The Cinderella Man

www.jamesjbraddock.com

If you haven't seen the movie, you should, it's a great movie! You'll need a box of tissues though.

Mylan's Sports through the Years

As I was cleaning the office in the basement I came across all of Mylan's sports pictures. I find it neat to look at them and see how much he's changed through the years. He's gone from adorable to handsome so fast!

2006 T-Ball and Soccer-age 6:

2007 Baseball and Basketball-age 7:

2008 Baseball-age 8:

2009 Football and Baseball (we haven't gotten our baseball pics in yet)-age 9:

Family Photos

I've been cleaning out the office in the basement and found a bunch of family pics that I never got a round to framing. Mylan is age 6, I am age 26 and Larry is age 32.

Rebecca the Artist

Black Friday!

Well as you know...I hate to go shopping. However, every year I put that on hold because I go with my mother-in-law, Sue, to do some Black Friday holiday shopping! Sue is a blast! She makes shopping fun! So at 3:30am I was at her house to head out and help her pick out gifts for people, fight off the crowd and do some people watching! People are nuts on Black Friday! Toys R' Us was open at midnight, Old Navy opened at 3am, JCPenny opened at 4am and others at 6am! Crazy! Typically Larry and I don't shop on Black Friday but this year Mylan wants a basketball goal and we found a great deal at Sports Authority. So this AM Larry was at the store at 5am to purchase that. There end up being a line almost around the store and only 3 of those basketball goals left! Super Dad to the rescue! Sue and I went to JCPenny's, Bath and Body Works, Michael's, a sports store in the mall and Sears. We had a Late breakfast and were back home before noon. I got a 4 hour nap and now I'm ready for next year.

A Little Hard Work and A Lesson Learned

This week at school Mylan got four tallies (Strikes against him) for various things. So Larry and I decided to take away his opportunity to go to the Derby Panthers Football game. This was upsetting to him because it is something he and Larry love to do together. Mylan not only has to avoid getting any tallies during the week but he must also achieve his AR goal (Accelerated Reader) each week in order to go to the football games with Larry. Mylan works very hard each week to meet those goals so when he managed to get four tallies in one week Larry and I were a bit shocked. We also wanted to make sure it didn't happen again. Besides not being able to go to the game on Friday he also had to do chores all day today. So after church he did his home work and then set out to do the chores I asked him to do. Since Mylan isn't a difficult child very often, he doesn't gets punishment like this very often. I found it difficult to even give him the punishment. As a parent I started to feel bad...although it is just a part of parenting. I started out with having him pull all the bed sheets off the beds and starting them into the wash (he later put them into the dryer), then I had him clean the bathroom (sink, toilet and tub). He said he actually enjoyed that so I decided that I needed to find something he wouldn't enjoy. So I had him rake the front yard (all the leaves into a pile). He found that to be hard work. Believe me it is, I've done it many times myself. Once he finished with that I gave him a little break. After the break I had a little chat with him to see how well I thought he'd learned his lesson. After our chat I decided that he needed a little more incentive to learn his lesson so I had him do some more raking but in the back yard this time. For those of you who've seen our back yard you know it's a disaster. I ended up having Mylan sweep all the leaves off the deck and then sweep all the leaves from the back porch. I knew this would be hard work because the leaves were wet. While he did this he explained to me the lesson he learned, so I told him that once he was finished and once I had checked it to be sure he'd done the job right that he would then be finished for the day. I think our punishment was successful and Mylan had a lesson learned. Only time will tell.

Here are pics I took of him in the backyard working.

Theses are the leaves on the back porch..wet and heavy. Poor kid.

Getting ready...

Today we put up the Christmas tree and the other decorations! Mylan also put up his little Christmas town complete with fake sparkly snow. Last year Val gave Mylan part of her Christmas town because she saw how much Mylan loved hers. That was so nice of her! It's adorable how much Mylan still loves the things that I would've thought he'd have out grown by now. I love his spirit! I mean even things such as hugs and kisses. It embarrasses him to do that in front of others but at home he will sometimes just crawl up on the coach to snuggle with me, give me an unexpected kiss, tell me he loves me unexpectedly or come up to me and put his head on my chest and wrap his arms around me so tight for a good hug! I love a good snuggle!

This is Mylan's favorite piece. It has a little river that uses real water!

So after we got all that done I had to clean house for our guests tonight. We are having Shonda, Mike, Nathaniel and Pasha over for an early Thanksgiving dinner! Family and food...good times!

This Could Have Been Worse!

Okay so this could have been worse! This could have been a disaster! So here's the story...get ready to laugh! Last night Larry, Mylan and I were at a local pizza place for his football teams award ceremony. We all went to the buffet line to get our food and as I was headed back to the table I thought I'd felt something soft brush up against my leg. This is strange because I was wearing jeans. So I shake my leg a little to shake whatever it is off. Once I get to the table and sit down I reach down to adjust my pant leg thinking that maybe it had gotten rolled up somehow and that maybe I was feeling it falling back down. I don't know if that makes any sense to you but it did to me at the moment. However, my pant leg was just fine. So as I begin to look up to start to eat my food I happen to notice something very familiar to me LAYING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FLOOR! OMG! It's a pair of my underwear! OMG! It's a pair of MY UNDERWEAR laying in the middle of the restaurant floor! Just as I realize that a pair of my underwear have possibly been exposed to not only the entire restaurant but Mylan's entire football team...one of his assistant coaches walk right over them! Thank the Lord that he didn't even notice. So I take a quick look around to be sure no one is looking and I quickly scoop them up and stuff them into my pocket. Phew! That was a close one! Of course I had to let Larry know right then, it was too funny not too! So you ask, how did this happen? My guess is that they some how got static clinged to the inside of my jeans through the laundry process. You ask, why didn't anyone notice? My guess is that it was because I was lucky enough for it to have been very crowded due to all the football players and their families. Phew! That could have been worse than it was!

The Perfect Gentleman

So you already know about Sherman by now if you've read my other post. On Tuesday he called the office to ask if I'd go to lunch with him to the Taco Shop. He said that he didn't want me to be jealous because he took Kelli out last week. I wish everyone could meet Sherman because he's so funny! So today was my lunch date with Sherman. He was the perfect gentleman. He opened up my car door for me to get in, ordered my lunch and pulled out my chair. So for the whole lunch hour he talked. I got a few questions in here and there but he did all the talking. I learned about his life, his career with the gas company, how he met his wife, his children, his time in the Army, how he learned to dance (he wants to teach me to dance), that he got an engineering/business degree at K-State, that he is selling his house and the new apartment he's moving into and all the issues he's had with that and I also learned that he walks quite a bit through out the day. No wonder he is so sharp and in such good shape for an 85 yr old! He told me that he plans to live to be 100. Later today he came in for his 2:30pm apt to get some cavities filled. While he was in the chair getting ready to have his fillings done he told Doctor all about our lunch date and told Doctor that as long as I was working there he'd keep coming in. Doctor just laughed and said "Okay". Before Sherman left we told each other how much fun we had at lunch, he gave me a kiss on the cheek and a hug. After Sherman left, Doctor told patients for the rest of the day about my lunch date with Sherman. I guess Doctor gets a kick out of it!
For those of you who are thinking that this is weird, it's not, you'd have to know our office and our patients. I work in a very small office. I am the only Dental Assistant and the only full time employee. The other one, Kelli, is a part time receptionist. If you come to our office expecting a glamorous upscale dental office where you'll be treated like a number rather than a person...you'd might as well leave. In April I will have worked at this office for 7 years and I've gotten to know my patients quit well. I know some of my patients better than others but the one thing that I like best about this our office is that our patients aren't numbers. To us our patients have faces, a life outside getting a filling or teeth cleaning, they have a family and a history. My boss takes time (sometimes too much time) to talk to the patients about their life and other things. Unlike other offices I've worked at it isn't drill, fill and hand over all your money. I have to say that so far Sherman is my favorite patient though. I always tease Doctor that when he retires that we need to get together to write a book about all of our craziest patients. We've got some stories to tell!

Flirty Patients

We have a patient named Sherman who is almost blind. He is a short, adorable little old man at the age of 84. He is also flirty and hilarious. Sherman is in excellent shape for an 84 year old man. He only lives about a 10 to 15 min walk from our office. Because he can hardly see he walks everywhere. I often see Sherman walking places with his back pack on headed to whatever his next destination is. He used to have a dog named Sandy that would walk with him everywhere. He loved that dog, however, Sandie was a a very energetic dog. Not something a nearly blind 84 year old man needs. So although it made him sad Sherman found her a good home with his physician.
A while back Kelli, my co-worker, gave Sherman a ride home from the grocery store. This was when he still had Sandy. Kelli helped Sherman with his groceries into the house and he showed Kelli Sandy who was playing in the back yard. Sherman used to use a muzzle on Sandy when they went out for walks because it allowed him better control of her on the leash. Kelli noticed that poor little Sandy's muzzle was on too tight and it was cutting into her skin. Sherman had no idea because like I said he's is nearly blind. Kelli has a big heart when it comes to animals, she will rescue anything. She once saw a cat hit by a car then tried to follow it when it ran off because she saw it's leg was broken. When she couldn't find it she called the animal hospital all day to see if it had gotten brought in by anyone. Turned out that it had been brought in by someone else and that it was going to be okay. So anyway, Kelli got the muzzle off Sandy and noticed that the cut was pretty deep with puss and the muzzle had obviously been on her for too long. So Kelli took Sherman and Sandie to the vet. Sherman was so please that Kelli discovered this and helped Sandie out.
So the other day Sherman took Kelli out to lunch to repay her for her help. My boss and I kept teasing her and saying that she had a hot date! Ha-ha! After their lunch date Sherman had a recall appointment with us. As I seated him for his x-rays he said, "No wonder the doc has been in practice for 40 yrs when he's got two girls like you two!" While I was taking the x-rays on him he said to me, "I want you to look in my mouth to make sure my teeth are okay because I want to try to kiss you!" I just put my hands on my hips and said, "Now Sherman! Are you going to behave today?" He laughed and said that he wanted Kelli to be his new girlfriend (He had an 87 yr old girlfriend but he said she left him for his best friend. He was very sad about it.) but then he found out that Kelli had a boyfriend. So he said, "So since Kelli can't be my girlfriend I am working on you but I don't plan to ask you any questions because I don't want to know!" I said, "Well okay. I was going to tell you but I guess I won't now." Then Sherman said, "Oh I already know you're married! I can hope though can't I? I would've asked you out to lunch too but I knew you were married and I was afraid you're husband was bigger then me!" After his appointment he got lots of hugs from Kelli and I and he was on his way.

Nathaniel and Pasha

This is a pic that I snagged from Pasha's face book page of Nathaniel proposing to Pasha at the zoo back in October!

Halloween 2009

The first picture was taken at Grandma Sue's house and the second was taken at the Booe's.

The VanderGiesen's.

The Taylor's.

The Syring's.

The Comer's.

The Booe's.

The Alexander's.