Officially Autumn.

The first day of fall certainly warrants a blog post. I have been waiting for today since the first scorching hot day of the summer. Are we in agreement that the summer was unbearable? Yes, we are. ...I thought so.

I'm not typically a morning person - usually I will not talk to you until I completely wake up, which takes a couple of hours - but I am feeling particularly happy today. I think because the events of today have been quite comical, and I have only been awake for less than 2 hours.

Ash woke me up this morning so that I could braid her hair. She told me my alarm had been going off for a long time and that she herself was almost late for work. This gave me the idea that I was running late. In a hurry, I checked the time; it said 7:30 on my phone but my brain registered that it was 8:30. So, like usual, I let myself lay in bed for 10 or 15 more minutes. I had planned on getting up early to straighten my hair, but at this point, I threw my hair up in messy pigtails. I rushed out to my car and was on my way to work, running just a few minutes behind... like normal. I walked up to our office door and almost unlocked it when I noticed that there were no lights on in LensCrafters and they are always here before the doctor's side. I checked my phone to see if someone tried to contact me because they were late and that is the point that I noticed it had just turned 8:03 am. Not 9:03. I was one whole hour early to work. There was nothing I could do but laugh. I felt a little dumb. And a little embarrassed.

But I quickly absolved my embarrassment by treating myself to a Pumpkin Spiced Latte for the first day of fall. How convenient is it that Starbucks is just across the parking lot from my work? I am one lucky optometric technician. ;)

I enjoyed the latte in Starbucks for a while before retreating to my car to finish it off while listening to The Cab. (BTW, they have a new album "Symphony Soldier" that is to die for. I am in love with the entire album and have been able to listen to nothing else. You must go out and buy it!) While sitting in my car, a few drops of the orange colored latte dropped onto my light green scrubs. I had a napkin so I dipped it in the cup of water I had with me and scrubbed the two spots until it was only semi-noticeable. A few minutes later, I did it again - this time, it was more like splashes of latte. I then happened to notice a random pair of nicely-folded-and-ready-to-be-worn scrubs in my car. I just had to chuckle at the situation.

Nothing went "right" this morning but everything turned out better than I had wanted/planned. I think it was God who orchestrated this entire thing. It's Friday. It's Fall. It feels fabulous outside. He sure knows how to make me happy. :)

Happy Friday, lovelies!

Locks of Love.

Kind of hard to see, but
this was the night before.



Cousin It.



12 inches.



New hair.



Half a century.

Daddy is 50 years young today! In celebration, here are 50 things you probably didn't know about him...

1. He is the youngest of four.
2. He is an engineer for SRS.
3. His transportation is a motorcycle.
4. He is the funniest person alive.
5. He calls me Bucket.
6. He has taught himself to play many many instruments, including guitar, banjo, piano, drums, etc.
7. His mind is incredibly creative; he used to help my siblings and I with projects and such.
8. His middle name is Alan.
9. He played soccer in college as a goalie.
10. He filmed hours and hours of our lives as we were growing up.
11. He graduated from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
12. He used to DJ for all of our school dances. (The high school pageants, too.)
13. He gave me my middle name. (Brooke)
14. He  is the parent from which my siblings and I learned our sarcasm/humor/quick wit.
15. He's a trekkie.
16. He looks exactly like his father did.
17. He is relatively a quiet person (I take after him).
18. He helped coach the softball teams I was on.
19. He used to rock a mustache.
20. His favorite movie is The Blues Brothers.
21. He watched all of the Harry Potters so he could go with my siblings and I to the Deathly Hallows
part 2 midnight premier.
22. He is an avid reader.
23. He has two brothers and one sister.
24. He broke both arms when he was little. (I think he fell off of a tree.)
25. He can fix anything.
26. He gave his physical genes to Cody and Brandy.
27. He is a runner.
28. He rode the dragon on his motorcycle. (a winding, narrow, curvy road in the mountains)
29. He will "hit the deck" at every rapid.
30. He chews on toothpicks until there is barely anything left.
31. He is the master griller.
32. If our old (long time dead) dog, Scotty, was a person, he would be my dad.
33. He once burned me with boiling water on accident. (we were making macaroni and cheese)
34. He was the tooth puller and fairy.
35. He would call every single one of our pets "Biscuit."
36. He taught my siblings and I the Smartt family secret.
37. He knows how to turn a phrase for a paper. (He helped us plenty of times.)
38. He has done (possibly is still doing?) the Caveman Diet.
39. He used to play "Everybody Dance Now" on the stereo for us in the living room so he could
watch/film us dancing.
40. He tried a Krystal at the Krystal Headquarters in Chattanooga before it came out.
41. When he was little, he used to lay under the record player to watch the gears turn.
42. He wears contacts. (In fact, he is the one that contributed to my bad vision. :P)
43. He built us a fort in our backyard.
44. He is very handy with tools.
45. He is an incredible artist.
46. As a teen, he had perfect helmet shaped hair.
47. He had a red '68 or '69 Camaro. And I think he had it until Brandy was born; they traded it in for a
Ford Aerostar aka The Pimp Van.
48. His first worked at TVA before moving us to North Augusta to work at SRS.
49. He tans very quickly.
50. He used to put all of our drawings on the wall in his old office behind his computer. It was
completely filled.

Happy Birthday, Fah-jah!

I love you so much!!