Arriving:  New York City, November 28, 2006

7:53am

7:54am

I LOVE NYC!  The end of November 2006 Tim and I went to New York to see My Morning Jacket.  For my birthday that year he surprised me with tickets to see them at The Roseland Ballroom.  It was my first time to New York and both the city and the concert were amazing!   We have been talking about getting married in Central Park ever since, so instead of buying Christmas presents this year, we had decided to take a short trip to New York some time in January or February, to see what we could plan.   We had just come to the decision that maybe it was best not to go and to save the money instead. Lucky me, little sister Lauri pointed me in the direction of some super cheap flights and then we found a super cheap hotel room.  Super cheap meaning price, no cheesy weird bedspreads or crunchy carpet for me, I just can't do it.  The fact that we decided to go last minute makes it even more exciting, cause it's more like a surprise!  The four of us will be going at the end of the month, so please pray for some half way decent weather for us!  At least let it be over 30 degrees!  

p.s.  I have read somewhere that it is not a good idea to post that you will be on vacation on your blog, to avoid giving people the heads up that it would be a nice time to break into your house.  Sooo, just incase some crazy people are reading this and think that we are going to be gone so it might be a good time to break into our house, not the best idea.  Both of our large dogs will be here still along with their wonderful doggy-sitter, their Uncle Mike.  And if that doesn't deter you, we have three crazy, luny cats.  (and there's probably not much you'd want anyway, we're famous amongst those who know us for garbage picking)

p.s.s.  If anyone has any great restaurant suggestions or places that we should go while we're there, please send me a comment.  We don't have many definite plans, so we are very open to ideas!

I know, I know, it has been way too long.  I have to say I am flattered and so grateful to everyone who has asked about and even complained that I haven't posted.  You guys are awesome and I love you!  The truth is that I have so much else that I need to be doing on the computer, that I felt guilty spending the time to post. It hasn't been that I haven't had anything to tell you or show you, believe me there's plenty!   After giving it much thought I have decided that it shouldn't matter what else is going on, I need to spend at least a little time posting. I really enjoy posting and getting feedback, and  also having an online record of what is going on in my life and my work.   Today I am going to start by introducing you to the newest member of our zoo of a family, Murphy.  We adopted him from a rescue right before Christmas.  Lucy loves having other dogs around so much that we thought it would be good for her to have a brother and constant canine companion.  They were honestly in love with each other from the very beginning.  I, on the other hand, have not been so selfless.  I love him and he is a good dog, but I have had my moments of missing my time with just me and my "baby".  Thankfully, that is already subsiding, because Tim (and some others) said that I am very mean.  I love Murphy, believe me, I do, he's so sweet.  I'm not playing favorites with my animals, I swear (kinda)!  

From what his foster mom told us, Murphy and his sister spent the first year and a half of their lives in a barn, without much human interaction.  They were fed and given water, but nobody spent much time loving them (pretty much none).  Considering that, it is amazing how gentle and loving with people Murphy is, he loves everyone.  He is half black lab and half golden retriever, with the gentleness and smarts of a golden and the spunk and happy-go-lucky of a lab.  Don't get me wrong, both Lucy and Murphy still need some work, but we're on it, Cesar would be proud!  We definitely lucked out with both our dogs.  Okay enough rambling, here's some random pics I have taken of Murphy since we brought him home.  

This is a true sign that Lucy loves Murphy.  She will hold sticks and bones for him and let him chew on them, as long as he remembers that she's in charge and that she will remain holding them, he can chew as long as he wants.

**************WARNING:  IF FOR SOME REASON YOU CAN'T STAND PICTURES OF RODENTS, YOU MIGHT WANNA SKIP THE REST OF THIS POST****************

:) we will now continue with our regularly scheduled program :)

Okay, now for the squeamish part.  Not long after Murphy made himself comfortable living in his new home, he decided he needed to go exploring behind our garage.  Much to my dismay, here's what he found.

    yeah, that's a rat, and yeah, I screamed my head off to get him to put it down

Just in case you were wondering what a rat's fingernails looked like, the answer is creepy old lady fingernails...who knew?!

Here's our friend on the shovel, in case you wanted some perspective on his size.

Be back soon!  Promise!

If you're interested in the answer to the question below just click on it... :) Why do wedding photo's take so long?

Post Ceremony Glee. I love so many from this wedding.  I really love this one.

Heather is the most patient and kind friend ever!  Thank you!  I love you!  I promise I am working!  

Dave is always great at calling me out in his comments!  (I'm just glad he's commenting!)  He pointing out that it has been 26 days since my last post.  26 days!  That's horrible!  Life has been crazy busy lately, but that is still unacceptable!  So this is a quick post, some pics that I didn't edit much just some exposure correction and noise reduction, but they are still fun! :)  At the beginning of this winter we went to the cider mill with my sister and her husband and our dogs. Sanjay, my brother-in-law, was kind enough to take some "family" portraits for us (they're not complete family portrait because the kitties were missing). Sanjay's never used my camera before so when I didn't change the setting to program he didn't know it and the pics were all underexposed, but luckily, I was able to lighten some of them up enough, cause I think they're really fun.  

So here we are, goofy and proud...

uh, yeah, not really sure what I was doing here...

What are we looking at?

This one would make a great Christmas card if only Lucy hadn't fallen asleep with waiting for this all to be over!

I don't remember what was going on here, but I'm gonna guess it was hard for me to get up from squatting.  Yeah, I am getting that old!

Thanks Sanjay for taking these, too fun!  I will be posting more pics from our cider mill trip eventually, I promise!  

 

As you can see, my internet/computer programs are fixed!  Yip-ee!!!!  All this time, it was just my wireless router gone bad.  Now I have a pretty new Apple router...I love Apple, I really do.  I'm a late convert, but love it is!  I'm in the process of editing Heather and Chris's wedding photo's and every time I came across this photo I would chuckle to myself.  I felt this picture deserved it's own non-wedding related post.  So here is Elwood, wondering why someone is pulling on his mama!