Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mothers Day to all the mom's and grandmom's out there!

Today's actually the day my little one was due if she hadn't decided to pop out six weeks earlier. I'm glad she's already here so I can officially celebrate my first mother's day.

I was already treated to flowers, cards and my favorite donuts this morning. I also got a nice gift card for a spa day. I'm really looking forward to that! I could get used to getting spoiled on mother's day!

Later we are off to Oma's house for a BBQ and to celebrate mama's day with my mama!

My Valentine

Dodge completely surprised me by having my valentines gift delivered to me today while at work. Even though we both agreed Valentine's day could easily be skipped. We'd rather celebrate my Mom's birthday (it's tomorrow)!

I got a call from the building's back dock telling me I needed to sign something and I asked twice, "You sure it's for me?" I honestly couldn't figure what would have been delivered in my name. I also had no idea where the back dock was but it was clearly labeled so I had no problems.

It's a plant instead of just some roses so here's hoping I can keep it alive! I'm definitely taking it home. There's no light here in my dungeon of an office. The toy is very cute, too. I love puppies!

It was very sweet of him and I appreciate it very much. Thank you sweetheart! I love you.

Christmas 2008

Dodge Handing Me a Gift
Originally uploaded by Jamie Howell

We had a very nice Christmas this year with my family at Mom's house. Mom made a delicious turkey dinner and after opening gifts we watched a couple movies while Mom made empanadas for a snack.

Dodge's parents sent us some very nice gifts. The cookie racks were very much needed and I have a new recipe I want to try in the dutch oven.

Photos from Christmas have been posted to my Flickr account! Take a look!

Fun Gift!

We went to Ed and Misty's on Saturday and we had a little gift exchange. I got an origami calendar! Pretty neat, huh! Pictures of some of the folks (mostly people's adorable kids) can be found in my Flickr. It was nice to see Nathan and Kim all the way from Poland! Before he complains; yes I was happy to see you too, Alan.

I brought my new calendar to work because I thought Matt might enjoy doing the origami, too. He's out sick today but it starts in January anyway so it's no rush.

Since I did bring it to work and we're not here January 1st, I did the first origami to try it out. Check out my sweet dove! Yeah, I'm pretty much an origami master now.

My Kindle's Broked!

Dodge got me a Kindle for Christmas this year and yes I've already opened it. To be fair, he opened his first (I had bought him one, too). I only wanted mine after seeing him use his for a few days. I was trying to hold out for Christmas!

It's a really neat book reader. I purchased some books and can read any of them on the go without having to haul novels around with me. It's pretty spiffy!

The problem is that ever since registering it on Amazon, it has not connected back to Whispernet, the wireless connection through Sprint the device has. That means I can't browse the Amazon store or wirelessly purchase any other books with the device. I can buy ebooks online and transfer them to the kindle with a USB cable so I'm not completely unable to get books. However, part of the coolness of the book is being able to browse and get books on the fly without your computer.

I spent some time on the phone this morning with Amazon Kindle Support. The good news is that the guy on the phone really didn't know what to do with me. Makes it feel like this isn't a wide spread problem with the device. He had me try resetting it and verifying the registration of the device. He checked the signal for the Whispernet service in both my home and work locations and says that shouldn't be any problem. He tried for me to get the diagnostics from the kindle but the command he gave me brought up a blank page.

So we're going to have to exchange my kindle for a new one because the wireless device in this one is just plain broke. The bad news is that Amazon is completely sold out of kindles. He said they show the next shipment to arrive in March. March! Gah!

Since I can use the kindle still to read my books he said to just keep it for now and he'll hold off sending me the shipping lables until they have some in stock to swap with me. That way I can continue to use my kindle instead of just watching Dodge use his for 3 months.

Halloween

Here are 2 of my cousins, Becky & Suzie, out trick or treating.

Happy Halloween!

Our boss wanted us all to dress up for Halloween. Since later we found out she wouldn't be in due to her Father visiting we all said poo on that idea. Our new student Craig wasn't sure whether we really weren't dressing up or were just tricking him into not dressing up while we all did. To be safe, he brought a costume to work today just in case.

Since he had it, I had him put it on so I could take a picture. We'll send it to the boss so he gets brownie points.

Easter Dinner

Went to mom's house for a wonderful meal. Mom had little eggs with our names on them sitting on the table. We then watched August Rush on pay per view. Great movie, by the way. Now just bummed the weekend is over already.

New Year

We spent New Year's at Ed and Misty's this year. Alan was there (Rachel was home sick), Joe and Jynel stopped in and Matt Bromly and his wife Tonya was there with their 2 kids. Just a simple night of pizza and movies to bring in the new year. Dodge made some sushi to bring for everyone to try. Even Misty said she liked it!

Of course Nateski made an appearance for some photos and well wishings of Happy New Year. Nathan probably will get those sordid pictures/videos soon if he hasn't already.

My one and only resolution this year is this:

I'm not going to break any bones this year.

Christmas Exchange Curse

I've been cursed with holiday gift exchanges pretty much my entire life. This trend started in preschool when instead of a nice toy, I excited opened my gift of shoe strings. Mom always told me "Just say thank you and cry when you get home" so I'm really good at pretending I love the crappy gift I get.

This year's entry is a lovely assortment of items I got from the work gift exchange. First off, in the back is the jumbo universal remote. It's a real remote just it's huge. It's just slightly smaller than Oscar. Next on the list is a special pair of shocking office supplies. Yes, they are a fake pen and stapler and if you attempt to use them, they'll shock you. Hard too! It actually hurts. Lastly is the lovely pooping snowman. You press down on his head and a little piece of poop candy comes out his butt.

Other holiday gift horrors would include toilet paper (not even good toilet paper, the cheap rough stuff), a pooping santa (but I now have a set!), a singing motorcycle santa figurine, I could go on and on. Maybe I'll write a book someday of what not to bring to a gift exchange.

Merry Christmas Dodge!

Pack your bags and get ready for a fabulous 2nd Anniversary. I have booked us a cruise to Alaska!

7 Night Alaska Sawyer Glacier Cruise Sailing On Rhapsody Of The Seas
Departing 22-Aug-2008 from Seattle, Washington

Date	Port	Arrive	Depart	Activity
22-Aug	Seattle, WA		4:00 PM
23-Aug	Cruising			Cruising
24-Aug	Juneau, AK	11:00 AM	8:00 PM	Docked
25-Aug	Skagway, AK	7:00 AM	8:30 PM	Docked
26-Aug	Tracy Arm Fjord, AK	7:00 AM	12:00 PM	Cruising
27-Aug	Prince Rupert, BC	8:00 AM	6:00 PM	Docked
28-Aug	Inside Passage			Cruising
29-Aug	Seattle, WA	6:00 AM

Christmas Party

Mom had a big holiday party. The kid's made gingerbread houses & the ladies had an ornament exchange while the boys were downstairs playing poker. Christy and I were lucky and got to make both a gingerbread house AND do the ornament party. My house is in back on the left.

I got a really nice golden ball with a print of santa and 2007 written on it. I'm pretty happy. Everyone else was fighting over the light up tree bulb and the snowman ornament. It was a really good time.

See more photos from the Christmas Party!

Christmas Cookie Update

Yesterday morning, I finished making the cookies and set them up nice and pretty. Snapped a picture of my handywork and proudly displayed the picture of my work on the blog. I made myself a cup of coffee and settled down to a cookie and coffee for breakfast. After tasting the new peanut butter cookies, it was very much decided that they were disgusting and went into the trash. It's really too bad as they came out looking perfect and I was so pleased with them. Guess I'm going to have to go back to making the full fat cookies and we'll just have to be responsible enough to not over-endulge.

Last night I made some Cream Cheese Finger cookies and they turned out very good. Dodge likened them to pecan sandies (which explains why I like them so much). I used the regular recipe, just substituted the cream cheese for fat-free variety. So I'm glad that all my experiments aren't such a horrible failure. That's a picture from the magazine I got the recipe from although mine do look just like them.

This morning I attempted to make Mom's Sugar Cookies. I made the dough last night and let it chill and this morning just broke off a hunk of dough to make up a quick dozen cookies. They turned out great and taste very good. I think I'm starting to get mom's recipe down! The kitchen aid mixer seems to be the tool that's really helped me. Mom doesn't use one but apparently I need it!

Only one more cookie I plan on making (besides a regular batch of peanut butter cookies for Dodge) and that's a rugelach for Mom's Christmas party this weekend. Hopefully they turn out!

Christmas Cookies!

Yes, we are still doing Weight Watchers but Christmas isn't Christmas without cookies if you ask me. To help us stay good, I researched lower fat cookies.

I found this peanut butter cookie recipe. We'll see if they pass the Dodge test when he gets home. They are his favorite. I also made some chocolate truffles. I just substituted fat-free sweetened condensed milk for the regular stuff.

Both are easy to fit into our diet as a snack so I'm excited. I plan on making two more types of cookies this weekend.

Our Thanksgiving

I attempted cooking my own thanksgiving feast this year. I'm pleased to report that it was a huge success! The turkey came out perfect. I'll definately try this again next year. Dodge and I stuffed ourselves and now are relaxing.

Turkey Day!

Thanksgiving dinner at mom's was delicious! We both ate too much but it was all too good not to try everything.

Thanksgiving Morning

We woke to probably about a 1/2" of snow. That little brown spec is Oscar playing in it. The first official snowfall of the season. Snow was blowing around last week but none of it stuck.

Dodge is busy making us some French toast but we're saving our appetite for dinner at mom's today.

More Halloween

Sarah's girls: Jessica, Sydney & Mollie.

Halloween

Becky & Susan (cousins of Jamie) stop by for trick or treats!