and her family in Pittsburgh. Before the play date we took Morgan to get her new school uniforms. Morgan had such a great time being fawned over by all the women who were fitting her and helping us find the proper uniform attire for Kindergarten. Yes, folks, my baby starts school in TWO WEEKS! This Mama is having a very hard time with the fact that she will be starting school.

Mid-July saw Patrick on the road A LOT for work. He spent some time in Baltimore helping some friends pack up their place to move, then back to Baltimore for work. Morgan was busy with swim lessons, which she loved, and I was busy trying to keep track of who needed to be where when. There are some days I don't know how single parents do it!

On July 19th Patrick and I celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary. Although we actually didn't get to spend it together, it was still a great day. I am so blessed to be married to a wonderful man. Here's looking at 80 more honey!

We celebrated Patrick's Grandpa Ralph's 82nd birthday on July 23rd. What a fun weekend that was with a very special man. It was HOT, but we beat the heat with good company and fun with the kids.

Last weekend we traveled to Charlotte, NC to visit our dear friends the Strains. Their son, Morgan's godbrother, Ethan turned one on the 26th of July and we went down to celebrate with him and his family. It was a wonderful weekend with our dear friends, whom we don't get to see nearly enough of.

As August starts, things are slowing down a little bit for us. However, with the start of school (boo hoo!) and the start of football season just around the corner, we are relishing in the lull. Morgan is spending as much time as possible at her Nannie and Big Pop's before school keeps her in Morgantown, and we are preparing for life to be turned upside down when she starts school on the 18th.

So that's the update from Small Town USA. As you can see by the links throughout this post, I keep Morgan's website much more up to date, so you can always stop there if you haven't heard from us in a while. We're still around, just busy, as always!

Five

Happy Birthday to my sweet Morgan. Five years have flown by so quickly.

500

I was hoping to save my 500th post on this blog for our new house, but since it has been nearly 2 months since I last blogged AND there aren't any prospects for a new house on the horizon, I thought I'd better let you all know that the Tenneys are alive and well.

It's been a very hectic last two months. Nothing much major going on, just the craziness of work for both me and Patrick. It seems that we have been going in two different directions, Mach 10 with our hair on fire. And June will be no different. However, Patrick's busy season will be coming to a close in the next few weeks, and my July calendar is freeing up a bit, so I am greatly looking forward to some down time with the family.

Morgan is doing really well. I update her website far more often than I update here, because her life is frankly much more interesting than ours :) She has officially graduated from preschool and is excited about going to a new school in the fall. We are hoping to have her spend lots of time with her grandparents before "real" school starts and we actually have to be in town every week for her to go to school.

House hunting continues. We actually attempted to purchase a house, but that fell through as the seller wouldn't budge on his price. It's been a long road and I am super exhausted. Every house seems to run together! But we are still looking and praying that our house will come along soon.

Not much else is going on in Small Town USA. I hope to update the blog more regularly, but our life has been pretty boring....go to work, go home, clean, repeat. I hope you all are enjoying your summer so far. Stay tuned for more adventures of the Tenney Family!

Scrapbooking Weekend!

I just accidentally published my post about my wonderful scrapbooking weekend on Morgan's page (oops) and don't feel like re-posting it here, so click this link if you want to read about it!

House Hunting

As some of you may already know, we've been house hunting for about 3 weeks. I can't even begin to tell you the number houses I have poured over online. The process has truly been exhausting, and I know we have just started.


However, I am really excited because we actually put in an offer for a house yesterday!!! It's a 3 bedroom ranch in Fairmont, WV with a full, unfinished basement and TONS of potential!




I am trying hard not to get my hopes up, because I know that the process can fall through at the very beginning, but Patrick and I love this house so much we have been praying hard that this is our new home! We love everything about this home. And I hope within the next 48 hours we hear if the sellers accept our offer. We did put in a low offer, but hopefully it will be acceptable.

For now I am off to start looking at more places that we hopefully won't have to go see! If you would, please say a prayer for this process and that God's will be done. I pray that His will includes us living in this new home.

**UPDATE**
Unfortunately we did not get the house we were wanting above. It was a multi-offer situation and our highest bid was beat by the other couple :( I was really upset about it, but really feel God asking me to step out in FAITH and trust Him. So that is what I am doing. And we are back on the hunt this afternoon!

Lucky Thirteen

Thirteen years ago Patrick asked me to be his girlfriend while we were in my dorm room at Dadisman Hall at West Virginia University. It's hard to believe we've been a couple for so many years already. Here's to another year and our 8th wedding anniversary in 2011!

*This picture was taken at Patrick's cousin Matt's wedding in May 1998, 2 months after we started dating.*

Status Quo

There hasn't been much to report around the Tenney household lately. It seems like we have been holding steady, in the work and school routine. We've weathered the snow and moved into the rain, looking forward to nicer days ahead with the promise of Spring.

Patrick is gearing up for the beginning of "workshop season" which starts tomorrow with a Suicide Intervention/Prevention workshop in Morgantown. He is also in charge of organizing a bullying awareness conference that has over 500 attendees! He's been very busy at work. He is leaving next week for a well deserved golf trip to South Carolina with his best friend/cousin Matt.

Morgan is doing well. She spent some time with the in-laws and had a great time at their house. She's been a little under the weather this week, resulting in a few days at home with Mama and Daddy. I smiled yesterday when she said she through her tears that she didn't want her Daddy to stay with her, she wanted her Mama. It was sweet.

I haven't been doing much other than a little housework here and there. I started a new cross stitch project that I am working on. I also had a great day shopping with my Aunt the other day. We try to do that once a month and I always come with bags of stuff!

We are finishing off the basketball season this week with two home games. Then we'll reclaim our weekends until September :) We have a few trips planned in the coming month, lots of birthdays to celebrate, and hope to get out house hunting soon.

So we're not doing anything too special. Sorry it's been a while since my last post, but we've pretty much been status quo.

My Loves

Happy Valentine's Day to my three loves.....love my little family!

Stuck in between

It's been a season of stuck in between lately for me. Stuck in between pain and tolerance. Between anger and forgiveness. Between agony and contentment. When your "fat pants" are too big and your next size down are too small. Friends, it's a very frustrating place to be.

After dealing with some pretty intense personal things in early November to rushing through the holidays it seems I was spit out in January absolutely exhausted. January is such a depressing month for me in general. Holiday decorations have been put away. Parties have stopped. The weather gets more severe, and things at work slow to a snail's pace. It gives me a lot of time to contemplate what has been going on in my life. This year I have realized that I am stuck in a quagmire, unable to really make headway in any direction. I've been struggling against myself and against situations that are far out of my control. My energy is depleted and my patience is thin.

February has begun and I hope to have a path to move toward this month. I started reading a book called Calm My Anxious Heart by Linda Dillow. It's all about teaching yourself to give your situations over to God and allow Him to rule the situations of your life. I am hoping that this book will illuminate that path I so desperately look for, and will provide some spiritual renewal that I believe will help bolster other energies. If you have any extra energy just hanging around your house, could you bottle it up and send it my way?

Happy Birthday Cecelia!

Today our sister-in-law, Cecelia, celebrates her 30th birthday. We want to wish her the very best as she begins a new decade. We love you!

WVU Basketball

Today the Tenneys spent the afternoon with our good friends Josh and Anna Robinson at the WVU Coliseum watching the Mountaineers take on the #8 Purdue Boilermakers. It was Morgan and my first game of 2011, and boy was it a good one. Morgan got her first Zul (frozen sweet lemonade) of the new year, and we all got free Gold Rush t-shirts! It was a sloppy game by both teams, with less than 50 points total at the half. But the second half was much better and the Coliseum got L-O-U-D!

I'm pretty sure that is Greg Gumble of CBS Sports down there.
WVU basketball great, Da'Sean Butler (a member of last year's Final Four team)

Head coach Bob Huggins, yelling at the refs for yet another horrible call.

The 'Eers were able to come out with a 4 point victory today, and we loved singing Country Roads at the end of the game (a WVU tradition after every home football and basketball win). Next week we'll be back at the Coliseum for the next home game. We can't wait!

Nothing says "a 4 year old girl lives here" like naked Barbies in the bathtub.

Nothing says "I am rushed every morning" like getting to work and discovering you have on one brown boot and one black boot.

Nothing says "I hate reading out loud" like asking your preschooler to get out her story reader and sit next to you for a bed time story.

Nothing says "my husband loves me" like watching him clean up dog vomit just so you won't have to.

Nothing says "I don't know, why don't you tell me what's for dinner?" like an empty oven.

Nothing says "Mommy needs to be alone for one blasted second!" like a locked bathroom door.

Nothing says "I love you" like a strawberry on the cheek.

Nothing says "I'm overwhelmed" like noticing that it is awfully quiet but not going to investigate because you are enjoying the peace.

Nothing says "Mommy body" like a roadmap of stretchmarks on your stomach.

Nothing says "You may think I'm trustworthy in the bathroom, but I'm not" like a counter full of hand soap and a floor full of water.

Nothing says "A four year old girl lives here" like naked Barbies in the bathtub.

Dec 25-31 Review

The last week of 2010 was very busy, but very fun for the Tenney family. I plan to post the recap of each day under the actual day it happened, so you will have to look back into 2010 to see what we did. We had lots of fun and took lots of pictures. So stay tuned and scroll down!

New Year, New Directions

Happy New Year from the Tenneys! I will be the first to admit that I am happy to see 2010 go. It was a tough year, especially the last 5 months. I am excited about the freshness we experience with the first day of a new year. We anticipate a few major life events in 2011 (and no, I am not pregnant :) and more than anything look forward to being more active as a family unit.

I've thought a lot about changes for 2011. I've made pointless resolutions in the past, and the "standard" resolutions of leading a healthier life and losing weight are always on the forefront of my mind so are therefore not resolutions.

In 2011 I will have one challenge for myself....to make time to be creative through Morgan's scrapbook, which is nearly entirely incomplete, and cross stitching. I hope to complete Morgan's first year of life in her scrapbook and create/complete 3 cross stitch projects.

So here's praying that all of you have a blessed 2011. I am happy that you are a part of this blog. It is one creative outlet that I truly enjoy.