It has been kind of a blah day. I have been just sort of out of it and not wanting to do anything. Boo! So basically I wasted my day and got nothing accomplished. I am house sitting next week as well as becoming the guardian of a 16 year old for the week. It is a surreal experience to think that someones care and well being is up to me. While this teenager is low maintenance and can take care of herself it is weird to know that she still would need my permission to go to the doctor or check out of school. I really do not feel that I am old enough to being making those kind of decisions. I am constantly being reminded that I am an adult, I mean my new teenage child (for the week) called me "Ma'am" today! What! That is wrong on so many levels!

I will have some stories to tell I'm sure about my adventures in parenting this next week.

A special topic for my 100th post: Cystic Fibrosis

Definition:
Cystic fibrosis (also known as CF) is a hereditary disease that affects mainly the exocrine (mucus) glands of the lungs, liver, pancreas, and intestines, causing progressive disability due to multi system failure. Cystic fibrosis is one of the most common life-shortening, childhood-onset inherited diseases. In the United States, 1 in 3900 children is born with CF.

Why I care:
- I lost my uncle to CF.
- I am a carrier for the CF gene.
- My brother is a carrier for the CF gene.
- I know the heartache the family of a CFer goes through.

Why should you care:
- Approximately 30,000 people in the United States have cystic fibrosis. An additional ten million more—or about one in every 31 Americans—are carriers of the defective CF gene, but do not have the disease. The disease is most common in Caucasians, but it can affect all races.
- Currently, there is no cure for cystic fibrosis.
- In 1955, children with CF were not expected to live even to first grade. In 2005, the predicted median age of survival rose to 36.5 years, up from 32 in 2000.
- Today, thanks to continued Foundation-supported research and specialized care, an increasing number of people with cystic fibrosis are living into adulthood and leading healthier lives that include careers, marriage, and families of their own.

Special CF Websites you should visit:

• http://www.cff.org/
• http://cfhusband.blogspot.com/
• http://65lbs.blogspot.com/
• http://www.cysticfibrosis.com/index.cfm

Please pray for Angie and her family. They are struggling right now and they keep facing one tragedy after the other. But through it all their faith remains strong.

Check out Angie's blog here, http://audreycaroline.blogspot.com/

Woes of the single 25 year old sorority girl...

So today has been not so good for me and my single life. In one day I got an invitation to one of my sorority sisters wedding and another one of my sorority sisters announced on Facebook that she is engaged. YIKES! This is killing my psyche!

I am happy for them, honestly I am. These are amazing women who absolutely deserve any piece of happiness that they get. But I can help but wonder, when is it going to be my turn?

Without getting into any details about how or why I got into this slightly depressed pity party mood, I decided that I need to create a list of the blessings in my life that I can revisit when I am getting down and having a "I wish my life were different" night. So here goes:

1. My faith and relationship with my savior Jesus Christ
2. I can worship the Lord freely and openly in whatever way or anywhere I want.
3. I have amazing parents who love me unconditionally and support me in all I do.
4. Wonderful Grandparents who do anything for me and have provided for my life thus far and my life in the future.
5. I had a place to come home to that didn't question my reasons for leaving or coming back.
6. I had the opportunity to go back to school to finish my education.
7. There was an academic advisor who was willing to go to bat for me.
8. I met Amber on my very first day at a new school. She has been my rock and guide post and I am lucky to have her on my new journey.
9. My two best friends didn't let me fall by the wayside when I ran and have remained my constants.
10. Even if we hadn't talked in years and are not as close as we once were I have many friends that I could call if I really needed them.
11. I never have to worry about the necessities of life.
12. I can honestly and faithfully believe that God will provide.
13. In comparison to some, I am relatively healthy.
14. I have discovered I can learn things about others, faith, God, myself, and what I need to do for other people from blogs.
15. There is always another day and when I wake up I can praise God for all that he has given me.

Well that is a working list that I am sure can and will be only added to.

If you ever want to feel good about yourself make friends with a Kindergarten class. I went to visit my field experience class and those kids just made my day. They were so happy to see me and they just kept hugging me. One little girl kept telling me that I was beautiful, wow that brightened my day for sure. I was very lucky to be a part of a great class this semester and my mentor teacher was awesome too. I am really going to miss those kiddos.

But on another note, yesterday I was witness to a very disturbing full blown tantrum by one of those students. This was not a screaming crying typical bratty tantrum; this was a full on violent attack. The way this little boy was screaming and the things he was saying was very disturbing. I cannot imagine what made this little boy become so violent that he threw crayons, paper, and chairs. If you were witness to this scene you would know that he was exhibiting some very adult behaviors and saying very adult phrases. It makes me very sad to think about this child's home life. His home is clearly full of hateful words and actions. I hate to know that when I am a teacher I will have to be witness to destructive families and there will not be anything that I can really do about it.

Not in a chatty mood. Here are some highlights of my day:

• Car got slimed. GROSS! I thought I lived with adults.... boy I was wrong.
• Church--> New preacher--> Undecided
• Apartment management could care less about my slimed car
• Driving to my parent's with a slimed car
• Laying out in the sun in the pool.... pool water too cold
• Yum...Popsicles.
• Sunday TV sucks
• Laundry
• Robbie coming home tomorrow?
• I need a job.
• I'm really glad that I can wear my white linen skirt again

Sorry I am super behind on my posting. But some super Texas size lightening blew out my buildings DSL line so I have been Internet less. So now today I have spent the day alternating between vomiting and waiting for the DSL guy.

I will catch up soon.

Today was a good day.

My Daddy was playing in a charity golf tournament at our country club so me and Pickle took our golf cart to follow his group around for a while. It was fun to see the course and ride around. I hadn't been on the golf course in forever and it was good to be on the course again, even if it was just riding around. Then I sat in the backyard at my parent's house and watched the other groups playing on our hole. I actually love to watch golf so it was fun. Plus it is always entertaining to watch really bad golfers! :) My Dad's team did really well and came in second place. I was very proud of him.

The day made me wish I still played golf. Maybe it is something I will pick up again when I can afford to devote a lot of time to it.

The only bad thing was that I have had a crazy migraine all day. I am about to call it a night so I can sleep off this headache.

Post topic planned for tomorrow: Cystic Fibrosis

Happy Mother's Day Pickle!

I have the greatest Mommy in the whole world. She is the best Pickle and my best friend. I love her lots. I am so glad that I was able to spend the day with her today. This is the first mother's day I have been home in like 6 or 7 years; in college I couldn't come home because of finals and then I was in North Carolina. So my poor mother was without her children for a lot of years on Mother's Day.

So Pick, thanks for all you do and loving me so unconditionally!

P.S.- If you hadn't realized it I call my mom, Pickle.

It is funny how many people stumbled on my blog in search of Locks of Love. Well I hope if they are looking at my site they see how cool it is to chop your hair off for a good cause. :-) Oh and I don't want it to be deceiving because the picture looks weird but those braids are over 10 inches of hair. The picture makes the braids look short, but you have to have 10 inches to donate.

So I was watching qualifying at Darlington today and it made me nostalgic for when I went to the race there. It was the most fun I ever had at a race; Darlington is way better than Talladega and even better than Texas Motor Speedway (but I still think Lowe's Motor Speedway is my favorite, but that is just because I spent so much time there and it feels like home). I think I hold a special place in my heart for Darlington because I sat in the front row and got pelted with tire rubber all night. Doesn't sound like fun, but it was AWESOME. I even left the night with a bruise on my arm from the rubber hitting me. And then on the last lap, Kevin Harvick wrecks right in front of us. Yep, that makes the track worth visiting again.

Moral of this post, I wish I were at Darlington this weekend.

Donate your hair to Locks of Love.

http://www.locksoflove.org/


I Did.

Edit:

Why in the world does my chopped off hair look like a completely different the rest of the hair that is still on my head? Weird, I promise I don't dye my hair. But the picture of the braids proves that I am really a redhead. No one ever believes me that I am a redhead.

I had a post all prepared about how annoying it is at grocery stores when there are those employees who are checking under your cart and telling your checker "Hey she has water under there". It makes me angry, I was totally going to tell them. I am not trying to steal water. But that is all I am going to say about it. My post was bitter and rude. And I don't want to be that kind of person. I want to be positive and happy.

I made cupcakes today and they are so yummy. I had a serious craving so I bought all the fixings at the store. The cupcakes are not going to help me on my diet though. Oh well! :-)

I knew I had to take a statistics class in order to get my Masters degree. To say that I was dreading that class was an under statement. Not only did I have to take stats but I had to take it on the graduate level. YIKES! I started getting bad grades in math in the first grade. So I did not have high hopes for my grade in this class.

Well I decided to get it over with and took stats this semester. And ladies and gentlemen I would just like to say that, I am almost certain that I am going to get an A in that class!! YIPPEEE!!!!

I may not be graduating from law school in a couple weeks like all my other friends from undergrad, but at least I can say I got an A in statistics!

What a night! I was sitting on the couch minding my own business when the fire alarms starting going off. That is the scariest feeling in the whole world. I opened my front door and saw people running around so I figured it was the real deal. I run back in my apartment and I saw the cats running to avoid the noise so I grab my phone and purse and head outside. Turns out thankfully it was a false alarm, but it took the firemen coming back twice to get the alarms off. And as of right now we are back in the building but we have no working fire alarms. So if there is a real fire we have no way of knowing it. But tonight's activities have taught me some things:

1. The fire alarms never go off when I am fully dressed and not in my pajamas
2. If there was a real fire, I would most likely lose my cats which is very upsetting
3. City of Houston fire department (Kingwood- HFD) SUCKS. They were in no hurry to get here and did even have the sirens on. So if it was a real fire then damage would have been heavy
4. My apartment management needs to do something about the gate because the fire truck couldn't get in. That is a problem in my opinion.

On another note, Congratulations to Rick and Jenn for the birth of their beautiful daughter, Peyton Ryann.

I don't think it is fair that on my first days of summer vacation I get sick! I am either having an allergy attack or strep throat. Either way it is way sucko!

So I am done with the school except for my statistics final. I know I am done with school weeks before most other people who are in college but still I feel like this semester is never ending.

I have a list going of fabulously funny things to post about. Here is a preview:

• Open letter to Boeing Corp.
• Proper etiquette at doctor's offices
• What I have learned from Kindergartners
• We were all adults, why all the drama?

Who's excited? Come on, I can be funny. And now that my Dad reads this blog, hopefully someone will laugh.

Remember Daddy, you have to think I'm funny cause you're my Daddy.