I went and spent my Christmas and birthday money. I got a pair of pants, a tshirt, a new purse (very cute!) and a new winter parka. I have been wearing the same Board Doctor jacket for at least ten years now. It was a great jacket in it's day, but since I have lost weight and time has taken a bit of a toll on it, it feels good to have a new one. It feels strange to wear a parka that actually fits....I look forward to many happy years with this coat. I will post a picture of it when I get one. It is a 3 in 1, mostly black with some gray on it. That way it will match the collection of scarves I have gathered in the last few years as well as my blue and gray mittens and my new red toque.

While I'm being nostalgic....

Gotta love those tight red pants, haha, and the dancing. So hilarious!

A little nostalgia (mostly for Karen and I)......

Christmas survey!

I don't know if anyone will be around to answer this survey and we may need to decide before I can take your opinions into account....

But we found out today that we are next to pick our puppy from the litter that was born December 7th that we were fourth on the waiting list for. The first person on the list backed out, the second chose the male (we want a female) the third chose one that we weren't interested in and well now it is our turn to pick. All three that we were interested in are left. We have it narrowed down to two possibilities and I was going to post pictures of the two potential "Kiwi"s and see which one you thought we should choose.




The puppies are schnoodles. It is a cross between a schnauzer and a poodle. In looking at hundreds (if not thousands) of pictures of schnoodles we decided that we like the ones that take more after the schnauzer. I think that the pure black puppy looks more like the schnauzer, however we like the black and white markings of the second puppy. We are feeling a little torn about this, but thought we would ask the breeder her thoughts and sleep on it. See what we think in the morning. I am getting very excited to bring this little sweetheart into our home :)

I must be my father's daughter....

For those of you who don't know my parents.....my dad is the emotional one. I think I take after him in that aspect. Pastor Mike just dropped off a lovely basket of goodies for us from the church family. He said that they have been praying for us since Jay got sick. I feel a little emotional right now. It is so nice to know that we are being prayed for and that people are thinking about us and want to give us such nice things. This is the third act of kindness that we have received from the church...(well food related act of kindness anyway) since Jay got out of the hospital. It is so appreciated and has me sitting here blubbering a little.

This morning I put on a sweater with a pocket in it. It felt like there was something in it. So I put my hand in and pulled out two packets of plum sauce (the kind you get a Chinese food restaurants). For the life of me I can't remember how it got there. Glad this sweater hadn't been through the wash with those in there, could have made for a big mess!

Know how you get a sticky floor??

Get your husband to crush up candy canes (for Christmas baking) with a hammer.

My Christmas present

I am finally feeling fairly excited about Christmas. This year it has been tough finding the Christmas spirit, but I think I have finally found it. I am looking forward to having company in our house for Christmas and looking forward to having supper with my parents and my in-laws on Christmas eve then going to church. This year the excitement does not stem from getting gifts. I already got my big Christmas present in October (laptop). Other than that, I have a healthy husband at home to spend Christmas with. What more could I ask for??

I've been meaning to mention this since Monday...

When we took Jay in to the ER on Monday to get stitched back up (after he got his stitches out and he wound opened back up), they had some pretty loud country music radio playing. I was surprised just how loud they had it playing at the nurses station. The thing that I found pretty ironic was that they were playing the song Live Until I Die by Clay Walker. I thought it was an interesting song to be playing in an ER.

If any of you ladies out there are looking for a great romantic comedy this Christmas, I would recommend The Holiday. It came out last year, but I just watched it for the first time and I really enjoyed it. Probably wouldn't recommend it for the guys....but a great girl movie. It made me cry and everything :)

Ta Da!

I am so impressed with this tree. As a kid, all the real trees we had were sort of Charlie Brown-ish and this is anything but. It is incredibly full and smells just awesome! I have only swept up about ten needles since yesterday (a lot more fell off as it was thawing), so I am convinced that it will probably survive until at least January 1st. Yesterday when dad and I were setting it up we had to saw about 6 branches off at the bottom because the trunk wasn't long enough that it would sit at the bottom of the tree stand. We were concerned that it wouldn't be full enough...I guess we were wrong.

Getting There

I am finally starting to feel a little Christmas-y. After the tree fiasco of earlier this week, we came home tonight with a tree stand and a real tree. We need to wait until tomorrow afternoon to set it up with the help of my parents but the smell of real tree is all over my mittens already, and I love it! I think this tree is much fuller than most trees we got when I was growing up. Hopefully it will survive until at least Boxing Day.

I found out this evening that our puppy was born. We are fourth on the waiting list for the litter of puppies that was born tonight. We want a female pup and four of the five pups are female so we should be getting a puppy in February next year. The pup that we are both drawn to is black and white, but because it is the only black and white female I imagine it will get snapped up quickly. The other females are mainly black with a little white on them. Our favorite choice would be silver, but it's an unpredictable colour because usually the pups are black when they are born then turn silver by about age two.

Bah Humbug

I have been looking for a Christmas tree for quite some time. I was unable to find one that I was pleased with, until Monday night. I went to Extra Foods to pick up a few groceries and saw a tree there that I thought was perfect. It is a 7.5 foot, prelit tree. The thing that really impressed me was that it had 1000 lights, 500 clear and 500 coloured. You could use a remote control to either turn them from coloured to white or have both on at the same time. Jay and I had the chance to go buy this tree this afternoon. I would have got it Monday night, but the box was REALLY heavy and I was certain that it wouldn't fit in my car.

We brought it home and I opened it up this evening. I put it together and we plugged it in and all looked good. It needed a lot of 'fluffing' because the branches were really squished together. When we took a closer look we realized that one section of the coloured lights wasn't on. Shoot! I checked all the plug ins and we got all of them. Dang! So I went through methodically and checked each bulb to make sure none were loose or missing in the section that wasn't on. I found nothing. I was really frustrated by this point with small scrapes and cuts all over my hands and forearms from man-handling this beast of a tree. I made an executive decision that we would keep the tree after putting this much work into it already. We would just turn the burned out section towards the window where no one would see it. So I did that and set to work 'fluffing' up the branches. After spending at least twenty or so minutes doing that I realized that another section of coloured lights had gone out. $%#@&! I was so frustrated by this point that I pulled that tree apart in record speed, jammed it back in the box (I can't believe it fit!) and we took it back. Unfortunately when Jay grabbed the receipt off of the desk, he grabbed the wrong one from Extra Foods. So we got the tree brought into the store and he quickly ran home to get the right receipt. After he came back I bought us some donuts to medicate our frustrations....mmm donuts.

I am getting to the point where I don't even know if I want a tree at all :P Yesterday my Christmas spirit was bumped up by decorating at work then going out for supper for Christmas with my coworkers, and of course Jay coming home from the hospital. Today I feel like my tank is empty again. I may get a real tree...or maybe we will decorate our banister like Jay has wanted to since he saw them and put our gifts under our banister!

Update

Jay is doing really well. He is still in the hospital but is definitely on the mend. They moved him out of ICU on Thursday afternoon. There hasn't been any sort of word on how long he might be in for....but yesterday his surgeon stopped by and said he would be able to sew up the gaping hole in his back either today or tomorrow. I hope that goes well and that he is able to get up into his chair sometime soon.

Yesterday I was talking with Karen about Jay. I mentioned that they hadn't sewn up his back yet and she said she wouldn't want to see his wound. I am the type that likes to watch medical shows, surgeries and things of that nature. I do realize that it's different when you see these things on a loved one, but I said to her that I thought I wouldn't mind seeing it, just because I was curious what it looked like. Well yesterday, after trying to sit up in bed Jay's dressing started to fall off, and I did see it...and well....I am kind of wishing I hadn't. Honestly though, after the initial shock and being grossed out by it passed, I went in for another look before the nurse came to tape it back on. Still pretty gross looking, but intriguing to me nonetheless.

Since he is in a room now, he can have some visitors. I believe visiting hours are 12-8pm. He said he doesn't want to have to tell the story of what happened to him over and over again. I think he would be okay with some visitors, as long as they do not overstay their welcome. And please knock and wait for a response before heading into his room. I think over the years with all his hospital stays Jay doesn't have much modesty left, but you might just embarrass yourself if he is sitting up to pee and you see more of him than you might like to.