SEC football

The temperature is changing...the leaves soon will too. That can only mean one thing: FALL! I love this season for so many reasons, but one reason common to both Scott and myself is SEC FOOTBALL!! We love it--and it's safe to say we are huge fans. Since I grew up in Oxford, and we live in Oxford, we're natural Ole Miss fans. Although I did not go to undergrad at Ole Miss, I still consider myself a Rebel fan--except when it comes to ONE game. Since I went to college at The University of Alabama, I must cheer for the Tide! I love to watch every game that I can on television and we try to get to Tuscaloosa for at least one game each year. Alabama football excites me!! For most of the season all is calm in the Thompson house--Scott and I have season tickets to Ole Miss games, and we stroll through the Grove each week to experience a second of the tailgating atmosphere. But when the Rebels and Tide play, it's safe to say that Scott and I separate for the weekend! I'll post more on that later...after that October matchup. Below are a few pictures from a recent Ole Miss game. (I don't know why one is TINY...but when I have more time, I'll allow my OCD to take over.)

Weekend visit with Best Friends

This past weekend Scott and I were thrilled to get to visit with both of our best friends! We went to the Ole Miss football game at Wake Forest, which was an exciting game that I am glad we attended. Scott's best friend, Brian, lives in Raleigh so we stayed with him and made a weekend of it. We loved getting to see Brian and his new hometown, as well as hang out with his girlfriend, Laura. Thanks to you both for putting up with us and for entertaining us!! I will post pictures from the weekend as soon as I get them (hint, hint Laura!). I am very sad because we left our camera.

Scott and I had some free time to drive over to Durham where we toured the campus of Duke University. It was beautiful!! I couldn't believe the architecture of each and every building--even their sports facilities (although small) are pretty. On that note, because we were in town we thought we would try to visit with Coach David Cutcliffe, the new head coach of Duke. When Coach Cut was at Ole Miss he travelled a good bit with Scott. I remember when he left Ole Miss Scott was truly upset--he really thinks highly of this gentleman. Because of this, I was hoping to meet him. Side note: Back in January Scott and his great friend John went to visit Brian. During this visit, Scott and John tried to catch Coach Cut at his office, but missed him by mere minutes. Fast forward to now: While we were chatting with his administrative assistant, he walked through the reception area! We got to visit with him for a good long while--he and Scott caught up, we saw recent pictures of his family, and got his impression of the recent changes in Ole Miss football (which I will not post on our blog!). Let me tell you, this man is indeed one to respect and admire. I really enjoyed our special impromptu visit with him and am now a Duke football fan. And let me just say--he has one impressive office with a flat-screen HD television/computer screen that will make even the employees at Best Buy drool!

Friday evening we went with Brian and Laura to Chapel Hill to enjoy a night out at The University of North Carolina (which is Laura's Alma mater). We didn't get to see much of it, but we were very, very impressed with The Carolina Inn, where we went for drinks and bluegrass on the lawn. If I lived anywhere in the area this would be a regular weekend spot for me!

Saturday was game day, and we loaded into a mini-van and headed to Winston-Salem where we toured the campus of Wake Forest University. Again, a pretty campus! It was fun to see where 2 of my post-college roommates went to undergraduate school. I got a quick glance at the chapel where one of my friends got engaged! The only facilities we "toured" were the restrooms outside of the baseball field (Can you believe the women's room was unlocked!? Seriously, the guys decided on a bathroom break in this back parking lot where we were turning around...and we looked up and there was a bathroom! The ladies decided to take advantage of this unexpected blessing, and were disappointed when the guys realized the men's room was locked. I said, "At least check the women's room---it ought to be a universal rule that ALL women's rooms are unlocked at all times." And indeed it was! Because this never happens, I had to document it!).

The game was super exciting--and Ole Miss almost won. Sadly with 1:01 left in the game, our defense ran out of steam and Wake kicked a winning field goal with 3 seconds left. Heartbreaker. The major highlights from the game were sitting so close to the band that I felt I needed an instrument and getting to see my friends Jason and Brent (I haven't seen Brent in probably 3 years and Jason lives in freaking Iowa!). It really was fun to see familiar faces in the crowd!

Now, I have shared a lot about the weekend except for when I got to see my best friend. Because we were flying, we decided to fly out of the Birmingham airport so that we could see my best friend, Dana and her great husband Chris. They are special friends to both me and Scott and we were eager to visit with them because they just had their first child at the beginning of August. I wanted to get to meet Wells as a tiny baby, so was thrilled when our flight plans worked out as we hoped. Wells is a great baby--and managed to stay awake until we arrived in town Thursday evening (He was so excited he didn't take a nap all day! Sorry Dana!). I couldn't believe how alert Wells is--and how quickly he fell in love with his Aunt Mary. He really is adorable and we had fun seeing our friends as parents. The picture is of Wells' sporting his new bathrobe we gave him in true Hugh Hefner style. I can tell already that this boy is going to have the ladies lined up!



Another highlight was getting to spend time with my brother Brad and his wife Bentley. Although that visit was quick, we did appreciate the guest bedroom and ride to the airport. It's so fun to have family and friends living so close to one another so I can visit with lots of fun people when I am in town.

Now that we are back in Oxford, things are somewhat settling down....but as can be expected there are more adventures to be shared. It's football season, Debate time, and classes for Scott. We will share more soon!

Home improved

Recently I posted that Scott, Mo and I were busy with home improvement projects. At that time, we were painting our guest bedroom. This bedroom was the "step-child" of our home--the room that we had great intentions to get around to earlier, but seemed content with simply shutting the door and ignoring the plain walls and post-college/first apartment furnishings.

Our major motivator to complete this bedroom was football season. I know, it sounds crazy, but football season is not only a motivator for us but it has also become a nice little money maker to finance our home improvement projects.

This is our third football season to rent out our condo for home football games. The season that Scott and I got married (yes, we married during football season!) we took a leap of faith and posted our condo on a fan blog. That season was a trial-and-error, and we rented to several different groups. I won't elaborate on the errors, but the blessing was a wonderful weekend tenant--a precious family from Jackson. The next year our tenant, who we now consider our football family, rented for most of the home games so we didn't worry with multiple renters. Thank goodness for Coach Nutt, because I was seriously wondering if our football family would commit to this season! Now that Scott and I are both employed, our football funds can now go to finishing our last little projects on our home improvement list (and savings, of course!). First on our list was finishing our guest bedroom.

After completing our projects, I thought I would post pictures. I also came across some of the pictures we emailed to our football family three seasons ago. Prepare to ohhhh and ahhh.

The Living Room 2 years ago:

(When our football family came the first season we had a warped TV Stand!!)

The Living Room NOW:

The "master" bedroom 3 years ago:

The "master bedroom" NOW:

And now...for the guest bedroom (which we didn't photograph before):

And today, after our annual Labor Day road trip, we added this beautiful piece to our living room: (It has a great hutch that sits on top, but we don't have room/need for it now.)

Many thanks to our football family for contributing to our house! We will forever be grateful for the Ray family :) And I must also thank both my parents and Scott's parents. Scott's parents helped us attempt to landscape our backyard. Unfortunately the seed we spread did not agree with the pine trees. My parents have helped with numerous projects around the house. The most recent is making the cornice box and headboard for our guest room. I think they turned out looking great :) They have also played a big role in our football weekend deal, as they allow us to crash at their home! Now that our guestroom is done, we need to have both parents and friends and family come stay with us. I promise you'll be much more comfortable!!!

Overdue Celebration

Mary and I had a pretty intense semester this past spring. She was studying for finals and finishing up her internship at Lafayette Elementary School. My life was consumed with study sessions at the library, preparing for my comp exams. We both named our individual rewards for earning our Masters degrees. My reward was to be a party pig of Southern Pecan beer. Little did I know that Oxford no longer carries the party pigs. I think it has something to do with supply and demand. The beer is becoming so popular, they can't keep it both in restaurants and bars as well as in retail locations. So I never got my party pig. Lynn Sloan did buy me a half case of Southern Pecan in bottles, though!!!

I'll have to correct myself. Mary's reward was not for earning her degree. She wanted to celebrate signing a contract for employment. We found out late April/early May that she was offered the job of counselor at Lafayette Middle School. Though we were extremely excited and full of celebration, Mary wanted to follow the rules. She wouldn't accept her reward until she actually signed her contract. Though we knew she had the job, she didn't actually get and sign her contract until she went to work full time in July. We finally got our chance to go eat dinner in celebration of officially becoming DINKS (Double Income No Kids).

Mary outside of Kabuki with her Educator's License

Our dinner being prepared

Full bellies

Oxford High c/o '98

"RAISE HELL DAMN STRAIGHT--WE'RE THE C/O '98!!"--Keith Wilson

This past weekend was my 10 year class reunion---and did we have fun! Truthfully I wasn't very excited about the weekend because I have been so super busy lately. I was one of many who planned the reunion, so I think I was just ready to mark something off of my list of things to do. However when the weekend festivities started up, I suddenly got a boost of energy and enjoyed each and every minute of the weekend. I will recap in a few pictures...well, several pictures!

It's Official---Hayes is headed home!

According to text messages received at 8:48 this morning, "It's official!...We're bring Hayes' home!" Or as Jeffrey wrote, "It's official! He's stuck with us!" Either way, it's GREAT news!!! I have a wonderful new addition to my family---and I finally get to meet him this afternoon!!! Thank you ALL for your prayers and kind words. Love love, Mary

Watermelon Carnival 2008

Because my parents and the Hollis' are out of town for the weekend while welcoming Hayes (yes, I will probably mention him in the next dozen or so posts...), Scott and I have the honor of dog duty. We are staying at my parents house with FIVE dogs!

We were sad because our friends who were going to join us for a swim could not come. We sure hope Reagan and Josh get to feeling better soon....and that Farryn and Timeka don't get sick the last week of summer!

So that we could escape the house (and the dogs), we decided to venture to Water Valley, MS for the 39th Annual Watermelon Carnival . Nevermind that it's over 100 degrees outside....Scott had never been and was wanting to take advantage of the free watermelon. And because it had been at least 10 years (that's when I last worked at Sno-Biz and we hit all the small town summer festivals) since I had been to the Carnival, I thought it would be fun for both of us.

We put the dogs up, gassed up the car (damn near $60!) and drove to Water Valley (only about 20 minutes away) for the Carnival. About 20 minutes later, we were done. hahah I don't mean to offend any big time fans of the Water Valley Watermelon Carnival, but I can guarantee you that there were NOT 20,000 people there. There might have been 200....but not near 20,000. I'm hoping more showed up when the musical line-up got better and when the day cooled off. We probably timed it all wrong for the entertainment (I think the girl performing was more along the lines of karaoke). But we did time it right for the free watermelon and Scott thoroughly enjoyed it. I searched for a Sno-Biz stand and was disappointed when I had to settle on a generic vendor, but the refreshments were key to our enjoyment in the crazy heat.

We weren't really into the vendors (especially the politicians), so we loaded back up and "toured" Water Valley so that we could scout out the houses we've seen listed on the Real Estate channel for "reasonable" amounts. There is a reason real estate is much lower in Water Valley than in Oxford. Scott said it would be worth purchasing a home in Water Valley if we could have "that guy with his laptop" (you know, the HGTV Hidden Potentials designer) come in and help us with a renovation plan. Can you tell what we watch?!

So there you have it--another Thompson adventure. Who says we have nothing to do in Mississippi?


FREE WATERMELON! People were lined up!!


Scott patiently waiting--he didn't even get upset when some big-time fans cut him in line!


Scott's seed-spittin' grin


The Watermelon Carnival Shuttle---a tractor pulled this trailer full of kids around the block. No, we did not ride. Nor did we ride the ponies.