Happy Fourth of July!

I have work to do and I'm doing everything I can think of to avoid it. All of a sudden I have all of these crafty ideas and I just want to be upstairs in my craft studio playing. I made a "prize ribbon" in celebration of the holiday.

We are going to watch fireworks tonight and that should be fun so I really need to buckle down and get my work done then I can relax. If I would just get started it should only take me two or three hours but I just don't want to do it! :(
Let me procrastinate just a little more and share one more thing with you:
I've mentioned before about our Shih Tzu Teddy Bear - he likes to see what the neighbor's dogs are doing by peeking through a small knothole in the fence.

Here he is trying to resist but he just can't stand it!

He can sit there all day and it's a bummer for him when they are not at home. He gets bored but keeps coming back to make sure they aren't there.

Have a great 4th!

Still working on projects around the house but no pictures to show just yet. Doug took me shopping this weekend and bought me an iPad! Yay Me! He also bought me a new Coach bag for our trip along with a cute crab key chain, a new pair of sneakers, tea and two insulated tea cups from an awesome tea store at the mall, and some facial moisturizer that I wanted. It was such a fun day of shopping!
Saturday was Rachel's 2nd birthday party and what a party it was! There was a cotton candy machine, ponies, a jupiter jump and a balloon making magician!
Rachel is eating her cotton candy *AND* riding a pony at the same time - sweet to be a 2 year old, isn't it?


In the back yard I have a few birdfeeders and a hanging planter on the fence. When the feeder ran out of food I looked out the window to see this:

I made him nervous when I walked outside with my camera.

Teddy goes crazy when he sees squirrels - of course it doesn't help when we yell, "There's a skirr!" or sometimes we say "A scuzz!" He loves to chase the "skirrs" off the birdfeeders. He comes back feeling so proud.

Finally, I was scheduled to have a craft night at my house this Friday but unfortunately we are going to have to postpone it for a week or so. I did get one crafty project finished and am working on a couple others. Seems like just when I get things sort of organized up there, I start a few new projects and mess things up again.

Keeping Busy

I've been thoroughly enjoying my time off from work and trying to get my huge list of stuff accomplished this month. Is it bad to say that I don't miss work at all?
I'm making progress although maybe a little slower than I had hoped. I'm going to go easy on myself and allow myself to enjoy life a little.
We've been trying to eat a little healthier so on Sunday, Doug grilled some veggies and made absolutely *DELICIOUS* portabello mushrooms on the grill. Oh, the flavor! They were fabulous. Doug is a very good cook and I love when he cooks for me.

I've been working hard at putting a garden in the backyard. It's alot of work to start a garden from scratch but it is coming along. The problem is that is has been so incredibly hot here the last week or so and it has made it a little difficult to work outside for too long but I'm getting there. You can see one of the bags of dirt in the picture. The soil in the back yard is kind of compact and clay like so we actually have to go and buy garden soil. Hopefully my plants are going to grow - that would be awful to do all that work and then have everything die.
I've also picked out mostly plants that butterflies and hummingbirds love. I've had a few hummingbirds at my feeders already and I've spotted on butterfly. Once word gets out about my flowers I'm sure they will start flocking to my backyard. ;)


I've got myself a little helper. He provides moral support, company and he even helps me with digging. Good Boy!

Despite the heat, I have been slowly working on cleaning out the garage - again - it is so hot I have to take it a little at a time. Plus, there are these huge red and black wasps that keep trying to dive bomb me so that kind of slows me down since I have to keep running out of the garage like a crazy lady.
Next Friday night I'm having some friends over for a craft night so the pressure is on to get my craft room finished. The last two days I have been painting shelves for that room and I'm getting excited to get everything in place. I need to ask Doug to hang one of my ribbon shelves and put my TV on the wall. The reveal is coming soon! Yay!!

Oklahoma Blizzard of 2009

Looking out our front door on Christmas Eve, this is what we saw. The wind was blowing and the snow was piling up and it was just beautiful!
How grateful we were to be inside and warm and just spend some time together enjoying Christmas Eve.
When we woke up Christmas morning, the snow had stopped and most of the highways had reopened but the weatherman said to stay put if you didn't have to go anywhere. Needless to say, we didn't make it to Doug's mom's house for the festivities. Instead we stayed bundled up inside, I made some breakfast and we just enjoyed a quiet Christmas at home.

When I heard the weather was going to turn bad, I thought I would be "smart" and pull my jeep into the driveway so that if the driveway got icy, I could walk on the crunchy grass and at least get into my car. Well, that didn't work out as planned - the way the wind must have been blowing during the storm placed a four foot snow drift on our walkway from the front door right to the front of my car. Since I don't plan to get out there and shovel any time soon, I'm going to have to make my way out through the garage, down the driveway and around to the drivers side door. Or, maybe I'll just stay home until the snow all melts!

This is a view from inside Doug's car as we just pulled out of our garage and are headed down the street. Pretty icy! Glad he is driving and not me!

This is a picture of Teddy Bear sitting out by our fence. Right near where he is sitting is a little knot hole/peep hole that looks into our neighbor's back yard. Next door live two little cute dogs named Boomer & Sooner. Teddy sits by that little knot hole, listens for a while then peeks his eye up to the peep hole like this:

If Boomer and Sooner are on the other side, all the dogs go completely NUTS trying to get to one another. It's one big fun game for them. Watching him look through that peep hole is so funny! Just thought I'd share.

How much is that Doggie in the window?

On Saturday, I pulled all the pansies out of the front. While taking pictures of the beds without flowers, I looked up to notice a crazy man looking out the window at me! Can you see him? Doug opened the windows in my office so the dogs could enjoy the fresh air and see what I was doing out front. I think I see Phoebe peering over the windowsill but Teddy is front and center. I wonder where the other two dogs are? The beds look sad without the pretty pansies.
I've only planted a few perennials so far including Black Eyed Susans and Lavendar.
I've left plenty of room to add more flowers and more color as I go along. Usually, I plant geraniums (usually pink) or begonia just like everybody else. This year I want to be different and mix things up. Plus, it is so exciting when things bloom from year to year and you can watch the plants get bigger and prettier. I've also thrown in a few verbena to attract the hummingbirds and butterflies. Of course, I forgot to take my after pictures so I'll have to do that another day.

Speaking of hummingbirds, I saw one just the other day. He flew up to one of the birdfeeders in the back looking for some nectar. I immediately came in and filled up my hummingbird feeder and put it in the backyard. I hope I'm not too late. All I need to do now is to plant some hummingbird and butterfly friendly flowers in the backyard too.

Lots going on at work. Getting ready for a few conventions coming up. Plus, we are starting an Osteoporosis Support Group at the end of May. Busy, busy, busy!

Teddy Bear

I wanted to share a layout I did over the weekend. Doug took this picture around Christmas time and although it is sort of blurry I absolutely love it.

What do you think?

Snow.. Ugh!

Woke up to a freezing cold day today with big, fat snowflakes. I am so ready to be done with winter. I need sunshine and warm days. The good news is that it looks like by the middle of next week we will be headed into warmer weather. Can't wait!

Last night we went to a dinner presentation at Flemings Steakhouse in Utica Square. The presentation was about continuous epidural infusion rather than a single epidural steroid injection for back pain. Exciting, huh? Actually, it was kind of interesting and definitely made sense for some of our patients. Look forward to see if it works better than the ordinary injection. The dinner part wasn't the greatest however. I was really looking forward to eating at Fleming's because I had never been. It was mediocre at best and it definitely wouldn't be my choice if I had to pay the bill.

Missed out on a dinner tonight because of exhaustion and a terrible headache. I was supposed to attend a meeting at Dave and Buster's but didn't make it. Been going like crazy and need a break. So, I'm just taking the evening a little easy, straightening up my office which has gotten totally out of control the last week. Also listening to my iTunes and to Doug hollering in the other room over the Sooners and the basketball game. Sorry Douglas. :( Seems as though the Sooners have let him down tonight.

Okay, enough doom and gloom. On a more positive note, here I am tonight with Teddy:

I know I look tired, but isn't he just too cute?!?

On other positive news, I booked our flight for our trip home to Connecticut this summer. Can't wait! We are going to stay with Bobby and Jess and I'm sure have a great time. Yay! We haven't been to Connecticut since September of 2007 and I sure miss my family. And I can't fail to mention my favorite pizza in the whole entire world: Pepe's Pizza on Wooster Street in New Haven. It's world famous. I tell my family everytime I go home that I'm going for Pepe's. They can join me or not but I'm not going to miss it - yes - it IS that good!