November 20, 2010

I've been patiently waiting for some canvas prints to come in the mail. Finally! I put one of my favorite lighthouse pictures on canvas and we hung it in the living room. I love it! It's not as big as it looks in the above picture. It's only 12X18. But I also only paid 14.99 for it on Artscow. If you friend Artscow on facebook, they periodically send out promo codes on their status for great deals. Like I said, I bought this canvas print for 14.99 with free shipping. I'm gonna order two more and have a set of 3 pictures on the wall.

November 19, 2010

So recently, I've been trying to recover some picture files from my broken external hard drive. I called Best Buy to see how much it would cost. They told me that they don't do that on site and they would have to send it out. It would cost anywhere from $260 to $1800. Really? I'll research other avenues. Hello Google. I found some free software to download that is used for recognizing failed hard drives. Bazinga! For the last few days, I've been successfully extracting my picture files from the failed external hard drive onto my computer. Then burning them onto CDs and DVDs. It's going to take some time to get all the files. But I've recovered some old pictures that I could sell that I haven't had access to for the last year and a half. Which is great because a guy at Jon's work wants to buy some Notre Dame pictures for framing. Thank you PC Inspector!

November 18, 2010

Finally, I bought my new camera today! I'm so excited. So excited that I came home from work and fell asleep on the couch. I'll play with it tomorrow. Jon and I went to Ethan's Taekwondo class tonight. Then it got late and we picked up some McD's because I didn't feel like making dinner tonight. I think I'm starting to get sick. I have a gooshy head--my head feels full and heavy and I'm really tired.

November 17, 2010

We have our first Christmas decoration out! Okay, that's because I just bought it today and I'm not gonna go put it in the basement for a week or two. I went to the Christmas Tree Shoppe today to buy a Thanksgiving Day hat. They have a hat in their flyer that looks like you have a turkey on your head. Not a gobble, gobble turkey, but a meaty and delicious cooked turkey. Ever see the Friends episode where Joey gets the turkey stuck on his head? Anyhoo, they were out. But I did find this Christmas Card holder. It was only 2.99.

November 16, 2010

Must be a farmer. A witty farmer.

November 15, 2010

We have this thing in our family called NAT. When we were growing up, my grandma always made southern sweet tea. It was always around. She kept it in the fridge at all times. We all grew up drinking it and all love it. However, if you did not grow up in our family, you hate it. It's weird, but true. The joke is that if you aren't a Rucker, you don't like the sweet tea. (The Rucker story is long and sorted and for another time.) But my dad is the exception. He is not a Rucker. He married into the family. But, he's been around for awhile now. And now he now carries on the tradition of making and always having the NAT around. In time, this beloved tea was renamed by the Not-a-Ruckers as Nasty Ass Tea. Or NAT. Jon is Not-a-Rucker. He absolutely hates it. So he insists that I make NNAT at home. Or Not Nasty Ass Tea.

November 14, 2010

:-(

November 13, 2010

Who would have thought that the Irish would win today because I ate a donut for breakfast that had shamrock sprinkles on it! I hate sprinkles, and was pretty disappointed that the bakery put sprinkles on all the donuts. Not one without, dammit. And my 47¢ Starbucks coffee has made an appearance in the picture as well. That's right. 47¢.

November 12, 2010

Morgan's birthday is Monday and Chris threw her a birthday party at my mom and dad's tonight. My mom and dad got her a bunch of dress up clothes and wigs and accessories. She loved them and did a total makeover before we did cake and ice cream. Here she is blowing out her candle with her princess dress, wig, crown and make up. Too cute.

November 11, 2010

Dukey's gonna get a crick in his neck sleeping like that.

November 10, 2010

Tonight I went to my first meeting as an associate member of the Clay Fire Department. Woohoo! We got the lowdown on expectations and safety precautions. I can't wait to go to some calls! I have to schedule my battalion chief ride along first. Stay tuned...

November 9, 2010

Leaves, leaves and more leaves. Here's how we do it. We use the lawn mower to 'mow' up the leaves. Since the bagger works for shit, we don't use it. The leaves just get sucked up and thrown out the side. So basically, we mow in circles to, more or less, corral the leaves into a manageable pile. We then rake them onto a tarp, drag them over to the other side of the driveway near the woods for burning at a later date.

November 8, 2010

Quality lunch. Beer and poppers.

November 7, 2010

Bubba makes a good pillow. Pooper still wants nothing to do with Duke, but Bubba tolerates him. Mostly because he is fat and lazy and doesn't wanna get up and move.

November 6, 2010

Starting last night and into this morning, we had our first snowfall. Pretty much most of this disappeared by late afternoon. This picture was taken at 8:28am.

November 5, 2010

Oh, we have been craving some deep dish ZA for awhile now. When Jay and Jen (Should I start calling them 'Jan' for short?) go to Giannetto's for dinner, we take turns buying. I hadn't realized that it was their turn when Jen said they were paying. (I hope I didn't misunderstand.) Which means next time it will be our turn, we owe them. Which really means that we have a reason to go back again. And again. And again.

November 4, 2010

Warm Iron When Needed? This is on my bath towel. Do you iron your towels? You know, when kinfolk come 'round?

November 3, 2010

I made the easiest and most delicious pumpkin muffins today. A coworker was telling me about it and I found the specific recipe online. All you use is a box of spice cake mix and a 15 oz can of pumpkin. No oil, water or eggs. I did add a little cinnamon to it though. Just mix together and put in muffin cups and bake at 350° for 20-22 minutes. The batter is real dense and thick, but trust me--they turn out wonderful. Next time I am going to sprinkle some cinnamon/brown sugar crumble on top before I bake them. I'll be making these for Thanksgiving. Yummo!

November 2, 2010

I found Duke's costume for next year! 50% off, of course. It's a Roman warrior riding on a chariot. I figured Jon wouldn't mind a costume if it were a little manly. Duke didn't like me putting it on. He thought it was a chew toy. But once I got it on, he was okay with it. I can't wait till next Halloween!

November 1, 2010

Babies got baths tonight. Pooper is 13 and Bubba is 12 and we've never had a problem with fleas before. But I think maybe Duke brought them in from outside. Duke is treated, but we never treat the cats because they are indoor cats. But somehow, they got 'em. So we bathed them and treated them with some Spot On. Hopefully we will nip this in the bud. They hated it by the way. You'd think we were slowly killing them by the sounds of their yowls. Such torture.

October 31, 2010

Happy Halloweekend!


After work today, Jon and I went over to my parents' house for dinner and to pass out candy to the trick-or-treaters. Jon and I don't get trick-or-treaters at our house. Well, at least we don't think so. In the 8 years that we have lived there, we've never been home for Halloween. I think its safe to assume that we don't get any kids, because our house sits back from the road a little and there is a line of trees that separate our house from the street. We have an empty lot just to the east of us that sits on the corner. And our neighbor to the west of us is about 30 yards away. I just don't think kids are gonna run through our area of the street. Morgan dressed up as Batgirl and Lauren as a gangster. I took pictures of some of the best homemade costumes that we saw that night. I think the best one was bacon. There was a great R2-D2 that made the R2-D2 noise that he makes, a toothbrush and toothpaste. One girl was dressed up like a cowgirl and had her dog with her that had a costume on that looked like he was a horse and had a little cowboy riding on his back. Next year, we will have treats for the doggies too. And I decided that next year I'm putting a costume on Duke. We never have before, but we're gonna try. Jon's not into it, but I don't care.

October 30, 2010

Panera Baked Potato Soup is highly recommended. Of course, you can get it at Panera. But we now sell it at Target in the deli. Phenomenal.

October 29, 2010

I found this cool gift card at work that I've never seen before. It appears to be from a past Christmas. I took it home to give to the girls. They might think it's kind of neat for a hot minute. (It had a zero balance, I didn't steal it.)

October 28, 2010

I'm so excited to embark on a new adventure. Jay set up a program with the Clay Fire Department for freelance photographers to work as associate members. There are three of us, ideally one for each shift. We will get text messages whenever there is a call and we are suppose to respond and take pictures. Its still in the beginning stages. But I did pick up my vest. (I photoshopped 'photographer' on it. It really just says Clay Fire.) Hopefully, I will be able to respond to some interesting calls. Looks like I'm gonna have to buy a camera real soon huh? Jon says I should prepare myself for possibly seeing some gruesome stuff. I think I will be ok. But you never know until you're in that situation. We have a meeting next month to go over safety procedures and expectations. Honestly, I don't think I will respond to anything until I have all the safety information.

October 27, 2010

Today was a pretty non eventful day. My dad and I have been trying to coordinate our schedules to take some nice fall pictures with the changing leaves. It's pretty much too late for that now. We met at St. Mary's hoping to get some nice pictures there. No luck. So we drove over to Notre Dame to try our luck there. Not much better. I did get some shots of the dome as the sun was going down, but nothing too compelling.

October 26, 2010

So, we were pretty busy this weekend and we had planned on taking down the gazebo canopy top. Saturday, we had two soccer games and a Halloween party that we went to. Sunday, we went to Lauren's soccer game and did some grocery shopping. When we got home, we had to give Duke a bath. So we didn't get to the gazebo. Big mistake. Today proved to be a near-disastrous wind filled day. I guess the storms were pretty severe. I was at work and monitored it on the computer, but being in a big store with no windows except for the entrance door, I was mostly oblivious to the wrath. When I got home, I found our gazebo to be slightly affected by the weather. Luckily, Jon was due home shortly after me and we could get it bent back into place without anything getting damaged. In fact, we're pretty lucky that it didn't tip over and crack our slider windows. I let Duke out for a quick pee and ushered him right back in. It was still quite windy, and I didn't want him getting hurt. When Jon got home we fixed it. Sort of. Surprisingly, it bent back into place with little effort. And there wasn't a single stitch out of place on the gazebo top. Wow did we luck out. Now, we just needed to get the top off for the season and everything would be fine, right? Nope. In Jon's irritated and impatient state, he pulls on the corner of the top to get it off the frame and rips a big hole right in the corner. Ya know, where it needs to stretch tautly over the frame corner? Jon has a tendency to not think before he acts. So know we will have to buy a new canopy for about $65.

October 25, 2010

Booooooo.

October 24, 2010

Today, Jon and went to Lauren's final game in her soccer tournament. The Invaders won! Lauren probably has more trophies right now than she knows what to do with. At the game, Jon found $30 laying on the ground. Bonus!