Game Night

Tonight we had family game night at our house. Koty even got to meet Sophie for the first time. He really wanted to play with her so badly, but Sophie was a little bit nervous of his size and his bounciness. She barked at him a few times, but I'm not quite sure what she meant by it. He jumped back when she barked, like he understood quite clearly.
The games were fun. The guys played Eucher, and the kids and ladies played Scattergories (Aunt Marty's homemade version), Boggle, and Dutch Blitz. You think we'd all be happy after such a fun night, but one of my children is quite sad and I'm not sure why.

Naughtyness

Someone was naughty today. While I was out with Steven for a while this evening, Dave was playing with Koty. Koty decided to chew his bone...and then the couch skirt. Dave said he was sitting right there, and it happened so fast. I am not very happy about it, but luckily it isn't worse. I still think he's a cutie. (Dave AND Koty)

A Warm Blanket

When we went to Florida in February, my mother in law taught Steven how to crochet. She was making a baby blanket at the time, and Steven was very interested in what she was doing. He said that he wanted to make his own blanket, so we took him to Wal Mart and bought him some yarn. This is how far along he is now. He's doing a great job!

Feeling Very Sleepy

For the past 3 days I have had some extremely sleepy moments and was starting to get a little nervous about it when I thought of something. Dave bought me some over the counter Zyrtec (allergy medicine). He told me it was "non drowsy", but when I read the box (after sleeping on the couch for an hour and a half after dinner) there was no mention of it being non drowsy. In fact one of the side effects is that I may feel drowsy after taking it and there are instructions to "be careful when operating a motor vehicle". I will only take it before going to bed from now on. Thank goodness I didn't take one this morning before going to work, I never would've made it through the morning. I'm so relieved to know that I'm not dying. Lol!

Eyebrow Plucking

So how many husbands are kind enough to pluck their wives eyebrows for them? Yesterday Dave was doing just that when Michael took this picture. This is one thing that Dave does not like me to pay for, so he says he'll do it. Lol! Dave quickly made it appear that he was plucking my nose hairs. I am very thankful to say that I don't have any of those that are visible yet.

Graduation Day

Tonight was Koty's last day of puppy Kindergarten.He got to dress up in a lizard outfit (which he loved...NOT), and he got to run around lots with his friends.He even got to pick out a new prize ball and got a diploma!

New Neighbors!

This was the scene directly across the street from us when I came home from work today. Hmm... I wonder who our new neighbors will be.

Making the Best of the Snow

Today Martha and I decided to make the best of all the snow and take the kids sledding. They had a good time, and we had fun taking pictures. Afterwards we all came back to our house for some yummy hot chocolate!

Visitors

Today Bethany, Adam, and Josh ventured out into the cold and came to visit us....well, not just to visit us, but they stopped in for a bit. It was good to see them. I hadn't seen Josh since Thanksgiving, and boy has he grown. He had lots of nice smiles for me, and even showed me his two teeth. Koty was very excited to see a little baby, he's never seen one that small before. He just HAD to see what he tasted like so he licked his face a little, and nibbled his foot a bit. He was a little too interested in Josh so we had to restrain him somewhat. This is Josh, all ready to venture back out into our winter wonderland out there. Be careful driving, Adam!

This is our spring right now, gmj

Brace yourself for a foot of snow or more

This is the one of the titles in out local newspaper today, and what we are expecting tonight and tomorrow...brrr! Maybe we can go cross country skiing this season after all, or how about tubing with the kids!

The search is on...

Lately I have started to search for a pair of new flip flops since mine that I've had for several years started to break in Florida. I must look now because, believe it or not, in a month or so I may have a hard time finding what I'm looking for. I'm amazed that a pair of simple flip flops commonly runs around $50 or more!

Iceberg

This picture stinks, but it shows the "iceberg" that I took the boys to play on at the Aquatic Center here in town yesterday. They played on this thing for 2 hours. There's a big slide on one side. It's pretty neat!

Eeeew!

This evening I learned that I can not allow Koty to finish a whole rawhide chewy in a matter of a few hours...he puked up his whole dinner because of it. Next time I will take it away when it's half eaten.

We're so confused!

Tonight on our way home from small group, Dave tried to call the boys on his cell phone to let them know we were on our way home and to be ready for bed. When he dialed our home number he didn't get anyone here, he got another residence, so he decided to try again....same thing. The third time he very carefully punched our home number into his keypad...same thing! The man on the other end was a little impatient, and I guess rightfully so. Dave told him what number he was dialing and asked what the number of the residence was. Very strangely it turned out to be an OLD cell phone number of Dave's. ??? It was a slow ride home due to a lot of snowfall and slippery roads, but we finally made it. Later, after the kids were in bed I realized that our internet connection didn't work on either computer, so Dave went to the basement to reset the modem and the router. I was then able to connect to the internet, and almost immediately got a phone call from our telephone company. Dave's sister had evidently tried to call us 5 times and had gotten this other residence instead, so she called our telephone company to report that some lines must be crossed.
This is the reason that we kept getting the other residence...A LONG time ago, Dave gave the phone company his cell number as a number that a phone call would be forwarded to if our telephone was out of order. Evidently he never gave his new cell number, therefore this poor family has been getting a bunch of phone calls intended for us. (I called a couple of times a few weeks ago on my way to work and got this other family too)

Kayaking

One of the neighbors here has a couple of kayaks that he said we could borrow if we wanted, so Dave and his sister, Liesl, went kayaking this morning. They got into the canal right behind our place and off they went into the Bay (or whatever it's called). It was a beautiful day and I think they had a nice time. Later we all went to the beach. Tomorrow we will start for home...I'm ready. It was a nice, relaxing vacation, but I love my home in NY. Besides, Koty needs us and our fish are very hungry!

Head hunting on the beach

A coolish day

Today it was a cooler day, around 64 degrees. We decided to take a long walk down the beach playing the "I spy" game. That's Dave's crazy sister walking next to me, and Michael giving his shadow bunny ears. Steven wanted to be in the water today, but it was just too cool, so he had to settle for the surf.

Sweet Berries

This is my father-in-law eating one of the most delicious things here in Bradenton. Last night we went to "Sweet Berries" for frozen custard. We go here every year we come here, at least twice. This is THE BEST frozen custard I have ever had.

A dinner adventure

Night 1 in Bradenton:

Today we were going to have a pot roast for dinner, but the oven here keeps shutting off. This makes cooking very difficult. By 7:10 the pot roast was still not finished cooking, so we decided to leave it cooking in the oven for tomorrow, and we went out to eat. When we got to the restaurant, the prices were outrageous (at more than 1), and we found out that it is much more expensive to eat at a restaurant on the weekends. It was $10.39 per person (it was a buffet), which meant to feed our children alone would have cost us more than $20.00. We all decided that we would return to our cozy little condo and eat our pot roast. At least we had some good laughs in the van on the way out to eat, exposing everyone's strange little quirks. We are just about ready to chow and it is 8:30pm. What an exciting adventure!! Dinner smells scrumptious!

Florida vacation!

We arrived in Bradenton, Florida at my in-laws place at 9:00pm last night. It seemed like a long trip this year for some reason, but we are happy we're here. After a good night's sleep last night, we are enjoying a little sun and swimming today. Will post pics later...or will try too. Our connection isn't great here.