Disney World

To say that I am excited about heading to Disney World next week, may be a bit of an understatement! I am absolutely exstatic! I haven't been in over 5 years, and that was a quick trip that I only spent at the Magic Kingdom. I didn't have the funds and let's face it Universal Studios is much cheaper, so I spent 2 days there. I am spending 3 full days at the Disney parks with a park hopper so I can go from park to park whenever I want. I do however think that I will end up at Magic Kingdom every night to watch Tink fly from the castle and the fireworks display.

Aubrey doesn't really do fireworks, so I may have to do that solo, but just ask Heather, I am not afraid to travel around Orlando by myself. I've made Aubrey a couple of shirts to wear during our stay. Here's her Cinderella:

I've finished a Little Mermaid one too and plan to get a couple more done before we leave on Tuesday. This is also part of her Christmas present! I think that it turned out really good! I know that Kali plans on letting her wear it to eat with Cinderella if it's too cold to wear her dress. Otherwise, she's going to be making some outfit changes.

We have dinner reservations to eat at the SciFi restaurant.

This restaurant is so much fun and I just can't wait to pretend like I'm 5 again! I'm still a little bummed that Kent "can't go," but I know that I will have fun no matter what!

Catch Up

-Well, I must admit, I have let my blog go by the wayside. My life has been so filled with "stuff" that I really haven't made time for much computer time. I haven't been keeping up with blogs much less updating my own. Life has been complete chaos for the last couple of weeks and it doesn't look like I will have much down time until next year. Here's my December line up for the rest of the year. Other than working every other week, on my off weeks I will be saying hello to Mickey and friends in 9 days. I leave for Disney world with my family in a little over one week. I'm really excited about it! I'm just nervous that I signed up to stay with the parentals. Kent can't go, so my older sis and I are leaving when she gets off work next Tues evening. I'm not really looking forward to a 10 hour drive/ride, but it will all be worth it when I see tink fly out of the castle:). FYI-that's my favorite part! I come back just in time to go back to work for a week and shuffle myself around to see everyone for Christmas. It's really difficult to enjoy the holidays sleep deprived. But that's another drama filled post. Then, on my next Wednesday off, we head to the beach to celebrate the ringing in of 2011. I'm really looking forward to some good downtime spent on the balcony with some coffee and a good book. I still have a stack of new books that have yet to be cracked so my plan is to read 2. We'll see how that goes.
-A couple of weeks ago, Kent called and said he could get me tickets to the AL game vs Georgia State. It was on a Thurs night and I was off, so it just so happened that Loni already had a babysitter, so she and I had a girls night out to Tuscaloosa to cheer on the tide. We won really big and we went to eat at Pepito's-YUM!!! It was a lot of fun and for the first time in forever, Loni and I had a night out that did not include sewing, cutting fabric, making bows, and without husbands, children or dogs.
-This past Wednesday night, I had some friends over from work and hosted a Southern Living inspired party. It was so much fun and such good food and company! I cooked all day long starting with the desserts: Maple Brown Sugared Pecans, Peppermint Bark, & Salty Nut Brittle. Then I started with the roasted turkey, Maque Choux (really good corn dish), garlic and ginger green beans, & squash casserole. Everything turned out really delicious! Then I topped it off with some caramel apple cider. The only thing that was not homemade were the rolls. I was not about to tackle that one, so thank you sister shuberts!
-I was really happy yesterday for all of you Auburn tiger fans out there! I think that it would be really awesome to have 2 years of teams from the state to have the National Championship. Also, having 2 straight years of heisman trophy winners would be amazing! There is something to be said about how good the SEC teams have been doing these past few years! I love football Saturdays! I'm really liking football Sundays more and more too with the Saints. That's exactly what I'm doing now. Watching the Saints while Kent naps:) It's really a nail biter too! We just scored to go up by 4 with 30 seconds left-not that you care.
-I love my house decorated for Christmas! I catch myself just staring at my tree. Kent thinks that its all totally too much, but I really don't care. It makes me happy!
-Having 3 dogs in the house is a little too much most of the time. As I am typing this, Max is wandering around aimlessly and Lucy & Frankie are napping on top of Kent. It's too expensive too! Especially when 2 have constant pancreatitis requiring lab draws and special formula food and the other has to take arthritis meds. It's really ridiculous! And Kent wonders why we don't have any $$.

New Orleans

For the last 3 years, we've gone out of the country mid October on either our honeymoon or anniversary trip. This year, we decided to go to Gulf Shores for an extended vacay in Sept, then have a weekend in New Orleans to hang out and watch the Saints play. I was never into NFL football before I started dating Kent, but now I love it and am even remembering names of some players and who they play for. I mean, after 5 years, you are bound to catch on to some things right? Anyway, the Saints have always been Kent's team and we've seen them play in Atlanta twice since being married. So we headed out this past Saturday for our road trip to New Orleans. I really want to ride the train, but since we were limited on time, driving was a better option. I booked through priceline and our hotel was about halfway between the Superdome and the French Quarter. We got there 2 h before check-in time, but within 15 minutes, they had us in an upgraded room and gave us a discount on our parking. Thanks Quality Inn! After settling in, we headed to eat. The Acme Oyster house was on Kent's list, and since I've only been there once in my life I don't really know what/where to go.

It was delicious and we watched the first half of the Auburn/LSU game. After that we walked around and went to Jackson Square, watched a street show and headed to Bourbon St.

We watched football in various spots and had a really great time. Sunday morning, we headed to Cafe Du Monde to eat some beignets and stuff ourselves with powdered sugar! I asked Kent to take a pic of me eating one, and I'm posed and ready when he blows the sugar all in my face.

Thanks hun! It was funny though. Then we headed out to the Superdome.

Our seats were 3 rows from the tip top but right on the 45 yard line. The Saints played like crap and handed the Browns the game on a silver platter, but we still had a great time with the experience. The ceiling of the superdome still has some holes from Katrina. After the game, we headed to eat at La Bayou on Bourbon St. Kent had a roast beef po boy and I had a New Orleans poboy (shrimp, fried green tomatoes, and remoulade sauce) that were delicious!

We went to Pat O'Briens piano bar which was a lot of fun and then just kinda made rounds listening to live music and watching other NFL games that were on. We also found these two Browns fans that I HAD to have my pic taken with!

I must say, that hair is amazing! Especially after wearing a hat all day! Haha!

It was a much needed weekend with the hubs! Now we are back to reality with sewing, monogramming, nursing, etc. Now the countdown is on for Disney!!

Tailgating...

So my birthday gift from hubs was tickets to the Alabama Homecoming. We've never been to an AL game together before and it's been almost 5 years since I've been to a game in T-town, so you can see why I was uber excited about my gift! The game started at 8pm, so we had all day to tailgate. We ended up trading our two tickets for 4 tickets and had another couple that met us there. We timed it perfect and got to park right beside each other in a field, so we just set up our tailgate right there. We brought the satellite, TV, grill and snacks. It was soooo much fun! We watched the Auburn game and grilled hamburgers, bratwurst, and andoille sausage. Yummo! We might have turned into slight rednecks when the sun was going down though:)

After the Auburn game, we packed up and headed to Denny Chimes, said hello to a coworker and went in the game.

It was a little bit closer than we all expected, but we pulled out a win. Bummer of the night, was that I had to go straight to work afterward. Thanks Savannah for staying for me:) I was only 2h late, so that wasn't too bad.

Ankle Problems

December will mark the 10th anniversary of me being hit by a drunk driver. I was heading to work one morning and BAM! my life changed in an instant. I was incredibly fortunate that my only injuries were a "crushed" ankle and a knee that was cut wide open. I was in an ankle cast, using crutches and going through therapy on and off for about 2 years.
Fast forward 10 years, and the ankle is showing signs of rebellion. I've always had some struggles when I stay up on it for extended periods of time, such as going to Six Flags or working doubles, but lately it has been unbearable. Working these arts and craft shows have proven to be much more difficult than expected. By the end of the day, I am limping from place to place, sometimes crawling from the bedroom to the bathroom.
I took the initiative to go to the doctor and have it checked out. I had just had enough!
So essentially, I will always have problems. I have severe arthritis in my subtalar joint, which is the most used joint in your foot that supports walking. Isn't that wonderful! I'm 28years old and I have "severe arthritis." I was really throwing myself a pity party after going to the doc. I'm just not that happy about it. But we are taking it in three phases.
Phase one is starting Mobic-a prescription arthritis med, changing shoes, wearing an ankle brace and wearing new insoles to my shoes.
Phase two is having a CT to evaluate the joint and doing shots in the joint.
Phase three is having my ankle bones fused together.
So far phase one is doing the trick and I think that I am going to cancel my phase 2 appointment. I've been to New Orleans walking around half the country, and did great! I must say that it's a relief! I am sure that I will eventually have to move to the other stages, but hopefully that can wait until much later on.

I did get to look at my new xrays and compare them to the ones from years ago which was pretty cool. Here's my CT from the day of the accident:

If you look at the ankle on the left, you can see in the middle there is pieces of bone just floating around in there:)

And here's my xray from the other day:

On the picture on the left, you can see a white line in the middle of the ankle. That's arthritis!

This is how you walk around if you are me:

Just because I need to wear a brace at times, doesn't mean I can't still wear cute shoes!!!

Memphis

The reason I have been MIA for a while is because of my side business. We were in a show two weekends ago in Huntsville and in about an hour, I am leaving work. We are heading out to Memphis for our first HUGE show. Wish us luck! I'm a little bit nervous about it. Especially since we have never been and don't really know what to expect. We have a lot of new products and I am praying for a good following and start of a customer basis in TN. I'll let you know when I get back on Monday...

College Football

College football started in full swing while we were at the beach. I am loving it! I love watching ESPN college game day, I love watching football! We went to watch our niece cheer last night and the game was sooooo good! It was back and forth during the first half, and then Hueytown ended up winning by 2 touchdowns. I just love watching how much these high school boys get into pumping up the crowd and motivating each other. Kent bought me tickets to go watch my favorite team on Oct 16th.

YEAH!! We've never been to an AL game together, so i am really excited! We've seen his GA Dawgs play 3 times and it's about time we go cheer on the Crimson Tide together. I must admit that GA is now my #2 team. There are 2 reasons for that. #1:

The coach! I just think that he is a true role model for college students and he stands for what he believes.

#2:

UGA!!! Enough said!