Pumpkins...

Saturday we held our annual pumpkin carving night with the Barclays. I love that once they're kids are in bed we can do whatever we want and turn the movie up as high as we can and they still sleep through it! Halloween movie of choice this year--Hocus Pocus--Can't beat a classic!! the mess:

Michael won best pumpkin for 2009...and he should because, well it was pretty cool, and took the longest.
and in no particular order:
Pluto (Jamie)
Ursela (Justin)
BSU (Michael)
Jack-O-Lantern (Jared)
Cinderella (Jacque)

Happy Halloween!!

Abby Moo...

Yesterday we lost our 4-year-old Beagle, Abby. We left her out back, like we always did, while we went to town. Abby layed down on the back deck and the tags on her collar got stuck between the boards. She twisted herself up trying to get out and strangled herself. Knowing we may not be in our house much longer, we decided to take her up to Justin's parents house to rest in peace. This is quite possibly one of the hardest things I've ever done. I was telling Justin yesterday that I always thought people who cried over their pets were dumb...well count me as one of them now! I was really looking forward to working from home and having her here with me all the time. Since we don't have kids, loosing Abby was like loosing a child for us. Thank you, everyone for your thoughts, prayers and messages. We know this had to happen for a reason, we're just waiting to find out why.

Meet Auto...

He's the newest addition to our zoo. (pretty soon I'm going to start charging admission!) He will be prettier in a few more months after he grows the rest of his feathers back. He was a rescue bird and had been plucking his feathers due to stress. This picture was a month or so after we got him and he's already made a huge improvement on picking at his feathers. I'll have to start posting more often you can see what a pretty bird he's growing up to be!

A Happy Birthday...

I took my birthday off from work and spent the day with Justin. He had the day all planned out, but with two different plans. So he made me choose 1 or 2 all day long, and whatever he had assigned to that number, that's what we did. It was kind of like those Choose Your Own Adventure books we read in grade school...you remember those right??!! We went out to lunch (Olive Garden) and to a movie (UP in 3D) and to Coldstone for some ice cream. Then had dinner at my mom's house with the whole family. And what did I pick for my birthday dinner you ask? HOT WINGS!! YUM!!

Mason helped me open all of my presents. I have been telling Justin all summer that I want a pink 22 for my birthday...but we had already discussed that I wouldn't be getting it. So, even knowing that was the case, I got a little excited to open the last present...which was an empty gun case to go with my gun cleaning kit and ear muffs, so that I have everything I need when he DOES get me my pink 22 someday...SOON!!
Thank you everyone for another WONDERFUL birthday!

I know Labor Day was a month ago...

Yeah...I'm that far behind...but it's really not very far behind at all considering we really haven't done much to blog about this month. Michael's parents came up over Labor Day so we got to spend some time with them and his, newly adopted, little brother and sister. We met them one morning at the school to play at the playground and took Abby and Lexie with us so they could run around a little. But they weren't very interested in running, or fetching the ball...here's how it worked...I threw the ball, and then walked them to the ball because they were too busy sniffing around to chase after it...Beagles!

Thomas and Angel had a great time pulling them around on their leashes...and since the dogs are supposed to be trained not to pull on a leash and watch the person on the other end of the leash, we let them yank away at those leashes!