Sweet tea, tacos, and volleyball

The Barker household has a new obsession.....TACO CASA! This past year Longview has been blessed with not one, but two of these fab restaurants! If you have never heard of it, it's a lot like Taco Bell, but the food is way better and their sweet tea is the best in town (Sorry Jucy's)! I have already eaten there twice this week. A lot of times Leven will just bring us home sweet teas when he comes home from volleyball. I've never really liked sweet tea until I married Leven. Growing up (if you know my dad) there was NEVER sweet tea in our house. My dad drinks more tea than any person I have ever met. He carries around a big mug and drinks tea all day long. He likes it strong with lemon in it! But now I am obsessed with sweet tea. Sweeter the better!

Leven's volleyball team is now 26-8 and 6-0 in district. Awesome! Leven had a wonderful write up in the Longview News Journal today about his team and how well they are playing. Check it out :
http://www.news-journal.com/sports/local/article_7b5e80ba-98d4-5d29-96ba-5aa95a3ecb5b.html

They play Kilgore tomorrow to end the first round of district!

Remember when....

I think I heard "remember when" at least 100 times this past weekend. But of course, that's what you do when you haven't seen your high school friends in 20 years! Wow, 20 years!
We had a wonderful time in Mexia. Friday night after Leven's volleyball game (yes they won!) we headed to Mexia to try and catch halftime. And we did. Thank goodness...another 15 miles we probably would've put Taydem out on the side of the road, ha! kidding of course. We visited the whole second half and then headed out for the night! We ended up at Leven's good buddy Sonny's house until about 2 am!

We woke the next morning to the smell of sausage, bacon, eggs, gravy and biscuits! Yummy! Thank you Gwen for cooking us breakfast. We stayed and visited with Leven's dad for a couple of hours and then we were off again. His class was meeting at the Reunion Grounds for a family picnic. There was sooooo much food. We could not have asked for better weather. I don't think it got past 85 and the breeze was wonderful! Everytime I looked for Taydem her hands were back in the Cheeto bag or someone's coolor sneaking a drink!

After about 3 hours we left for Leven's mom's house. Leven's brother's family was also in that weekend and it was such a joy to get to hang out with them. Ann cooked some good spaghetti for everyone, we watched a little football, Mike took the boys in the back yard to shoot some guns and we just relaxed. I thank Ann and Mike so much for watching Taydem that night. She is getting to be a hand full these days and they were both so patient with her. Taydem follows Mike around like a little puppy dog. She loves him! Thank you a bunch. While the kids stayed home and watched TV and played card games all night, we headed out to The Cowboy (a honky tonk there in Mexia) to meet up with Leven's classmates for one last night of fun! Again, we didn't get home until after 2 am!

Tons of fun-new memories-new friends





Leven and Chris

"At the end of the day, FAITH is a funny thing. It turns up when you don't really expect it. It's like one day you realize that the fairy tale may be slightly different than you had dreamed. The castle, well, it may not be a castle. And its not so important happy ever after, just that it's happy right now. See once in a while, once in a blue moon, people will surprise you, and once in a while people may even take your breath away."

Meredith Grey

Pig Man

One of Leven's good child hood friends has his own hunting reality show on The Sporting Channel (605, DirecTV). His first season was a hit and he has now signed on for a 2nd season. Can you guess what he hunts? Of course, pigs! Here in Texas there are WAY too many of these nasty animals. I'm not talking about a cute little pig on a farm. This is what I'm talking about:

This guy works with me

Check out Brian's website and check out his show! This weekend is Leven's 20th high school reunion in Mexia. I will get to meet Brian and tons of Leven's other classmates! I'm sure it will be a fun weekend. I'll be sure to post pictures next week!

http://www.pigmantv.com/

4-0 and Lon Morris

Lady Pirates picked up another win last night against Jacksonville. Leven said there wasn't much competitionn with those girls.

Jacksonville, TX holds a special place in my heart. This was the first town I lived in after high school WITHOUT my parents. I went to Lon Morris College on a music and volleyball scholarship there in Jville and made some of my closest friends! Lon Morris is a tiny junior college, but it fit me perfectly. I sang in the school choir and was put in a traveling ensemble. We would travel every Sunday to a different church around Texas (Lon Morris is a private junior college, Methodist). I actually hated it. As much as I love to sing, I hated traveling 3-4 hours every Sunday to sing for a tiny church in the middle of nowhere for about 50 people and then travel back home. The volleyball team, then, was probably the worse team I have ever been on. I loved my first year coach (Coach "Weg") and we actually weren't that bad. She left the second year and our replacement was a complete JOKE! He had never even coached volleyball or even seen a game. We had to tell him the rules and show him drills. OMG! Looking back I like to laugh at the whole situation but at that time, I stayed pissed! I don't think we won a game...we were so P-I-T-I-F-U-L! But, I made lasting memories, gained some independence, and I'm still very close to my good friends from there today! Samantha (Sam) and I met my sophomore year. (We also played against each other in high school. She's from Gilmer.) She also played volleyball and also hated our crazy coach. After her second year, she moved in with me at Sam Houston! We were trailor park girls and made the best memories at Sam Houston together. We became like sisters and she was also in my wedding as a bridesmaid. I love and miss her dearly. She has made her home in Waller, TX on farm with her hubby Tommy (whom she met at Sam Houston) and her sweet baby boy, Tanner.

Carla and I met our first year at Lon Morris. She was also in the choir but her main job was playing the piano! We didn't really get close until after we left Lon Morris. She was living in Tyler going to school and I was attending UT Tyler. I would spend the night with her often after my night class and we would stay up talking for hours. I went through a really rough period in my life during this time and she was my sweet friend that was really there for me. She still lives in Tyler today as a realtor and has 2 of the cutest boys (Jackson and Grant) along with a police officer for a husband. Brittany and I also met our first year there. We both played volleyball (although we also played against each other in high school, she's from Hallsville). Brittany started out her 2nd year there, but she REALLY hated our crazy coach and she left the school. She always wanted to be a hair stylest so that's what she did. She has been cutting and coloring my hair since! So every time I get my hair done, we catch up with each other. She lives in Longview, but our lives are going in different directions. She is married and has the cutest little girl (Emersyn) and will have Grant early October! Lucas and I met my second year (since he's a baby). He was a golfer and drove a huge jacked up Tahoe that all the girls loved! He likes to rub this in my face, but the first thing I ever said to him was, "Hey, are you the one that drives that Tahoe?" Ha, knowing I knew it was his! All the girls dared me to ask him! We never even talked at Lon Morris. He went on to play golf at 'Ole Miss. Fast forward about 8 years.....he found me on facebook! Crazy! We continued to email each other, catching up what we had missed out over the years. This picture was the first time we had seen each other since Lon Morris. He is married to a beautiful woman (Aliya) and sales insurance in Plano. We try and keep in touch and have visited each other's towns often.

Rough weekend for tooter poot!

Taydem had a rough weekend. She's at that age where she is getting into everything and testing us along the way. She's into rolling her eyes and me and telling me to leave her alone! OMG! NO mam, sassy pants!

So we get up on Saturday morning and head to Wal-Mart. We do our shopping, pay and as we are leaving the cashier Taydem starts running. I yelled her name, ignores me. Yelled her name again, ignores me. By now she is probably 30 ft from me and is not slowing down. I start running after her while pushing the buggy yelling at her to stop. Wal-Mart wasn't very busy since it was early, but still no one helped me. She has now rounded the corner and is headed outside and I lost sight of her. My heart is beating out of my chest, I'm freaking out! A little old lady looked at me, looked at Tay, looked back and me and I yelled for her to yell at Taydem. She yelled for Taydem as she was going through the door. I rounded the corner (finally) and Taydem was walking back inside! I was furious. I tried really hard to gather myself before I smacked her right in front of everyone. I grabbed her by the arm and told her, well come to think of it, I have no idea now what I said to her!! But I practically dragged her to the car. Once we got to the car I tore into her butt! I was still so upset. She cried the whole way home. We get home and I then put her in time out (which is sitting on her bed). She cries and cries and cries. I could hear her, "Momma mean!" Leven walks in from mowing and asked what happened. I told him and he went in to talk to her. I finally calmed down and went to talk to her myself. I wanted her to understand why I got mad at her. It's so hard at this age to get them to understand you and your emotions. She kept telling me that she was sorry. Awh...broke my heart.

So..............about an hour later she is playing in the gameroom and breaks one of Leven's collectable baseball plates. Here we go again. Now this time I know she didn't mean to do it. But she knows not to touch the stuff on the shelves. So she's back on her bed for another round of time out! She kept crying and saying her foot hurt. I went in and the poor girl had cut her foot when she broke the plate. Awh, broke my heart again!! My goodness. So we doctored her up and put a band-aid on the cut!

The very next day we were at my parents house and she was running and tripped and SMACK, right into the coffee table! Her cheek caught the edge of the coffee table perfectly. She couldn't even catch herself. My dad almost started crying bc he felt so bad for her. Poor baby! This was all in one weekend. She's a tough little cookie, but I feel we are watching her more now than 6 months ago. She's not afraid of anything and loves to climb!!! I took a picture of her cheek. Check out her face in this picture. She loves getting the attention after she hurts herself.

I played dress up with her on Saturday! I even put make-up on her! I couldn't help myself. Her eyelashes are soooooooo long! Hook 'em!

All smiles

Three words: Kicked that butt!

The Lady Pirates came out to play on Friday night. It was the best game in the world and I know those girls were on cloud 9 all weekend, including their coach! Leven knew that Hallsville would be the team to beat and got his team physically and mentally prepared all week. And it paid off! We swept Hallsville in 3 games. We all just knew it would go 5 games, but we shut them out! It came down to Leven out coaching the other coach. I'm so proud of him! He told the girls that if they won both games last week then he would shave his goatee off and they could go swimming in the school pool one day after practice this week. So, he shaved his face yesterday and they will swim on Wednesday! They were so pumped! Trever had the student section loud and ready. Ten students showed up at my house ready to color their bodies! And they did awesome too. 3-0 in district!

Tay and Cade

Enjoy watching Taydem with her best friend, Cade! Have a happy weekend everyone!

Step into my kitchen

So the dinner I made last night was the BEST supper I think we've ever eaten. The pork tenderloin turned out soooooo tender and the gravy was to die for! Trever ate 3 helpings. And every helping was bigger than my one. So of course we had no leftovers. We never do! After I cleaned up, I decided to make snickerdoodle cookies. I love these cookies and I have never made any before. I wanted to make them for Leven's volleyball team. I ended up making two batches and had so many left over. I brought some to work and left some at our house! Yummy! Taydem ate three right out of the oven. She loved them! Taydem got stuck in the pantry!!

I made her stay there until I took her picture (mean momma!)

My mouth is watering

Today at lunch I'm going to run home and put our supper in the crockpot! Pork tenderloin! I'm going to throw in a can of mushroom soup, package of onion soup mix and let it cook!! Sounds tasty already. I'll probably make some mashed potatoes as well and use the soup left in the crockpot as a gravy topping! Is your mouth watering yet?? Tonight I'm going to attempt to make my first batch of Snicker Doodle cookies! Teresa (lady that works with me and she's also the one that made Taydem's birthday cake) makes the best snicker doodle cookies EVER, and she gave me her recipe! So I'll let you know how they turn out!

Huge win last night

Lady Pirates dominated the court last night! Sent John Tyler home in four games! I only wish we had more people to come support the girls and Leven. Heck, the AD wasn't even there! It's a big gym so we need tons more people there for the next game. We play Hallsville and they are dang good and will have to put up a fight to beat us in our own gym. I hope Trever can rally up more of the students to come and watch! Last night he and two of his friends painted their faces, arms and stomach! Taydem was scared of him! ha

"She thinks my tractor's sexy!!"

Hollywood pose

I really think Taydem has got the "Red Carpet" pose down! Check her out:

OMG- What time is it?

I woke up yesterday to the sun hitting me in my face-this is not a good thing. I tried to read the alarm clock on Leven's side of the bed but I'm blind as a bat so I reached for my cell phone. As I was putting the cell phone up to my nose to read the time (again, I'm that blind) I noticed I was getting a phone call, but my phone wasn't making any noise. "Hello?" It was the church calling me to see where I was.....OMG!

Let me back up a little bit. I have been counting down the days for September 12th. Tim (church choir director) asked me to sing "my song" (the one I did back in May) a few weeks ago for the September 12th services. He told me I would sing the song in all three church services. This means that I have to be at the church at 7, to run through all the songs we would be singing that morning. I have been freaking out all week bc I still had this horrible congestion (4 weeks I had that mess!) and I had to get rid of it by Sunday. I went to the doctor last Tuesday; got a shot and a zpack. I even did three of Taydem's breathing treatments! I finally started feeling better on Saturday and that night I MADE SURE that I set my alarm correctly on my phone. This is a big deal getting to sing and I didn't want to be late. So, what do you know??? I couldn't believe it when I saw the time on Sunday morning, 7:27 am!!! My stupid alarm did NOT wake me up! I hung up the phone call that I received and got dressed in 20 minutes. I was running around the house like a mad woman. I got to the church 5 minutes late. I was so embarressed and prayed on my way that they would all forgive me. And the did! I actually received hugs from everyone. So by the next two services I was geared up and ready to sing. The last service is always the best. I brought the house down!! They all were standing and clapping along with the song. So much fun! I was just hoping that my voice was going to last until the end. It started sqeeking in some places and I began to panic. I am too hard on myself. I want everything to be perfect. I walked off the stage with a huge smile.

Thank you Lord for giving me this talent and allowing me to share with others.

Stay between the lines

I'm sitting here thinking about my title of this blog post and it makes me smile! Right now this title fits perfect in the lives of Taydem and Trever.

I pick Tay up from preschool yesterday and her teacher tells me that Taydem will start having homework 2 nights a week. What? Really? Ok. I think that's a pretty good idea. But, again, she's 3! It will give us more time to work/play together after work and of course make her ever brighter than she already is. So the first worksheet she had to trace the shape and then color it in with the given color. The whole time I'm saying to her, "Stay between the lines."

Trever turns 16 in November, but he can't get his driver's license until January. So right now our job is to teach him how to drive. And we are constantly saying, "Stay between the lines!" Do you remember when you first started driving? You were so afraid that when passing another car your mirrors would hit. Or, from some odd reason staying closer to the ditch just seemed like a better idea. He still has a long ways to go. We will get there though. Just Lord, give Leven and I the patience!

Busted up

Going into district starting on Friday, Leven's team is 20-8! They KILLED 5-A Longview last night in three games. They played the best I have seen them play so far! Awesome job...Leven was so pumped about it, but he couldn't even celebrate the big win because.....

in the end of game three, I get a call from Trever's fall baseball coach telling me that he has a broken nose. WHAT? He was throwing batting practice in the batting cage and got a line drive hit right at his face. It knocked him out cold! So, at this moment I'm freakin out for Trever and hoping that the game is over in 5 minutes so I can tell Leven and we head that way. After the game I tell him and he decides he will go with me and let one of his assistants drive the bus back to the school. Once we get to Trever he is up and moving and all the dads there tell us it is starting to look some what better. They all thought he may have a concusion bc he was still a little loopy! Leven takes him to the ER and 3 hours later they are back home, thank goodness! He had no concusion and his nose was only fractured. It could've been a lot worse. The swelling had gone out instead of in which was a huge blessing. I didn't see him this morning, but Leven said he has 2 black eyes! Poor thing! (this picture was taken 2 nights later!)

Like I said earlier, Leven's volleyball team starts district on Friday against Marshall. Next week they have two HUGE games both being played at our home gym! I think he's going to tell them that if they beat both of these teams, he will shave his head!!!! I told him that will for sure get them pumped up!

Let the games begin

This morning I arrived at work with about 50 cookies staring at me from a little bakery in San Antonio called Mi Terria! Of course I had never heard of this place before, but my whole office said they were famous down in San An and after eating a sugar cookie I agree! Yummy!

Today Leven's volleyball team is 18-8 (the best record since being here) and he's still not happy. This team is loaded with athletes, but he thinks they are still not there! He has one girl that's 6'2", one is 6'0" and two girls that are around 5'10" and can JUMP out of the gym! But he wants more out of them. They play Henderson today at 4:30.

After the volleyball game we are headed to watch Tatum play Gilmer. Gilmer has won 2 state championships in the past few years and so has Tatum! It should be a really good game. Tatum has moved back down to 2A while Gilmer is still 3A!

Now let's trot down memory lane for a second: My oldest, more reserve, brother Dustin, had to give a Pep-Rally speech back when he was in high school when we were playing the Gilmer Buckeyes(you know like all football players do). And by the way, a "Buckeye" is a nut. He was so nervous back then to talk in front of people (and still is) and he couldn't make up his mind on what to say. (Let me remind you, he would practice his speech over and over all week, ha) So he finally takes the mic and says, "All I have to say, is let's go out there and BUST a NUT!" OMG.....I still can't believe to this day that he said this. The whole football team was rolling on the ground!!

It's approaching....

My 30th is getting closer and closer. Wow, September 1st already. I can remember as a child that the days and months lasted forever. I never thought the school years would ever end. Now that I'm older, I can't find enough time in the day. It's sad actually. Can we stop time for just a little while?

So back to the big 3-0. I'm not really sure why I'm stressing about this age, but I am. Again, as a child I can remember thinking 30 was so old. WHAT? I'm finally here and I feel like I'm about...um...let's say 24! I've been thinking about this day for the past few months, well actually this whole past year. Every year the Tatum Education Foundation puts on a huge event (shindig you may want to call it) to help raise money for scholarships. And it's on the same day as my birthday. Ugh! So everyone and their dog will be going to this event to eat, drink and dance the night away. I do enjoy going to it, but I really don't want to celebrate my birthday there! So, I think Lev and I will head up to Dallas for the day/night and enjoy ourselves! I love get-aways and that night will be perfect! I just need a babysitter now!!! Again, everyone and their dog will be busy that night (aka: ALL of MY Sitters!) so I will have to start looking now!

Everyone is good these days! My niece will have her 1st birthday this month and my nephew will turn 7 in October! My brother and his wife are opening up a new Jucy's Hamburger in Tyler! Dustin is actually building the store (contractor) so they are super busy right now! The other brother and his wife just sold their house and are about to start building their dream home! Danin and Eric are settling into their new home and are getting landscaping down now! Mom and Dad are doing fine as well. They seem to be always traveling somewhere. Leven will start district next week. yeah!! Taydem has a new best friend (boyfriend, ha)! We have new neighbors and their little boy, Cade turned 3 in June! They want to see each other EVERY day! It's too cute.