Christmas in July! Dabo's Ladies Clinic 2017

Apart from going to the beach, this may be one of my favorite things about the summer. It's DABO'S LADIES CLINIC!

Last year's Ladies Clinic was my first time going and I was beyond excited to come back this year. This clinic took place at the new Football Operations Complex a few weekends ago and it once again lived up to its hype. I actually LUCKED into getting a ticket this year because Katie Hinkley had a conflict and I was able to buy her ticket from her. On the day the tickets went on sale (last NOVEMBER, and no, that's not a typo), they sold out in 21 minutes. I leisurely logged in about 2 or 3 hours after they went on sale and was literally shocked that I wasn't able to get one. I was really grateful that I was able to get Katie's ticket. I would have been so disappointed to miss it! I have learned that lesson and will not stray from the tribe ever again! So anyway, Dabo actually congratulated all of us on being there since the tickets were so hard to come by and there was apparently a black market. Too funny.

Anyway, this particular clinic was so anticipated because of the new football complex. We knew we would get an inside look at this spectacular facility and it totally rocked. We also knew that Deshaun was nearby in Liberty, SC putting on a kids football clinic in the morning and we were hopeful that he would make an appearance in the afternoon, but {spoiler alert} he didn't. #sad

The thing that I appreciate most about this event is the access we get to both players and the assistant coaches. Dabo is really, really popular, so you really only get to take one quick pic with him and maybe, possibly get an autograph really quickly, but the other coaches are available for talking, autographs, shooting the breeze, etc. There are around 1300 ladies that sign up and attend this event and it's so well organized and run. It's a fave.

We gathered in the indoor practice facility in the morning for the kick off.



Coach Pearman is heavily involved with the planning of this event and he opened it up for us. He is hilarious. He had us laughing the whole time.



"We are the Champions" sung by the Clemson coaching staff



My favorite rotation...the weight room! The guys dance through this conga line and everyone is hollering and laughing and giving them high fives. It's so funny! The only negative this year was that this was our group's very first rotation and it was still early. I think it gets a little more raucous, both from the players and the ladies, later on in the day. It was a little tame being the first rotation, but still super awesome!

Matt Bockhorst doing a SPLIT.
He's a true freshman. What what!

Twins: Jacob and James Edwards
We have THREE sets of twins on the roster!

Dexter Lawrence aka Sexy Dexy & DJ Greenlee

Albert Huggins aka Huggy Bear

Cornell Powell

Isaiah Simmons

The man, the myth, the legend
CHRISTIAN WILKINS #42

With Cornell and Isaiah

Wilkins dead lift

Simmons dead lift

They were showing us the proper weight lifting technique. ;)

Jordan Williams, Gage Cervenka, Christian & Coach Greenlee (?)

My BFF
Christian Wilkins

Me, CW, Carole and Cason

Same group with Sexy Dexy

With Garrett Williams and DJ Greenlee

With the Edwards Twins
I told them I was a triplet mama & love multiples
LOL

The end of the weight room rotation made me sad because I love it so much. But there were lots of other fun rotations still to come!

With Kelly Bryant (our starting QB) and Shaq Smith

with Andy Teasdall

With Tee Higgins - he is seriously SO CUTE!

Jalen Williams was DJ'ing for us

With Adam Choice (my other new BFF) and I think Amari Rodgers

Tribe!
Kristen, Brittany, The Natty, Jalen (he surprised us and snuck in!),
Carole, Cason and me

With TJ Chase

With Jalen Williams
(he gave me a shout out for dancing!)

Cason and me with Will Swinney (Dabo's son)

Cool waterfall wall

The ALL IN chip that Tee gave me after
I told him that he was super adorable and I loved
him and I liked his Clemson decision video
with the fireworks. ;)

Carole and I met up with Polly during lunch and got a pic!

Lunchtime entertainment
Family Feud with Hunter Renfrow, Tanner Muse, Christian,
Maverick Morris, Albert Huggins, Clelin Ferrell and some lucky
ladies that were chosen at random

With Tyler Grisham (remember him from last year?)
#crushalert again.

Coach Venables!

Carole with Coach V.
She made him sign her natty ticket in a specific
spot and he told her that he "is coachable" hahaha! 

Coach Bates and his All In poem

Impressive facility

Jeff Davis talking about P.A.W. Journey

Panel of players that are benefitting from P.A.W. Journey

P.A.W. Journey was really cool to hear about. It's a program that Jeff Davis started and it's basically there to help our football players become well rounded young men, not just good football players. They know that not all of them will go to the NFL and those that do may not have a long NFL career. This program wants to support them and get them prepared for life after football. There are three pillars to the program:

• Striped (personal growth)
• C.U. in Life (life skills)
• 5th Quarter (career development)

The director of the program told us about a few cool things they had going on this summer. She told us that the football players only have 2 weeks off during the entire summer and that's their free time. They were offered an opportunity to go on a mission trip to Haiti during those 2 weeks and more than 15 of the guys went. They got to distribute shoes to children in need, help provide meals and be mentors. Several guys on the panel in the picture above went on that trip and said it was so eye opening to see how other people live and how fortunate we are. I think it's amazing that they gave up their only summer break to go help others and to hear about what a great experience it was for them. Another cool thing is that Clemson teamed up to Adobe to do an internship program. Adobe was planning to take 5 guys and they came and interviewed a bunch and took 7 instead of 5.  Those 7 guys went out to Silicon Valley, were in meetings with C-level execs, got a glimpse of corporate life, helped out in the office doing whatever tasks they were given, and now have an incredible internship that they can put on their resume. I'm so impressed with this program and the great things they're doing for our players. 

I did a google search and found some neat articles about P.A.W. Journey: Developing Players Off the Field and Trip to Haiti (which has a cool video).

Coach Scott

Coach Elliott drawing up some plays

the infamous indoor slide
It was blocked off so we couldn't slide down :(

NFL wall

with some uniform mannequins

Ode to #4 on the wall

Rotating uniform mannequins

In the locker room rotation, we learned a little bit about recruiting from Coach Streeter and how Clemson manages the recruitment of players (it's so intense and busy!) and Grady Jarrett's mama was there and spoke to us about the recruitment process from the standpoint of a parent. Very cool!

with Carole in front of Hunter's locker!

Panorama of the locker room

"Put me in, Coach!"

Official gloves

with Clelin Ferrell
We had a nice long convo. Super nice guy!

It was a fun filled day for a tiger stalker enthusiast like me. I wish that I had printed out a roster or studied it beforehand so I would have known every player that we saw. I recognized most of them and didn't remember names and positions. It has been a good 6+ months since we've played a football game. My memory is not as good as it once was. So, let's just note that this was an awesome event. I got all my pictures done...#notshy...got to have some nice discussions with several of my friends, I mean football players, and got to see the new facility first hand. It was a good day.

We also go to do some shopping and there were lots of vendors there and they brought allllllll their Clemson/Tiger/Orange and white things to this event. I got 2 new tiger books for the boys and got them both signed by the authors. The boys LOVE their tiger books!

Let me give a shout out to my rock star husband that took care of the kids all evening on Friday and all day on Saturday so I could have my Clemson football day. He's so good! Last year Stokes was throwing up and I felt horrible, so I was really glad that they were all well this year. Thomas was able to fit 3 car seats in his truck (we've never even tried before and thought they wouldn't fit!) so I was pleasantly surprised and impressed that he took them out to run an errand or two. Go Da-da!

Thomas sent me this picture during the day on Saturday!
YAY!

With as much fun as I had in Clemson, I was excited to get home to this sweet view!

Two of my handsome fellas

Ry Ry in Dada's truck