A Day No Mice Would Die

Was not today. After many days of being tormented with snap traps licked clean without being sprung, and several days of empty sticky traps, today was the day we found our little friend. The bad part was that he was actually kind of cute. Little gray fellow with a white stripe on his head. Not at all the menacing creature I expected to find. But it was very sad to see his feet stuck on a sticky trap and him trying desperately to get free. If it weren't for Hubby's aversion to mice I would have called him to dispose of the poor thing so I wouldn't have to see it suffer. Can you tell I miss all of the pets we had? I would have put him in a cage and kept him, but Hubby would have been grossed out. So, we made a compromise. I would 'take care' of the live mouse in the cupboard, and he agreed to dispose of any and all arachnoids in the house from now on. So without a good reason to have him boil water, I had him empty the upstairs trash while I took care of things. I don't think I've ever had to kill a small animal on purpose. Well ok , I did shoot at a few squirrels but I don't think I ever actually killed any of them. So anyhoo, I packaged the little guy up in an opaque bag and into the big garbage bag with Hubby then promptly took out. A sad day, but hopefully the last we see of mice droppings. Ew.

Sick, Again

I am so tired of being sick. I had a hacking cough for most of December and now it looks like Hubby and I both have bad colds. My face and head feels like I had a run in with a cinder block while I was asleep. It is not pretty when both of us are sick, it's downright lousy. We both stay in our pj's all day, and neither of us feel like doing anything. So, the cereal bowls begin piling up. Real healthy when you're sick, but I am not in the mood to cook, and he isn't exactly volunteering to do it either. I want my mommy! Mom's are the best when you're sick. They always know which drugs to give you and take great care of you. Oh man, what am I going to do when we have kids and I get sick?? Is there a pre-plan for that?!

Our New Years was good. We went to Erika's for a dinner party, ate great food, played some Scattagories and chatted it up with friends. Then we stopped by Mark and Andrea's where a YP's bash was in full swing. The adults were playing a game called CatchPhrase, which has a handheld electronic thingy that you pass around the room. It randomly comes up with words in particular categories and you have to make your team guess the word. Kind of a cross between verbal Pictionary and Taboo. It was hilarious, and a blast to play! For anyone that likes Pictionary, look into this game- its perfect for large groups. So then we headed home, being the old people that we are. We arrived home just in time to see the ball drop, then we fell asleep. Wahoo. That was our evening.

Hubby is taking me down to Atlanta for our Anniversary! He has some work to do for JohnR down there, but then we'll have a little relaxation time. AND..... I booked another trip back to CA! I am so excited. I miss the boys so much! The problem is fitting in time to see everybody while I'm there. I'll be there 1/29- 2/6.

Happy Holidays!

Whew~ What a whirlwind past few weeks, and it's still going! Lots of company over, lots of invitations out. It has been fun, but a little exhausting. Cookies, did I mention all the cookies I've made? I even tackled Mom's famous Almond Roca! And like she has discovered, next year that's all I'm going to make! People love it and it is exceedingly easy to make! It was really weird not being at Burbank Conference this year, but we hope to be able to go next year. I had 10 people seated around our table Christmas Eve and it was so much fun. Did I mention I love to cook? :) Hubby's sister and her family were up from Florida and so his whole family came to dinner (just missing Jen who went to CA).

We even had our own little holiday party here. Pete and Niki were visiting from Iowa and the 4 of us girls got together again. We had a blast. We saw the idea in a magazine to have an 'Ornament Party', in which each guest brings an ornament as a gift for each of the other guests. It was a really cool idea! We only served hor'dourves, which even ended up being way more than we could eat. Erika brought an amazing Goat cheese and leek tart, amongst other things, and Darrah made bacon wrapped scallops and priscutto wrapped asparagus. All of us watched the movie "The Christmas Story" about Ralphie and his Red Rider BB Gun. Then, since the guys had a football game coming on at 8pm, we left to go to Darrah's next door. We changed into pj's, roasted marshmallows over the stove, played Scrabble and generally clowed around. So much fun!

I tried to make Christmas cards this year! Yea for the effort, but I didn't get around to nearly as many as I wanted to send out!! So some of you may be getting them in the days to follow, consider them as early MLK Jr. Day greetings. So for everyone out there,,, here is the official Photoshop-ed picture for 2007. Yes, that is our condo in the background.

We got snow!

I know it sounds crazy, but it's still a novelty for me ok?! It officially feels like winter. Granted it only lasted for two days, but it was really cool. (I learned something cool... if you put your wipers up, they wont freeze to the window!) I have been sick for the past 2 weeks and have been feeling miserable. After 2 trips to the doctors office, and about $100 copays and meds, I am finally feeling better.

Mom, John and Jaime were here for Thanksgiving. It was so good to have them here! Mom did the turkey because whole birds gross me out. Everything turned out great, we took them sightseeing in Philly, Lancaster and DC. But the night before we left for DC Hubby twisted his ankle, so he stayed home, and I was sick by the time we got down there and ended up staying in the hotel all day. We went to a really quaint restaurant in Alexandria called the Gadsby Tavern. George Washington actually frequented there!

We went to Hubby's work Christmas party last night and had fun! Tomorrow we are having a cookie baking party at Erika's! Tis the season.

Catalogue Clutter

For those of you who receive 4 or more catalogs a day in the mail, this website is for you! Check out catalogchoice.org. It is a free service, and once you give them your name(s) and address you can select the magazines you want to unsubscribe from. Fantastic. I saw this on the morning news one day and decided to sign up. They say it takes about 10 weeks for it to take effect, but still, if there is a hope of unclogging the mailbox I'll jump at it. Save a stack of the catalogs you want to delete, because there are literally hundreds to choose from and I forgot which ones I actually get, and some of them ask for the 'customer number' on the back of the catalog.

Ratatouille Screening Party

The three of us thought that a wine and cheese party was the perfect compliment to a cute movie about food in Paris! We had great fun finding different kinds of cheese, along with and crackers and wine. We also had grapes and apples to go with it. Oh, and we had sushi... just because we like sushi too. We dimmed the lights, unfurled our cloth napkins and watched this really cute movie about a lovable rat who has a passion for cooking. I highly recommend the movie. I have a shameless habit of turning the silliest little thing into an excuse to have a party, but we have fun!

Life Is A Gift

Today before you say an unkind word -
Think of someone who can't speak.

Before you complain about the taste of your food -
Think of someone who has nothing to eat.

Before you complain about your husband or wife -
Think of someone who's crying out to GOD for a companion.

Today before you complain about life -
Think of someone who went too early to heaven.

Before you complain about your children -
Think of someone who desires children but they're barren.

Before you argue about your dirty house someone didn't clean or sweep -
Think of the people who are living in the streets.

Before whining about the distance you drive -
Think of someone who walks the same distance with their feet.

And when you are tired and complain about your job -
Think of the unemployed, the disabled, and those who wish they had your job.

But before you think of pointing the finger or condemning another -
Remember that not one of us is without sin and we all answer to one MAKER.

And when depressing thoughts seem to get you down -
Put a smile on your face and thank GOD you're alive and still around.

Wake up cat

I saw this on Yahoo video. I don't normally peruse YouTube and such, but I was cracking up at this one. Anyone who has had a kitty can relate! This one is for you Dobug!

I tried putting the actual video on my blog but couldn't make it work, so here is the link.

http://video.yahoo.com/video/play?vid=1322921&fr=yvmtf

Mearns-Kilcup Wedding

We were just at Calista's wedding this past weekend. It was a beautiful wedding. The bride looked radiant, the flowers were amazing, the food was delicious, and the company superb. Peter and Nicole were there and it was really good to see them. All in all, we had a blast. It was a semi-formal wedding, so we were all too eager to dress up! Husbands grudgingly complied. After that Hubby and I drove down to North Carolina so he could do some computer work for John's business. The drive was spectacular.

If any of you haven't seen fall on the east coast, I highly recommend it. The colors are simply stunning. Fall is now my favorite time of year. If I can remember to take my camera outside, I will try to get some pictures. There wasn't much 'fall' to speak of in California, so I really appreciate it here. The weather is cooling off, so we have our fireplace going in the evenings. I have been baking pumpkin and apple pies, pumpkin bread, mulling cider on the stove, etc. LOVE IT! Poor Hubby has also had to endure all the fall leaves and floral arrangements that are popping up around the house. And it's time to get all those scarves and sweaters out of storage! Yea! My closet was officially rotated last week.

Las Vegas

Hubby went to a computer conference in LV and I got to go with him! We did a lot of sight seeing and got to see Hoover Dam. It is truly amazing if any of you get the opportunity to see it. I flew from NV to CA for a few days while Hubby was in class. It was so good to see my family! I miss my grandparents especially, and was thankful I got to spend some time with them. I also got to see Sara and Aubrey, and she is growing up so fast!

Jacob's First Birthday

Chub-Chubs is now 1 year old!! I am so thankful I was able to be there for his first birthday party. He is getting cuter all the time, and I miss seeing him grow up! I gave Big Brother a set of walkie talkies as an early b-day present for him so he wouldn't feel too left out. We had great fun playing hide and seek with them after the party.

Josh and Amy's Wedding

I finally have some pictures to post! Here is a slide show of the wedding, and of course..... my nephews!!

Shiny

I got my first piece of Otis B jewelry and I love it! I had been looking for a nice pearl bracelet for a while and till I saw this really cute one on Darrah's website, and saw that she has slashed her prices! Her jewelry is fresh, flirty and stylish. I'm not really the jewelry type, but I like to have a few really nice pieces. All of her creations are made with semi-precious stones, so they really are high quality, not just beads on a string. My sister in law recognized her work right away, "Is that one of Darrah's? It is so cute!" Click here for her website, or I have it listed under my links.

Busy Bees

It has been forever since I posted anything and I'm feeling guilty, especially since there has been so much going on that I could post about. At the end of September I flew to AZ for Josh and Amy's wedding. It was beautiful, she was beautiful, and everything went smoothly. I still haven't gotten around to editing the pictures yet. I got to spend time with family, and it was so good to see all of them. My nephews seem to be getting cuter by the day and I miss them so much!

So I got home on a Monday, and that Thursday my sister flew out here! I figured she wasn't in school or working and deserved a break from packing, so why not come see me? She is here for 2 weeks or so, and we have been kicking around. She now knows how boring my life really is, and how quickly the days can fill up with meaningless little tasks. How sad is this - I saw 2 tractor-trailer accidents this week and I thought that was incredibly exciting. Ug.

Two weekends ago, Do, Erika and I drove down to DC for their picnic. It was very small this year because there was a wedding in NJ at the same time, but we had a good time regardless. It was good to get a chance to just sit down and chat with people we don't get to see too often. Do's beau Craig was able to meet us there too, since he has been working in Virginia for the past few months. (Yes, this was part of the ploy to get my sister to come out and stay with me) Then we went to the DC meeting on Sunday.

On a sad note, we had a goodbye dinner for Peter and Nicole. He got a job in Iowa and we found out they were moving. We had a great time at Applebees, not talking about moving, and giving them "un-birthday" gifts, and by Friday they were gone. Us girls are going to miss Nicole terribly. She was part of our transplant club! (Wives who married men in Dorothy and moved here from somewhere else) She is always a beacon of love and cheerfulness. She is the type of person you want around if you are having a bad day, becuase she can always bring out the best in a situation, and she is sooo much fun to hang out with. Hopefully they come back to visit often, Iowa is lucky to have her back.

This past weekend, Hubby and I took Do and Craig up to Lancaster, PA and toured around Amish country. The shops are amazing, and the countryside is spectacular. The leaves are just starting to turn here. Driving on meandering roads, leaves floating down around you, hearing the clop clop clop of passing horse and buggy, seeing the tractors in the fields, looking at the quilts hanging over fences... ~sigh~ I love Amish country. We did the touristy thing and took a guided tour of an old order Amish house, and learned more about their way of life. Did you know that Amish women hold their dresses together with straight pins? They think it was because there used to be a shortage of buttons, and you can pin as fast as you can button anyway so why bother with extras? I wonder if there is some poor Amish girl that is as klutzy as I am? She probably has pin prick marks all over her. My sister bought a beautiful wall-hanging quilt that is in shades of blue. Hubby and I bought a hutch! We had a bit of difficulty bringing it home but we finally got it here and in good condition.

This coming weeking Hubby and I are headed for Las Vegas. He has a work seminar for the week and I am flying from Vegas to CA to spend a few more days with family. It's Jacob's first birthday too! I am so excited I can be there for the party!! Hubby and I will have a few days for sightseeing too, so we booked an airplane tour of the Grand Canyon and a walking tour of Hoover Dam (Hubby hasn't seen either yet). He also is excited to go see a Lance Burton show. So hopefully, we will have a fun, safe time!

Storage galore

We got a new hutch for the dining room! I am tickled pink, and Hubby actually really likes it too. We got it in Lancaster County. I don't think its made by the Amish because we didn't pay that much for it. But it's the style we like and it looks very sturdy, so we were ok with it. It has lots of cupboard and drawer space and even has a board that you can pull out for even more counter space.
How perfect for football nights! This will keep them out of my kitchen :) I am waiting till we can semi-secure the top piece to the bottom piece before putting things in it. Of course my first reaction is to bolt everything down and secure it to the wall so it wont budge. Hubby has to keep reminding me that there are no major earthquakes in Jersey. Oh yeah. No wonder I couldn't find Quake Putty in any stores around here! It is helpful to secure things when you have kids flying around the house though.


Here is something else I found that I really liked. If you have a muffin pan sitting around, fill it with potpourri and tea lights. It looks and smells like fall.

Beautiful Days and ER Visits

The weather has been absolutely perfect here lately. Blue skies, puffy white clouds, highs in the 70's and low humidity. D, LG and I went to this 'new' park I found to feed the geese. (Note the huge swan too in the one picture) The park is not really new, but it's new to us! I saw it on the map and went hunting for it one day. It is a beautiful lake surrounded by lush green trees and grass. It even has a sand volleyball court and a covered eating area. You can even fish there, just can't go out on the water. It's accessed off a minor road and surrounded by trees. If you weren't looking for it you would drive right by and never know it was there. Therefore, it is deserted most of the time and it looks like the transients haven't discovered it yet!! Yippee!!

In other news, we made a trip to the emergency room last night. Hubby has been working really hard lately and has been stressed. His company is splitting into two separate companies and it is apparently a nightmare. Hubby's job is secure but his work load has doubled for the time being. He is trying to handle the logistics of the split and make sure that both companies will have working computers, databases etc. So, he has been a little stressed.

Anyhoo... we went to my in-laws for dinner and got home around 9. He mentioned he hadn't been feeling well, and when I took his BP he said it was low for him. When he laid down for bed at 11 or so he said his chest was feeling tight, he couldn't take deep breaths and started feeling dizzy. He said felt like he was going to pass out so we decided to go to ER. I was thinking it was anxiety or stress related, and that would probably explain the shortness of breath, dizzy, feeling faint etc, but the tightness in the chest was a little disturbing. We spent the night in a noisy ER, listening to angry people yell at the receptionist about the wait and how they weren't being seen because they weren't white, yada yada yada. The staff was very kind and considerate in spite of being abused. It was very odd to sit back and watch, to feel so powerless - to be on the 'other side' of the equation for once. They ran an EKG, took chest x-rays and did some blood work.

Bottom line, his heart is in great shape. The doctor thought that it might have been his reflux that caused the tightness in the chest/stomach area. He is supposed to follow up with his regular doctor, get a complete physical and go to a stomach specialist. He had a bleeding ulcer a few years ago, and it seems like stress may have aggravated an already weak spot. We finally got home at 5:30 this morning. Long night, tense at times, but we made it through. Thank the Lord that Hubby is going to be ok. Today was a beautiful day too. Drove with the sunroof open.

Got curtains?

I finally have living room curtains! Gone are the plastic vertical blinds. It took a week or two to find the right color combination. I would buy them all over town, bring them home and pin them to the wall so Hubby could see what I was 'seeing in my head'. Then back to the store they would go if he didn't like them. Finally I think we found a winner. It looks so much more 'home-y' now!

The Perfect Fitting Jeans

I was reading Diagonally Parked's blog and checked out the website that she found called zafu.com. It is a fantastic site for all of us who are not built exactly like the models they fashion clothes for. I would love to take a good look at the woman they supposedly create size 10 clothes for. Anyway, you can find jeans, pants and BRAS!! You put in your measurements, and problem areas and they search for the best fitting product for your body type, and tell you where you can find it. Wahoo! Thanks Rebekah!

Expansion issues

Good news, my black molly fry are growing like weeds. Still very cute, but I think we're down to about 4 I think. This evening, Hubby noticed a little pale object that looked suspiciously like a baby fish. Oh brother. Yep, that's what it was! We had noticed that one of the yellow mollys was really fat this past week. I thought she was just pigging out at feeding time. Yes, I have apologized. Upon closer inspection, she is down to normal size, and there are tiny yellow fry popping there heads out of the rocks. What am I going to do with these fish?! It's not like I can catch the little buggers. I guess I'll wait to see if they survive, then deal with I then.

On another note, we have Amish Friendship Bread being passed around here. As any of you that have been a part of it know, once you get tagged you have bread starter coming out your ears. And you have a hard time giving it all away! So, I've been trying to find a way to make regular bread with the starter instead of the sugary yummy bread it's supposed to make. I tried to make rolls substituting the starter for the yeast/milk starter recipes call for, but the rolls didn't rise. Hockey pucks to be exact. Following the Amish bread instructions, once you mix the ingredients you put it right in the oven, without having to knead it, or let it rise. So the fermenting process is different from when you use yeast, but I'm not sure if that necessarily means that the normal bread ingredients have to change. Can't I just substitute starter for starter? Today I used the starter from Day 6 of the 10 day cycle. I'm going to wait til Day 10 to try it again. The only problem is that if you follow the Amish bread instructions, you end up with about 5 cups of starter. Grrrr. I suppose there is plenty of it... I'll just go by trial and error. Unless someone has some suggestions...

Rock On Baby

This is my best friend's daughter. The look on her face is classic. What a cutie! and I love the shirt!