Willow vs. The Christmas Tree

We decorated the house this week.

Please ignore the mangled piglett toy laying lifeless at my feet and focus on the tree and all it's glittery beauty.

We found a sweet little douglas fir tree at Lowes, had the guy strap it on our roof and then went through the drive through at Chick-Fil-A to pick up some peppermint-chocolate shakes. (Josh had a bit of trouble swallowing the chunks in the shake and felt the need to chew every bit of peppermint that made it's way though his straw).

Willow was a bit scared of the tree at first and she went into a fit of barking and whining as though someone had kicked her when she discovered it strapped on top of our car. Once the initial shock wore off I think she began to remember her wayward ways of the Christmas of 2009 when she repeatedly attacked the tree and destroyed everything on the bottom 3rd of our tree by December 19. She determined that lights, tinsel, and all of our precious wooden and glass ornaments were demolished in her fluffy little fangs.

This year, I consciously placed mostly plastic/unbreakable ornaments near the bottom of the tree. A mere 2 mins after the tree was complete I spied on willow as she snuck up on a stuffed snowman hanging on the bottom of the tree. She sniffed it quizzically, became startled by something she saw/smelled and jumped backward for a half a second and then promptly recovered from the scare and ripped the little stuffed mann of snow off the tree and ran for the couch.

The victim.

"NAHHH!" I yelled, scaring her and my unsuspecting husband, Josh, half to death.

She dropped the snowman and sheepishly looked my way. "No, no, Willow. No!" I sternly said grabbing the snowman and placing him back on the tree in the exact same spot. Pointy carrot nose, striped scarf, and beady eyes taunting her, once again.

I know she will rip it off the tree many times before Dec. 25th comes around, but I figure it's good bait to keep her away from the light chords and tinsel. To a dog, tinsel always seems like a good idea to eat, but we all know how that story ends...and no body wants to spend their christmas holiday pulling something sparkly out of a dogs booty.

Regardless, we haven't had any incidents since the above mentions, so perhaps my little puppy has matured. Also, I think our house looks winter wonderland fabulous. Hopefully I didn't go overboard on the christmas garland.

That funky wavy thing on the wall is a reflection off my funky wavy mirrors on the wall to the left.

Our aweseome(ly hard) puzzle.

Are your trees up and decorated? Do you all do a real or a fake tree? Any animal/tree troubles elsewhere in the world?

Merry Christmas!

Confessions

I get mad at people for texting and driving because of a horribly graphic UK PSA video I saw about it, but when i'm driving alone, I do it all the time.

Josh and I easily can go through 36 eggs in one week.

I started listening to Christmas music November 8th.

I want to work from home someday to see if I have the motivation and the focus to not wander off and take a nap every 10 mins.

I kinda want to run a 1/2 marathon again, but i miserably failed at training for my 5K on Oct. 30 so i'm too scared to sign up. Walk/jogging 13.1 miles is a lot harder than walk/jogging 3.1

Sometimes I sit down to read my Bible at lunch and end up watching "Let's Make a Deal" instead.

I don't understand bloggers who are all gushy and lovey about their husbands all the time. It makes me feel like i'm a bad wife.Don't get me wrong, I love Josh, but i'm not the swoony type i guess.

I read all the Twilight books and loved every minute of them. 

If I ever got a cat I would name him Junior. (get it, Kat junior?!)

Most people get up for Black Friday shopping so they can get good deals on gifts for their loved ones. I end up buying stuff for myself every time.

I work in the ag industry and can barely tell the difference between a tractor and a combine.

One of my favorite meals in the whole world is Chicken Scampi from Olive Garden. Not so classy, but extra tasty!

I think red heads are the best looking people. It would be hard for you to find a red head (male or female) that I didn't think was attractive in some way.

I love cooking and baking, but I don't really know how to do either in a healthy way that is still produces something tasty.

Sometimes I miss just wearing my engagement ring and kinda think my wedding band (wrap) adds too much bling.

If I could do France over again, I wouldn't spend as much time shopping and I would spend more time doing cheesy touristy things and sight seeing.

I'm discovering that when you put yourself out there with friends and get burned it's really hard to put yourself out there again.

I still haven't put up my Christmas decorations and it makes me want to cry.

Others opinions mean way to much to me.

I keep forgetting that I turn 26 in 16 days. I still feel like i'm in college and 22.

The One Where Thanksgiving Was Exactly What it Should Be

This past week I have been delinquently MIA from pretty much all computer activity. This was not necessarily on purpose, but my life evolved into a tech-free zone with family visiting, babies arriving, and much merriment to be had around the national stuff-your-face-holiday, Thanksgiving.

My parents and littlest sister, Emily, rushed into town the Friday before Thanksgiving because my most adorable and all-things-sweet-and-cute niece was on her way! They arrived around 9:00 pm and we all promptly visited Starbucks to pump our bodies full of caffeinated peppermint mochas and egg nog lattes for the long night ahead of us.

As it turns out Cynthia, my eldest sister in labor at the time, needed some rest so everyone but my mom and JP (Cynthia's fiance) headed home around 11:45 expecting a middle of the night phone call we all hit the sack.

By the next morning it was apparent that the labor wasn't progressing as we all had hoped and Cynthia was exhausted. At noon on November 20th, they decided to go ahead with a c-section to get little Annalee out of there and into the bright world of love that awaited her. Now...here is where I feel like a crap Aunt.

I had a hair appointment at noon. I had scheduled this several months in advance and desperately needed some work done AND thought I could be back in time for a first look at Annalee with JP through the glass after the c-section. Turns out c-sections take like 30 mins and I missed out on those very precious moments first glimpses through the nursery viewing window for cell phone pictures, oo's and ahh's, and tears.

I missed it. and I really really regret it...However, luckily I didn't miss out on the first no-glass meet and greet with the little one. And like I mentioned here she is perfect. And has such a sweet temperament. And I could hold her all day every day and never get sick of it. And just talking about her makes my heart hurt a little bit because of how much I miss her right now.

The next few days after Annalee's arrival were a blur of hospital visits, big moves from hospital to home, adjustments for my sister, adjustments for the baby, etc, etc. (everyone is doing very nicely now - BTW)

Before I knew it Thanksgiving eve was upon us and mom and I did one really serious shopping trip to fill 1.25 carts full of enough food to feed an army and then went home for approximately 5.75 hours of pie baking (I made 1 killer apple pie, and 1 pumpkin pie all by myself!) and food prep for the big day. It was painfully obvious how out of shape I am because just standing for that long made my legs hurt....Oy Vey!

Thanksgiving day was exactly as it should be. I woke up, and because of urging from Emily and because I wanted to enjoy the day guilt free, we went for a run. Didn't get far (maybe 1.25 miles) but nearly died and definitely burned some calories. I crashed in front of the couch and zoned out at the giant commercial we call entertainment, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, then showered and started cooking around 11:30.

Making a big meal is somewhat like being a conductor of a professional orchestra or maybe a bomb defusing specialist. The timing has to be exactly right or everything will fall apart and you will lose your patrons/ everything will explode and your patrons will die.

Thus - much team work was needed between all people involved. Mom and I made all the side dishes (corn pudding, green bean casserole, sweet potato souffle, mashed potatoes, stuffing, corn - Hello starchville!) Dad manned the gravy, 22 lb turkey, and excessive-but-necessary chex mix and Emily may or may not have burnt the rolls, but we got everything to the table in time for a feast that probably would have been enough food for 20. We still have quite a few leftovers in our fridge.

after the meal i promptly passed out on the couch from a tryptophan hangover and didn't wake up till it was dark outside and my tummy notified me it was time for something a bit sweet. (apple pie!!!)

Literally, the remainder of the weekend I think the girls did was one of 5 things:

1. Watch movies - mostly of the Christmas genre, but we may or may not have watch Boondock Saints and Elf back to back.
2. Eat - Leftovers, pizza, sausage casserole Friday morning, more left overs, more pizza. It was glorious.
3. Drink Coffee - my family knows how to put away coffee like a bear preparing for hibernation knows how to put away...whatever bears eat (berries? bunnies? humans?) Probably should have thought of a better analogy that I actually knew the second part to...
4. Puzzles - We did one and a half 1,000 piece puzzles while my family was here. They left me with the hard half of a very hard puzzle to finish on my own and I realized last night that every time I closed my eyes before bed I could not stop picturing puzzle pieces! 
5. Stare at Annalee - We are staring at her like willow does at the food on a visitors plate. 

The remainder of the week the guys did one of 2 things:

1. Fix Stuff: Our house is old. it's falling apart. they fixed our kitchen sink (which broke again after Josh fixed it 3 months ago), Our refrigerator (which might still be broken) our bathroom's leaky valves (which ended up being a much bigger ordeal than anyone anticipated including tearing tiles off the walls, not being able to find matching tiles, grout and dirt everywhere, and so on, and so on). I'm so thankful for this being done, though! I think it will save money on our water/heating bill in the future. Thanks Josh and Dad!
2. Watch sports: Notre Dame game, Florida game, OSU dominating Michigan game, Predators hockey game. 

Wish I would have gotten more sleep during the break, but it was so good to be with family. I got to spend some quality time with my sister Emily and my mom. I'm quite thankful that I will get to see all of them (plus rebecca - my 3rd sister) again very soon.

And one more for the road....just because.

Annalee Grace

Behold. A precious baby has arrived.

My new niece, Annalee Grace, made her grand debut on Saturday, November 20th at 12:15 pm. She is 8 lbs and 20 inches long of squishy cuteness. As most babies are in their first few days, Annalee mostly sleeps, eats, and poops at this point, but she has completely captured the hearts of our entire family.

Proud Papa.

Giant hand uncle.

Doting Nana.

Facebook pictures, updates, and comments have been ringing through the digital airwaves for the past 48 hours and I'm pretty sure everyone other than our family is getting sick of it, but we don't care. We think she is impossible to get sick of and is most definitely something to write home, er...tweet about. So we post pictures of her getting her first foot massage.

We post pictures of her getting her first diaper changed.

We post pictures of her wearing an Ohio State buckeye hat.

A fan from birth.

We post picture of precious little sleeping face and we all oooo and ahhh at her every face scrunch, yawn, and sneeze. She sure knows how to perform for an audience of on lookers only 3 days in.

I'm so happy to be an aunt again. It's especially exciting having this baby come from my older sister and living so close to us. I feel very lucky to get to be a big part of her life in these next few years to come.

 

Conversation

me: Oh hey katherine, what's up?
myself: oh...not much. Just doing some work, hanging out and ABOUT TO BE AN AUNT AGAIN!!!!!!!!!

Yeah...that conversation didn't really just happen with myself, but the emotion did.

My sister is in labor. I can't wait to meet the adorable little curly red-headed-wee one!