Christmas!

So this post is a few days late, but I've been busy playing with some new games I got for Christmas! My Christmas was great! It sure snuck up quickly though. I doesn't seem like it should almost be 2012!
Anyway, Christmas Eve we had my mom's sister and her family over. This included three of my cousins and uncle as well. We normally would have my mom's other sister over as well, but she decided to go to Spokane with her husband to spend Christmas with my grandparents. We had our traditional chicken noodle soup for dinner, all homemade (except the chicken which was bought from costco). The noodles are even homemade! In years past it was my Grandma that made the noodles, but for the past few years my grandparents haven't made it over for Christmas so the job fell to my uncle.
After everyone left we opened presents. We always open presents Christmas Eve. It has been this way for as long as I can remember! I got most everything I asked for! The games I mentioned early are the Sims 3 pets and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 1 for xbox. I also got part 2, but want to play in order. The next morning, Christmas, we opened our Santa Stockings. These are just small little gifts and candy. Later that day, my dad's side of the family came over. Again it was a small gathering. Normally we have his brother and wife, his sister and husband, his nephew and his wife and two children, and my nana, his mom. This year we only had the latter two. My uncle and his wife went to Arizona to have Christmas with his daughter and her family and my Aunt and her husband stayed home because they had to take my cousin and her family to the airport at the same time as dinner. For dinner we had some beef thing with gravy and potatoes. We always have that for Christmas dinner. I don't really like it to be honest...i'm not really a meat and potatoes kind of person, although I do enjoy a good steak every now and then (as long as it has no fat...because that grosses me out.) Unfortunately, I have no pictures from Christmas. I meant to look for my camera charger, but forgot and didn't really want to have to email photos from my phone to my computer, to much effort. :P I am already looking forward to next Christmas! I really hope that it snows next year though, I missed that these past few years, it just hasn't been cold enough (I like to say I am going to buy a winter home in Alaska instead of the typical Florida or Arizona because I like the cold that much!)

Well, I hope that everyone has a really happy New Year!!! Stay safe and don't drink too much!

Busy!!

It's been such a busy two days!!! Yesterday, Sunday, I spent 5 hours making and frosting cookies!!! For some really smart reason I decided to double the cookie recipe. Let me tell you, having to roll out dough, cut out shapes, and then later frost them! Hard work!!! I took a break right after the cookies all came out of the oven, about ten minutes probably, and then started on the frosting. I started the frosting at 3:30-3:35. My mom helped some, but not much. :P After 2 1/2 hours of frosting I took about a 15 minute break to eat dinner. After dinner it was right back to frosting where I eventually finished at 7:11!!! (that was the actual time I finished, I remember!)
At one point, between the after dinner frosting and finishing the Santa Fire Truck came through the neighborhood!! For those who are not familiar with the Santa Fire Truck, it is an old fire truck that goes around the neighborhoods of Redmond with Santa on the back. When they see you, Santa gets off the truck and gives you a candy cane!!! You can also donate to Hopelink, but as we already did shortly after Thanksgiving, we didn't again. One year, when the Santa Fire Truck came by I even got a stuffed animal!! It was a bear in purple pajamas with stars and moons on it that glowed in the dark!
I was glad when I finally finished the cookies! I already made a batch of Sugar cookies last week!

Today, I made some more cookies. I think I must be crazy because this isn't the end of the baking! Still going to make Spritz cookies, oreo balls, and fudge!! I made shortbread with Chocolate chips in the middle, as well as some popsika (a polish cinnamon sugar type mixture that goes in Kolaches, which are polish pastries!). These cookies only took about an 45 minutes (25 of which was the baking part!).

After completing the cookies I wrapped presents!!! I wrapped my presents to my brother and dad and then wrapped the presents to my dad that my mom got him. She doesn't have the time to wrap the presents because of work, so I wrap them for her every year.

What would a post be without any mention of dogs!!! Right now we have Bolt, Harry, and Teddy, in addition to Charlie! We have had all these dogs before and we like them all. Harry is a bit of a grump, I think he is actually bipolar because he is happy and wanting pets one minute and literally a second later will snap at you! Teddy is a terror! All he wants to do is play with the other dogs, but the other dogs won't play with him. He also has to wear a diaper because he can't resist lifting his leg. Bolt is a cutie. He is small and has an underbite. He loves to sit with me and be anywhere I might be. Charlie had been really good lately though is getting a bit tired of the other dogs.

I hope to have some more to blog about after Christmas!!! I just need to find my camera charger so that I can actually take pictures at Christmas time and not with my iPhone.

Santa Squirrel! 

I attempted to make a nativity scene, but it is hard to make wise men!

My attempt at Jesus in cookie form. :) (baby Jesus that is)

I had to cut out wings with the dough, they are a bit big. 

This is a Camel Ho. I made it, and another, to go along with the Penguin Pimps I made my brother and his friend. I don't have a picture of the Penguin pimps though! 

Squirrels!! I was low on the brown frosting to had to improvise for the one in the yellow and green. 

Santa Penguin!

Santa Camel!!

Joseph and Mary!

Penguin! I don't know quite how I got the black frosting....

Bolt!

Charlie attempting to be a Hipster. 

Harry, though he is hairier now!

I don't have a picture of Teddy, but will get one soon!

That Time of Year

Well, it's that time of year again! I'm not talking about the busy shopping time, or the time coming to spend with family, no I am talking about that time of year when we have dogs coming out of our ears! We have had a dog at our house since the 9th of November and we won't get a break from dogs until the 28th of November. After that we get until the 9th of December before another dog comes and then it isn't until next year that we get another break! Wow!

At this moment we have four dogs besides Charlie at our house. We have Bolt, Lucy, Lucy, and Georgie. Tomorrow we get Zenith the Schnauzer. It isn't really that bad having all these dogs though. This group is pretty mellow, which is really nice. One of the Lucy's is a 13 year old Miniature Poodle (black). She can't see well or hear well, so she basically ignores everything, but of course not by choice!! We do, however, have the barkers. Georgie the....I don't know what kind of dog she is, but she is fat, is the instegater. Once she starts to bark, the other Lucy, a Toy poodle...also black! and Bolt, a little white Maltese join in, along with Charlie of course!

Speaking of Charlie, he is handeling all these doggies really well. You can usually tell when he is ready for a break, but because these dogs just keep to themselves for the most part and don't bother him, he is ok. The other day, Saturday, Charlie went to Molbaks with us. They were having a take your picture with "Santa Paws" thing and I wanted to get one with Santa, Charlie, and I. It was hosted by the Humane Society or something, and with a small donation you got your picture taken. My gosh! There were a lot of people with their dogs there!!! The line to get your picture taken was a little bit too long and my family didn't really want to wait, so I decided that I would skip it. Besides, I have a picture with Charlie and Santa from a couple years ago.

I don't know about you, but I am sure looking forward to Thanksgiving! I love the holidays, especially at this time of year because of the colors, the weather, and the type of food that is served. I don't however, like Turkey....I can't wait to see my family and have jello, mashed potatoes, rolls, pie, etc! My family has three Thanksgiving dinners! We have the typical Turkey dinner on Thursday, then we have a ham dinner on Friday, which I LOVE because I LOVE ham! and then Saturday we have another dinner, which is usually chicken or something. It is really fun, but boy are you stuffed and fat afterwards! This coming Sunday is also my mom's birthday, so we will be doing something fun that day as well!

I hope that you all have a great Thanksgiving (If you celebrate it)!

This is big Lucy

Bolt. Don't you just love his teeth!

Charlie wearing my hat!

Georgie

Little Lucy

Whoops

I have been horrible about posting!! I just don't have a very interesting life. Charlie has been really well. Nothing has happened to him lately. :) me, on the other hand, have been crazy busy with school and work. I might have quit my job at the bakery, but my nanny/babysitting job that I have been doing has really taken off. I am regularly taking two girls to school and regularly picking up too different girls from school! I have also. Babysat every Saturday night since the 22 of October!!! I babysat last night and am actually babysitting right now! Crazy I know! I have tomorrow free from school and work so I am spending it...working on school. Lol

I just downloaded the blogger app for my phone, so maybe I will be posting more. I say that like every time I post too!!! Oh well. Also, just to get a sense of who is reading this, please leave a comment. If not a lot are reading it, I really don't know if it is worthwhile keeping!! Please, please let me know! Thank you. :) We will see what happens.

Busy!

Wow...I can't believe that it is already October 19th! I have been in school for a month and it is almost mid term time! Things have been super crazy lately. It seems like once school starts there aren't enough hours in the day. Many of you might know that I quit my job at Great Harvest Bread to concentrate better on my school work. Since last October I have been watching two girl's after school while their parents work. I pick the elementary school child up and then take her home. I decided to keep that job after quitting Great Harvest, but little did I know what that would bring! Every M, W, and F I walk two different girls to school in the morning and then on M, I watch an 18 month old! It is crazy! On top of this I am still getting the odd weekend babysitting job. It isn't as hard to do this and stay on top of my school work as the hours are a lot easier to manage.
School is going really well. As I mentioned, Mid terms are close, next week. It always seems like I never learned the stuff when the review guides come out, but I know I have! It is hard to keep on top of everything that I have learned in a few short weeks!
Now enough about me and on to Charlie! Charlie has been doing very well. We haven't had too many visiting dogs over the past few weeks, but this past weekend we did have Jack and Spike over and Charlie was so happy! He had been getting bored from not having doggies to play with and humans just aren't as fun! We don't bite and wrestle like other dogs! The minute Spike got here Charlie was all over him wanting to play. It was fun listening to their play.
He hasn't been to Joseph's in awhile. This past Tuesday my mom and I had to go into Bellevue together, her to Joseph's and me to school. Since we were going out to lunch after school and work we didn't want to bring him. My mom and I went to Paddy Coyne's Irish Pub and then the Bliss Berri afterward! It was fun!
Right now Charlie is sleeping away...of course! He hasn't done much else today, having spent most of his time upstairs on his bed in the media room with me. I hope that something exciting happens so I have more to blog about!!!

Charlie after licking John's plate! He wouldn't stop licking his chops!

Jack is the one on the bench and Spike is on the floor. 

The Vet, and the Groomers!

This has been a terribly busy week for Charlie! The poor dog was traumatized two days in a row because he had to go to the vet and he had to get a haircut! Now Charlie really does not like the vet or the groomers, but he makes it much worse then it actually is by worrying himself so much! A few weeks ago Charlie got a reminder card in the mail that he needed to go to the vet for his check up and bordartella shot. I finally got around to making the appointment Monday and he went on Tuesday. He was fine in the car on the way down, just enjoying his car ride and when we got the vet he wanted to get out and he was excited!! That quickly changed! As soon as he was out of the car it hit him! He realized we were at the horrifying vets!!!! He did an about turn and went the other way. I let him walk away (he was leashed) but he did have to go in so I had to pick him up and take him in. He shock so much!!! He got is check up and his shots and we left, it really wasn't that bad!

Wednesday Charlie had his hair cut. Again he makes it worse then it is and I don't see why he doesn't enjoy it!!! He was getting hairy so he did need one! He looks soooooo cute now!!!!! He has been catching up on much needed sleep today. He can rest well knowing he won't have to go back to the vet for another year, hopefully, and the groomers for at least 3 months!

See how hairy he was!!! I don't have an after picture this time!

Ok so this isn't Charlie, but I had to put it up...my lovely mother! Goofing off of course!

And my mom again!

Slacking

I admit that I have been very bad about posting regularly, but whenever I have something to post I am never near my computer and then by the time I am, I forget! Anyway, Charlie has been very good this past month. :) He has been sleeping, playing with the doggy guests, having a vacation from the family, and of course being his cute self.

Last week my family, minus Charlie went to Las Vegas. Charlie stayed home with a neighbor and I am sure he enjoyed having a break from the family! :) Las Vegas was really fun. We left Friday the 9th and came back a week later on the 16th. We went to the strip and visited many casinos, we went to the Red Rock Canyon and also the Hoover Dam. It was a very fun vacation. It was nice to have sun for once! We didn't get much of that this summer in Seattle!

We have only been home for a couple days, but it already feels like we have been home forever! It is weird how that works. Today my mom and I went to Bellevue Square because I needed some new clothes for the fall/winter and JcPenneys always has great deals! I also got some legos! I have been wanting them for awhile now as it has been awhile since I last bought some! I bought Diagon Alley and The Knight Bus from the Harry Potter set! I don't know where I will be able to put these legos! I never have enough room for them, but I keep buying them anyway!

Charlie slept while we were gone or so I assume! He has been sleeping pretty much all the time since Friday....Apparently he didn't get a good enough rest while we were gone on vacation. Probably was too worried about where we were to really sleep deeply!

There is not much else to mention. I start school here tomorrow, though I don't have to go to campus until Tuesday. I also might as well make an "official" announcement that I will be leaving my job at Great Harvest Bread. I thought after three years I should try my hand at something else while I have the chance to easily switch jobs. I also needed some more time to be able to volunteer for school. It isn't a requirement, but I thought it would look good for when I put in my transfer applications to the various colleges I would like to go to!

I have said this in the past, but I will try to be more diligent about blogging! It's just hard to think of things to say!! Charlie will still be included in the posts, but I think I need to start blogging about myself and other things as well! I do hope people enjoy reading this though!