Over the hill

I knew it was all going to be downhill past my 21st birthday, but what I didn't know was how quickly I would race down that stupid hill! I found out this week that I HAVE to get braces and soon. No getting around it. I tried and failed. The position of one of my teeth means that should I get a cavity in it (very likely because it is wedged in by another tooth and there's no good way to floss, etc) there are not a lot of options for filling it. Guess what the dentist found on Monday? You got it- a cavity in that tooth. Great. So come January I get to have some of that tooth REMOVED in order to take care of the cavity and eventually that tooth will need to be pulled. So, unless I want to walk around toothless I'll need to get braces to pull my teeth back in line. Perfect. Since I refuse to resemble the stereotypical Arkansasan (toothless and cannot pronunciate) looks like I'll be getting braces next year at the ripe age of 28. Can you see me shudder?

And to top it all off, it looks like I probably cracked my hip in that spectacular mountain bike wreck a couple of months ago. I went back to the doctor because my hip is still bothering me some: a lingering hematoma, some swelling, and pain if a lot of pressure is placed on my hip. According to the doc I probably cracked it (when I got the initial exam after the wreck no one bothered to x-ray my hip) and now it was really too late to do anything about it. So I get to live with it and hope the swelling goes down and everything returns to normal.

Did I mention this is all Jeremy's fault?! The love of my life has a sick and twisted sense of humor because he thinks its hilarious that I have a broken hip at 27. I told him it wouldn't be funny when I started looking like this by 30! Ha! Whose laughing now?!

Adrenaline Junkie

It's official-Emma is a bonafide adrenaline junkie. Do you see the gray starting to show up in my hair?!

Saturday night we went to Malvern Elementary's Fall Festival with our sis-in-law Holly, nephew Holton, and MeMe. Holly and MeMe both work at the elementary and we thought it would be fun for Emma to go and play with Holton. One of the major attractions was this huge 18' inflatable slide, something very similar to this:

Emma kept wanting to run right to it and I was steering her away from it about 20 times a minute. Don't judge-She's not even two for crying out loud! She's still my little baby! Eventually I gave up and let her give it a try. You have to climb up this ladder thing in the back to even reach the top, so silly me I was thinking this would deter her. Not one bit! She climbed up that ladder like a little monkey on a mission (and there were 5th or 6th grade kids who couldn't even climb up this thing!). I stood behind to make sure she wouldn't fall and then I fully expected her to make it to the top and turn right back around once she looked at how far down it was to the bottom. Nope. She turned around once to smile at me and then off she went. Jeremy was waiting at the bottom to catch her and was laughing his butt off. As soon as she got off she wanted to run around and do it again so Jeremy took her that time so I could watch her come down. She was loving every minute of it and went about 7 times before the older kids started getting rough and I made her stop. Guess she's not such a little baby anymore. Boo!

Sunday the weather was so nice we spent almost all afternoon outside after church. Emma insisted on swinging for about 30 minutes and she wanted to go HIGH and FAST. If you let her slow down she would demand "MORE!".

I have a feeling we're going to have a lot of broken bones and bruises if this keeps up!

You want me to what?!

So, when I started at the railroad 5 years ago I tried pretty hard to blend in with all the testosterone because my estrogen stuck out like a sore thumb. "Don't apologize for using foul language in front of me. Chances are I've said worse." "No thanks, I can carry my own little 5 pound bag, you're such a peach." Not that I mind chivalry, in fact I love it. It's a dying art. Manners are great too. But five years ago I needed to be one of the guys. Sometimes I think that was a big mistake- hence the shovel in my office.

The other employees at my office are used to me now. They accept me as one of their own but are (shock!) ok with the fact that I also happen to be a girl. In fact I think it surprises them at times. You should see their faces if I wear a skirt; they always assume I'm on my way to a funeral.

So, why does a manager for the railroad have a shovel in her office you might ask? I had been working on a project to locate a new transload customer on our line and he needed to dig a hole and install a wind sock (safety procedure) as the commodity had some hazardous qualities. He asked ME if I would dig the hole for him. Seriously?! Now granted this guy looked like he had not done any manual labor IN HIS LIFE, but really! Just so you can get a mental picture- dude was wearing prada loafers, Polo collar shirt, and had a manicure. With clear polish. yeah. So I suppose compared to him in my sweet heels from target and TJ Maxx scored ensemble I looked more apt to perform manual labor. Boy did he get a surprise.

Needless to say yours truly did NOT dig any holes and superfly was outside digging in his shiny prada shoes. Ha! Wish I had taken a picture . . .

MIA

I'm still alive, don't worry. I've just been super busy and haven't been able to blog dutifully. I've got a lot to catch up on so here we go. . . .

First, I'm back from Omaha safe and sound. This should be my last business trip for the year, knock on wood. I have supreme guilt every time I leave Emma so it's nice to be home and cuddle with my little monkey.

Jeremy turned the big 3-0 on Sept 26th. I felt kind of bad because I didn't plan him a big blow-out bash, we just went to eat at Fisherman's Wharf in Hot Springs (best seafood ever. period.) and on Saturday night we had the normal family dinner at his mom's house. When I apologized to him for not making a bigger production out of his birthday he laughed in my face and said "why? It's just another day!" That eased my guilt considerably. Here's Emma feeding the ducks that like to congregate on the water right off the outdoor dining area at Fisherman's Wharf.

She thought this was fantastic and it took a lot of patience on our part to keep her seated long enough to eat any of her meal. (I really need to start counting all of the pictures I have with Jeremy in a razorback shirt. Perhaps it's time to make him buy other clothing.)

The next morning we got up at 6:30, Emma's preferred time to start the day, and made Daddy some sugar cookies. His fave. I got her this awesome pink apron at Williams and Sonoma. Love. She was a little ticked off at first that she had to wear it, but she got over it quick enough. (The first picture shows her wearing her mad face.)

Decorations for Emma's b-day party are coming along slowly but surely. I still have a lot to do and only a little time left to do it. I'll post some pics of the finished product, but for right now just pray for me that I can recreate a Wild West town in my yard. And that it doesn't rain.

Over the weekend we went to Garner Family Homestead Farm for our annual trip to the Pumpkin Patch. PopPop was at the Razorback game so it was just the three of us and MeMe. Last year Emma really didn't care about the outing but this year she had a blast. She was so excited about getting her "punkin" that she could hardly stand it. And the weather was kind of crisp so it was perfect fall and pumpkin weather.

I've decided that I desperately need new clothes for fall. I've reverted to Jeremy's favorites-a razorback t-shirt. Aargh! Jennifer-guess what we're going to do next month when I come to Fayetteville (hopefully!)?!

And finally, I'm trying to become more involved with our chruch so I joined a Beth Moore bible study class and to my surprise I'm really enjoying it. I didn't know what to expect but we're almost half way through the course and I'm really learning a lot. I was really involved with a youth group when I was in high school, but didn't really learn alot. It was more of a little learning here, a lot of fun activities and trips there. We may do another bible study in the spring that I may sign up for. I have a lot of things in my life to be thankful for, so its probably time I really start showing it.