Erin Akin Carroll

1. We’re still on our high after our Gamecocks beat top-ranked Alabama on Saturday at Williams-Brice stadium! It was such an exciting day and I’m so happy that I was able to be there with TC. ESPN’s College Game Day came to Columbia this weekend and they actually used the Horse Shoe for their set, which is a really hard thing to do. Only a handful of events have ever been held on the Horse Shoe, but it provided a beautiful back drop for Game Day.

We walked to the Horse Shoe from our house around 11:00 a.m. to catch the end of Game Day and the number of students and fans out there really impressed me. At its most crowded time, there were 9,000 people out there!

After Game Day, we headed to the stadium for a little tailgating before the game. It was a hot day, but our seats were in the shade by the time we got in the stadium. I’ve never heard Williams-Brice stadium so loud! Our fans wanted to win and our team wanted to win and I couldn’t be more proud. TC and I were pretty nervous the whole time and couldn’t really start to get a grasp on the fact that we might actually beat the #1 team in the country! It was just so much fun!

2. When we woke up on Sunday morning, we began to mourn. Remember our beloved Peter Parker? The spider who took up residence in the window above my kitchen sink? And laid three huge nests of spider eggs?

We had noticed that Peter Parker was acting a little disoriented. She had built a new web just for her in the other window and her legs were kind of shaky and her web was a mess. We have all read or seen Charlotte’s Web, so we had an idea of what was going to happen to Peter Parker. But we just weren’t prepared to see that she was gone on Sunday morning. Just gone! What a sad day.

Her three nests of eggs are still there in the other window and I’m pretty sure we’re going to have those removed so we don’t have a million spider babies around here. TC had said, “If she dies, we’re getting rid of the eggs, but if she sticks around until they hatch then they can stay.” So that’s what we’re going to do. But you can bet that I’m not going to be out there messing with any spider babies! Yikes!

3. TC and I have always laughed about Wilford Brimley and the way he says diabetes… “diabeetus.” We’ve made lots of jokes about if you have “diabeetus” you drive a Toyota Prius and we just get super silly and ridiculous. And no one else probably finds this funny at all.

The other day when I Googled Wilford Brimley’s name to look up his Wikipedia entry, I found this and fell out laughing.

4. I’m excited that we have two weeks in a row of away games…. but also pray that we can win both of those away games. It’ll be nice to have a couple of weekends away from the stadium.

I hope you’re all having a great Tuesday!

My blog is a giveaway machine lately! But the holidays are approaching and it’s a great time to get some great stuff.

One of my lovely advertisers, Sweet Birdie’s Nest, is doing a fabulous giveaway today.

Heidi and Beverly are giving away 25 press printed cards (including envelopes) and a 10% discount on additional printed cards. The winner will also receive 25 2-inch circle coordinating address labels.

All designs are 5×7 or 5×5 and come with envelopes. The cards are press printed on linen cardstock paper and they can provide two-sided printing for most of their designs.  Each card is completely customizable and Sweet Birdie’s Nest would love to personalize your card with your own text, greeting, and photographs. This prize is valued at $63, plus an additional 10% off any additional cards and address labels of the same design.

Also, especially for Blue-Eyed Bride readers, Sweet Birdie’s Nest is offering a 10% discount on all holiday card orders.  Enter code BLUEEYEDBRIDE in the “notes to seller” when you purchase your card design from our Etsy shop.  This code expires November 15, 2010.

Visit the Etsy shop: http://www.etsy.com/shop/sweetbirdiesnest

Visit the blog:  www.sweetbirdiesnest.com

To enter, just leave a comment on this post! Easy peasy.

Good luck, friends!

When my sweet friend, Amy, emailed me yesterday and told me she’d be doing a blog topic called “Getting Real” and wanted me to participate, I started to worry. I’ve always kept it real on my blog and have been about as open as possible about my struggles and worries. But this time I know that Amy was looking for us to do it to encourage others and I just started to worry about what I would say.

I mean, don’t get me wrong. I was mostly worried because when I think about my struggles and insecurities and things that have weighed me down over the years, I can immediately think of about ten different things. Which one would I write about?

I dated someone seriously in high school, but didn’t date anyone in college. I just knew that I’d go to college and meet my husband and that didn’t happen. Those were sad times. I was overweight for all of college and had one girl in particular who liked to point that out to me. That was a sad time. Would I ever lose the weight? I’ve gone through a rough time here in Columbia after friends moved away and TC and I were engaged where I couldn’t seem to find my place. And then again after we were married and had Hudson. And you know what? Every struggle and every prayer has been answered in God’s time.

The biggest thing I can say about not dating in college and those years of insecurity and doubt is that He was saving me. There was the perfect man for me out there and I wasn’t where I was supposed to be just yet. And I did lose the weight after some hard work and a lot of time.

But the thing I’m going to talk about today is finding my place. My value. My purpose.

You all know my recent struggles with being a SAHM. I love being home with Hudson every day and I know exactly how important that is. But I was also finding that I needed to be needed. And that’s the truth. I don’t know why, exactly, but who doesn’t like to be needed? I was becoming more and more insecure when I would think about some of the talents that I left behind and had chosen to stop using.

So I started plugging myself in more in every way that I could find. Various church commitments, activities for Hudson, Junior League commitments, etc. And that was all good, but I have been so incredibly busy lately that I’m starting to realize just how overwhelmed I am. And more commitments means that I spend more nights away from home or more time responding to emails and making phone calls.

And you know what? It took a very loud message from our Pastor during his sermon recently when the Lord told me, “a full calendar doesn’t make you important.”

Shouldn’t I just know that because He died for me, I am important? How much more important do I need to feel?

And then I look at my perfect and precious little boy and think, “Why would I want to fill my day with anything other than being with you?”

I know we all need activities away from home just as working mothers need activities away from work. I totally understand that and I’m not saying at all that I plan on quitting anything that I’ve started. But God has shown me that I have been foolish for spending so much time looking when my value and self-worth should have been plain as day to me all along.

My full calendar and extra bits of cash from my side job are not going to make me feel better about getting out of bed in the morning if I’m not seeing how important He already thinks I am. And I have to believe it, too!

Last night during Bible study, we were watching Beth Moore on video and she directed us to Acts 21:24, in which Paul says, “However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me– the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace.”

What I think of my life should mean nothing to me. I know that the Lord Jesus found me to be so important that He died for me. What I think doesn’t matter one little bit!

I know that not all of my readers are Believers and my prayer is that this post isn’t a turn-off for you. But this is my heart and I wanted to share it today because there may be just one other person that has gone through the same thing.

In the past few weeks I have re-prioritized and have found that not only am I less stressed, but I am also not looking for ways to be stressed. I don’t need to add a thing to my calendar and I don’t need to get phone calls from people inviting me to do things to feel loved and important.

I want to encourage all of you to visit Amy’s wonderful blog today and if you are a blogger and want to share your story, you can link up there to her post. There are quite a few really honest posts that have already been linked up and maybe one of them is something you need to read.