Too Early

At 5:00 this morning, I woke up to Sammy barking incessantly. I finally went downstairs when I couldn't take anymore of it to find Michael with a piece of cheese in his hands and a look of desperation on his face. And then I hear the word skunk. Still in my bathrobe, I grab the cheese from his hands and trudge outside to ever-so-calmly coax Sammy back inside. Finally, with Michael on one side of the shed and me on the other, we got her! I headed straight the tub with her, which she gave me a few nice looks for, but eventually got her cleaned up. The house still has the faint pepe le pew odor, but it's fading.

On a positive Sammy note, we are successfully working on her staying inside by herself when we're gone. In the past, she's been crated or outside, but now that it's getting cold again, I hate to keep her outside and I wanted to try and do away with the crate. She has some anxiety when we leave which has lessened as she ages, so I thought why not. We started with 15 minutes and built on that. She's up to 4 hours with no damage to the house or its furnishings. I am very excited about this development! I think my big girl is ready to be a real house dog all the time!

A Very Fall Weekend

Michael's weekend actually started a little early on Friday. He called me from work in the morning, explaining that he was working on a gear when metal flew up and hit him in the mouth, chipping his front tooth. The tooth actually chipped on the back half, so you couldn't tell that he chipped it. He wasn't in pain, but wanted to get it taken care of before the weekend. So we made a trip up to the dentist and they fixed him right up.

Michael's parents came up to visit on Saturday afternoon. We usually go down there to visit and it was nice to see them and not have to drive! Although most of the trips down there this summer have been on the bike. We did a little shopping and went out for an early dinner. They headed back before dark.

The rest of the weekend was nice and lazy. We don't always have weekends where we're just at home with not a lot to do. It's nice. We watched movies Friday and Saturday nights and carved pumpkins today. I just got done cooking up my pumpkin seeds, yummy! We also went for our last bike ride this afternoon. The sun was out but it still was too cold. That wind blows right in my ears and it hurts. It was nice though to go out even for one more short last ride. I'm sure Michael will still be riding that bike for awhile, but I'm done.

We still haven't turned on the heat. It's still pretty nice during the day and we have big warm blankets at night. But we made our first fire of the season Saturday night and we've pretty much had it going since (don't worry, not at night when we're sleeping). I just love a fire in the fireplace. The warmth and crackle. It's so mesmerizing. It really made me feel like Fall is finally here. I don't know that I'm ready for the winter weather quite yet, but I'll enjoy the cooler weather and colorful leaves for now.

Spending Time with Jaime & Lucas

On Saturday morning, Sammy and I went down to Jaime's to spend a little quality time. Of course Sammy was beyond happy when she realized she'd be visiting Zeus. She always starts crying when we turn on their road, just so anxious to get out of the car and run to her buddy. I was starving when I got there so we went down to the Downtowner for lunch (they have delicious BLT's there!). And then we stopped next door at the bird store so we could go down in the basement to "walk through nature." Their basement is set up with all these fake trees and animals, with even a couple of deer. Lucas enjoys it, but I think he thinks that they're real because he doesn't really want to touch any of the animals.

We did a little scrapbooking in the afternoon while Lucas was napping. And by little, I mean little. We didn't even get one full page done by the time he woke up. Granted he had a shorter nap, but it was still an hour long! Yes, this is why we're still working on the same book we've been working on for a year. My goal is to get done with this book (Jaime's pregnancy) so we can move to Lucas' book before the new year. We'll see. Either way, it's always nice to see the look on Jaime's face when a page is complete. She's so excited and it makes everything worthwhile.

One of Jeremy's classmates got married that evening so I watched Lucas while Jaime went to the ceremony and then she came back and picked us up for the reception. I felt a little out of place, not knowing barely anyone, but Lucas helped keep me entertained. We went out and fed the goats (yes, goats-I don't know why they're there) and played on the playground for a little bit. After dinner we went outside to say good-bye to some people and ended up staying for quite awhile talking. Lucas found a little girl to play with and so they ran around for awhile.

Jaime had to pick up JJ from her band competition at 1 that morning so we stayed up for awhile watching tv when we got home. We slept for a little bit on the couch until she had to leave. I went to bring Sammy inside for the night and she wasn't by Zeus, which usually she is curled up next to him sleeping (as cool as it's been, I couldn't imagine why she wouldn't be next to all that fur). I called and called and she was nowhere. I panicked a little when I heard the coyotes howling. It felt like forever, but it was probably only a few minutes later and Sammy comes flying into the backyard. If you've ever seen Sammy really running it really looks like she's flying above ground. So I quickly brought her inside and curled up on the couch and fell asleep. What seemed like a few hours later (I think it was about 6:30am) Lucas comes into the living room and curls up with me. Aw, cuddly baby in the morning; nothing better. So we watched cars until Jaime woke up. When Lucas saw her, he said "hi mommy, hi Jaime!" It's so hilarious to hear him call her by her name. After some breakfast, some dancing around the table, and a bath, Sammy and I packed up our stuff and headed home. I had drill yesterday night so after I got home I took a quick shower and headed up to Atterbury. I was so tired last night but I think I made up for it-I won't even say how late I slept in this morning! Now it's off to school to start another week!

Catching Up

Well, it's been a little bit since my last entry. I've been extremely busy with school. We had full day fields this past week and a few major assignments due this Monday. I took a field trip with the Kindergarten class to the pumpkin patch. We learned about all the different kinds of pumpkins and squash, we were able to pet some animals (including little ducks!), went through a corn maze, and picked pumpkins out in the field. I was surprised that each student could pick a pumpkin to take home. They were very excited about that.

Last Saturday Jaime and I took Lucas to Abby's birthday party. We went to the Fall parade. Lucas really enjoyed putting the candy in the bag, but I think it was the idea of cleaning up than it was about getting candy. After presents and cake, Lucas and Abby went outside to play. I just love to watch them play together. They're so cute. Jill looked amazing and already back into a pair of jeans! I couldn't hold Autumn because I was just getting over a cold, which was horrible to see a baby and not hold her. Next time. It was fun and Lucas didn't last very long on the ride home. Jaime and I scrapbooked for awhile during his nap. We might actually get done with this scrapbook in the next 5 years! Lucas was a little crabby when he woke up from his nap so Jaime decided just to take him home instead of taking him out to eat. Probably a good choice but I felt like it cut our time together short. I'm going down there next weekend so I'll be seeing him again.

We took Sammy to the vet this week for her annual check up and shots. She's overweight. :( She gained about 7lbs. from last year. Oh my! She's supposed to be a 25lb. dog and she's around 29lbs. Not too bad but we'll have to start watching the treats. It's hard when she's so cute--and the fact that she tells me when she wants a treat! (she goes to the "treat" cupboard and stares at it and then "lets me know" it's time to get her a treat)

Yesterday we went on our first big bike run. The money raised went to a little boy who lost his mommy. I think there were about 75 bikes. We started in Seymour and went up to Caddie's in Columbus. And then from there we headed down to N. Vernon. They were just headed back to Seymour, so we split off there. We've never ridden with that many bikes and it was amazing. The rumbling just pounds inside you and the feeling you get being in the middle of that many bikes riding down the road. It was pretty neat. We had a police escort out of Seymour and from there on we blocked our own roads. I felt so above the law! I probably like riding in small groups the best, but it was a good experience.

Last week was a pretty tough week for me and so I'm glad the weekend has gone better. We're celebrating Michael's birthday tonight as well. We'll just go out to dinner and do cake here. It should be a good end to the weekend. Well, my weekend--Michael is off on Monday for Columbus Day and so he'll be going on another bike ride with some guys from work.