VOTE!

I know you can't get enough right now of the election! Well, this is something you need to vote on, but it's not for President.
Vote for the driver of our 98 racecar, Justin Wakefield, for most popular driver. Click on this link http://www.speed51.com/2008_Stories/MPD/SLM_MPD.html then scroll down to the PASS South list, click on Justin Wakefield, and cast your vote. You can vote once a day. I know me and my peeps are online way more than the rest of these drivers and their fam, so let's show them and win!
I'm all about winning...on the track and off! GO 98!

North Georgia State Fair

We made our annual visit to the fair and it was sooooo fun! Me, Jake, the kids, Mom, Lindsey and Taylor went together, but when we got there everyone was there! Well, it seemed like at least half the crowd was people we knew! We met up with Hollie, Pete and their girls...Kim was there with her kiddos and her family too...Chris, Jen, and Emme met us there...I've not named everyone, but you get the idea. :) Hollie and Pete had 1/2 their church with them! The food was yummy as always, the rides were exciting, if you like the feeling that at any minute the ride might fly apart and break along with you in it...hahaha, :) but most of all the time spent laughing and talking with family and friends was the best! Mom didn't realize what she was getting herself into by going to the fair with us. We picked her up about 6:00pm and didn't leave the fair until all the lights went out after 11:00pm! Considering she doesn't ride any rides and is trying to not eat junk food, she had lots of time to walk around, hang out, and keep giving the grandkids money for this thing they had to do or this game they had to play! Not to mention, she played some mean games of Bingo too! Dad had plans for the night so he couldn't come along...even if he hadn't had plans he wouldn't have "hung in" there half as long as Mom! Dad would have liked the eating part and the hanging out for a while, but then he would have had enough. The kiddos...never enough! Yet again I left my camera at home. Sorry, but I did just get home the day before from Disney World, tried to unpack, getting ready for our next trip, and everything else, so I have an excuse...sort of! You know what the pics would be like...just imagine the lights, food, kids smiling ear to ear, rednecks in the background...you got it! FUN, FUN, FUN!!!

Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party

Just in case you didn't recognize these 2, it's Indiana Jones and the Candy Corn Princess...aka my CC and KC! All dressed up and ready for the PARTY! Who are these crazy peeps on the monorail??? They must be CRAZY!!! They look a little familiar to me!?! I'm still in disbelief that I got talked into dressing up...just representing for the Flintstones!!! Just wait until Halloween actually gets here...this won't be the last you see of the Flintstones yet! Believe it or not, we actually were a "hit" at the party. People kept stopping us and asking if we'd pose for a picture! Too funny...it happened at least 5 or 6 times. The ones who didn't ask to take our picture would just yell out our "Flintstone names" at us or point and stare! Needless to say we didn't go un-noticed. :) CC and KC were embarrassed by us and the scene we were making at first. I guess they finally got use to it! Looking cute at the Magic Kingdom!
The "kiddos" with Pluto at our character dinner!
"Betty" gettin' nuzzled by Dale after dinner! :)
We rode the rides in Magic Kingdom with absolutely NO WAITS! This is a miracle for the Magic Kingdom. You gotta love the special event nights. We stayed until they closed at midnight and we'd had all the fun we could handle! Loved the Halloween Fireworks and the Halloween parade, by the way! (even though I can't count how many times I've seen them) :)
FUN, FUN NIGHT!!!

More Disney Fun

As I told you in a previous post KC has started her own blog. Here she is on our trip taking pictures of her own...yeah, we were all waiting for her, but she got some good pics! Give her a couple of days and I'm sure she'll have a new story to post.
The boys always like to get a boat, so here are my 2 men out on the lake. Too cool!
"Look Mom, no hands!" Hahaha. Lindsey and Taylor taking a turn on the little boat.
As KC informed me, "Getting a hair wrap at Disney is a tradition". So here she is!
We rode tons of rides on our trip. All the good stuff at the Disney parks then we went to the Universal parks for more thrills. Who can get enough roller coasters??? Not my CC...just at Islands of Adventure he rode The Hulk 3 times then Dueling Dragons 2 times! I don't have pictures of all our adventures...mainly due to the fact that I was too busy riding the rides to take pictures!
All I can say is this is what you feel like after a few days with The Carswells...
We are out of control!!! :)

1st Part of Our Trip and Lindsey's Birthday

We had a great trip to Orlando and Disney World this past week. We stayed at the Polynesian Hotel, which is nice and convenient to the parks. The kids had a blast, as usual, and are already ready to go back! Below is a picture I took of all my children! Yes I have 4 now. CC loves the volcano slide at the Polynesian...he couldn't do it enough times. KC, on the other hand, wasn't sure about the slide...until she finally got the courage to try it! She gave into the "pressure" and just did it!
Then, she was the one who couldn't get enough! This picture was her 1st time down, so she wasn't real sure about it!
We celebrated Lindsey's 22nd birthday while we were in Disney. We spent the 1st part of the day at Animal Kingdom then had lunch at Rainforest Cafe. "Deb" was our waitress and was sweet and funny. Linds needed her picture taken with Deb to remember our lunch with her! After lunch we were off to Epcot and later to Hollywood Studios. We rounded out the fun with a late dinner back at the hotel. We definitely made a day of it! Happy Birthday to Lindsey!!!

Thursday 13

Wow, I remembered it was Thursday! I'm home now from the beach, but headed out tomorrow with the kiddos, Jake, Lindsey and Taylor for Disney World! YAY, FUN!!! The kids are excited to see Mickey...again. We have our fall break from school next week, so we are going to take advantage of it. Jake's parents and one of his sisters and her little girl are planning to meet us down there for a few of the days, so we're excited to get to hang out with them too.

So, here's 13 things I'm looking forward to this week and love about Disney.

1. Hanging out with no school or homework
2. Spending time with family
3. Chilling by the pool in the sun
4. Lindsey's Birthday
5. Riding Rockin' Rollercoaster
6. Watching fireworks by the lake
7. Eating yummy food
8. Watching the kids frantically run from ride to ride with excitement
9. Spending way too much money on useless and overpriced things...haha it's Disney, what do I expect??
10. Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party...dressing up!?! Just wait for the pics :)
11. Trying to get into all the restaurants we like to eat at without a reservation
12. The magical aura of the entire Disney property
13. Coming back home so we can go racing!!!

Beach Bunny Fun

My little diva has decided she wants to have a blog! We started working on it and believe it or not she's been the one updating it. I looked this morning and she'd added stuff I didn't even know about. It's amazing what kids these days know about computers...although mine did start using the computer at the age of 2! Now at 9 and 10 they have notebook computers of their own...one pink and one blue. Who is spoiling these kids like that?!? Ummmm, not only me, they have Daddy wrapped pretty tight too! :) When you get a minute you'll have to check out KC's blog. Leave her a comment!!! She's sooooo excited about this, she'll be thrilled to know someone has looked at her site....it doesn't matter if she knows who you are or not! If you are my friend you are her friend too!

http://www.beachbunnyfun.blogspot.com/

Happy Monday

I hope you had a great weekend.
We went to PCB Thursday afternoon for a long weekend and to do a Men's Conference with Dad. The conference was at St. Andrews Baptist in Panama City on Friday night and Saturday morning. The conference went great...Dad, Jake and CC said. The girls went out to dinner on Friday night and slept late Saturday before heading onto the beach for the day. CC helped Jake the whole conference and loved it! He was making CD's and running credit cards. Learning to work hard from his Daddy and Papa! Once the conference ended my boys spend the afternoon on the beach, but Dad was back on the plane to Woodstock. Day and night, night and day...he never stops! :) The weather was beautiful all weekend, even with the hurricane in the Gulf. The water was rough and higher than normal, but sunny skies and HOT!
My kids have a different week out of school for fall break than the rest of our county, so we have school this week. The fam headed back to GA. Sunday night, but minus the Mommy. I stayed at the beach! Mom was staying a few more days, so I couldn't resist. I didn't want her to be all alone. Aren't I a sweet, thoughtful daughter?!? I will come back...one of these days! :) No, really I can't stay away from my 3 babies long! Kissy, Kissy Jakey Poo...
There's probably all of maybe 3 people going to even be reading my rambles considering almost everyone is either at the beach or Disney World this week, but I hope all 3 of you have a great Monday and a great start to the week! See you soon.

Wii Fit

My first love will always be Guitar Hero, but I at least have some other game now that I like. I've been trying to buy Wii Fit since early summer and every time it would be sold out. I finally got one a couple of weeks ago in PCB. When I first got it home we had alot going on so I didn't get to play. I got around to trying it out last week...too fun! Lindsey and Taylor had come over for dinner and to hang out. We got the kids to bed and Taylor and Jake went into our room and started playing Nascar 09 on the PS3. Lindsey was doing something, so I went downstairs to check out the Wii. About an hour or so later here comes Lindsey looking for me...I'm running in place, sweating and laughing the whole time! She thought I'd lost it this time for sure! Well, not for long cause next thing you know she's hoola-hooping and skiing! Next it's on to get the boys...all I got to say is Jake and Yoga??!!...scary. I got about as good of a work-out laughing until I was crying at that sight! So now it's not only Guitar Hero, Wii Fit gets added into the rotation. What more can you ask for...work-out, maybe...fun, tons of it!

Post-Victory

After the big Victory in N.C. we still had the Labor Day holiday left to hang out. We went over to Myrtle Beach late Saturday night after the race to chill for Sunday and Monday. We arrived dark and early at all of 4:00 in the morning! We went to Ocean Lakes again since we were close by. We would have loved to have headed back to PCB, but 1st of all we would have used up all our time traveling back down there, and 2nd the weather ended up not being great down there because of Gustav being in the Gulf. Anyway, we love to go to Myrtle Beach, so this was a good opportunity.

We did a bunch of nothing except relaxing on the beach and playing. We ate some yummy steaks the boys grilled for us and topped it off with some hot brownies and ice cream too, all while watching the Cup race on television outside with the waves crashing in the distance...ahhh what more can you ask for??? Hmmmm, massage on the beach in the ocean breeze?? hot cabana boy misting you with water in the warm sunshine?? being served fresh fruit and iced water while lounging by the water?? Not me!!?? Nooooo, never! Hahaha. We'll save that for another trip...but for this one we had a wonderful time hanging out with our family and friends!

Jake's best birthday EVER!!!

On August 30th Jake had a birthday! We'd known since the race schedule had come out that we'd be racing this year on his birthday. He'd rather spend a day at the track than almost anything else, so this was perfect. Little did we really know...this day would be so great and Jake get the best present...Win #2 for the season!!! Back to back wins...woohoo!
As you can tell from the above picture I get a little into the racing and was thrilled about the win! It was just unbelievable! We'd qualified on the pole, which showed we had a good car, then ran 2nd or 3rd most of the night. In my mind, during the race, I was thinking that 2nd or 3rd for the night was going to be good...but the race wasn't over yet! It seemed to be the never-ending race there towards the end. Next thing I know the 1st and 2nd cars wrecked each other. The caution came out, they got the track cleared, and the 98 was in 1st. Green flag, another wreck, caution, green flag, wreck, caution,green flag....We got down to the final green, white, checkered finish and the 98 held on and got it!!!
Our win a few weeks ago was awesome...but 2 in a row, and on Jake's birthday...incredible!!! We now have another trophy to add to our now collection. I'm liking that! I'd already given Jake a present from me and the kids, but after the race I should have taken it back. Hahaha. He'd take a race win over about anything I could buy!
To top things off for the day, we had lots of our friends and family at the track for the day with us. (we missed you Dad and Jody J.) Jake's Mom made a cake, so after the race, close to midnight, we had a little party...celebrated Jake's bday and added on some celebrating for the win! I can't even tell you what a day it was! Definitely a birthday Jake will never forget!
Happy Birthday Jake! Go 98!

Are you feeling neglected??

I know of one person who is...but I promise it's not intentional! I've been sooo on the go, with sooo many fun things going on that I can not stop long enough to update my blog! I'm on it now though... really soon, like in just a minute, as soon as I let the A/C man in, and he leaves, and I get dressed, and I finish straightening up...get the point? I don't even know what to post. I gotta sit and think about what all I'm going to tell you about. I know of one important thing, so hold on and I'll be right back!