Meeting the families

Pugsly is enjoying meeting the family so far. He's a little weary of people at first and even growled at my mom! But after a while, he warms up a bit to everyone unless there are a ton of people around. Then he'll just sit on my lap.

This is a video of Pugsly tromping through the snow the other day when we got a foot and a half of it. It's so much fun to see him hopping through it!

Where did he go?

In my last post, I mentioned how Pugsly likes to burrow in some of the blankets that we bought. This first picture is what I saw of him the first time I came out looking for him and he was burrowed.

Oh, trust me, he's in there. Just look at the next pictures.

Next we see him peeking out after I looked all over for him, calling his name.

He started to come out afterwards, but isn't this the cutest picture!

We went to the laundromat later in the day to wash all the blankets we bought, since some of them wouldn't fit in our washer. I was joking around with him and put him in the basket on top of the blankets. Look at this face! This is probably one of the best pictures we've gotten of him.

He decided to take a nap in the basket while we got the other stuff ready to go. He assumed the nap position, almost always curling up into a ball like this.

Handbells and horns

About 2 weeks ago, I had my first concert with the handbell choir. The concert was more for singing choirs, but we got to do one song by ourselves and two songs with the choirs. It was a lot of fun! I really enjoyed playing the bells and I'm looking forward to any other concerts I might be able to join in on. Unfortunately, I'll miss playing at the Christmas mass though. I've got some pictures of us polishing the bells after the last practice.This is one of our high school students. He is a drummer, and he also plays some of the really large bells.

This is me at the beginning of our assembly line. I was applying the polish while the others took it off. By this time though, I was done with applying it and was helping with the final polishing.

One of the larger bells up close.

The whole group of us who stayed to polish. The other bell players were in the choir, so they're at practice here.

Six months in the waiting, our Toyota Prius has finally arrived! We picked it up yesterday and took some pictures. Driving it home was fun, and then it snowed a foot and a half last night. It's in the garage, but I don't know if I want to get it out! :) Our other car has to sit outside now. And of course, it's piled with snow. We have a carport that we found in the garage, but we haven't had the chance to put it up before the snow came. But anyway, here are a few pictures of it.

Odometer reading of 9 miles on the car. It was actually 7 when we got it, but we took it for a spin before we went home.

Under the hood, before it gets dirty. See how clean and shiny it is?!

Me, parking the car in the driveway when we first got home.

Okay, I have to mention Pugsly in this post, even though I was trying not to. We decided to collect some used blankets for the rescue where we got Pugsly. We went to Goodwill and bought some really old, cheap blankets and just threw them on the kitchen floor when we got home. Eventually we plan on washing them, but in the meantime we wanted Pugsly to give them a trial. Well, he LOVES them. He has not slept on his blanket since these arrived. At first, he was just sleeping on top of the pile, but now he has taken to crawling through the blankets and covering up with them. At first you could still see his head, but now he's burrowing so far in there that you can't even see him anymore. Last night I came into the kitchen to turn off the light and say goodnight to him, but I couldn't find him. I called his name and then saw the blankets stirring. Of course, we managed to capture some pictures of him doing this, but they'll have to wait till the next post. They aren't downloaded off the camera yet. But just know that you're in for a really big treat. The pictures don't do it justice. I wish you could see him. We've decided that he needs a new blanket now so that he can burrow all the time.

Doggie clothes

Here you go Suzy. I took some pictures of Pugsly with his sweater on. He looks so cute, even though the sweater isn't the most attractive. The most important thing is that he's warm and doesn't shiver as much when he's outside with this on. Enjoy the pictures.

Giving Nate some love... this is his favorite pose when you pet him, he loves to climb on your legs.

You can't see it here, but he's actually kissing me at this moment. I try not to let him kiss me in the mouth, but that's where he always aims. He LOVES giving kisses.

More bragging about Pugsly

I really like my dog, so I'm going to put up some bragging pictures about him. He's been so great. We've only had him for about 5 days, but I've grown to love him and I think he loves us. Nate does pretty good with him too, for not being an animal person. He always says hello to Pugsly when he comes home (and by hello, I mean he stops to pet him for a few minutes) and he brings his work outside with Pugsly on the porch when the weather is nice. Pugsly has gotten into this habit where he seems to think that we left him forever whenever we go anywhere or when we go to sleep. When he sees us again, he is sooooo happy that he doesn't know what to do with himself. He ends up jumping and running in circles, all the while trying to jump up on us as well. I took the camera when I left for a meeting earlier today and had it ready when I came home. Before I even opened the door, I heard Pugsly whimpering. Here's a short video of what greeted me when I opened the door. This is taken with me standing up looking down at him.

Here are some more random pictures of him:

Here you can see him enjoying our backyard. This is in the way back, so we haven't mowed it. He loves to hop through the tall grass like a rabbit and loves to chase squirrels. He could care less about the deer or the birds we have in the yard, but squirrels and chipmunks are on his list.

This one he probably just woke up and is wondering what's going on. I think I called his name so he would look at the camera.

This is Pugsly outside on our porch enjoying the nice warm weather we've been having. He's looking at me, who's inside trying to sneak a good picture of him. I love it when his ears are up like this. Since he's nervous a lot, his ears are down and behind his head. He looks so sad like that.

Sleeping beauty. I took this yesterday, but he always sleeps like this. You can even see him nuzzle up under his tail. It's really cute.

It's true.

Yes, it's true, for anyone who doesn't believe it, or hasn't heard yet, we got a dog! Believe it or not, we did. He's name is Pugsly and he is about a year or two old. He is part pug and part pekingese. He's a rescue dog and he is so lovable. He's shy and scared of everything, including his shadow, which I found out yesterday. :) He LOVES being held and petted and is perfectly content watching the cars go by (as long as you are petting him while he's watching them). We sat on the front porch for a half hour today while he just watched the cars. Below I've posted a few pictures of him and I'm hoping to get a video of what he does when we first come home or wake up. It's so adorable.

Close up on his face. This is from when I went to visit him the first time, without Nate. I wanted to take a bunch of pictures of him, but he wasn't cooperating. He was just too scared of people.

Pugsly and his new family

Pausing while running around in the back yard. He loves the tall grass and to run, jump and sniff through it all. He's discovering that he likes to chase squirrels but the deer in the woods next door don't phase him at all. Notice the curve in the tail? I think that's the pug coming out of him. It's not always like that, but when he's in this position, it's obvious. He also has cute little wrinkles on his face sometimes that are characteristic of pugs.

Fall, birthdays, and more

Last weekend, I visited my sister and her family for my nephew's 3rd birthday. I had a great time spending so much time with my sister and her kids since my sister was on maternity leave. This was her first week back to work.   I took some pictures from the weekend. Here's some of the good ones. The first picture is Tyler blowing out his candles with Evee in the background. The second one is the birthday "cake" (cupcakes, really) that my sister and I made. I had a blast making it. The cupcakes were a mold that I bought. I was excited to be able to use it so soon! The third one is me and my two god-sons. Mikey is 10 now! He's growing so fast! And look at Tyler, he's such a ham!

I love fall, hence the next couple of pictures. I loved the leaves sitting in our yard and how they looked against the green grass. The panoramic picture is from the drive to the airport last week. The leaves here were at their Fall peak and absolutely beautiful. Today, I went to our back yard to take some pictures of the trees there in their fall colors. Unfortunately they are all still green. I stood in the middle of the parking lot and looked around. Out of the forest came 4 deer. They saw me, but saw that I wasn't moving and continued into the yard. They walked around and ate some grass for a while. I was there for a good 10 minutes before I looked into the woods and noticed a buck! It was the first buck that we've seen in the yard. I managed to get some great pictures of the does as well as a good video of them. I got a few pictures of the buck but only one of them was really good enough to see it.

Well, I'm having problems uploading the video, so I'll try to add it later. It really shows how close I was to the deer and how calm they were.

Family Time!

It seems like September and October are Family months.  I visited my sister for about a week in the middle of September. We had a good time being sisters (i.e. staying up late talking, going shopping, and loafing around). I'm glad I got to spend so much time with her (and the kids) while she's on maternity leave and not working. My parents came to visit at the end of September. It was the first time they were in Fredonia. From what I could tell, they liked it here. They seemed to enjoy themselves and even stayed till Sunday instead of leaving Saturday afternoon like originally intended. We visited the Festival of Grapes in Silver Creek and despite there only being a handful of grape-oriented things, we managed to come away with the fixings for a grape pie. Mmmm...

This past weekend my twin sister and her family came to visit.

It was the first time for them visiting Fredonia also. My sister is on maternity leave from having her second child. She has a (almost) 3 year old boy and a 10 week old girl. I got lots of baby time and toddler time in this weekend. Here are some great pictures of the kids and some of the things we did.

Next weekend, we'll be with Nate's family at their annual clambake. I feel like I haven't seen them in forever, so it'll be good to see them. We'll be celebrating the many October birthdays in the family. 

Then the weekend after that is my nephew's 3rd birthday party (as well as my other nephew's 2nd birthday party, but I can't make it to both) so I'll see my sister and her family again!

Somewhere in there, we're squeezing in a short visit to Chicago to visit some friends. It's going to be short, but we'll see as many people as we can. I'm hoping to see my co-worker who had a baby at the beginning of September.

Ding-a-ling!

This is really exciting. I got a call from the music director from church last week. She asked me if I wanted to join the handbell choir. How cool is that! We had our first practice yesterday. I had no idea how difficult it could be. Imagine taking a difficult piano score, with lots of notes on both treble clef and bass clef and playing only one or two notes at a time. I'm sure I'll get the hang of it, but it's so weird. It was a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to playing some more. Our first concert is November 6th, I think, whatever that Sunday is. Thankfully she gave me a part in the bass clef so if I mess up, it's not part of the melody and it probably won't be as noticeable, or at least I'm hoping that's the case. This is just what I was looking for, something fun to get involved in. I just wish there were a few more people my age there. The director calls us her ding-a-lings. Ha ha!

I can't believe I did it

I tried really hard not to do it. I was curious, but I let everyone else tell me about it. I didn't want to jump on the band wagon, but I couldn't hold out any longer... I joined Facebook.  I tried joining LinkedIn, a professional networking site, hoping that would not only help me find a job, but to quench my thirst for social networking sites. I decided that there were too many people for me to keep in touch with that are all on Facebook. I found more people than I expected! As of right now, without even doing much, I have 31 friends already! It's only been 2 or 3 days.  I can't wait till I have more time to be able to check out the features of the site and see what cool stuff I can do. If you're on Facebook and not my friend yet, look me up and add me.

Funny YouTube video

This video is hilarious! The first time I saw it, I watched it over and over and laughed so hard I cried. I hope everyone enjoys it as much as I do. I can't resist laughing every time I see it.

Wedding picture

I couldn't resist posting this picture of me and Nate from the wedding we went to this weekend. I think we both look so cute, aside from the fact that we're looking right into the sun and I had a migraine. I love the color coordination and I think Nate looks stunning in that shirt. He went out on a limb buying this shirt for himself and I think he looks awesome in it! The visual effects of our reflection in the car hood is a nice touch. :)

Friends, marriage, and cars

This weekend we got to see some friends from Chicago when we went to a wedding of one of them. It was great to see them again and catch up in person. It reminds me how good I feel when I'm around friends.  Congratulations to JE and T on their marriage. Many blessings for your years together.

The best part of the weekend was staying with my sister. I stayed up talking to her till almost 2 A.M. Friday night/Saturday morning. It was great to be around her again. I just wish we could get together all the time. I loved talking to her. It was great that my month-old niece was able to hang out with us too. I can't wait to see them again at my niece's baptism in two weeks.

The best feeling in the world happened to me when we arrived at my sister's house Friday night. It was after my nephew's bedtime, so I didn't expect him to be awake or to see him till the next day. When I pulled in the driveway, my brother-in-law was in the garage and peaked in the house to say we were there. Out runs my nephew, who's almost 3 now, arms wide open, yelling my name. He ran into my arms and gave me a giant hug. It was the best feeling ever! I obviously don't have any children, so I'm not used to kids being attached to me. I melted when he did that.  He's the cutest nephew too, he always wants to talk to me when I'm talking to my sister. The other day she called me to ask me a question and then hung up. The phone rang a few seconds later and it was her again. She forgot to let my nephew talk to me, so she had to call back. He asked me to come to his house. Thankfully I was able to tell him I was coming that weekend, so as not to disappoint him.

So, while waiting for our Prius to arrive (it's been 4 months now and at least another month to go) it's been harder and harder to get around without a car. Yes, we have our bikes and that's been really handy, especially since my parents gave us their kiddy trailer so we can carry our groceries home,  but we had to rent a car anytime we wanted to do some major traveling. Last weekend we decided to buy a car in the interim. We had great luck when we went out on Monday. We picked up our car on Wednesday. It's a maroon ' 95 Buick Century with onlly 82,000 miles on it! We really lucked out. We got a good deal and a great car. We drove it to the wedding this weekend and got some great gas mileage too. We're falling in love with the car and will have to seriously think about if we want to keep it or not. :) Here's a picture of our girl...

Oh, Deer!

We really do have deer in our yard, and we finally got a good picture of one before it ran away. I was taking out the compost yesterday and I turned around after dumping it in the pile and it was staring me in the face. Okay, it was down the hill, but it was so close! It stared at me for a while, then I left to go get the camera and Nate. We went back to look at it and it was still there looking at us. I took this picture of it, then it started to walk away. It snorted at us a few times, but it left before I could get another good picture. Anyway, I enjoyed getting this one and I'm glad we finally got to snap a picture of it.

7 years, a niece, and Niagra Falls

Earlier this week, Nate and I celebrated out 7 year anniversary. He was really sweet, this year he bought me a framed picture of Multnomah Falls and hung it in the bedroom while I was still sleeping. Then he took me to a local inn/restaurant for dinner, a night in one of their rooms, and breakfast. It was an awesome place! We had a really good time playing cards and reading. He even planned a short prayer service. I think I'll keep him for at least another 7 years. :)

So a lot has happened since I last posted. My sister had her baby! The baby girl's name is Gretchen Kristine (middle name was chosen after my sister's middle name). She's a doll, she look just like her brother did. Here are some pictures of my new niece and her big brother.

Look, she's smiling at her mom already. Mom looks happy. 

This is what you get when you try to get Tyler to smile. I thought it was so cute, I couldn't resist.

We had some family come and visit us last weekend, which was really awesome. It was nice to be in a place where people want to come visit and to be close enough for them to come. Friday night we had the most spectacular storm I had ever been through. It was scary! There was lots of thunder and lightning, which sounded like it was right above us. There was even some loud ones that woke everyone up and brought almost all of us to the kitchen to see if everyone was okay. We took our turns in the bathroom and tried to fall asleep afterwards. I checked the time, for a full half hour after we got up, it thundered constantly. Not just one here and there, but it was a rolling thunder that didn't stop. The craziest part of the night was the electrical noise we all heard. It was a loud zap that shut off our electricity. Some people saw sparks outside and we got up to make sure nothing was on fire. We were about to call the authorities in case something went wrong, when our electricity turned back on. 

Saturday, we went to Niagara Falls. I talked to my mom and she said that every time we've gone there, we've been on the Canadian side. I know that when my sister and I were there about 10 years ago with friends, we were also on the Canadian side. So this was my first experience at the falls on the American side. Here are some more pictures:

It was a beautiful day to go up there. It was sunny, breezy, clear, and comfortable weather for a picnic. We were exhausted by the end of the day but the ice cream we had at the end of our walk around the falls sure helped re-energize us for the ride back, well some of us at least. After dinner we had some great games of Twister. I haven't played that in ages! The whole weekend was great. We had lots of laughs, great food, and shared experiences that will last a lifetime. Thanks again to everyone for visiting! 

Town pictures

I actually remembered my camera when I was going to church this weekend so I got some pictures of the downtown area. This picture is of the Opera House.  They have a lot of different event going on throughout the year.

This next picture is just a view of Main St in one direction.

This one is a bummer. It's an inn whose 200 year old tree fell down this week. You can see the tree here. There were 2 large trees flanking the walkway up to the front door. The one on the left is still there. It has a plaque on it saying when it was planted.

This is our church, St. Josephs, just a couple of blocks away from downtown, on Main St.

This is a common area in downtown near where they hold the Farmer's market and some other summer events. There's a fountain and a gazebo and some park benches.

So that's your sneak preview... hope you enjoyed the pictures. 

Weekend alone

So, we've now been in our new home for a month. This weekend I had the opportunity to spend the weekend by myself here. I hate being by myself, but I surprisingly had a great time. I got my bike fixed up a few days ago and today I rode all around town to the market and to get a hair cut and to a couple of garage sales. It was great to not be coped up in the house and not be able to go anywhere without walking. I need to work up to biking longer and longer each time though, because tonight my legs ache. It's really strange because I've been walking up a storm ever since we moved here. But I guess biking is so different on your body.

I'm looking forward to getting a car though, I'd like to explore the area a lot more. Not just our town, but the surrounding area and doing some hiking or some outdoor summer activity besides weeding the yard. By the way, people coming to visit is a great way for us to learn more about the area, so one at a time, let me know when you want to come. We're looking forward to visitors!

New Home

I promise I'm trying to post more than once a month. I'll get better at it, I hope. So, we're out of that dreadful big city and into our new home in rural New York. How do I like it? So far it's good. It's so hard to say because we've spent the first two weeks unpacking and hardly anything else. We've got a LOT done. If only we can keep the unpacking messes to a minimum... The town is great. It's a small downtown that's actually pretty active. We went to a classical music concert last weekend and there were a lot of people there for the size of the town. It was really nice. They offer a lot of programs and festivals. We also found a special place already. It's an ice cream shop. Those are always good, but this one has Hershey's ice cream and it also sells tacos! Strange combination, but it works. :) Since it was so hot our second week, we went there a couple of times.

This week is a mixture of stuff. I'm visiting my sister and watching my nephew for the week. In between that, the two weekends are busy visiting other family for Father's Day and my niece's baptism. It's so great to be closer to home where we can just drive for the weekend if we wanted to. We're still waiting on our car though. I don't know how long it's going to take, but I'm predicting the end of July. I guess Toyota still can't keep up with the Prius demands.

Maybe next time, I'll post a picture of our new town. I'll have to get a good picture of something that's representative. I'll think about that one...

I'm an aunt again!

I'm so blessed to have so many nieces and nephews and I was blessed again on Friday. My sister-in-law (husband's sister) had a baby boy on Friday morning. Congratulations to her and her husband and welcome to Elliot! You are coming into a wonderful family who will take good care of you and love you so much!

Awesome-est website

If you're ever stuck on presents to get me, just check out this website. I'd be happy with just about anything from here.

www.thepurplestore.com

It's awesome! Everything is purple, everything! I can't get enough purple!!

The Countown begins!

It's official! We'll be moving to Fredonia, New York. I hope to have a movie posted soon for people who haven't seen the video of our house yet. I'm looking forward to getting out of the city and living in a neighborhood where there isn't anything but houses. Okay, the university is nearby, but I don't think you can see it from our house. Houses, that's all you can see, and there's trees in the neighborhood, lots of them. I counted today, there's 37 days left till we move. Our stuff will be leaving the city before we do and I'll work for a few more days so I don't know the exact day we'll be leaving the city, but it'll be around then. There's a lot to do between now and then, but I cannot wait!

Happy Triduum!

This week is the most important week in a Christian's year. It celebrates the life and death and resurrection of Jesus, our Savior. As we enter into the most holy days of our year, the sacred Triduum, I wish everyone a blessed and meaningful celebrations. May the experiences of the Triduum this year bring you understanding of the sacrifice that was made for us and the joys of the Resurrection.

We will be celebrating on Saturday, by making Ukrainian Easter eggs. This will be my first experience delving into to this form of art and I could not be more excited! My thoughts are racing with patterns that I'd like to try. Looking up the meanings of all the symbols and patterns has filled my mind with so many ideas that I'd like to try. But, I will probably go with something really really basic since it's my first time doing this. After the Easter Mass on Sunday morning, it's off to brunch at a friends house in the early afternoon. If time allows, we may head over to another friends house for an early dinner, but I'm not sure if the timing will work out for that one.

Again, I hope you all have a wonderful Triduum and I look forward to hearing about your celebrations. You will all be in my thoughts and prayers this week!

Done, done, done!

He's done! My husband is completely done with school! He passed his oral comprehensive exams and now we're just waiting for graduation. In the next two months while we wait for the official ceremony he'll be looking for jobs. He's already got a couple of interviews lined up and I'm sure many more to come. I'm so excited to be moving out of the city, and I can't wait to figure out where that will be and to settle down some where.

Sick of the City

I'm so sick of this city. I'm ready to get out of here now. This morning on my way to work, I actually stayed awake on the bus. I was looking out the window as the bus rode alongside the railroad track embankment. This embankment was cleaned up a few months ago from trash, but already, there's more trash than there was before it was cleaned up. You can't look a few inches without seeing bottles, chips wrappers, or newspapers. It's disgusting! Any other place I have lived, nobody would put up with that. I even saw a guy last week drinking out of a paper cut and when he was done, he threw it in the road. There was probably a trash can less than 20 feet away because he was working outside an apartment complex.

The other day, I was on the subway platform waiting for the train. I was reading a book I just bought, and there were about 3 or 4 teenagers yelling really loud, just talking to each other. They were the type of people I wanted to stay away from, so I purposely got on a different car of the train. When the train stopped at a station, they got off and started yelling and laughing at somebody who was "different" in my car. They were arguing back and forth with this person. It was so frustrating, I just want to be in a normal place where everyone is happy and friendly.

Random flying notes

In the past two days, I've randomly come across some websites that have to do with flying. They're interesting enough that I thought I should share them with you guys. The first one is from the TSA. They have developed a blog that their own employees will use to address concerns by flight passengers. All are welcome to post comments to the blogs and after the first blog entry (yesterday), they received over 700 comments! Today's blog was informing the commenters that they are working on different ways to allow flyers to voice opinions and ask questions. What a great forum! I'm looking forward to checking that out once the blog gets going in full swing. Here's the link: http://www.tsa.gov/blog.

The other webpage I saw was talking about airline rule 240. Apparently this was a rule created back when airlines were regulated. After deregulation, the airlines don't have to follow this, but some still do. So what is it?  It reads that if a flight is canceled or delayed, "caused by anything other than weather, the airline would fly you on the next available flight — not their next available flight, which might not leave for another 24 hours." What? They never do that anymore. But check out this article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22900119/ This guy has tried it several times and it worked. The key? Be nice when you're asking about it, know what you're talking about, and just know that they are doing you a favor if they do this for you because the rule is not so much a rule anymore. I say it's worth a try, at least.

Mac magnets

It's been a while since I posted, but here hasn't been a whole lot going on. The thing that has kept me the most busy is my new computer. I bought a refurbished MacBook and I love it!  I've almost got everything tranferred from one computer to the other, so I'm almost running at full capacity. I'm still learning more and more about the Mac OS, but it's so much better than Windows. It's so intuitive, I'm not sure why anyone would want a Windows machine, who THINKS they know what would be intuitive.  I've loved Macs since since I worked with them in Portland, and I've finally got my own. I couldn't be more excited over it. I feel like such a geek being this excited, but what can I say, I work in the IT field. :) If anyone knows of job openings for Mac lovers, let me know.  Ha ha!

I hope everyone is doing well. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone sometime!

Christmas holiday

I just want everyone to know what a great Christmas holiday I had. I'm blessed with a job that allowed me to take a whole week off to celebrate with family and friends. After the week I felt refreshed and happy and realized how much I love spending time with family and friends and how important that is to me.

Thank you to all the people in my life who help me feel this way. I had a great time with everyone I saw. I never had a dull moment the entire week, from all the little kiddies (and kiddies to be) to parents, siblings, and in-laws we visited. Thanks for making my vacation a great one and for making Christmas meaningful for me being surrounded by so many loved ones. I hope you all have a  great new year and that this year brings lots of joy and great memories!