Winter Wonderland - Kind of

Since I decided to finally put the sleds back into the attic yesterday look what it decided to do last night and is still doing this morning....

These are just taken standing on our patio. I like the way the snow looks on the trees.

Last week it was nice here. Almost 50 degrees and a partly sunny sky. Anthony and I walked to Maverick and got a snack one day after school and it was just gorgeous out. I got excited for boating season. Gary has been working on putting the speakers on the boat and playing with the walkie talkie that comes with it. Needless to say, we will now be the obxnoxious ones out on the lake...not really... but we will have to go when there is not a lot of people on the lake so that the three of them can have their fun hollering at each other with the walkie and the testing that will take place "to see how loud the stereo can go and how it sounds." As if we haven't been able to tell that in the garage already!

Caitlin moved into her new place on campus on Thursday. She now lives in the LLC which stands for the Living Learning Center. She shares the apartment/suite with 7 other girls and is extremely happy. This is one building I haven't seen but she did get to tour it when we went down for orientation. I don't think she even spent a full week at her room in the Towers since Christmas break. She was lonely and so far is enjoying living with all the other girls. We cut her meal plan down to 7 meals a week and now she will be cooking meals there. She is suppose to be updating her blog with pictures but it might take a while. She told me she just does everything on Facebook now. I reminded her that Grandma and Grandpa don't have Facebook and her response was that now you might just have to get it! She will work on it though.

Not much else going on here. Adrian went hot tubbing last night at Zach's in the snow - he though that was pretty fun. It wiped him out though. He was only gone 2 hours and when he came home he went straight upstairs to our room to watch tv - this was at 9. When we went up an hour later he was laying horizontal on our bed with the lights and tv on sound asleep. That is the second time this week that he has fallen asleep like that. Now that I think about it though maybe he is getting sick because he woke up this morning with a headache. On a scale from 1-10 it is almost a 7. He will be back in bed before to much longer I'm sure. I really hope he grows out of these headaches.

I did get a room at the Ameritel for when I come over in a week or so. I really don't know much else about what is going on those few days. I don't even know the time or place of the wedding! We do have a rehearsal and dinner on Thursday and we all are going to dinner Wed. night when we get into town. We will head back sometime late Saturday afternoon. Andrea's mom's birthday is Sat. and she would like to go to lunch with her so we will leave after that.

Speaking of IF - Caitlin is now talking about coming to Idaho Falls the weekend before her birthday. So if her plans stick we will be coming there instead of Logan. Amanda wrote to Tim on Facebook that she will be there then too and we thought it might be fun to have one massive dinner together. Craig is on fb now too and he added that he and Pam would like to come also. That got me to thinking of when Leo's was where we would always meet....ahhhh fond memories.

Wanted Dead or Alive

Anthony is really enjoying his new guitar teacher. He is working on this song - Wanted Dead or Alive by Bon Jovi (I think I have mentioned that before - sorry). The boy who has his lesson prior to Anthony's really jams and gets Anthony pretty excited. I'm sure it won't be to long before Anthony can play just as well. He spends a lot of time looking up guitar videos on You Tube and tries to play some of the songs.

Dog Obediance

Monday was our first night of dog obediance class and before class had even begun we had a problem. A lady I work with is taking the same class and we were talking while our dogs were checking each other out when suddenly Charlie let out a yelp and tried to get away. Turns out Anna's dog bit Charlie on the ear. It was bleeding and we really aren't sure what & why it happened. Adrian seems to think that Charlie jumped up on Birdie (her dog) but I thought they were just smelling each other. Any how we kind of cleaned it up and the trainer said that dogs get bit all the time on their ears - so it seemed like maybe it wasn't that big of a deal. Tuesday afternoon we noticed that the wound was starting to puss up a little so I made a vet appointment. Wednesday afternoon Charlie and I went to the vet where they ended up shaving the bottom half of his ear to see the wound more clearly. It is about a half inch cut (which is worse than I thought it was) with a hole on the underside. The gave me the option of putting in a couple of stitches or staples ($350-$400) so there would be no scarring or just waiting to see if it closes up on its' own and doesn't abscess. As you can probably guess I chose the cheaper option knowing Gary would shoot me on the spot if I had spent that much to fix a cut on a dog's ear.
We came home with antibiotics, anti-inflammatory, a cleanser, and an e-collar (one of those cones around his neck) in hopes of keeping the wound clean.
I swear when it rains it certainly seems to pour!

Ben that is a great idea for Anthony. I think he is going to give it a shot. He was pretty excited after the lesson this week because the teacher got him started on Wanted Dead or Alive by Bon Jovi. Let's put it this way - I haven't had to ask him to practice this week. His enthusiasm for the guitar has been renewed!

It was a beautiful day here in Boise today. 50 degrees, blue sky and sunshine and I was loving it. It is hard to think we still technically have 2 more months of winter when it is that nice outside. Hopefully spring will come early this year.

What a Week!

What a week this has been. We really don't have any big news to report but it seems like Christmas was so long ago that I felt like we needed a new entry.
Caitlin left on Wednesday to head back to Logan. It was very sad to see her go but she felt like it was time. She enjoyed being here seeing family and friends but as she said she has her life there now too. She has spent the last few days hanging out with friends and today she is getting ready for the first day of the new semester. She thinks her hardest class will be an English Language Learners class which is a 400 level class. It is 2 1/2 hrs. long and she is a little concerned being a freshman in a sr level class but she has had enough spanish that it really shouldn't be too bad - at least that is what we are hoping.
Not much going on with the boys. Anthony started with a new guitar teacher this past week. I think he will be a better teacher (one who doesn't spend 1/2 the lesson playing his own music), however Anthony is a little frustrated because this teacher wants him to hold the pick differently. I guess it feels unnatural. This teacher goes more out of the book and doesn't want to see Anthony writing the name of the chord above the notes. Which is the way it should be but hard when that isn't the way he has been doing it for the last 4 months.
We got Adrian a new bed today. He was deteremined to put it together on his own. Gary did have to help him get started but otherwise he did a lot of the work. It looks really nice in his room and I think he is pleased with it. The problem was that the memory foam pad he got for Christmas made his bed to tall. We took the box springs off the frame he had and it helped but I didn't want the box springs laying under his bed for who knows how many years. With this new bed we can have both mattresses and his new pad and there is still plenty of room on the headboard.
Gary is still hanging in there with work. It is a day by day thing - some days are better than others. He spent part of this afternoon putting a windshield wiper that he got for Christmas on the boat. I think it is more for looks than anything. We don't usually tend to be on the lake when rain comes in because the water gets to rough. I'm sure the boys will be more than willing to throw some water at the windshield to make sure the wiper works.
I am still trying to recover from this pneumonia. It seems to be taking FOREVER! I figured the other day I have had 4 dr. visits, 2 antibiotics, an inhaler, a chest xray, and now I am on muscle relaxants and anti-inflamatory drugs. I was feeling much better after I started the muscle relaxants but then I went shopping yesterday and didn't take anyting till I got home (they tend to make me pretty tired & loopy) and my chest has been bothering me again every since. I feel like if I do anything other than sit on my hind end I can't catch a break. Plus if the pain comes back I will need to go in for a chest cat scan to make sure I dont' have a clot. I really don't want to do that. It all has been very frustrating this time around. I am really thinking I need to get the pneumonia & flu shot this year but the problem is even then it is still no guarantee.
Anyhow that is enough about our lives. I hope everyone is doing well and is healthy!