Ogletree twins: Celebrate 18th birthday, honor grandfathers
Newnan High School football players Alec and Alexander Ogletree are arguably the state's most famous twins. The 6-foot-3, 220-pound Alec is rated as one of the nation's top prospects and committed to Georgia over more than 50 scholarship offers. The 5-10, 205-pound Alexander, nicknamed "Zander," is an All-State candidate at linebacker but has yet to generate as much college attention as his brother because of height.
This season, AJC reporter Michael Carvell and photographer Jason Getz are following the twins as they deal with the pressures of recruiting, newfound stardom and attempting to lead Newnan (which started off the year with a 4-0 record) to the Class AAAAA championship.
On Friday, we will have celebrated the birthday of my twin boys, Alec and Alexander. They are now both 18 years old.
Since there was a football game on Friday, we had a birthday dinner earlier in the week with the two boys, their sister Lisa Partridge, and her two-year old son, Jay Boozer. I cooked one of their favorite meals -- Rotisserie chicken, rice, corn, and brownies with cream-cheese icing.
Most every night we eat together as a family. My husband Al was away at work, as he drives a truck for a living. However, he always does his best to make it to the games on Friday night and hasn’t missed one yet. I work at Kroger in electronics.
The twins are big eaters. Alec is bigger, and eats the most, usually getting second and third helpings. He didn't like the brownies from the birthday meal because of the cream cheese, but he wouldn't have turned down my banana pudding because it's his favorite. Alexander's favorite dessert is strawberry shortcake.
On a regular night, the rest of the family tries to eat before the twins.
Because if we don't, then the food is gone. A few weeks ago, I was going to order 50 chicken wings to eat while watching football on TV. Alec said he could eat 30, and Alex said around 15. So I had to order more than 50 so everyone would have some.
Friday [was] a big night for the boys. It was homecoming, and they [wore] a special pair of cleats in the game. The personalized shoes had "RIP Ray" and "RIP John" stitched to the back of left and right heels. They did this done in honor of their grandfathers, John Partridge and Ray Ogletree. They had the cleats since the beginning of the season, but they felt like Friday's homecoming was the perfect time to [debut] them.
The shoes were out of respect for their grandfathers, who died when both of the boys were really young. However, both of my boys inherited a lot of characteristics from them. Alec is quiet and more reserved like John Partridge, and Alex is more outgoing and social like Ray Ogletree. They are both fine young men like their grandfathers were.
-- Allyson Ogletree
