Look Who Got a Haircut!

Before...


...and after!



And just for fun...one of my fave commercials...

Rollin On the River...Chapter II

I was off of work Friday and went boating on the river again with my mom and dad. I thought I would give my dad a break from driving the boat since he drives us around all the time, so as soon as we were on the water, I took the helm. We were on the water for about 10 minutes, still idling our way up the slough to the main channel of the river. My dad was in the process of digging the river map out of the glove box and telling me you've really got to be careful, because there hidden wing dams under the water in a lot of places when CLUNK CLUNK CLUNK! We hit something. He said "Put it in neutral, put it in neutral!" So I throw her in neutral and trim the motor up. I was like "Oh, you mean I should be careful not to hit one of THOSE???" Sheesh. I wish they would mark those things a little better so you would know where they were. We took a minute to survey the damage and it didn't look as bad as I thought - I didn't chew up the prop at all, but did ding the bottom part of the motor a little bit. Even though it didn't look bad, I guess I messed up some rubber ring inside the prop, b/c the boat wouldn't go full speed after that. Luckily we had a spare prop in the boat so after we had lunch at Kinder's restaurant on the water, we found a nice sandy beach and pulled the boat up to change the prop. Good as new, right? Spent the rest of the day cruisin around with no problems (my dad driving of course). Wouldn't ya know it, as soon as I get behind the wheel again and I'm driving for about 5 minutes, I hear a loud steady "Beeeeeeeeeeep!" Some warning alarm is going off in the boat. I promptly put it in neutral and turn the engine off and I'm like "Now what?? What the heck was THAT?" My dad said it's either low on oil, or something else, or something else. (Technichal stuff...girls aren't good at remembering that kind of thing) He checked everything out and said it looked okay, so he started the boat up and after a couple minutes the alarm went off. By this point we decided it would be best to head back towards the marina where we put the boat in. The alarm came one one more time during the 30 minute trip back, but we made it back safely. I am so done with driving the boat - why does everything always have to happen when I'M driving? Seriously. It's like the curse of the Gretch. I have a feeling that next time I volunteer to drive, he's gonna say "Umm, no that's okay. I got it!" lol

A Deeper Respect For the Breakfast Wrap

I got a breakfast wrap from the cafeteria at work yesterday and after eating 1/2 of it, I was stuffed. I saved the other half, planning on eating it for lunch. However, my stomach promptly rejected that idea and started sending shooting pains out to let me know that I should not eat the remaining half of the wrap. I'm pretty sure I got a touch of food poisoning from it - last night wasn't pretty. I called into work today so I could be in the comfort of my own home should an emergency arise, and I'm glad I made that decision! Aye aye aye. I am already feeling much better than I did yesterday, so hopefully by tomorrow I'll be back to normal. No more breakfast wraps for me for a while...

Gotta Love the Dollar Store

To anyone out there who does not have at least one daughter to play dress up with, I highly recommend trying for one...

We took Bella to the dollar store on Saturday afternoon and bought her some dress up clothes - we got some glittery fairy wings, a sparkly tutu, and a fuzzy purse. You will notice in some of the pics that she is also sportin some Strawberry Shortcake sunglasses and pink bracelets ("Pretties" as Bella calls them. That girl sure can accesorize! She's had the sunglasses for a couple months now, and I think she thinks she's all that (and possibly a bag of chips too) when she has them on. I know she's not my kid and all, and maybe I am a little biased, but I think she's absolutely adorable! Love me some Bella :)

Rollin on the River

In lieu of going to work yesterday, I instead opted to go over to my parents' house, jump in the truck with them, and head out to St Charles for a day of boating on the Missouri River. Gotta love those random days off! With all the flooding we've had this year, I expected there to be a lot of debris and junk floating in the water, but surprisingly it was not bad at all. Although I never felt the need to get in the water because I never got all that hot, I would have done it in a heartbeat without being grossed out. We cruised up the river until we got up near the dam, then turned around and went back until we found a nice sandy beach where we had our picnic lunch and lounged around all afternoon. It was such a relaxing day that I told my parents we should do this every week. lol We will more than likely go again sometime next month, and are also planning on taking a fall boat ride too to look at the leaves when they start changing colors. Skipper Gretchy Gretch signing off now...

A Ride On the Katy

This afternoon Lenny, my mom and I drove out to Weldon Springs and took a bike ride on the good ol' Katy Trail. You couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day - it was in the low eighties with lots of sun, which is pretty much perfect in my book. Not sure exactly how far we rode, but my butt is a little sore now so we must have gone quite a ways. Lenny thought he was all that because he figured out how to ride with no hands, and I couldn't for the life of me do it. Oh well, at least I got up on the wakeboard. And I can't expect to be good at EVERYTHING. haha :) Here are a few pics from today.

Introducing Drew Bailey!

Our friends Jim and Val gave birth to their first child Wednesday afternoon, and we went and saw them in the hospital last night. Valerie said that Wednesday night the nurses let baby Drew stay in the room with them, and she woke up during the middle of the night and just stared at the baby for 4 hours straight, then finally woke Jim up and said "Can you bring him over here? I just want to hold him." Awwww :) I think they are still in awe of him, which I can totally understand. It's such an amazing process, you can't help but wonder how on earth everything comes together to produce this little miracle. Anyway, little Drew (well, maybe not so little - he was 9lbs 12oz!) is just perfect - he probably has the most beautiful skin of any newborn I've ever seen. And I loved his soft hair too. When we first got there, Jim "styled" Drew's hair into a fauxhawk for us :) Here are a couple pics of the baby and the happy parents. Congrats Jim and Val, and welcome to the world Drew Bailey!!!

On a Day Like Today....

That is, until I get to work. :)

Float Trip 2008

We went on the annual float trip with a bunch of friends this past weekend and I have to say that this has been the best float trip to date! Gotta give mad props to my boy Len for that one - he makes everything more fun! :) I think it was a really good crowd of people and pretty much everyone clicked, which is hard to do when you have that big of a group. Unfortunately I did not get any pics, but then again I'm totally fine with that seeing as though I really don't feel like posting swimwear pics all over the internet. Anyway, we had so much fun, we're trying to sneak one more float in before the summer is up. Anyone in???