Fall, Fall, Fall!!!!

It has been quite busy around the Johnson household and I have finally come to terms with the fact that I'm just not as good at blogging as I used to be! It's ok though, because everything else I spend my time doing is completely worth it!

Between work, school (the kids, not me...not yet anyway!), sick kids, airport runs, baking and sleeping (some) I've just only had time to read blogs and not the time to sit down and upload pictures and actually type something out. I don't really like posting without pictures, which is another reason I don't post a whole lot. However, I've got lots of pictures to share today and even though I've not completely adjusted to the time change in some ways it's a great thing. This morning, for example, Grace and I were up by 7:30 but I didn't feel tired because it still felt like it was 8:30 to me so she and I have had lots of time today to spend together!

We've been having some issues with her sleeping habits. I'm not sure what the deal is, but for about the last month, more nights than not, she wakes up at least 2-3 times a night and tries to come downstairs and get in bed with us. Most of the time I'm able to intercept her and lay her back in her bed, but that doesn't always work. And the times that it does work she wants me to lay down with her until she goes back to sleep so each time I'm up it's usually for 20-30 minutes and sometimes for an hour. On the nights that I'm absolutely exhausted I just let her get in bed with us or I'll eventually bring her back downstairs to our room if she's taking forever to go back to sleep. Last night was a good night though and she didn't wake up until very early this morning and she came and got in bed with us. So....I haven't had just a whole lot of restful sleep lately, which is ok I guess, because it's all part of being a mommy. I just really really REALLY like my sleep!! And I don't put her back to bed just because I don't want to cuddle and sleep with her, I just don't want her to get used to sleeping with us and not in her own room. She's almost 3 and I want her to know that mommy and daddy's room is not her room! We're working through it and I'm just taking each night one at a time.

On a lighter and more fun note.....we made homemade chocolate chip cookies this morning!!! The fall/holiday season always brings out the baker in me! I just want to cook, cook, cook!! And, as previously stated, we have had lots of time this morning to bond! This was the first time she's helped me and she had a few issues listening and not adding more ingredients than we needed, but she is only 2 so what did I expect?!

They turned out great though and we've already enjoyed one!! She loved it and just kept saying "Can I help ya?" in her cute little southern drawl! My girl is most definitely from the south and I love it!

She's also a little bit ornery! I know, I know, that probably comes as a real shock...especially if you know any of our family! She is a handful though and though we have still had some struggles with the "terrible twos" we're coming through it ok and she is getting better!

We are currently watching The Santa Clause 3 for the second time so far this year! This picture was taken the first time she watched it and she just lounged back the whole time completely in awe yet again with the Clause!! I'm pretty sure she's probably going to be just like her momma and her Nana when it comes to Christmas! Mom and I LOVE LOVE LOVE Christmas and everything that comes with it! I'm so excited about putting out our Christmas decorations that I actually asked Gene last Friday if I could put them out now and he said "NO!" Boo! Oh alright fine, I guess I'll wait! Especially considering Thanksgiving is only like 3 weeks away and that's when we put ours out!!!! Woot!

My wonderful Granny is doing absolutely beautifully recovering from her surgery!! She had an appointment with Dr. Gallaher, her surgeon, a week and a half ago and he completely released her and said that she needed to be careful but she could return to her normal activities!! He also told her he didn't want to see her again...in a good way of course!! Her appointment was here in Fayetteville so Mom went and picked her up and while she was up here we had lunch at Guido's to see Tanner and then we had to pay a visit to Kirkland's! Ummm hello?! Who else LOVES that store? Oh my, they've got their Christmas stuff out too, so as if I didn't love it enough before I really do now! Mom and I could just get stupid in that store! Ahem. Anyways, while we were in there Granny found these yummy candles and bought Mom and I one! We all got the Cafe Mocha one and it smells yuuuuuummmy! I'm burning it as I type this actually.

This would be Grace's hot chocolate face! The first time she watched The Santa Clause she had a cup of hot chocolate. 'Tis the season!

My man, who is oh so ready for his 2 week vacation that starts next Tuesday, which will be spent in the woods with Jake (his other wife! ha!) hunting! Jake and his family own a ton of land over in Madison County and there's a cabin on it that Gene and Jake will spend much of their time in and around. I took this picture of him while he was cleaning one of his guns. Notice my kitchen cabinet became a work station. I was not real happy about it, but there's not much I could do or say considering the poor thing doesn't have a garage or a shop to do it in! One of these days (when we win the lottery) he wants to build a shop to keep his motorcycle and all of his tools in. But, for now, the kitchen counter will just have to do. The sacrifices a wife makes.

Very intent. The man is obsessed with guns. And hunting. All that is on our tv when he is home is hunting. It's so bad that even now Grace asks to watching the hunting channel. Really?! Grace, honey, you're a little girl! Oh well, it could be worse I suppose.

Colt and Corey love taking pictures, especially of and with their baby sister! I find it precious! Colt started feeling bad Saturday morning and by Sunday morning had a fever of 102 degrees. Lovely. So, we quarantined him to the upstairs portion of the house and doped him up on some Motrin and Tylenol Cold & Flu. By noon it had broken and never got up above 97. That is until yesterday morning when it was up to 100. So Gene made him a doctor's appointment and I took him in to see what was up. I was really hoping it was not the flu, and considering all of the kids have had their flu shots, I was hoping even more that it was not the stinking swine flu. Luckily, it wasn't either. He has an infection in his throat and was prescribed an antibiotic! He's back to school today and was very relieved because that boy hates missing school. Seriously, I'm not being sarcastic. He really was hating not being in school yesterday. I am certainly not complaining, it beats the alternative!

Saturday afternoon Corey and Grace were playing outside and Corey was capturing some pretty cool shots! I love this one of Miss Thang, well except for the fact that it makes her looks like she's a little girl and not a baby! I can't believe she's already almost 3, and that Colt is 16 and driving and Corey will be 15 in a little over a month. If anyone figures out how to slow time down would you please be so kind as to share it with me?!? Thanks!

Have I mentioned before that I am in love with this season?! Because I so am. With all the rain we've had this year the colors have been gorgeous! It's probably the prettiest fall we've had in a while. Another one of the advantages to living in the country....being surrounded by trees. The road out to our house is beautiful to drive while the leaves are changing because you're surrounded by bright pretty colors!

It's the eye of the photographer! Corey is crazy when it comes to the camera and loves to take pictures of anything and everything. The kid can make a rock look amazing! I just don't have any talent when it comes to that, or the patience to learn! I've already told Gene that when I reach my goal weight in my weight loss journey we're going to have family pictures taken, because ya know, in 4 years we've never once had a family picture done! Sad, I know. Don't judge!

Mom, Dad and Tanner spent this past weekend in Las Vegas celebrating Tanner's 21st birthday! Mom and Dad told us that they would take us to Vegas when we turned 21 and they took me back in '06 and followed through this past weekend by taking Tanner! They had an absolute blast and I'm sure when Mom gets a chance she'll post about it with some pictures and when she does I'll be sure to link to it so you can check them out!

This will be my 5th Christmas to work at the pd and for the first time I will actually have both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day off!!!!! Gene also has them both off so I decided that this year I was not going to stress myself out about making arrangements and when we would have Christmas with my family and then when we would have it with Gene's family and having to rush around to eat or do presents before having to go to work so I am taking the WHOLE week of Christmas off!! I am so very excited about finally being able to really enjoy the holiday with our families!! I love my job, but I'm telling ya, having to work just about every holiday every year gets old! So, this year we won't have to! Yay for vacations!

Alright, I think that about wraps everything up that's been happening. The highlights anyway! I know, that was a long "highlight!" Now I've got to go fold some laundry and finish getting ready for work! I'm training a rookie and this is his last week before he's completely released and I'm very ready to be done training. As much as I love it, it's also stressful, so now I'll be done for a while. Until we hire some new ones, which will be soon, because we have 2 positions open right now. So, if you know anyone who is interested in being a dispatcher, send them our way!!

Happy Tuesday everyone!!!!

Route 66 Trip - Days 1, 2, 3, & 4

If you own a motorcycle and ever have a free week, I strongly recommend taking a trip down old Route 66!! Gene and I left at 6:30 am on Sunday, July 13th to head to Amarillo, TX. We went with some good friends of ours, Steve and Jennie Wherenberg. The plan was to drive straight to Amarillo the first day and we were going to gradually work our way back home on Route 66.

On Friday the 4th, Gene and I rode over to Steve and Jennie's house in Farmington so that I could get a little accustomed to the bike. I will say I almost fell off once!! Gene didn't put the sissy bar (passenger backrest) on so I HAD to hold on to him to keep from going backwards. We had just pulled up at a light as it was turning red and I reached back to fix my shirt when off we went again! And no....I was not holding on and ready for it! My feet shot up in the air and I barely was able to grab hold of Gene before I fell to the asphalt! It was a little scary, but then we were both laughing about it. We hung out at their house for a little bit talking about the trip and discussing what things we wanted to do. We had decided to meet in Greenland at Tobo's at 6:00 and leave from there. So....that's what we did!

We made several stops throughout the day Sunday so it wasn't bad at all. It was cloudy and yucky looking all day, and we were so afraid we were going to get rained on. The temperature was actually perfect though, and Jennie and I wore our rain jackets pretty much the whole way. We did get sprinkled on once but when you're driving 70 mph down the interstate it's hard to feel it! We stopped in Sallisaw and ate breakfast, and my rear was already sore by the time we made it there. I was afraid I was in for a world of trouble!! However, we usually didn't ride for more than about 50-70 miles at any given time and we'd stop again, so about every hour to hour and a half we'd take a break and after I walked around for a few minutes I was good to go again. You just kinda start to go numb after a while because you don't have any room to move around! We ended up making it to Amarillo at about 6:00 that evening.

Steve had started talking about trying to find a campsite and Jennie and just looked at each other like "we are tired, hot, and sore...we want a shower and a bed!!!" So...we all then came to the decision that we would find a room and soak up some air conditioning. Thank the Lord!!! Ha!

After we got settled into our room, we were hungry and decided on eating at the Big Texan, which is the home of the free 72 oz steak! Yes, you get a free 72 oz steak if you can eat it and all the fixings in an hour. Crazy! While we there eating there was a guy trying to do it....he failed!! Our food was really good though. After dinner, we went back to the motel, took showers and crashed! We were exhausted.

The next morning we ate breakfast, loaded up, and headed to the Cadillac Ranch! Actually, we stopped at Wal-Mart and bought some spray paint so we could grafitti the Cadillacs!! It was really windy, so we had to be careful not to get it on us. The picture I posted below is of Gene and I in front of it, but you can't see the cars.

Steve was having some issues with the mufflers on his bike. By the time we made it into Amarillo, he had lost the baffles that go inside his mufflers so his bike was really loud and was starting to run a little funny. After we left Cadillac Ranch we went to Tripp's Harley Davidson dealership to see if they could fix Steve's bike. Long story short, all the mechanic guys were jerks and not willing to help us. They ended up selling us some take-off mufflers to do a temporary fix, but Gene and Steve had to change them out back behind their shop. It was a mess, but it just added to the adventure!! We ate lunch at Olive Garden once he got the bike fixed, and then headed out to the Paulo Duro Canyon in Canyon, TX (just south of Amarillo).

It was gorgeous, but it was HOT!! We stopped at the lookout first and you could see across and down into almost the whole thing. It was really neat. Then we decided to drive down into it, because you can tour it in your own vehicle and it's a 16 mile round trip. It was hotter than Haites down there!! We could hardly breathe because the air was so hot. We didn't waste much time down in there and we got the heck out of there!

After the canyon we headed back to get on 66. Once we caught up to it, we travelled through some old towns in OK. I'll spare you all the details and stops because it would take you and I both forever to make it through! We did stop in Erick, OK, which is where Roger Miller is from. It was about 8:00 Monday night when we stopped in Erick and we had originally stopped to find a place to eat but stumbled across the Roger Miller Museum. Gene had gone to their police station (literally a metal shed) to ask about a diner or cafe to eat at and Steve, Jennie, and I were walking downtown just looking at things. We saw the museum, but it was closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. A lady stopped in front of us and asked if we were wanting to see the museum. We told her sure, and she told us to just hold on a minute and she would go grab the keys from her house!! No joke, that woman could not have been gone for any longer than 7 minutes when she was back with the keys and giving us a tour!! She was such a sweet lady, and knew a lot about Roger Miller. She didn't even charge us the fee to take the tour. It was awesome!!

After the museum we drove on to Elk City, OK, which is actually where Steve is from and grew up. It was already after 10 by the time we made it into town and were looking for a place to eat dinner still. We decided on Denny's....mainly because it was the only thing open that late!! Steve called his son, Nathan, to see if he was in town because he still lives in Elk City. Nathan ended up meeting us up there, and Gene had gone next door to check on a room but every room in the town was full, because all the oil crews were in town (it's a huge oil town). So, Nathan offered to let us stay at his house! We saved some money that night...thanks Nathan!! We took showers after we made it there and crashed once again!

The next morning we ate breakfast and visited the Route 66 Museum in town. It was really neat and they had part of it set up like the way the town used to be in the "old days". After we saw the whole museum, we headed out. Our next stop was in Clinton, OK where there's another Route 66 Museum, so we stopped in and checked that one out. It was neat, because it was set up differently than the one in Elk City. We did a tour of it, then headed out of Clinton.

This was all on Monday and Tuesday. Tuesday evening after leaving Clinton we jumped back onto 66 and just enjoyed the scenery! We stopped in Yukon, which is the home of Garth Brooks, and ate dinner at a neat restaurant that had pretty good food. After dinner we went in search of a room. We checked a couple that were close to the interstate and they were all full. Our best option was going to be driving on into Oklahoma City, which was only about 20 miles further east. So, we hopped on and rode on! We ended up finding a room, and settle in again. Notice...still no camping!! Love good running water, electricity, and a soft comfy bed!

Wednesday morning we got up and ate breakfast then headed to the Oklahoma City Memorial. If you have never visited it, you must. It's worth the 4 hour drive from NW Arkansas just to see it. It was so incredibly moving and also very heart breaking. We spent almost 2 hours just seeing everything.

After the Memorial, we met Steve's other son, Steve Jr. for lunch at Toby Keith's Bar & Grill! Steve Jr. lives and works in OK City, so it was cool that we got to meet him and they got to spend some time together. Steve Jr. bought our lunch with his company credit card. It was a "business lunch"!! Thanks Halliburton!! The food was excellent, and they actually have a fried bologna sandwich on their menu. How funny is that?!?! Think maybe we're in the South? Ha! Steve ordered it and said it was really good.

After lunch, we visited the National Cowboy Museum, and it was really neat also. It was beautiful inside there and we got to see a lot of cool things. We visited our fair share of museums throughout the week! For dinner that night we ate at a place called Trappers, and it was really good too. It's a cajun style restaurant and they're specialty is alligator.....yuck! Needless to say, that is NOT what I got! The food was good though.

After dinner we went over to Steve Jr.'s house to visit for a while. We got to meet his wife, Mandy, and their sweet baby girl, Danee! She was born in May, and the most precious little thing (except for my sweet girl of course!). We stayed and talked for quite a while until we were all so sleepy we could hardly hold a conversation, so we headed back to the rooms. We crashed for the night after a hot shower!

That pretty much sums up Sun - Wed so I'm gonna take a break now, and I'll wrap up the end of the week in a later post! It's been a long day, so I'm headed to bed now.

Good Night!

Taylor

P.S. - The picture below is of Steve, Jennie, myself, & Gene in front of the Big Texan in Amarillo. You can tell by looking at all of us that we were so tired!