Day 181

Developing a Perpetually Positive Attitude. Doesn't that sound like something I need? It was 'suggested' that I take this online class by National Seminars, and I have to admit, it was a pretty good little class...well worth the one hour I spent listening to it today!

Day 180

Mmmm...lasagna roll ups! I saw the Pioneer Woman a couple weeks back, and it looked really good, and pretty easy...you can find her recipe here.  I decided to follow her concept, only using Mom's tried and true manicotti recipe.  These were delicious, but really, it probably would have been just as easy, or easier to just make lasagna and layer the noodles, instead of rolling each one up.

Day 179

We've been trying to get Lucy to warm up to her food, sprinkled with the new DinoVite, and she could just kind of give or take it. She's not much of an eater anyway. But we found the secret...wet the food and stir in the DinoVite, and tonight she's going to town like a little piggy!! I'm not sure how, since the smell and look of it is pretty nasty...but then again, I'm not a pooch.

Day 178

It's Fish Fry Friday...this time at Mom's house. She made fish, french fries and homemade Red Lobster Cheddar Bay Biscuits...yum! Thanks Mom!

Day 177

Just a couple of cutie patooties, begging for their new treats that came with their DinoVite! They love those beefy nuggets!

Day 176

We're home from McMenamin's and we brought home some loot. We had two different packages added to our room, the Romance Package, which gave us a bottle of champagne (along with two flutes, some chocolate truffles and some massage oil), and the Brewmaster's Package which gave us a growler full of beer.  We also brought home 4 more bottles of beer and a few bottles of wine for us and our nearest and dearest :).

Day 175

The McMenamin's Sampler...all gone! We each got one with our room package, along with a growler filled with whichever brew we decide is our favorite.

Day 174

Stopped to see the girls after work, but left them to spend the night with Mom while we head to McMenamin's in the morning. Lucy looked so sad as I went out the door...it's like she couldn't believe she didn't get to go home with me!

Day 173

A little retail therapy at Kohl's today...getting ready for the 4th of July with placemats and dish towels.  How cute are these?

Day 172

52 Pick Up has nothing on this! I dropped my entire box of Project Life cards. I'm not sure how many that is, but trust me, it's a lot. And it's two different kits, plus some seasonal and occasion mini packs I had all color coded and arranged just so. Blah! Putting this back together was not much fun.

Day 171

A couple of my favorite cars from Cool Desert Nights. Watched at the fire station again this year, with Mom, Uncle Larry, Aunt Sue and Caitlyn.

Day 170

Caityln finally got some pool time over at Mel's this afternoon. She had the whole pool to herself, to swim, float, dive and...well...whatever this maneuver was?!?

Day 169

Been hearing the commercial for this stuff for some time now. Rob convinced me to order some, and it finally arrived today. We'll see if it helps itchy Lucy and chubby Baylee!

Day 168

Well look who stopped by the office again today for a visit. It's Baby Dean! He's grown so much since the last time I saw him, getting to be such a big boy. He's pulling himself up on things, scooting all over the place. I'm sure he will be walking in no time! And he's still just the happiest boy...flirting with the ladies.  You don't realize just how much he's changing until you look at other pictures - like when he visited the office back in February. Hope his mom brings him in a little more often...every four months is just too long to go between visits!

Day 167

Rob bought the most beautiful bouquet of flowers for me, for our 2nd anniversary. With everything else that has been going on the last couple days, I am just now snapping a picture of them - but they are truly the prettiest flowers he has given me yet.

And to his credit, he remembered that my bouquet from our wedding had peonies in it, so he made sure the one he brought me this weekend had some too...and roses, and carnations, and beautiful big spider mums...all in varying hues of pink. Thanks Bean...and Happy Anniversary!

Day 166

Rob and I with Father Champoux for our Convalidation Ceremony - or our Marriage Blessing. It was a beautiful way to celebrate our second wedding anniversary...with family and friends this time!

Day 165

Here's the finished product. A dozen little glass jars wrapped with a navy blue bow for our BBQ after our Marriage Blessing.

It's going to be a really informal affair, but I thought about what I could do to add just a small touch of color and decor to the tables. I came up with the idea to do these short, squatty 1/2 pint canning jars. They are the perfect size to hold a tea light - which in this case happens to be citronella to ward off bees and bugs and such - it's a twofer! Mom, Billie and I were out shopping yesterday and I picked them up, and then today I added a sheer ribbon bow for a decorative touch...voila party decorations!

Day 164

Happy Birthday to our Sweet Lucy! She is seven years old today. And again this year, she got a bone cookie from Blylee's to celebrate her special day.

Unfortunately, she looks a little more scared than happy, but maybe that's just because, like the rest of us, we don't like having birthdays as much as we did when we were kids?!? Even this old girl has been touched by grey hair!  Or maybe it's because she thought she was in trouble, having to just sit still so I could snap her picture, when all she really wanted to do was tear into her birthday cookie!

Happy Birthday sweet girl. I hope we get to celebrate many, many more with you.

Day 163

Poor Rob. This is pretty much what dinner looks like for him most nights of the week. With him working swing shift, he doesn't get home until around 11:00 p.m. So most of the time he comes home to find whatever was for dinner, waiting for him in the microwave.

If I'm home and cook dinner, then he will usually find a plate made up for him. But if I happen to spend the evening with Mom, like tonight, he will find some containers filled with leftovers she has sent home for him. Tonight's menu? Pork loin, macaroni and cheese and green beans.

Day 162

This is Baylee the lurker.

As I've said before, Lucy likes to eat at bed time, after all of her 'pack' is in one place, and settled. Well, Baylee has a tendency to bully her way in, and take over Lucy's bowl. Sometimes she just won't take no for an answer and even gets sent to time-out while Lucy finishes eating.

Lately though, while Lucy eats Baylee refuses to get in her bed, but lies just outside of it instead. That way she has a bird's eye view that allows her to see when Lucy is finished, and then she can come sniffing around for crumbs.  So this seems to be the compromise we have worked out...her lurking at the end of the bed...all innocent like, when we all know she is anything but!

Day 161

Oh Baylee Girl. You are so silly. I wanted to take a picture of her before bed, but she was being camera shy! Hard as I tried, it was like she just knew I wanted to take her picture and she insisted on looking away.  Well, her head was turned away, but she was giving a bit of a beady eye in my general direction - as if to say...I see you over there Mom, and I want no part of it.

Looks like she was photo bombed my Lucy's two front paws!

Day 160

The Brady's are home...the Brady's are home! The thing is, they are all here, but Pat was the only one who would let me take his picture.

They flew in pretty late last night, and swung by Mom's just to pick up a couple essentials...like fans. And now tonight, they are back over to Mom's to pick up another essential item for their stay here in town...a coffee pot! A must have for sure...fans for sleeping, coffee for rising!

Tonight was just a quick hello, hopefully we'll be seeing them more while they are here.

Day 159

It's a slow Sunday. Not much going on. For lack of anything better or more interesting, I thought I would share one more Fourth of July decoration.

This sweet little bunny was another of my full time decorations back when my house was done in the Americana motif. She's one of things that survived the transition, and I'm thankful, because I like to bring her back out year after year.

Day 158

And on to more fun Anniversary / Vows Renewal / Convalidation Ceremony details.  Today I went to Desserts by Kelly and ordered the cake. I soooo wanted a really nice cake. Let's just be honest, it's the wedding cake I never had.

I found a cake I really liked on Kelly's webpage and so I went in to order one just like it. The one pictured was a three-layer cake, so I cut it back to just one (rather large 12"!), but kept the look basically the same. I chose a lemon cake, with lemon filling, and a white chocolate buttercream frosting. I also ordered a dozen of her petit fours - which are almondy and delicious! I'm so excited - I think it's going to be my favorite part of the gathering afterwards.

And just to get a little preview, and because I was there amongst all of her delightful goodies, I brought home a couple petit fours and this little lemon bundt for Rob and I to share. If this little bundt is any indication how our cake is going to taste - it's going to be one tasty cake!

Day 157

It's all about the bride, right? Since I found my dress yesterday, I decided to use it as inspiration for our theme for the day...I'm going with navy and white. Today after work I stopped at the Hobby Lobby and picked up all the paper products we will need...dinner plates, cake plates, napkins, cups and table covers.

There is only a hand full of people coming to our blessing and our gathering after, so there is far too much stuff here, I know that - more than we will ever need. But my idea is to to be able to stack everything in a blue-white-blue-white pattern, so I needed a package of each thing, in each color.

Finding something to wear was the tough part...putting all of these other details together is the fun part...I'm getting excited and my wheels are turning now!!

Day 156

So here it is. I found a dress for our Marriage Blessing. It's been the thing I've been most nervous about since Rob and I actually decided we were going to do it. Anyone who knows anything about me knows I'm not a dress kind of girl...I can stretch out of my comfort zone to a skirt and top, but dresses are usually out of the questions.

I wanted to try though...I wanted to find a nice, but yet kind of summery dress - not a wedding dress, obviously, but just a nice dress. I was just about to resort to slacks and a blouse - much to Rob's dissatisfaction, when I found this today at Macy's on my lunch hour. Score!  It's just a simple, sleek tank dress with a very wide lace accent down the front, paired with an angled, open sweater. It's probably a little shorter than I would have liked, but those maxi skirts just don't work on me. So, voila...just like that I'm ready...as soon as I find shoes!!

Day 155

A couple months back I was having a casual conversation with Tom. I was telling him how Rob and I have been wanting to have our marriage blessed in the church, but I that didn't want two different 'wedding dates'. And, unfortunately, this year our anniversary is going to fall on a Sunday. And Tom, ever the positive and optimist, said - that's NO PROBLEM.

Rob called the church and inquired, and found out that it really was no problem. So on May 1st, we met with Father Champoux to get all of our paperwork in order, and to put ourselves down for a Convalidation Ceremony at church on our second anniversary, June 15th! We both are very excited, and we want to keep it relatively small, but we want to make a bit of a to do of it at the same time. We have been tossing around ideas, and I think we've narrowed it down to the ceremony at the church, followed by a BBQ gathering over at Mom's in her backyard with a few friends and family.

Rob is a pretty easy going guy when it comes to things like this...he just rolls with the punches, just like he did with our actual wedding. But there was one thing he took a stand on. For the ceremony, he wanted me to have the anniversary band that I had wanted on our 1st anniversary, but unfortunately, we were too broke at the time to buy. He said he wanted to be able to slip something new on my finger, in commemoration of our renewed commitment to each other. I argued with him a little, said I didn't need it, etc., but he was pretty stubborn on this point.

So yesterday, I went out and got a match to my wedding band. Would you believe they had one...two years later...in stock??  And would you believe it had almost doubled in price from three years ago, when we picked them out...BUT, it was going on sale today?? What are the odds? So I made the purchase last night, and then was able to pick it up tonight after work. It will just create a sandwich of my engagement ring - wedding band on the bottom, anniversary band on the top. The only problem is that the ring is not in my size, and sending it off for sizing would take three weeks! And we don't have three weeks to wait, so Rob will be putting the ring on as best as he can, in a ceremonious way, rather than actually getting it onto my chubby little finger!

Day 154

Okay, so I realize the picture is a little odd looking. I was trying to show my latest dessert or snack of choice. This is a Weight Watchers Peanut Butter and Caramel Ice Cream Candy Bar.

What all those words really mean...a frozen Snickers! I swear these taste just like them, but only not so bad for you. In the world of WW, only 4 points...that's pretty darn good for a dessert treat. Tonight, I climbed onto my bed, unwrapped one, and enjoyed!

Day 153

It was 9:30 tonight, the pups and I were on our way home from Mom's house...and it felt warm! Chelsea the Charger said it was still 82° in fact. Summer is surely just around the corner. Can't wait for those hot days, and warm nights...all the time!

Day 152

Check this out! Another plate of fun pre-summer grilling...this time at over at Mom's.

I had taken out some chicken thighs for dinner tonight, and was going to grill them, along with some corn on the cob and baby red potatoes. I ended up packing up all of my dinner fixin's, and heading over to Mom's. I grilled everything up at her place, baked some cornbread muffins, and she supplied the freshly made, delicious green salad.  We even ate outside on the patio.  Wow, did it turn out to be an incredible Sunday dinner!