Happy Anniversary Week to me!! And Michael too! :-)

So last week was soooo eventful! I have my three yeary wedding anniversary with my wonderful husband Michael and my two year anniversary at the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences Advising Center. WHOO HOO!! The only way things could get any better would be if my beautiful husband...um I mean handsom husband was home with me!!!
This weekend Mom came up and we played all day Saturday and some on Sunday! My pups Brinkley and Gabby love her sooo much. I know that they get excited when ANYone comes over but when Mom gets here...WOW!! It's like she is there second mom and Gabby will not leave her side. (unless she has a bone) ;-) We got mani/pedi's, ate some Taco Bueno, walked the dogs, took an hour nap, returned things at Bed Bath and Beyond, watched The Dark Night, returned some more things to Home Depot, went to Target, got coffee for Mom's friend at Starbucks, walked the dogs again, and cleaned the house (room by room) unitl 1:30 in the AM!! And that was just Saturday!!!
I am always sooo happy to see my mom and it makes me sad to see her go...but I was just as tired after she left as my pups were. She can really wear me out!
So lets get it over with...I love Stephenie Meyer's Twilight Series!! Yes that is right I am lovin me some vampire love story!!! This weekend marks the release of the fourth and final book in the series...Breaking Dawn. Me and three lovely ladies from work are going to the midnight release party at Barnes and Noble. We even have shirts that we bought or made for the event!! Then they are all coming to my place for an all night reading marathon!! It's gonna be AWESOME!!!! Here is a my favorite picture which has nothing to do with the book...but is still super great all the same!!!

In real life I am also over half way done with my second summer school class and that is GREAT! I have loved this class eventhough I was super scared that the professor wouldnt' liek me. Thankfully she does and I hope to still get a great grade for yet another supurb counseling class! My buddies Jason and Erin and I have a big project that we have to have finshed by the end of this week and we don't feel that we are all that close so keep your fingers crossed that all our thoughts and ideas will come together and that we will rock our professor's face off!!

Well that is all for now...check back with me later and hopefully it won't be a month inbetween posts!

It's FINALLY over!!!

ORIENTATION IS FINISHED...well at least until August but that one doesn't ever seem to count anyway since there are no classes for anyone! 15 days straight of orientation sure makes it go by but I don't think I could have made it one more day. :-)

Today is Monday and we are off to a busy start! Our secretary is out for the week so that means some quality time with the front desk!! This morning it's me up front and half of the freshman class for our football team just walked in! They are getting advised for some classes that are starting today. :-D

The rest of this week should be super fun for me. I am going to get to go to my class for a change. I will get to hear two presentation on diversity counseling and then on the last day we have a cultural pot luck. I am bringing cornbread because no matter what the meal was they always had corn bread. As a matter of fact when the dogs ran out of dog food they got to eat cornbread too! Now the big deal is that I have never made cornbread! I will make it on Wednesday night so that I can make it again if I need too...and chances are I might!

Because the 4th of July falls on Friday this week we will get a wonderful 3 day weekend and I am going to go to the beautiful town of Brinkley to see my family. I will be highlighting Mom's hair and practicing a song with my Dad for my cousin's wedding. :-) Fun filled times in the Delta.

Well better get back to work...

Glad you're having fun!

The slide show is pretty cool.
I don't know how pictures with that much back light came out so well.
I am glad Wal-Mart opened up the concerts to the public so more people could go.
But I think you could have gotten in with your discount card
since I am an associate, if it had been associates only.
I am surprised they did not have Journey perform since they
have an exclusive Journey CD/DVD that was released just the next week.
But then again, I would have bee upset to miss that.
Lots of dust storms here again.
The last one lasted for about 3 days, took a day off and then hit for another day and a half.
The fish don't want to bite during a dust storm! ;o)
Oh well, I guess I HAVE to work some of the time.

WAL-MART Rocks!!

Last night was the first real night of the Wal-Mart shareholders concert series and this year they are all open to the public. :-) Here are some of the wonderful picutres that courtney was able to take while we were there!
WE are going to go see Carrie Underwood and Keith Urban on Thusrday too so that should be lots of fun.

YEA Wal-Mart!! :-D

I hope you didn't wear those vests the whole cruise

As usual, the pics are great.
The one of you at the railing is another example of how beautiful you are
and how you were made for a camera.
I HAVE to hear some stories about the Arkansans your were "fortunate" enough to meet.
Idon't think I could have kept a straight face when the teeth came out.
IF you ever feel like "cruising" again, we will do it at a time when there won't be
high school grads everywhere, or else we will go to Alaska or someplace they won't be.
While your were busy not winning anything at slots or bingo,
I actually joined a couple of poker games here,
Broke even one night and doubled my money the other night.
And each game saw me play for 5 hours!
I definitely think I got their money's worth. ;o)
Things are really getting busy for us here, so I have been putting in a few long days.
I got an "off day" for the first time in 3 weeks the other day...
I had to work for 3 hours and by the time I could go fishing,
my 2 favorite spots were taken and the fish had already stopped biting.
Needless to say, no new fishing pics.
I hope you have fun digging for rocks with my Mom and little bro!

I love you x 1,000,000
M

Ships and Mexico

YEA!!! I am back on solid ground!!

Mom and I had such a good time but there is no place like home. :-)

Here is a little rundown of our trip...

This was my first trip to New Orleans and since we were early we walked down to the French Quarter...don't need to visit there again!!

We got on the ship and for the first 8 hours I wasn't sure if I was going to make it...the Mississippi is one windy river!! Once we were in open water I did much much better.

The first night we tried to do a little Bingo...found out really quick we weren't that lucky. We had a hamburger at 4 and decided that we wouldn't do the formal sit down dinner for the first night. We then had another hamburger at 11!! :-D

The next day (Sunday for those who are already lost) we read our books, slept, ate, and Mom went to some seminars on where to shop for the best deals in Cozumel. That night we went to formal dinner and WOW were we in for a surprise. We were at a table with people from Arkansas. Paragould to be exact. It was a mother, father, daughter and her husband. During the first dinner we heard stories about the mother puking in the kitchen sink while her girls were in the other two bathrooms, the origin of Loushauna's name (nope mom was not named shauna with a dad named lou...just the name of a lady that did ponds cold cream commercials) and got to listen as the family played the water glasses. Now disclaimer...i too placed the water glass for the first time because I didn't want to be rude. After that Mom and I went back to the room and decided that we might not do formal dinner again. We also saw a comic and he was funny, and the dancers danced and the singer sang.

Monday was our first day off the ship. We spent 5 hours on a bus and 2 hours at the Chichen Itza ruins in Puerto Progresso

So glad we went but 100 degree temps with no shade made for some of the hottest two hours of my life. I was sooo happy to get back into the air conditioned bus. This night is a blur...I know I slept through the regular sit down dinner and mom went to hear something important or read (I can't remember) and then we watched all the Monday night season finales. We relaxed and loved it. The only down side to Monday night was that Mom got stuck in the elevator and then when it finally opened she got off and on her next elevator she met a man, told him about getting stuck and he said "well I just lost $40 in the casino" and Mom was like " I guess I can't top that".

Tuesday came and we didn't have to meet on shore until 10:00 so we were a little more relaxed with breakfast...even though we ate the same thing every morning! We went to do clear kayaking and snorkeling...both were a HUGH letdown. The description we saw was much nicer than trip we actually did and thanks to all that we didn't get to spend much time at all shopping. :-( Speaking of shopping though...while we were waiting to get back on the bus to go back into Cozumel Mom showed her superb bargaining skills when she paid $3 for a 6 in purple kids comb...if this was any inclination of her buying power in Mexico we should have never left the boat. We watched a fight almost break out at Margaritaville...a clear display of why you shouldn't drink before lunch...or take 5 shots at lunch for that matter. Because there were two Carnival ships docked at the same time getting back on the ship was a pain! AND we ran into the young couple from dinner and they said they missed us and Loushauna said "we thought we scared you away" soooooo we HAD to go to the big dinner that night. Not to our surprise they were in rare form this night too! The mom spent several minutes showing my mom her new dentures and how great her K-9's were. She also cut pieces off of Earls plate and had all of us at the table try it. Shortly after that I got to see Early digging in hid gums with his fork...I asked if everything was alright and he said it would have been if I had let him finish. WOW!!! After dinner we retired to our room to watch the two hour finale of American Idol...YEA DAVID COOK!!! After it was over she went up for some fresh air and some of our "thug wanna be's" were singing behind her ...wanna get a white girl, gotta get a white girl..." she was getting really worried they were singing but as she slowly turned around they darted into a room. Since I left home she doesn't listen to rap as much but she was guessing it's one of the new hits. :-D

Our last day was our day to lay out. It was overcast and the perfect temp for me and Mom to sit out and read. We probably spent 4 hours on deck and got only a little burnt so that was great! I even saw one of my students Rusty Jester from Ashdown. He was on a big trip with his family. Mom was excited because she was worried that would be the first place EVER that we would have gone that I didn't know someone. We took a break in the middle of our baking to try our hand at a slot tournament. Like I mentioned earlier we are not that lucky but we thought what the heck...We both got our card for $20 and the whole game was to just keep spinning for 5 minutes to see who got the biggest score. While I was watching mom I met Rusty's grandmother that looked to be around 45. I don't know what is in the water in Ashdown but I want some of it!!! She told me that Rusty had won $1000.00 the day before on the slots. Needless to say, Mom and I didn't win the tournament but I did play with $5 on Rusty's hot machine for like 45 minutes...I didn't walk away with anything but $5 for 45 minutes was worth it. For old times sake we had another burger for dinner and tried to take a picture or two for Michael...I think this was the best one.

So as the sun set on our last day I couldn't wait to get back home to my pups but all in all we had a blast...when we filled out the survey of when we planed to cruise again we both put 25 months or longer. :-)

You're cruisin' now

Sorry about the title...couldn't help myself.
The pictures are great and you look beautiful in all of them...as usual.
To be so pretty AND photogenic is a gift you certainly have loads of!
I am glad you had a good graduation/Mother's Day weekend.
It must have been great to see the family at our place for a change.
And to have KT's shower on Mother's Day was priceless.
I just wish I could have been there to help clean a make some snacks and things.

Well I finally shipped you a little package today.
Included are some pics I have taken since this deployment began.
There is a short video of me right after I caught a monster "Saddam Bass"
in which you will hear a few choice words from some of the guys around me.
Sorry...I guess all Army men have foul mouths.

I am already putting together another surprise box for you.
Imagine, I go to Iraq with the military and I am sending You care packages. ;o)

I hope you had a great time on your cruise...or are having since you are there as I type this.
Send or attach some more pics for me to see!

I love you and I miss you.

It's really official!

So even though I have had my degree since January…walking across that stage let me know that it was really real. :-)













My mom, dad and MeMe all came up for my graduation and it was great to see them all! We ate at Granite City on Friday night and my PapPaw was able to join us there as well. We took pictures and were even able to wrangle a new graduate (Jason Barns) to take pictures for us before everything got started. With a MFA in Art we figured we would be in good hands and other than the photo with the dump truck in the back ground he did a GREAT job! Our only real complaint about the picuters was that until I got in line I didn’t have that stupid hood on right. The directions they included with it couldn’t have been more wrong! So for the pictures with the family it wasn’t right but once I was in the tunnel it was all great. And yes we lined up in a tunnel and were herded in like a bunch of cattle. :-D



Everyone there gave good little speeches but after an hour and a half I ducked out and Mom, Dad and I went to have brunch at Common Grounds! I am pretty sure that with Thursday’s dinner at Noodles with my Bible study gals, Friday’s dinner at Granite City and Saturday’s brunch I put on a solid 5 lbs! (to borrow from Laura – BOO HISS!!!)



Looking back on this weekend I realized that I didn’t even have one. Friday was entertaining family and so was Saturday then Sunday I helped throw a surprise baby shower for my old roommate Katie. I never realized how hard it is to get everything ready for a shower. That was the first one I planned and I will have to say I don’t look forward to doing any more. J We did have a great time and that helped to add to the proverbial 5 lbs as well. Whitney and I started working on everything at 1:30 and the guest of honor showed up at 4:45 completely surprised. Everyone left by 7:30 then I walked the dogs and was completely spent after that. When I woke up today I realized that I felt like I hadn’t slept in three days sooo I can’t wait until SATURDAY when Mom and I leave for our cruise. I can tell that I will need the rest and relaxation from my basic 2 weeks of work.

Congradutation!

I wish I could be there to watch you walk, sweetheart!
Instead I am here just waiting to get off work so I can keep answering those letters from the class in Alabama.
I hope your parents get some pics of you an the stage that you can post for me to see.
I love you and can't wait to get home so your life can go even better (and mine too)!
143

One more day until DEAD DAY!!

So excited!! I have 6 questions to answer and then I am done with this semester!! :-) WOW - Time flys when your husband is serving his country in Baghdad. :-D

One more week unitl I get to walk at my second GRADUATION!! YEA!! I mean can you tell I am excited?!?

Nothing else is reallying going on but I wanted to post just to say that my life is going great right now. I miss you lots so get home safe and soon!

jgw

Hot as blazes!

Another day pushing 105 degrees...but at least it there is no dust storm.
I had the day off today and spent the morning sleeping in (until 7) and then went fishing.
I do not have those pics ready to post yet, but I will attach some from the last time...
OK, the upload did not work again.
Anyway, the fishing was good this morning.
I caught 3 asps and several carp...3 big ones that I got pictures of.
Another guy videoed my catching another...including it getting off the hook right as I was about to drag it up onto the bank.
I hope your paper went well the other night.
I love you!

What? 2 days in a row?!

Greetings from sunny Baghdad! But then I guess it has to be sunny....seeing as it is a desert and all. We had a 3 day dust storm that ended about 3 days ago. Everything looked a little yellow/brown and hazy. Worse than what we had down in Kuwait. I would love to attach a picture, but everytime I try to upload one, the Internet connection craps out. I guess it may be some kind of firewall that the provider uses or something. I can not even download movies or music with this stupid provider.
Hopefully the video camera will be here soon. It shipped on Friday. Maybe then I can record a video or two of me fishing and not catching anything. :o)

i'm bored, i'm bored, i'm bored

Soooo bored! Not because I don't have a ton to do and not because I have finished both of my papers that are due this week...one tomorrow and one Thursday...just cause I am!!

Today we had some hail (pea sized) and in like 3 minutes time the sky went from a little overcast to BLACK! But now the rain is gone and the sun is even trying to come out from behind the clouds.

I am so excited that school is almost out and I will finally have some time to read for pleasure. :-) Okay back to work...if I must!

Thanks so much for posting! :-) It really made me smile!!

I am blogging! I am blogging!

Whew! 104 degrees out there today! Oh well, at least the dust storm is over (I will send a pic for you to post).
Since it is getting hot, the fish aren't biting like they were. They go out to deeper water after about noon, and we can not cast out that far with the rods and reels that we have.
Shakespeare has said that they will send us some rods of some kind...VERY nice of them...and I hope they get here soon!

They redecorating looks GREAT! I don't see why you think you need my opinion about things. You do this very well on your own.
Very good picture of the pups as well...they look happy and worn slap out (excuse my southern drawl there).

I told you that I got to meet the rapper Twista the other day. Not a bad guy. And boy you should have seen his iPod! All jewel encrusted and e'ythang. He was blingin!
I did not have my camera at the time, so I did not get a picture with him, but a buddy took a picture of him and will give me a copy. Maybe I will be able to get a picture with some other celeb sometime.

I love you muchly!

My new decor...well new for Michael :-)

(The foyer)

So it took me a year to get my house to feel like a home. :-) We had all the pieces but I needed help getting them all arranged (thanks Jamie) and Mom helped with a few minor purchases. :-)

Here they are in all their glory!

(other side of the door)

Mom made me move my crosses and add some color to the room and now I can't find a new place for the crosses. But the pictures do look nicer here than int he bottom of my guest closet.

Of course no house tour would be complete with out Brinkley and Gabby :-)

Now "My Chair" has a special place all its own. :-)

And last for the living room is the fireplace.

The next photos will be of the bedroom and the chairs mom and I recovered!! :-)

(New curtains and a candle thingy)

(above the TV)

(directly across from the bed)

Tada...and that's our house. :-) Everything else looks just the same as when you left.

Arkansas soldier catches an Iraqi that took the bait

Michael is one funny soldier! He sent this pic with the title you see above. I know that Iraq can't be all that bad for him if he is still getting to fish!! :-D

What is up with this weather?

It's going crazy here in NWA!! :-) First we have rain for what seems like 2 straight weeks and now it's 25 degrees when you wake up!?! I sure wish things would get to a normal season...hot or cold.

This weekend me and the pups had a lot of quality time together. :-) Gabby even lucked out and got to sleep with mommy. When I woke up on Sunday she had her body under the covers and her head on the same pillow as me! This dog really thinks she is a person and not a pooch! :-) We got to take 2 walks on both Saturday and Sunday and they ran and ran and ran!! Then while I worked on my psychopharm paper they laid around and kept me safe from all the crazy cats in the neighborhood that try to break into our house. (okay so they don't really try to break in but if they can be seen outside the window you would think they were toting a large machine gun and threatening my livelihood!!)

There were baby showers and spa parties and even movies at a friends! I mean I am one popular gal!! All in all it was just what I needed, a little R&R to get me ready for a new week!

Here's to hoping the weather guy is right and we are going to have some 70 degree weather really soon.

Pups

So I finally realized how to get a good picture out of Gabby...run her for about 10 minutes and the n she will sit still and smile with her tongue showing!! :-)

Yesterday we went for a walk and Gabby got to see a tractor. She was very curious but scared more than anything else!

Spring is here and we couldn't be happier!

Glad to know you made it!!

Even though it was short I am glad I got to talk to you today!! :-)

When you get a chance you can write me here!! This way you and I can keep in touch even if you can't call.

Love you!!

Hello to all in the hopes this post finds you well!

We arrived in Baghdad early yesterday morning and are attempting to get settled in our living spaces.
I hope to be taking and sending pictures soon, because the area where we are is fairly nice.
We are living in an area that used to be Saddam's hunting lodge...complete with small lakes stocked with carp.
The trip was a little harrowing since we had a "suspicious package" (i.e. suspected bomb) scare in Kuwait just minutes before we were supposed to load up on our buses.
The "bomb" just ended up being a package that was dropped while someone was walking to their tent.
Then we had what is called a combat landing when we arrived.
It is common for pilots to do this since we are in a hostile area...we were never under fire as far as we know...and we expected it.
And I thought roller coasters made my stomach flip-flop!
Anyway, I am about to start working with the men I will be replacing, so I have to go.
I just wanted to touch base and let everyone know that I am now in Iraq.

Take care!
Michael

Here Goes

So since we won't get to talk as much as we want I have decided that I will keep a blog to let you know what's happening with me and the puppies back state side. I will try to update this weekly at the least and add any photos that I take. :-) I love you!!