happy cinco!

this day always makes me miss college and my best friends from baylor. i think even when i'm 80 (supposing i'll make it that long) the date of may 5 will always bring me back to that red brick house on 9th and wood. i don't know how it all got started, but we annually put on the biggest cinco de mayo fiesta anyone had ever seen! we had mexican food, sparklers, pinatas, margaritas, mexican muumuus, salsa...the whole shabang. and that's also how my famous sangria recipe got started (i'll gladly give you the recipe - it's SO EASY.) the last cinco party that we threw senior year was the best of them all and will go down in history as legendary. it started as a small gathering of close friends from the class of '08 and by the end of the night, i looked across our glittered/confetti lawn and counted 100 people! i even overheard little 18-year-old freshmen exclaiming, "THIS IS THE BEST PARTY I'VE EVER BEEN TO IN MY LIFE!!!" we knew we had to go out big. oh my friends, i miss you so much. thanks for the memories. VIVA CINCO!

mel's wedding/birthday weekend I

yes, my birthday weekend is taking part in a mini series...i know you're on the edge of your seat!!!

as some of you may know, one of my dearest friends and one of my college room mates married the love of her life this past saturday. it was a classy, swanky affair and it had melissa nicole skaar written all over it to the very last detail!

since mel's dad is the pastor at fbc grand prairie, he performed the ceremony, which i thought was very touching. then, after the ceremony and church reception, we headed over to sundance square in ft. worth where the real fun began!

if you presumed that it was a baylor lovefest, you'd be correct. all the baylor ladies and dashing sigma alpha epsilons were in attendance and we danced and dined the night away at the fort worth city club. mel, i'll never forgive you for the dj calling us all out individually and making us bust a move solo on the dance floor!!!! (impromptu "you got served" soul train minus a glass of wine has never looked good on me...) but hey, by the time, "single ladies" rolled around, we were a-okay. by the way, tell jdub that his mother-son dance was a riot! LOVED IT!

everyone at the wedding sang happy birthday to lindsey and i and we were made to feel so special even on mel's day! i had THE BEST time at the skaar-theilig wedding and i truly have never seen a more gorgeous bride - CHECK HER OUT, SHE'S STUNNING! what can i say, my friends are knockouts.






all the baylor bears celebrating with the happy couple (AND THE BIG WIN OVER MIZZOU!)


sheri & nathan gettin' down!!! (this was hilarious.)


the bridesmaid and her mamma!

one great matrimonial affair...

feels like comin' home!

that's right, baylor homecoming was this past weekend and it was great. just great. i had been so stressed out about pulling off the golf tournament, that i totally didn't even register the fact that i was going back to wacko until i got there late friday night.

of course we got stomped by osu and the parade was a little more lackluster than usual, but the company more than made up for it. my entire extended fam (20+) made the voyage down, as did most of my best friends, and an unusually large representation of the class of '08. we made it to all of our old places - scruff's, cricket's, cafe cappuccino, lolita's, and are you ready for it...george's not once, not twice, but THREE TIMES! ah...the smell of crazy wings and the sound of pat green.

more than all of the baylor happenings though, i am most appreciative of my time spent with my best friends. i have longed and pined for their company more than i can ever express. since we're spread out all over the country we hardly ever see each other, but i carry them around in my heart always. we know each other so well that we pick up right where we left off the last time...

what's changed? instead of talking about frat daddies, the hills, and horrendous all-nighters, we now discuss IRA's, purchasing power when dealing with car dealerships, leveraging for better salaries, and being chamber of commerce members. what can i say, my small group of friends is pretty much kicking everyone's rear end and taking names. i am so honored and proud to be associated w/ my group of gals. we all seemed to agree that like-minded, goal-oriented individuals attract each other (gotta love that law of attraction) and that's how we all ended up together. just a sampling of what my bffs are doing: jess is taking over the sales dept at st. louis homes & lifestyles magazine and racking up clients all over the place, ali is top sales at state farm and pretty much runs the company, heather runs development for a prominent albuquerque NPO and is in charge of a 2.5 million capital campaign, britt's in grad school @ tulane getting her masters in social work and she's going to be the next miss louisiana after next weekend, cori jo is tearing it up in law school and clerking for my pops, and allison's shaping young minds and having the first little babe of the group! WOW. no slackers here. we may be baylor girls who prefer pedicures, hilights, and pretty jewelry...but we're all pistols and don't you dare underestimate us!!!

what hasn't changed? we're still fun. too much fun. :)

shame on me, didn't take one single picture this past weekend, but i do have some oldies if you'd like to take a stroll down memory lane...



house party in china spring baby!



random night senior year. we don't do serious very well. lawdy, y'all make me laugh.



ELITE! ELITE!



heather and i are retards that like to dress up in old dance costumes. we thought it was a good idea at the time.



my girlfriends and i used to go down to george's bar, we'd drink big o's until they closed down the place. talk about our lifelong ambitions...





scruffy murphy's. the site of most of my life's definitive moments.



told you so.



running through our "class of 2008 banner" at our graduation party.



i want each of you to know that i love you.
your friendship has challenged me, inspired me, molded me, and lifted me up when i have fallen to the bottom.
i thank God for y'all so much. every day.

the infamous bu pig incident

so i just got off the phone with one of my old college room mates (catherine) and she asked me if i had any photos of aforementioned incident because she was talking about it with her work colleagues and they didn't believe her! i have been howling with laughter for the last five minutes thinking about that day we woke up to go to class and found a huge, nasty, black hog dripping in blood on our front porch.

"who would do such a thing to the theta mansion?" we asked ourselves. word got around about the pig and several culprits were named: KOT, the baseball team, the noze brothers...and to this day, we still don't know who did it. it became somewhat of a spectacle because he lay slain in our front yard memorialized with empty beer bottles, cigarettes, and a little tiny sombrero (offerings from passersby) for quite sometime. the story became so notorious that the campus newspaper even ran a story about it!

i spent days on the phone with animal control, and this photo was taken the day they finally came...



oh how i miss college.

baylor homecoming in four days. :)

my thoughts on pigskin (spring edition)

yay! though the season of autumn is nowhere in sight, football madness has officially ensued!

yes, i realize that i am indeed a female, but trust me - if you grew up in my west texas household, football was a religion. you probably thought varsity blues and friday night lights were just screenplay fodder, hyperbolic exaggerations of a small town tale.

WRONG. football is, was, and always will be a way of life for us.

first things first - let's talk NFL.

right now, all i seem to be hearing about is this jay cutler controversy. my affinity for jay cutler goes back to a crisp, cool day in the fall of 2003. i was a vanderbilt-bound, wide-eyed little girl who thought being a vandy commodore was the secret to happiness. the commodores at that time were a historically basement-dwelling SEC team, but on that one day - that one day that i happened to be in nashville, they beat the university of kentucky! a momentous occasion of course, and i'll never forget seeing all the boys in their sports coats and ties grab the hand of their girlfriends in their tweed suits, pearls, and heels to storm the field. and who did we have to thank for this victory? that's right, jay cutler.

i say, let him be. i'm happy he's with the bears...who wants to play for a team that doesn't stand by you? jay, wishing you the best in chicago!



also...the draft is soon approaching - three weeks to be exact. i think this year's draft will definitely be interesting, i plan to keep my eye on three individuals in particular.

a) jason smith. obviously, i didn't end up at vandy, because instead, i spent an incredible 4 years at baylor! and that's where jason played for the last 4 years as an offensive tackle. jason's been getting a lot of buzz lately and with a scouting score of 97% it's easy to see why he's predicted to go 1 or 2. wanna know something really cool? we saw him at george's last week!



b) i'll definitely be looking to see where michael crabtree falls. he's done some amazing things at texas tech and he really energized that fan base and program. his stats and awards speak for themselves, and if things go according to plan, he's definitely top 5.



c) i'm extremely intrigued by what will happen with matthew stafford. matt's always been a fun one to watch, considering that he's from texas and he played for the georgia bulldogs. fortunately, i got to see him play in sanford stadium right there in athens a few times, so unbelievably awesome. i think it's pretty strange/confusing all the things that are being said about him and his "therapy" session with the '49ers psychologist. i don't think anyone should be determined by something like that, but who knows? guess we'll have to wait until april 25 to find out....



now, i haven't done that much research on the prospective status of college football teams yet (don't worry, that will come!), but i did attend baylor's spring game last week, which marks the beginning of their season.

from what i saw, the bears have a promising future for the first time in a long time. i know, i know. how many times have we said this? year after year after year. and always, our hearts are broken and we straggle out of the stadium as 3rd quarter winds down.

however, this team is different. you can just feel it. for one, i think art briles is directly responsible for this breath of fresh air, but i also have to give credit where credit is due and say that it's been an eternity since we've had a player like robert griffin. this guy's the real deal. he really performed at the spring scrimmage: 76% completion rate and 310 yards.

i also have to include the receiving yardage, since my little bro was mentioned...

Kendall Wright, 5-68-0; Justin Akers, 4-61-1; Terrance Williams, 4-41-0; Kyle Mitchell, 4-28-0; Justin Fenty, 4-20-0; Ernest Smith, 3-30-0; Michael Valdez, 2-24-0; Travis McClain, 2-24-0; Jared Salubi, 2-2-0; Jay Finley, 1-60-1; Brad Taylor, 1-43-1; Krys Buerck, 1-15-0; Stacy Williams, 1-17-0; Andrew Sowder, 1-11-0; Lanear Sampson, 1-9-0; Bryan Swindoll, 1-5-0; Matt Singletary, 1-4-0

we're proud of you bubba.







andy & rob



jackie, robert III, robert II



and that concludes my report, live from baylor university's campus in waco, texas! y'all have a good night!