Proud

I don’t think I have ever been more proud of Jody than I was this weekend. He has been working (with the help of Andy Villarreal) very diligently over the past few months putting together the 1st Annual Patrick Murphree Memorial Golf Tournament, which will fund the Patrick Murphree Scholarship set up at the University of Alabama. The tournament debuted Saturday and turned out to be such an amazing and fun event. Here are some tournament stats just to give you an idea: 23 four man teams participated grossing over $20,000 and drinking almost 37 cases of beer!

Getting ready to tee off!

The weather turned out to be incredible considering earlier in the week they were predicting 60% chance of rain. During registration and lunch the skies were overcast and looked like rain was heading in our direction, but as soon as the teams headed out for their first hole the skies cleared and the sun appeared! Shortly after that…The Blue Angels started flying over (Thanks Uncle David for arranging it).

Jody’s team of Scott Belcher, Kirk Sanders, Ben Light and himself ended up coming in second place overall, which won them each a $150 Callaway Golf Gift Certificate! (Check the Patrick Murphree Memorial Golf Tournament blog for a list of all the prizes, winners and more pictures when I get them all posted.)

Jody’s Team on their last hole

There were only a few mishaps of the day – Gammy (Patrick’s other Grandmother) got her car stuck in a culvert at Point Mallard Campgrounds when she got lost on her way to Target, the second set of $75 and $150 Callaway Golf gift certificates got mixed up so we had no clue which stack was which, and I left my sunroof open and about an inch of rain came in after the tournament was over and we were packing up!

Just a few thank yous to mention from my end: Thank you Andy Villarreal for being Jody’s mentor and for donating the delightful Domino’s pizza to feast on after the tournament!

Thank you Sara Walker for helping me man the Sign-In table and for driving me around in the golf cart all day so I could take pictures. I really enjoyed spending my day with you and am looking forward to it again next year!

Thank you Mandy Mitchell and Owen Anderson for entertaining my kids! Come by and play with us any time!

Thank you Kim, Tracey, Mandy and Beth for spending your day out there driving the beer carts. If you read the number of cases they went through...then you know they were BUSY!

Thank you to all the high school and college friends who drove in from all over the South to participate! You made the tournament fun and made me feel way younger than I am!

The “Frat Boys” from the University of Alabama

The D-High Crew (Frank…you made the blog)

The Hole-in-One Witnesses

The Girlfriends

Thank you to Popsy and Gigi for keeping the kids on Saturday so I could support Jody. Thank you to Nanny Nan and John B for taking kids Saturday night so we could house 6 of Patrick’s fraternity brothers and friends. I kind of felt like the housemother of a fraternity house but I truly loved every minute of it!

Every time there is an event in Patrick’s memory, I am reminded of the amazing group of friends Patrick collected over the years from all parts of his life! I really enjoyed seeing all of them and hearing all of their “Patrick Stories”. There was lots of laughter mixed with a few tears on that golf course!

I think Patrick would have been proud of Jody and everything he made of the tournament. Jody’s goal for next year is to have double the teams (divided into a morning and afternoon flight). It is my dream to see Banks playing in it one day!