Yes, I’m on TV! Today was my first day of being on our local TV program talking about our animals in foster care and up for adoption through the shelter. I was very nervous, but it all came out okay. Today I introduced a dog named Misty that is a half chihuahua/half basenji. She is housetrained and just did a great job of being on TV today which made life easier for me. I had to get up early to be there, but I did it! It was intimidating walking into a TV production area with the lights and cameras, but I think I did okay!
You can view me online at:
www.wcqt.com
And I’ll be on every Tuesday, just look under the date and the morning show category.
In other news, Arwen’s fully mobile now, crawling and going all over the place. She’s also clapping now, which is so cute. Anya’s doing fantastic in soccer and we have a new rule in gymnastics. No more lollipops until she starts doing her bar work. She’s a bit behind on the uneven bars and I finally had to make the threat of no more lollipops until she starts doing her bar work. Maybe that will work, she seems ready to try now at least. And I turned 32 yesterday. I don’t feel 32 at all!
Here’s a photo of Arwen crawling…

My friend Bethany really needs everyone’s help…her kids are entered in a Chick Fil A photo contest and they need your vote to stay in the top 20…go here to vote…

http://www.showusthecow.com/photos.php?city=cullman&state=&keyword=&firstname=bethany&view=search&Search=Search

And also we are having a raffle for the Cullman Animal Shelter…Each ticket is $3 or 6 tickets for $15 and you can win one of these beautiful quilts…obviously you can choose to enter for both quilts, but you can also be more team specific. War Eagle!

If you really want to see the Alabama quilt you can e-mail me, but really isn’t the Auburn one prettier?

Travis and I got to go see The Time Travelers Wife this past weekend. It was wonderful. Not as good as the book, but movies rarely are. I have to say the cast was perfect though. Eric Bana was the absolute perfect Henry and I loved Rachel McAdams as Clare. There were a lot of details left out of the story, but if they had included everything from the book the movie would have been 4 hours long. They did a great job at staying true to the book however, really they only took out a few parts; luckily, they did not change the entire story around or anything like that. It stayed really true to the book, the parts they did change they changed to be more appealing for the screen, but again it did not alter the main storyline or hurt the integrity of the book. I think Travis enjoyed it as well, plus we got to go to a movie by ourselves which is always nice and this time it was a romantic movie, which was something I had been craving. I really loved the book and seeing the movie just confirmed how much I loved the book. When I say the book was haunting me, it truly is. I’ve had a hard time getting back into reading anything else because I loved The Time Travelers Wife so much. I’m going to try a book my friend Betty recommended though, she said its one you wish would continue when its over and thats exactly how I felt about The Time Travelers Wife, both the movie and the book.

I got these photos the other day. Anya was playing with Chance like she usually does before bed and she decided to try and get Chance to go fetch his toy, then she decided she would try and help…And Miss Arwen is sitting up by herself so pretty these days…

So, while lots of people are getting ready to send their children off to school, I’ve been preparing Anya’s homeschooling materials. We are going to give it a try for her preschool this year, but I’m teaching her from Kindergarten workbooks. The goal is to teach her two to three hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays. These are also the days starting in September that we will be traveling to the Birmingham Zoo to attend class there as well. They have some great classes there and Anya will be going to one per week through December. It will give us a taste of both worlds because I don’t stay with her for the 2 hour classes at the zoo. We’ll see how she does. Travis and I are not completely committed to homeschooling nor are we committed to sending our daughter to public school here. We like the private Catholic school, but its a bit pricey for us. The public school seems like it would be nice, but we won’t really know for sure until we visit it and see for ourselves. I’m considering going to observe there for an hour or two one day this school year to see what its like, it is close to our house which I like and its a new school which I also like. However, as far as the teacher’s credentials and the school’s credentials I’m not sure. I know that homeschooling isn’t exactly what either of our parents want us to do, but the truth is that its our decision and we want to make the best decisions possible for our children’s education and if that turns out to be homeschooling then so be it. We have Anya in lots of social activities and will continue to do so. She’s loving soccer and loves gymnastics still. We are also considering piano classes and art classes for her eventually as well. I’d really like her to take piano. Anya wants to take painting though, because she loves to paint! Arwen seems like she might be more musical than Anya as she’s fascinated with everything musical right now.
In other news, Travis is pretty aggravated at listening to all the healthcare debates, as are lots of people. Although his source of aggravation is more based on the fact that neither side will listen they are just pointing the blame back and forth. I personally believe something needs to be done to help our healthcare system, but I don’t believe its national healthcare. I don’t see why we can’t focus more on the insurance companies, getting them to provide more options or even a customized healthcare plan. Like I would need maternity coverage, but I don’t think Travis will…and whereas we want good coverage for the girls, I really don’t think they need coverage for a colonoscopy. Yes, this would mean a lot of time and a lot of details, but look at how easy things are to do on the Internet these days. If lawyers would stay out of the situation and simply let the wording make sense, it wouldn’t be overly complicated. The bottom line is healthcare is expensive, insurance is expensive and there’s not going to be a magical solution to it that will work for everyone, but there will be plenty of blame to go around when things don’t work out for one party or the other or both.