Lauren Braddock Havey's Blog, page 3

The graduate

I cannot believe that my little boy has graduated from kindergarten! When I went to pick him up on the last day of school the music teacher was cranking Alice Coopers "School's Out For Summer" from the PA and everyone, including the principal, was jamming out! It was a year of transition, but a year of huge growth. He made "good choices" all second semester long and he is reading like a second grader! I am so proud of my "rising first grader"!!!!!!!!

Grandbobby and the Country Music Hall of Fame

Sunday night was a magical and surreal evening. My dad, songwriter Bobby Braddock, got inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame along with icons Jean Sheppard and Reba McIntire and I couldn't be more proud! He is a very low-key person so all of the hoopla, limo ride-red carpet, was a bit strange for him (I however LOVED it-ha!) He quipped during his speech that he couldn't tell what the fans outside were saying because he isn't good at reading lips, then he realized it was "who's that guy?"-ha! Songwriters are definitely used to "flying under the radar". Thanks to the CMHOF for recognizing writers! The program/induction ceremony they put together was out of this world. Blake Shelton and Miranda Lambert, Tracy Lawrence, Billy Currington and George Jones all sang my dad's songs and Bill Anderson did a wonderful job inducting him. Other artists to perform were Vince Gill, Bill Anderson/Elizabeth Cook, Tricia Yearwood, Garth Brooks, Martina McBride and Kelly Clarkson ... and Dolly Parton inducted Reba...it was amazing!
Kudos to the Country Music Hall of Fame. Kyle Young was a great MC and the little man was thrilled to hear that he was included in his speech. Kyle made the point that my dad's 6-year-old grandson doesn't call him Grandad or Grandpa, but "Grandbobby" which is appropriate because Bobby is grand! As totally unbiased family members we couldn't agree more and are endlessly proud of him!!! (pictured above with me and hubby, PR dude Jim Havey)

Here is some video footage of the event
http://countrymusichalloffame.org/201...

If anyone is in Nashville and gets a chance to check out the display for the "class of 2011" it will up all year. Don Henry and I will actually be playing the Country Music Hall of Fame songwriter series in the Ford Theater there on September 3rd, so that might be a good time to visit...y'all come! :)

Happy Mother's Day! (Cinco de Mayo and field day too!)

I hope this has been a wonderful day for everyone! I woke up to Little Man coming in with a bag of goodies he made for me at school. There was a mom survey...what does she do was one of the questions..."clean"...wha'?! That makes me laugh on a couple of different levels! He was very sweet though and proud of all the little gifties.
It was a busy week at his school. One day I went there with another kindergartener's mom who is a friend of mine and fellow performer, and we combined their two classes and did theater games with them. Wow! It was definitely fun...had them do stretches and warm up their bodies, do mirror exercises and explore different emotions. Forty kindergarteners acting excited, mad, etc. at the same time was, um... loud! They were super-cute though and I was really happy to be able to share this experience with my kiddo! (So he can see me doing something other than cleaning-ha!) I hung out for field day another day (his favorite part was the music teacher in the DJ booth!) and then, on Cinco de Mayo I got to relive my days of waitressing at the Iguana restaurant when I helped hand out chips and salsa to the kids in the cafe while they listened to a Latin trio. What a cool school he goes to! I can't BELIEVE he only has three weeks of kindergarten left! Unbelievable!
Let us all savor these glory days and sneak in a pampering (or two!) for yourselves this week as well!

Happy Easter Bunny...bok bok!

Busy Spring---need to post more soon. But wanted to take a minute and post the pic of our homemade bunny cake from today. This is a classic that my husband grew up on, but I had never made it before. Make two 9 inch rounds of a cake of your choice (we used CARROT). One round is the bunny head, the other round os cut int three pieces..the sides are cut into bunny ear pices and the middle is his bow tie. Ice with the frosting of your choice. Add coconut shavings for fur, draw a nose/mouth and outline of ears and bowtie with gel or decorator frosting, jellybeans for eyes, licorice for whiskers and voila! A bunny!

Oh baby, baby, it's a wild world....

We just got back from a trip to Disney's Wild Kingdom which, as my buddy Lila remarked, is like the mecca for my little guy. He says he wants to be a "zookeeper" when he grows up. I talk to him about how important the
kindness to animals is. I do want to nuture his interest in animals and talk to him about things he could do when he grows up to help animals.
We stayed at Animal Kingdom's Kidani Lodge which was amazing. We got an upgrade to a room with a view from our balcony of the exotic animals who roamed the "Savanna". He had a field guide and would wake up and check off who he saw wandering, giraffes, ostrich, opaki....
I think it is something he will never forget!

Give me your tired, your poor, your kindergarten readers

Just had to record the results of Little Man's Read-A-Thon from last month for posterity. In the three weeks it went on he read (or had read to him) 326 books. The whole school was on a mission and got tons of pledges from eager-readers to help break ground on a (long over-due)new library this year. There was an assembly to give prizes to the top readers and my little guy was so sure that, after reading 100 books in one week, his name would be called. When it was not he rushed the stage with protests! (Yikes...gotta love that impulse control! :) We'll keep working on
sportsmanship!) He did recieve a metal for being a "heavyweight reader" and his class got a pizza and ice cream party for their efforts. The funniest thing that happened was that he told me that the Statue of Liberty was at their reading assembly. I later read the PTO's newsletter about the event and saw the pictures and realized that what he thought was Miss Liberty was
actually Miss Tennessee in a tiara!

Country Music Hall of Fame

Thrilled and happy this week at the press announcement that my dad is getting inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Yay, Daddy!!! Congratz to Reba McEntire and Jean Shepard, too!

Little Prince Read-a-lot

"The essential things in life are seen not with the eyes, but with the heart."
-The Little Prince

Friday kicked off the Little Man's school's Read-A-Thon. The kids all dressed as favorite book character's to kick it off. Since we were reading The Little Prince at home he wanted to dress like the Little Prince and was just adorable. The kids were all precious in their costumes yesterday and were so excited. I am excited to see how many books I can read with my little prince over the next three weeks! Off to the library today for inspiration!

Disney dreamin'

With more snow in the forecast, I am snow-dayed out and dreaming of Disney! Much like we had a "smiley face countdown to Christmas" which helped the little guy "make good choices" at school and keep smiley faces on his smiley face chart in December, we are now on a "smiley face countdown to Disney". Now, this is a little bit risky because it is about seven weeks away and if one of the dealbreakers is broken we are all screwed! He is super-motivated though, and I have a loophole in mind anyway, so I think it is all good. We can will it to be-right? And as Jimminy-Cricket crooned ..."When you wish upon a star your dreams come true!"

Snow Way....another day off!

Happy New Year! Haven't written in a while. Busy 'round here. Getting back into the swing of a new school year for one whole week then we got blasted with snow. Tomorrow will be our forth snow day in a row! (Roads are clear except for some rural parts of the county) We have been having a great time, but...enough is enough! Ready to get back on it. We have enjoyed sleeping in and staying in our jammies, sledding and snow men, fires and hot cocoa. Oh, and today ... snow ice cream! Ok, eating the elements is a little funky (all white, thank you very much) but it was novel and fun. I just added skim milk, vanilla extract and blue agave nectar (in lieu of sugar) Yum.
It's been lovely. Now come on spring! :)