Who's the NEW Teen in the House?

 Why that would be our bacon eating, Dr. Pepper drinking, X-box loving, Snapchat streakin', hover board riding, night owl Isaac Matthew who turned the BIG 1-3 yesterday!  I had originally started this post on his birthday, but time slipped away from me.  That's what happens when you have THREE kids playing basketball. The season is confusing and keeping it track of it all requires multiple bottles of wine - hah!

I have to brag on my boy Isaac though. He is the type of kid who simply..has that way.  Y'all know what "way" I'm talking about - people are drawn to him.  He's easy to be around.  He's always happy.  Kids adore him, especially Mae Kathryn who says I-yak in the cutest way possible.  You'll rarely see him have a bad day.  He's just that way, ya know.  I'm proud of his way and grateful he's mine.  There's zero doubt in my mind that he'll do something special with his life, he's cut from that quilt.  That quilt that says, "you don't have to conform, you can be exactly who God designed you to be and own those traits to the fullest."

We celebrated his birthday on Wednesday night because all the planets aligned and we didn't have anything going on with basketball.  Well, actually, Karson had a short practice, but it still allowed for us to do something special for him. AZZIP is a birthday must - his absolute favorite place to eat.  We invited all the family, shared some pizza, and got a cookie cake.

Thank you AZZIP Pizza for letting us invade your space for the evening!

 Isaac Matthew is very loved!

 

 I wanted to do something extra special since turning 13 is no-joke - you're officially a TEENAGER.  I decided to get him 13 balloons with 13 gifts attached.  Me + Balloons = Error (I should've known).  When Matt turned 40, I booked him a Balloon-a-Gram.  A gorilla dressed up as a South Warren Spartan was to deliver him a balloon bouquet to school.  The delivery went as planned, but the numeric balloon was a "50" and not a "40" balloon.  Isaac was supposed to have 13 balloons.  When I went into Party City, I selected 13 balloons, paid for 13 balloons (extra helium and a balloon storage bag).  When I took them all out that night, only 12 made it home.  Fortunately, I had some balloons in the garage and blew one up to add to the card.  My balloon game is NOT STRONG and neither were my fault so I guess I shouldn't blame myself.  I simply don't have luck with balloons.  Isaac was totally surprised yesterday morning when we came into the den.  He had lots of nifty gifties - Fun Dip, Sweatband, Bob Ross socks, water balloons, Nike shorts, new water bottle, glass Coke bottles, Juicy Drop gum, M & M's, a yo-yo, lens attachments for his iPhone camera and some wireless Beats.

He had his favorite breakfast - BACON.

 

It would've been icing on the cake had his basketball team won last night on his birthday, BUT you can't have it all.  It was hard defeat for the Bulls losing by only two points.  All was right in the world though when he got home and logged onto Xbox LIVE.  He had a great 13th birthday - looking forward to many, many more.

 Birthdays through the years.....

 

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Baby it's COLD outside! Our poor little HVAC is running around the clock and hanging on for dear life at the moment.  It's a 22 year old unit and has been freezing up a lot lately.  We've been servicing it and got a sensor replaced but were delivered "the blow" on this last call that it's leaking freon and needs to be replaced.  Eeeeek!  So long savings account =(.  We've gotten some estimates and have plans in motion to get it replaced next Friday. We're hopeful it can hang on just a little longer - fingers and toes crossed.

   New Year's came and went (and look, it's already midway through the month).  

Karson spent the night out with friends.

Isaac went to a church youth group lock-in, and Matt, Miles and I hung out at my sister's house playing games and eating yummy appetizers.

 Matt and I braved the cold and went shopping at Dillards on New Year's Day.  The sale is way too good to pass up.  We got lots of good deals with all the other crazy shoppers out there.



Isaac spent New Years Day at the Titans football game, layered up (like Randy in A Christmas Story).  How about those Titans?!?  They had a nice run this year.

TOO FUNNY NOT TO POST: Karson got footage of Matt attempting to ride Isaac's new hover-board.  It didn't end well.  And, Isaac capitalized on the fall by making a Youtube video mash-up.

Something terribly devastating happened this month (and it wasn't Matt's fall -hah) ~ our local Jerry's closed.  It's like we've lost a part of the Bowling Green family.  I have memories from my childhood of eating at Jerry's.  Through the years, many of them (throughout our region) have closed and been replaced by Denny's and Frisch's Big Boy.  I didn't get the full story but there was something going on with litigation of the property and area it was located in, and the owners didn't want to mess with it anymore.  So, so sad.

I introduced Karson to Jerry's at a young age, and she quickly feel in love with it, like me.  We aren't on the North end of town much, but when we were, we'd make a special trip to Jerry's for spaghetti, coleslaw and hot fudge cake.  I believe the closest one to us is in Radcliffe according to our waitress. 

Isaac scored a Jerry's t-shirt on the day of the closing because a waitress spilled an entire Dr. Pepper on him.

After Jerry's, we dropped Isaac off at the bowling alley to celebrate his friend Mason's 13th birthday.  These two have been chummy since forever.  Hard to believe they are both teenagers (Isaac's 13th is next week - eeeeeeek).

 Isaac competed in the Future City competition at Oldham County Middle School over the MLK Holiday.  He and his group, Team Castleview, competed regionally with lots of other schools.  We spent the night in Louisville with my grandmother and headed out early Monday morning.  Because the weather was supposed to get nasty that afternoon, they expedited the schedule a little bit.  We managed to get back on the road at 1 PM which gave us a good amount of lead-time to get home.

 The boys did a fantastic job on their presentation and Q/A.  There's nothing easy about public speaking, but I thought they did a wonderful job.  Because the prompt was "age-friendly" cities, Isaac wanted to look the part of an "old person."  Many of the groups dressed as elderly people which added a little something to the presentation =).

I'll be making a teenager post next week.  Can't believe I'll have TWO in the house =(.