Emma should be a walking super star any day now....There has also been some confusion over her teeth. Emma doesn't have any teeth! Not a one!! But I was reading the other night that the age at which a baby gets teeth is supposed to be hereditary, so a lot of babies in our family don't get teeth until they are around a year old. That means that Emma probably won't get any teeth for another couple of months. I keep trying to get a cam shot of her standing but she sits down and races for the camera every time I point it at her! Also, make sure you all check the other gallery of pictures that Mike has so kindly posted for us! If you go back a few days on my journal you will see the words "another gallery" underlined...that is a link...click on it and you will see even more pics of the most beautiful baby! There are some older pics in there from when she was teeny tiny too.....guess that is all for now....bus driving is going great of course!!! later........

posted by Melissa 12:34 PM

Friday, September 21, 2001

Well, I had a great week driving the bus! Except for the occasional brat the kids were well behaved. Today one little girl brought me a rice krispie treat. At the last middle school stop a couple of little girls asked my name so that they could request me the next time their driver was going to be out. I don't think it was so much my good driving and great sense of humor as it was Emma's charm...I also pulled my right shoulder muscle shifting into 3rd gear (it is located at the bottom, not the top like in a car). It really hurts!!!

posted by Melissa 4:58 PM

Thursday, September 20, 2001

Emma walked some more tonight. She is able to stand up on her own now without needing anything to pull herself up. So she walked about 4 steps, then sat down some, and walked another couple of steps tonight to get from me to her mom.

Also, there is another gallery up. It has almost 90 pics in it that were captured by Uncle Greg while he was busy pretending to work at the office. Since there are so many pictures, I didn't take the time to make it match the rest of the site, but I may do that in the future.

posted by Michael 10:59 PM

Tuesday, September 18, 2001

Big news.... Emma has been standing up on her own a lot more lately, and tonight she finally took a few steps without assistance!!!! Apparently she is very advanced. Perhaps a genius. She is a prodigy. At least in walking, anyway. And even if she isn't we are super excited about this....

posted by Michael 10:29 PM

He's punk rock and I'm disco, it is as simple as that.

posted by Melissa 2:06 PM

Friday, September 14, 2001

School must carry on here in Stafford and so must us bus drivers. I am finally driving my own bus, although it is about one hundred years old. The wheels are still made out of stone! Today is the first time that Emma has ridden with me. I wanted to make sure I could do it before I put her through it as well. Today we did highschool, middle school and elementary. The kids absolutely loved Emma. They couldn't tell if she was a boy or a girl. She slept a lot of the time eventhough the middleschool kids were shouting at the top of their lungs.

posted by Melissa 6:05 PM

Emma loves America.

posted by Michael 5:18 PM

Tuesday, September 11, 2001

Today is one of, if not the worst, day in American history. The World Trade Center buildings in New York City were each hit by hi-jacked planes carrying numerous passengers. The Pentagon was also hit with another hi-jacked plane carrying approximately 60 passengers. Yet another 4th plane has crashed in Pennsylvania, also after being hi-jacked. We are not sure where that plane was intending to crash. I am guessing thousands of people are dead. Mike and I have been watching the news since 10am and it is now 5pm. I am so disturbed by the pictures I am seeing. People hanging out the windows of the Trade Center, crying for help. We even saw tape of one woman jumping to her death from high up in the Trade Center. This is a sad day.

posted by Melissa 5:06 PM

Well I have driven kids on the bus for two days now. I had a trainor with me, I think I did pretty well. The route we drive along is through a heavily traveled neighborhood with smallish streets. I had a great time, I thought that driving the bus itself was pretty cool but the kids were so funny and cute that they made the driving even better. Today, while I was backing up, making a U-turn, this boy goes "oh, you hit a mailbox!" I was like, "very funny." Of course I had not hit a mailbox! The middleschool boys are the worst, so loud! Anyway, I have to train one more day, Wednesday, then hopefully I will start driving regularly.

posted by Melissa 4:56 PM

Sunday, September 09, 2001

Hey Katie... Cheerleaders are dancers that have gone retarded.

posted by Michael 9:17 PM

Fox News is doing a story tonight where they are getting psychics to predict how the Redskins season will go. Mistress Melissa: Psychic to the Stars has been gracious enough to make her own predictions for us though... She says the Redkins look crappy, and that they will never win with Marty wearing his stupid straw hat all the time.

So there you have it. The season is already doomed.

posted by Michael 8:59 PM

Thursday, September 06, 2001

Today, Thursday, Emma stood up on her own for about 10-20 seconds, maybe longer. She also wasn't even wobbling, just standing there all cool like she has known how to stand all her life! She repeated this several times throughout the night. At one point she went to sit down but then stood back up again without ever falling, she must have incredible leg strength. I think she will definitely be walking within 6 weeks. That technically makes her a genius. As for myself, I am scheduled to have my HR meeting on Monday at 10am. If things get finished soon enough I will be riding along with another bus driver that afternoon.

posted by Melissa 11:54 PM

Monday, September 03, 2001

Special shout-out to Katie in Florida. woot woot.

posted by Michael 5:22 PM

Saturday, September 01, 2001

You know, I didn't even mention a word about my precious little boo boo angel kitty face. She is doing well, still no teeth and still not quite standing on her own. She is getting a lot of hair. She might be having a growth spurt cause she seems to have put on a little weight. Last night was fabulous because she slept for 8 hours straight (I went to bed an hour after her so I slept 7 hours straight)...not a peep! I woke up at 730 this morning feeling so refreshed, I wanted to go back to bed but I actually wasn't tired. There I go again talking about me! It is actually time for Em to go to bed so I will update more later on.....

posted by Melissa 10:25 PM

I didn't find out anything at the stupid bus driving meeting! I don't think they should have made the trainees go because hardly any of the information pertained to us, nor did we understand all of the bus driving lingo/problems that were discussed. So now the trainor is telling us that our next step in the training process will be to meet with the HR people and fill out a bunch of forms and learn how to fill out all the papers we have to fill out while we are driving a bus (not actually WHILE we are driving the bus but hopefully you get the point). Anyway, that should be this week coming up and then the week after that, Sept 10-14, I should be driving a route with another driver so that I may learn the ropes. The week after that I will hopefully get a route or sub-contract of my own. Once that happens I should be working around 5 hours a day. This is the plan, however, my feelings are that Stafford County is a little disorganized and unable to keep up with the vastly growing population therefore I conclude that things may not happen in that order nor in that amount of time...but we shall see....

posted by Melissa 10:21 PM