Amy U Arndt
Amy Arndt was born in Austin, Texas in 1972, the firstborn child of Glenn and Judy Underwood. Her love of storytelling started when she was a toddler when she was crammed in the baby section of the grocery cart, yelling "Come here, kids!" to the other children in the store. When Amy was a preschooler, her dad changed jobs, promptly rented a giant U-Haul and moved the family to Tyler, Texas (home of the famous Tyler roses, Heisman-winning football legend Earl Campbell, and Broadway legend Sandy Duncan).
By the time Amy was 8, she knew that she would grow up and write a book. She wrote a weird little poem in the third grade that was later published in a literary magazine for children. In middle school, Amy contributed to "The Husky Howls." a page-turning pre-teen newsletter.
After graduating high school in 1991, Amy spent a year living in Berlin, Germany as an exchange student. The transition from the confederate flag-waving in Tyler, Texas to living in a city with 4.5M residents just a few years after the Berlin Wall fell completely changed Amy's world view. Amy returned to Texas where she attended Tyler Junior College on a music scholarship, putting her love of writing on hold to accompany the choir at "Oklahoma!" rehearsals and majoring in International Relations.
Amy moved to San Marcos, Texas and enrolled in what was then called Southwest Texas State University. She changed her major to Mass Communications with an emphasis in print journalism. Having finally found her educational jam, Amy did internships for a variety of small town newspapers, covering city council meetings and local politics, and a fascinating front page feature story on a wayward emu who escaped from his designated field in the dark of night.
Amy took her sweet time finishing school, working multiple jobs to make ends meet, and finally graduated in 2000. She moved to Los Angeles where her sister Emily lived, and planned on staying for a few months before entering the workforce. During that time, Amy signed on to do temp work for Conde Nast publications and suddenly landed temp gigs at "Vogue," "Vanity Fair," "Architectural Digest," and "Bon Appetit" magazine, where she was eventually hired for being persistent (or so eager that they finally relented and hired her).
During that time, Amy began dating Tim Arndt, a former coworker and divorced father of two who lived in Austin. The long distance relationship became costly and difficult, so Amy moved back to Austin. After dating Tim for several years, Amy got the feeling he might not marry again, so she decided to move to New York to pursue work in publishing again. While she was preparing to move, Amy began feeling queasy and worried she might have a stomach flu, but that flu turned out to be a human baby. When the pregnancy test showed positive in a matter of seconds, Amy turned to Tim and said, 'What are we going to do?" And Tim said, "We're going to get married and have this baby."
Amy became a wife and stepmother of two on October 25 or 26 2002 (she and Tim are still not sure exactly what day it was), and Emily Rose Arndt was born in April of the following year, making their family complete.
While holding down "real jobs," Amy began writing a personal blog to help her have a creative outlet. The first post she pitched was to the New York Times' "Motherlode" blog, and in 2014 her post, "'Sleepovers' With My 9-Year-Old Daughter" went live online while Amy and her family celebrated with mimosas at Austin's Cherrywood Coffee House where Amy wrote every weekend.
2014 was the nudge Amy needed to start her book. Life got in the way and between her husband Tim getting cancer, Amy having several health scares and difficult battles with depression and anxiety, the book was an on again, off again project for years.
Though she knew at 8 she would write a book someday, Amy's first book took 39 years to arrive. "One Hairy Knee" is Amy's debut memoir. She hopes you read it and laugh, and that if you know Al Roker, you ask him to read it.
