Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Our Little Christmas Present

Name this item...

UPDATE:
Ok, so you would think that since it's on a pan, it must be something edible, right?! Wrong!! It is an oven mitt that didn't even go into the oven. It went in the drawer under the oven, you know the one to store extra pans in...if you have an electric stove!! If you have a gas stove (like we do), things like rubber and wooden handled things should NOT go in that drawer. I had stacked two pans on top of each other with an oven mitt in between them and put them in that "drawer". Tim decided while I was at work to heat up the oven to make something and the whole house filled with the horrid smell of burning rubber. And that marvelous smell did not leave our house for a good 3 days! Unfortunately, I cannot say this is the first time I did this. The last time I had stored our grill spatula in the drawer and the wooden handle on it actually caught fire. Finally, after this happening twice (ok, three times!), I decided to take everything out of it. You know what I found? A removable piece of metal with the words "Not for storage" underneath! Now they tell me!!

Go ahead, start guessing! And there will be extra points for whoever can guess the story that went along with it!!

Saturday, November 22, 2008

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...after a near tragedy!

We decided to go ahead and decorate for Christmas today, since we won't be home most of next weekend to do it. So, Tim went out to the garage to pull out all of the Christmas decorations and the tree. As soon as he brought them in, they were empty and things were put all around the house. I got our handrails decorated outside.
It was a little sad because last year, we had a great porch with posts and rails and I was able to put up all the garland and bows and lights, and this year I don't really have that great of a place to decorate outside. Then, I decorated the mantle with the vases that I put together with the cranberry looking filler with the candles.
I had seen this done with real cranberries as a table centerpiece and realized that I could do that myself! I decided to not use real cranberries, but I think it looks pretty good! Then, we put up the tree.
Tim put the star on top and I began looking for our ornaments. For some reason they were not packed in the large plastic tubs with the rest of my decorations. After going back and looking in the garage about 3 more times to see if there were any tubs that we had missed or if they were in a box that we had packed when we moved, I began to get a little worried that we had lost all of our ornaments in the last move. I went and looked through my office closet to see if I might have packed them away in there or in the hall closet...nothing. At this point, I am crying and telling Tim something like, "Everyone is going to be so mad at me because I lost our childhood". You see, we both have all of our childhood ornaments that we made or were given to us that we have always used on our Christmas tree. We also have two hand painted ornaments that my wonderful sister-in-law, Natalie, made us. One the year we got engaged and the other the year we got married. I cherish those ornaments because they are so personalized and I know how much time and love went into them. Then, I was trying to figure out how I was going to call my mom to tell her I had lost all of my ornaments. I just knew she was going to be so mad at me and it was going to be like the Christmas ornament disaster when my brother, Ryan, had made my mom a glass ornament in art class and my mom dropped it on the kitchen floor and it shattered, causing everyone to cry. Yes, it was going to be that disastrous. Then, while I'm crying on the couch, Tim says that we should go look through his closet and see if they might be there. This entire time we had been looking for a plastic tub filled with tissue wrapped ornaments, because that is how we both remembered me packing the ornaments up...two years ago. We had totally forgotten that I bought these great little ornament organizers last year. So, of course, the last place we would have looked for them (the bottom of Tim's closet) was where they were, in the perfect little ornament organizer!! I was so relieved! We put the ornaments on the tree and reminisced about each of the ornaments we put up.
We are not done with the decorating yet. There are some glass ornaments that I found that I just love that I want to hang on our tree as filler since I had forgotten how bare our little tree is! I'm also going to attempt to do the curled ribbon on our tree this year. Natalie is so good at it, and I'm sure it will end up looking like ribbon threw up on our tree, but I'm sure going to try! I absolutely love Christmas! Right now, I am sitting on the couch with the lights out, enjoying our lit tree and mantle. It's so perfect!

Friday, November 21, 2008

What a gassy boy!

This morning, while I was at the computer doing some work, Leo was here:
While Tim and Annie were here:Leo has the ability to make human sounding toots. Sometimes he does it when he's climbing up on something and sometimes he just does it while he's laying somewhere, but it ALWAYS surprises him. Usually he tilts his head looking at us like one of us did it. This morning, he was laying there when he let out an unusually loud toot and I guess it scared him, or he was doing a really good job of trying to put the blame on someone else, but he just started barking so loudly at the noise. I couldn't help but laugh at him! He was very concerned by what that loud horn sound was!! I calmed him down and he laid back down, only to begin his quieter, stinky little toots! Poor boy, must take after his daddy!!

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Our Guest Room

If you come visit, here is where you will stay:

This is my great-grandmother's furniture that was made in the late 1800's. The milk glass lamps and the pieces on the shelves were my other great-grandmother's.

This picture was my grandparents'. It was in their living room above their couch. I used to sit on my grandfather's lap in that room and talk to him about what I thought the people were doing. I have very vivid memories, even though I was only about 3 or 4, of that picture in that room. I am so glad my grandmother gave it to me!

Here is the dresser that I am using as my desk. The guest room is also used as my Mary Kay office.

I really love this room because of what all of these items mean to me. I love having little treasures from different sides of my family.

You know I can't end this post without some pictures of the dogs! Here you go:

I am so sorry this picture is sideways, it is not nearly as funny. You must tilt your head sideways so that you can see that Leo is sitting like a person!

Here is Annie in her new sweater right after she ate a pack of gum that Tim left out!

Long Shory Stort

We had a little issue last night. Well, actually, we have been having issues for about a month and a half with the washer and dryer combo that is in our house. I have been having to call our landlord pretty much every other day for this long explaining that our dryer had broken again! So, finally, Saturday they delivered a new washer and dryer combo to us. We were so glad, because now we wouldn't have to call our landlords anymore...until last night. Yes, last night, as I was doing the dishes, what was in the toilet 30 minutes before, was suddenly in the bathtub...and the pipes were gurgling. Tim and I looked at the tub kind of in disbelief as we both realized this meant we probably weren't going to be able to go to the bathroom at all that night since the water in the toilet had risen so much and was not showing any signs of going down. After calling my dad, we realized we were going to have to call our landlords yet again to tell them what was happening. Tim told me it was my turn to call them since he had just done it the last time. I promptly told him I would not do it, we would just wait it out. Yes, apparently I had decided that I was not going to go to the bathroom at our house anymore. I don't really know what I thought that would accomplish, since we wouldn't be able to wash clothes or do dishes, since the dishwater from the sink was backing up into the washing machine. It was quite a mess, but Tim decided he would call our landlord's son, who handles all of the problems when they are out of town (which is pretty much all the time). So he calls and is trying to figure out a delicate way to explain what was in our bathtub. So, as I am telling Tim what to say as he is talking to this guy (I tend to do this a lot and it is not appreciated very much!), Tim realizes how he wants to word it, and it comes out like this: "Well, long shory stort, what was flushed down our toilet is in our bathtub now". Yes, he said "long shory stort" and I lost it. I think it was because I was so upset that another thing was wrong with the house and was going to put us in an uncomfortable situation, but I died laughing. Tim didn't even realize what he had said until after he hung and I told him. He was a little embarassed at the fact that he was trying to really sound like he knew what he was talking about and ended up sounding as though he was drunk!

But, long shory stort, Roto-Rooter came today and took care of the problem. So, if you decide to come visit us, you can totally use the bathroom!!

Monday, November 17, 2008

Oh, Leo!


We have known for quite a while that Leo does not like it when we hug. We will stand in the middle of the living room and hug in front of him just to make him upset. He howls and growls and barks at us until we stop. At one point this weekend, he actually sat between us on the floor as we were standing, trying to separate us! What we haven't been able to figure out is if he doesn't like the fact that I am hugging Tim or that Tim is hugging me. Well, we figured it out today! Tim had a knot in his back, so while I was home at lunch, I rubbed it a little as we were standing in the hallway. Leo just sat there and looked at us, so we decided to try a little experiment. I turned around and Tim started rubbing my back. Instantly, Leo was up howling and whining and jumping at Tim. Apparently he is quite protective of his mommy!

Thursday, November 13, 2008

And I was doing so well...

I went almost a month without a post! Darn it! Well, nothing too exciting has been happening with us. Tim started back on his rotation this week. This one is more interesting than his last one. He will get to observe some surgeries as well as make trips to the PICU and NICU.

I am so excited about Christmas being around the corner. It is all I can do to not go ahead and decorate now! I love the whole "feeling" of Christmas. Christmas was NEVER about gifts when I was growing up, and I am so grateful to my parents for making it like that. We always did a Christmas advent and read the Christmas story before doing anything on Christmas day. I hope our children grow up knowing that we observe Jesus' birthday on Christmas and that is really what it's all about. What am I doing talking about all this....you'll hear enough about it from me next month!

My parents came this weekend and brought the rest of my great-grandmother's furniture to finish off the guest bedroom. I am using the dresser as my desk now, and it looks so good in there! My great-grandmother, Grandma Pug, is the one who first started my love of cooking. The first thing I ever made was in her kitchen. She was so special to me and I miss her very much.

Well, I'm sorry this post is rather boring. We really need some excitement around here!! :-)