Confession...

I have a confession to make.... I have a serious tendency towards road rage.
Whew!..... there - I said it.

I know this is the Christmas season, with goodwill towards men and all, but I am sorry, some people just do not know how to drive. These people need to have that fact pointed out to them as often as possible and by whatever means necessary.

Today I put on a ridiculous display for all to see. I am waiting to make a left hand turn into the school across highway traffic, when a lady coming the other direction was making a right hand turn, also into the school. Instead of her turning and letting me turn in behind her, she STOPS! So here I am cross ways in the highway waiting for her to complete her turn and she is just sitting there staring at me. So I yell...loudly so she can hear....GO! (pause) GO! (pause) GO! (pause)GO! (pause ) Idiot! All the while waving my hands wildly in the air for dramatic effect. Mind you all this time I am watching the cars speeding towards me at 60mph.

FINALLY, she slowly turned in front of me so I could complete my turn and escape certain death. As I pull in the parking lot, cursing under my breath, I notice the line of cars waiting to pull out who were watching my ridiculous display and laughing hysterically..... oops.

Do you think this puts me on Santa's naughty list?

23 and Counting...

The countdown is on... Panic is starting to set in... 23 days till Christmas!

We had a great Thanksgiving. Everything went exactly as outlined in my Thanksgiving Eve post, much to the amazement of my sister-in-law. Last year we started a new Burns family tradition when for some stupid reason we decided to get up at 3:30 in the morning to go shopping. I guess we had forgotten how insane it was, cause we did it again this year. At 4:13, the car pulled out of dad's driveway with me, Patti, Evan, Haley, Max and Ethan headed for the "sales."

Our first stop was Elder-Beerman. The parking lot was full all the way out to the highway and all the way over to Burger King. I could not believe the number of cars, to which I shouted out in disgust... "Idiots!" Then I realized... I was one of them.

Most of us left Elder-Beerman empty handed. I didn't see any "great deals." From there we went to Goody's, where I spent a whole $48. Then on to Wal-Mart. I have to tell you, it was scary. At one point, in the electronic section, as all six of us tried to stay together and move forward, Patti and I got a little frightened. We were literally trapped. Crammed in like sardines. Could not move in any direction. Had anyone yelled "fire" we most certainly would have been trampled to death. When we finally made it to the checkouts with our few purchases, the wait was probably an hour or more. We looked at eachother, laid our stuff on the nearest shelf, and left the store empty handed.... Then it was on to Penney's and out to breakfast. Even though we didn't buy anything to speak of, we were together, and laughing (some of us more than others - HALEY!) and making great memories. I am sure we will do it again next year, but perhaps will boycott Walmart.

Here are some pics from the long weekend.

Thanksgiving Eve....

I honestly don't know where the month has gone. I have been trying really hard to slow down and take better care of myself. I have help for the business now, which is a huge relief and takes a major weight off. (thanks Christy! - LOVE YOU!) I have a few days left on the heart monitor, so that will be another big relief to get rid of all the wires and such. Will have a couple of doctor's appointments next week, so looking forward to news from those.

Today, on this Thanksgiving Eve, I have some loose ends to tie up, some orders to place, etc. Tonight, the "feel" of the holidays will finally show up. It always does as soon as we stop everything and start to prepare for tomorrow. I LOVE IT! I will hang out with Aaron and the kids and make food to to take. We will be going to Aaron's families at noon and my dad's in the evening. Not one but TWO big dinners. It has been that way for the last 20 years, so we have learned to pace ourselves.

I don't get to see my mom on Thanksgiving, and that is always a real bummer. But, I am looking VERY forward to seeing Kent and his family. Haley is home from college, so can't wait to see her. Have not seen Max for months, so can't wait to squeeze him too. Jaden is SO excited to see Abby, he can hardly stand it. I can't wait to stand in the kitchen, crowded around the cheeseball, catching up with everyone while we wait on the turkey. It's tradition.

My family has a lot of Thanksgiving traditions...we are a predictable bunch. Dad and Kent will hang out in the garage watching some ball game, Julie, Patti, and I will hang in the kitchen and talk about everything we can think of. Evan will kind of migrate between the two. Big kids will impatiently await the food (which simply cannot be eaten before at least 7:30!) Little ones will run up and down the hallway, only stopping when papaw burns catches them.

We will gather around the table, take turns telling what we are most thankful for. My grandma Burns (almost 92!) will give thanks, and dad will be all misty eyed. Then we will proceed to stuff ourselves till we can hardly move, forgetting that grandma has made pumpkin AND chocolate pie! Somehow we will all find room for a piece or two. Kent will stand (cause he is too full to sit) in the kitchen eating several pieces of the persimmon pudding I make him every year. He will invariably say "Man, Aunt P, this is excellent! (his kids call me Aunt P - long story) The rest of the evening we will just be together and anticipate the Christmas season.

Doesn't that sound like just THE most perfect Thanksgiving! I can't wait.

Andreaaaaaa......

WAKE UP!!!!

You know how sometimes you are just happily going along, life is good, and things are relatively OK... then all of the sudden something happens that is not so good and makes you sit up and take notice. The proverbial "wake up call." This week I had one.

Very long story short... my heart has been doing funny things for a couple of months now. I have played it off as being stress related. A couple of times I have jokingly said to Aaron... "I am having chest pains so if I drop over, make sure and tell the paramedics." Tuesday night at the Festival of Bands I made the same statement to Christy and laughed it off.

Wednesday the pain was increasing, as were the palpitations. I said "ok God, if this is something serious, make it clear to me I need to have it checked out." Almost immediately my mind thought of my good friend Judy.(who passed away suddenly from a heart attack - she had chest pains the night before) I took that as my confirmation it was time to go.

Aaron and I headed to Jasper, and another long story short, my heart keeps going into what they call V-Tac (ventricular tachycardia) It is a potentially dangerous situation. I was kept over night and given just about every heart test known to man. I will wear a monitor for the next 3 weeks. Someone in some other state will be watching my rhythm 24/7 and if anything happens on the strip, they will call me to see if I am symptomatic. Isn't technology fabulous!

Testing also showed extreme anemia and suggested the possibility of an internal bleed. I will be having further testing to try and figure that out. I suspect a bleeding ulcer, but we shall see.

SO... I am considering this my wake up call. This is what happens when you neglect your health and are over-worked and over-stressed, under-nourished and fatigued. Your body stages a revolt. Mine seems to be preparing for war.

I will be slowing the pace a bit, hiring some help for the business, making sure to eat and drink throughout the day (sometimes I forget to), etc. I am getting older and as you get older things start to happen. It is inevitable. My mom very kindly put it this way..."you know honey, you ARE 41..." Thanks mom.

I greatly appreciate all the prayers, texts, and phone calls I have received over the past couple of days. My favorite Farhars even came to the hospital to bring me my phone charger... it could have been potentially disastrous if my phone had gone dead! :) Aaron, as always, has been my rock. I am very fortunate to have so many wonderful people in my life.

Please continue to pray for the next few weeks that everything can get straightened out and back to normal.

No "halfs" in our family...

The following was posted on Kent's (my brother's) blog today, so I can't take credit for it. Some of you may follow his blog anyway, but he did such a good job summing up the dynamic of our family, I paraphrased a few parts and stole the rest... :)


Like so many families these days, ours has been affected by divorce. It's a slippery slope. When familes split, new dynamics are created. Children's lives and loyalties are divided. New spouses enter the picture. Sibling relationships are created out of thin air, rather than biology. Our culture hasn't done well with it. As the world becomes more "evolved", the foundation of the family as an institution is being rocked. So much dysfunction exists. Look around...how many bruised and broken families do you have in your midst? I wonder how much of this stuff has always been out there, but under the radar, vs. how much is a legitimate acceleration of our world literally going to hell in a handbasket?

Fortunately, we've managed pretty well in spite of the challenges that it presents. Our parents divorced when Kent was in college and I was in high school. They both remarried and have wonderful spouses that love and care for them. Our Dad's wife is four years younger than Kent and two years older than me, which makes for great fun when new acquaintances try to figure out who's who in our family. We have a younger brother who is now in college. He's an incredible young man who is destined for great things. Kent has two great kids from his first marriage, and a third that came along later and absolutely has blessed our family beyond anything we could have ever imagined.

People sometimes ask us how we do it. How could you possibly have anything in common with a brother so much younger than you? What's with this young step-mom situation? How does she deal with being a Grandma? Weren't Kent's two older kids jealous when the baby came along? Isn't step-parenting hard for Kent's wife? Is she always conscious that they aren't "hers"? Lots of questions.

So what is the answer? We think it's this: There are "no halfs" in our family. No half brothers. No half sisters. No step parents. It sounds like I am blowing smoke, right? Although some of these relationships are not 100% biological, we don't care. Our half brother is our brother. Kent's wife has raised his two older children and loves them like they were her own. Kent's kids and my kids call our Dad's wife Mamaw and our mom's husband Papaw. The bottom line is that although we aren't all 100% related, we have never chosen to see it that way or to give it any power in our lives. Is it always perfect? Nope. Do we have our disagreements? Yep. But we wouldn't trade places with anybody.

How does that happen? One reason is that God has placed amazing people in our family. The other is that we love each other. It's that simple. Love is a verb. Love is a choice. Love is an action.

What about you? Are there halfs in your family? There doesn't "half" to be. Think about it.

Fall Fun...

Not a lot of time to post lately... obviously.

Went on a late night toilet papering mission last night with Christy and Cole, Becky and Brandon, and my two big boys. It was your typical tp trip, we went through 108 rolls, got caught by a preacher and stopped by the cops... well ok...maybe it wasn't so typical after all, but we had a blast.

Here are some recent pics of our trip with the Farhars to the corn maze.

Have a great halloween!

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Finally Friday..

Man, this has been a really long week.

Ava is much better today. Maybe things will get back to normal.

Here are some recent pics of things going on around the Jones house.

Hope you have a great weekend.

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