It's a good tired!

Well the weekend is coming to a close and it has been a busy one! We are all so tired. I sold Collard Festival T-shirts Friday night and all day Saturday at the festival. The festival was GREAT!!! Every aspect of the festival was a huge success but I have to say my favorites were the fireworks on Friday night, which were incredible, and the entertainment on Saturday. Elvis did a fantastic job and they were followed by one of the best quartets in southern gospel music, Unity. Unity is a family group, a mom, dad, and two beautiful daughters. The mom is Darlene Shirey, who I was excited to meet last year when I booked them for the festival the first time because I loved listening to her as an on air personality on WDXU (I believe that was the call letters), which was the only southern gospel station in the midlands when we first moved here. We LOVED it! Unfortunately, the radio station had to shut down and it is definitely missed but still being able to talk to Darlene Shirey is definitely a treat! She is just wonderful and her girls are so sweet, as is her husband. I had such a good time at the Collard Festival. Can ya tell? I will have pictures up of my wonderful entertainment on Monday or Tuesday.

Brittanie caught a nasty cold earlier in the week and she was much better by Friday but unfortunately she gave it to me. So I was at the festival with tissues and Afrin all day. I'm still battling it but feeling better today than I did yesterday. Brittanie marched in the parade with 3 other color guard cadets, went back to her car, drove to the school to put away the color guard equipment, changed clothes, came back to the festival and she and 8 other cadets helped Operation Thank You by going around getting people to sign Thank You cards and Get Well cards for our troops who are serving overseas. WLTX came out and did a report and Brittanie and the other cadets were right there. Brittanie, as battalion commander, was standing right next to the man from Operation Thank You that was being interviewed. They had about 8 minutes of footage. We weren't expecting all 8 minutes but when it aired, there was absolutely no interview and no cadets shown at all. Needless to say, it stunk and we weren't happy about that. They showed footage of Elvis on stage, someone's name on a card, and a little girl, about 2 years old, standing at the booth. To the left behind the little girl was Brittanie but it only showed her from the collar bone to the middle of her thighs. I knew it was her because I recognized the Rudy Guilani sticker on her and her dog tags and her Swansea JROTC shirt. But she was in the background. And here is all that was put on the website, wltx.com. No mention of the cadets that were out there sweating for something they believed in. Operation Thank You officials were wonderful though. They came to me and thanked me for inviting them and told me how wonderful the cadets were and that they couldn't have done it without them. I was proud of our cadets!!! But after Operation Thank You packed up and left, Brittanie and one of her friends went to see a movie. Then she came back home and went to John's house and got home at midnight. Needless to say, she was dog tired! John actually had to talk to her on the cell phone all the way home to keep her awake.

Today, Brittanie started doing chores, Katie was overtired from a busy weekend so she was whiny all day, and I'm still sick and trying to type anyway. Oh and Tom had to work all day. He didn't get home till after 8pm. So our weekend has been nonstop since Friday at 6pm. We are tired but it is definitely a good tired. I do want to say how much I appreciate Jessica, our collard baby, and all of her hard work in making the festival a success again this year.

Oh and I have a GREAT progress report. Brittanie has still been working hard with the diet and exercise and has lost 12 pounds now, drinking plenty of water, and according to the Army body fat calculator, she is at 30.35% body fat!! She is still not in compliance (30%) but she is soooooooooooooooooooo close! We are still waiting to hear back from the Army about the next step with the scholarship. But I'm so proud of her. She wants this scholarship and wants to be an Army officer so bad that she is willing to do whatever she has to in order to accomplish that goal!!