Thunder shirt on

Ready for the fireworks. 

Toy Time

Caring is Sharing

I love that they do this!

Lazy Days..

It has been a while since I forced you to view puppy pictures. They've been lazing about. That is fo-sho!

M. appears to be calming -- chosing to spend a lot of time in her crate relaxing under the fan mixed in with some major barking to scare the butterflies and birds away.

D. is just D -- she is pretty consistent now. A rock, a furry shaggy rock.

They dealt with the latest crisis a heck of a lot better than me :) Of course they got the benefit of having me around for a few extra days. More on that later.

The temps they were a changing

This evening it was cool enough to actually exist outside the AC. I took advantage of this opportunity to play with my new toy and clean out the car. I'm totally loving the 4th of July Shop Vac!!! Yes I AM that dorky. Plus, the car REALLY needed help.

I didn't wash -- I'll wait a few days for that in an effort to bring on some rain. We'll need it since we return to our regularly scheduled nastiness and 90 degree temps tomorrow.

The girls just sat and watched.. didn't offer any help other than some dumpster diving! However they didn't go after the neighbor dog, so I consider it an all around victory.

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Playtime at the Park

We hit the park this weekend in honor of the gorgeous weather. I've started exploring the park a little more, including going off on the trails rather than sticking to the roads.

This afternoon Daisy, Madison, and joined Amber and Andy for a trek through the park. Even better yet, we got to play with Pascal Pup-Pup the chihuahua, Dixie the Husky, and Rufus the English pointer too!

During our explorations we found some waterfalls at the park. The DOGS loved it. My girls hopped into the water and ran around like crazy. Daisyd actually got out there in the water and paddled around. Madison had some fun too!

Sandy Madison

I used to say that Madison was like a nice carmel cheese cake with a chocolate swirl on top. Now I look at her and see a piece of wood that needs sanding. haha

My babies are growing up?

Say it ain't so! This morning I was taking the trash out to the street. I hadn't quite closed the door from the kitchen to the garage all the way. Oops. Two puppies pawed it open and bounded out into the garage. Heart Attack. But instead of running they just circled me. Within 45 seconds disaster was averted and I had shooed them inside. Maybe the really are growing up. Or maybe it is just so gross and wet outside they don't want to be out there any more than I do at that time of day.

Saturday is as Saturday does

We had an all around Saturday sort of day. This morning the ladies of the house all gathered on the couch to watch the U of I -OSU football game. Unfortunately it didn't turn out as I would have liked. Fortunatley, we held our own except for all of those turnovers. If only they could learn to play well I would see lots of wins in our future - because they have the raw talent, that is for sure.

After the disappointment of the loss the other ladies were devastated. I tucked them in to sleep away their misery. Meanwhile I headed back to the dreaded office for another coat of paint. I think it is the last. Later on I hung new blinds in there. It is actually looking halfway decent. I'll post pictures once I get the furnitue in there. For now I leave you with my sleepy furry children. After they have been tucked into bed they are likely to stay asleep like that for a surprising amount of time.

September Turns to October

So there hasn't been too much on the blog front - but I don't have too much to report. It has been work city around my house. When I'm not working it is sleeping and mowing the lawn. How exciting is the life, eh? It seems like work is taking up the most time! blech!

Last weekend we had a nice quiet weekend around the house. The dogs have entered a new phase in their lives. They now enjoy sleeping all over one another and lounging. It took them a while, but they have fully assimilated! I just wish that this was me during the work day, not just on the weekend.

Unforunately we are still fighting the mosquitos. If you have any advice - I'm all ears!

A beautiful weekend

This weekend my mom came down to visit for easter. We had a fun little weekend.

She arrived on the train on friday afternoon. It was a little late since the frieght train ahead of them hit a truck, causing a 2 hour delay. After she got into town we headed to the Flowood shopping district. Unfortunately the grand-puppies had finished up their treats this week, which is a major tragedy at 721 Lake Forest dr. A short stop at Petsmart solved that problem. Friday night we enjoyed a nice, traditional 'southern' dinner at Walnut Hills, a.k.a. Round Table. it was qutie complete, including fried dill pickles and ranch dipping sauce and fried chicken. Mmmm

Saturday was a lazy affair - we hit the park in the late morning. We took the dogs over to the Vicksburg military park and took a little hike. unfortnatley, it was a bit warm for the furry ladies, and they got quite warm. luckily, I had some water with me and we stopped at the Illinois monument for a little rest. You can see that the girls found the one piece of midday shade and cozied up on in it. They also made a point of hugging the nice cool limestone wall. I can't blame them - I got a little sunburnt myself!

We followed up with a trip to the boutiques of downtown Vicksburg. Mom fell in love with my favorite store, Twigs. We took a nice long stop at my other favorite store, Lorelei books. We spent a long while chatting with Laura, the owner. She is so sweet, and obviously knows her books. I would love to be that well versed in what I've read! We ende the evening with Chinee takeout and Babysiting. Unfortunately Amanda's babysitter dropped off the planet, so I offered to fill in. They brought Virginia over and we played for a while before she hit the hay. Madison was a bit overwhelming to Virginia -- her energy level is too high for me some days. So, the puppies played outside while we had our baby time.

Sunday the Easter bunny visited and brought mom some sugar free candy! wasn't that sweet of him? Who knew he visited even when you aren't in your own home!?!?!? We went to the Ameristar and gorged ourselves on the champagne brunch. The food there is excellen, and the desserts are even better!!! we drove by the Vickburg Murals, a cool new addition to the 'Burg. We finished the afternoon off with a little yard work and I took mom to Jackson to catch her train home.

The puppies enjoyed having grandma here - they were exhausted after the end of her visit!!! So did their mom come to think of it. And yes, if you were wondring, it was Wonderful to eat cheese again! Who cares about chocolate, I wanted cheese!!!!

Kitchen Escapades

tried a new recipe this weekend. it gets given the checkmark of acceptance - it will be repeated. this one was a Sausage and Beans recipe out of the Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Cookbook. I'm loving this book! This recipe was reminiscent of Red beans and rice, but didn't have the cajun seasoning.

In unrelated news, the weather is fabulous. I can't believe it was snowing two days ago. today the high was about 65 degrees? I tried to take the dogs on a walk. It was a complete disaster. We walked out the door and nearly got attacked/tried to attack another dog. The entire walk they were pulling themselve. You would think that they had never been on a walk before. We had to stop and sit several times because they were panting so badly. In fact, Madison was at the point where she was panting and white tongue turned into slightly blue tongue. Apparently we can't handle walking any more.

For those parties interested in these types of things, the recipe follows--
Ingredients

• 1 lb fresh sausage such as turkey italian sausage or 1 lb smoked or full cooked sausage such as bratwurst, chicken apple sausage, or kielbaa
• 1/4 water if using fresh sausage
• 2 tbl olive oil
• 2 small bell pepers, seeded and cut into strips
• 1 medium ellow onion chopped
• 1 garlic clove minced
• 1- 15 ounce can white beans (great northern, butter beans, or cannellini) rinsed and drained
• 1- 15 ounce can red beans, such as small red or kidney beans, rinsed and drained
• 1 14.5 ounce can diced tomatoes, with thier juice
• 1/4 cup dry red wine
• salt and frehly ground black pepper to taste

1. Lighly brown sausage in ungreased skillet over medium heat. If fresh add water, voer, and cook until cooked through. uncover and cook for a few minutes more.
2. Let cool and slice
3. Warm oil over medium heat. Add peppers, onion, and garlic. cook, stirring, until just tender.
4. Transfer to slow cooker adding sausage, beans, tomatoes, and wine. cover and cook on high 3-4 hours, or on low 6-8 hours. ear the end check consitence and cook with the lid off to thicken if desired. Season and serve.

Snow, Snow, Snow

Yesterday brought a cold front and snow flurries to vicks-vegas!! This was my first snow since moving to the miserable state of Mississippi. The weather was miserably cold yesterday. Somehow I had forgotten to watch that part of the news, and left the house completely unprepared. After spending the day hooked on weather.com I headed to the grocery store, picked up some good food and headed to the homestead. It looked as though we were upposed to tap out at a low of 31, just below freezing, but it also looked as thought the snow-like frozen precipitation would miss us. I was WRONG!! It SNOWED last night!!! I let the girls out and they had fun in the flurries for a bit. Then we headed back in to our nice warm fire. I had just enough wood left in the house for the right size fire – because you know I wasn’t going out to the shed to get more. Here are some pictures of the girls in the snow last night. I also grabbed one of the house this morning when I took out the trash. Any accumulation on the ground had melted by 6;30 this morning, but the rooftops were still covered! It was fabulously exciting!! Crazy thing is that it will be about 70 degrees days from now!

The weekend, Bring it on

It is pretty common for us to walk around the lake and see deer tracks over by the dam. I know that we live ‘out in the count’, and I know that there is undeveloped land practically around the corner. I try to remember to be careful when coming home from work around dusk. But, the other night I had a crazy experience. I was coming home late at night. I was in my subdivision, not three houses up the road, when I noticed the neighborhood dogs running around. I said, gee those are some big dogs, that looks bigger than the tan dog from across the street. Suddenly, the realization hits me, it isn’t a pack of dogs, it is three deer running across the street! Thank God I wasn’t five seconds earlier or the Camry would be toast.

We had some beautiful weather here in the ‘burg. This evening the girls and I went for a little walk around the lake. Everyone is starting to take advantage of this weather to get things done. We stopped to chat with the family next door for a few minutes – it turns out we go to the same church. A couple of weeks ago I followed them to mass, and recently she had notice me at church. We are really starting to fit in around Lake Forest. On the way back around we got to stop by and talk with our other next door neighbor. Luckily, he hadn’t even noticed the excessive dog barking lately. I wish that were the case for me. He has noticed that our neighbor out back has put up a spotlight that shines directly into our back yards – not so cool for trying to sleep at night.

It has been a productive day in the Jersey house. I didn’t do the yard work that the weather was asking me to do. Instead, I started to finish off last weekend’s paint job. The minute I decided to put an offer in on the homestead I had a few visions of thing I wanted to do. Today I finally put my living room paint vision into practice – painting the beams in the vaulted ceiling to set them off from the ceiling. I never had any doubts that it would look good, but it looks even better than I thought it would. It really defines the room. I don’t understand how the previous owners thought that it was a good idea to paint it any other way!!! You need to check it out! I’ll be posting pics soon.

Back to the Basics

It has been a while since I've had a book to blog about. Between the house and my qualifying exam i haven't been the avid reader i would like to be. I have a few from Christmas that I read and should probably put up here. For the time being I would like to discuss Maisie Dobbs, by Jacqueline Winspear.

This is the first in a seres of mystery/novels centering on the Maisie Dobbs character. I would classify it as more of a novel than a mystery based on the way it read to me. The novel is set in Lonon/Kent, England. The "Current" day Maisie is a psychologist and investigator in London approximately 10 years after the conclusion of WWI. A series of flashbacks occur as a method by which the backstory unfolds. In this book Maisie has just set out to start her career in detecting. It was a fairly amiable read -- rather easygoing. The book didn't result in any super fabulous insights, however, I it was entertaining and gave cause to consier how one's upbringing and station in life affects verything. It also reminded me to think of the issues associated with war - the emotional scars of WWI sometiems outweighed the physical scars, a well as the fact that everyone is affected by battle, not just the soldier who sees it but also his family, friends, and even complete strangers. These are lessons that we shoul probably ponder considering the current state of affairs in the US with the War on Terror.

In going back to the basics i would also like to comment that we are enjoying some unseasonable weather. I'm trying not to get to used to it since we are still in February. Saturday afternoon I took the puppies on a walk in the Military Park again. We decid to up our mileage to the 3 mile, South Loop. It is always a nice walk. It is crazy to consider how close we are to civilization when you realize how clsoe you are to the Interstate, yet, the park is so serene and natural (monuments not withstanding). This afternoon we didn't brave the park, but rather walked around our subdivision. I added a little leg to our walk around the lake. Using a nifty tool I read about elsewhere I am now able to esimate my milage wherever I walk. G-map pedometer is so cool! Some computery people took the google map software and developed algorithms whereby a person can put in a starting locatoin, pinpoint any waypoints and get their mileage. Since I walk a lot of rather curvy roads following the ridgeline in the park, I need a lot of waypoints! Same with the neighborhood. I hightly reccomend it for runners, walkers, cyclers, etc. who want to guestimate their mileage when hitting the road.

I'm a wet noodle

Here is yet another dog related post. I'm watching the Westminster again with the puppies. I'm enjoying it as tonight they show the sporting dogs, which are my favoites nowadays, and the toys, who just amuse me. What I want to say though, is that the commercials by Pedigree really upset me. I'm such a softie. The dogs are so cute. And then the add is so sad. i can't tke any more dogs in - 2 is enough (we found taht out this week). But, it breaks my heart. So, if you are considering getting a dog, i suggest rescuing rather than getting a papered dog. They are already out there, just waiting for you to take them home. Just watch the pedigree ads. If they don't break your heart even just a little bit, please come talk to me.

Semi-related, I'm a little concerned. My dogs apear to have switched personalities. Daisy is Ms. Playful - wanting to play catch and chew on her rope all night. Madison has been sitting upnext to me wanting me to love on her.

Finally, It has been a nice night to watch the competition. Courtesy of the writer's guild, there is nothing on TV. And, it was a gross, wet, rainy day. We actually lost power at work today for about 40 minutes around lunch today. I kept waiting for someone to come through and tell us to come home. Never happened. However, we did light a fire ad enjoyed a nice night in front of the fire. i do enjoy my fireplace. I'm slowly getting better a this whole fire thing.

A walk in the park...

Today Daisy, Madison and I took a walk in the Military Park. It was a pretty day, and the warm side of the temperatures got to a point where we could actually walk outdoors. Lately we've been walking around the neighborhood lake, which is about a 1.25 mile walk - sometimes adding a sidestreet in. Since we had the day off and housework wasn't calling my name, we went to the park.


One of the few beauties of living in VIcksburg is that we have this huge military park with 16+ miles of trails in the middle of town. For the low rate of $20/year I can get unlimited access to the park. We re-newed and hit the trails. 2.75 miles later, after enduring the Lousinia hill (it is HORRIBLE - try it and you'll regret it), we returned to the car.


It was a fun walk - we got to see some deer - a doe and her fawn. The dogs got to sniff a million new things. This was also the first time I tried the park with both pups. Actually, it wasn't as bad as I thought it might be. The pups were EXHAUSTED when we got home. They ate their supper and went to pass out. I guess they are feeling it just as much as me. We'll be hitting Vicksburg and all of the local parks in the upcomming weekends in an effort to get into shape for the Annual Run Through History! This was what they looked like when i was making my supper! Tired little girls.

By the way - wasn't this a wonderful way for them to get out of bathtime. Every time I consider throwing them in the tub I hear a sigh come out of one of them. Such spoiled babies! Right now they are sleeping on my feet, keeping me warm, and snoring away. What a hard life!