Newest Member of the Family

Yes, I am sure you are in shock. Not by the fact, that I got ANOTHER dog, but that I actually took the time to blog in over a month and a half. I guess I just didn't feel like anything was newsworthy even though we've been very busy with baseball, track, Heritage School, Girl Scouts, a new student teacher in my room and logging tons of hours at Bejeweled. I guess you could say that I've replaced that silly game with blogging. In fact, I haven't read a blog in over a week, so if you don't read this, I am surely can not be offended. ;)

Back in December I thought that maybe, just maybe our Miniature Schnauzer, Ranger, needed a permanent friend to play with at our home. However, I did NOT want to housebreak a new puppy or go through that awful chewing stage. So, I decided to look into a pet rescue. I found several rescues in and around Omaha and Lincoln, but they all required a huge amount of paperwork (which I filled out) and a home visit or two. I was starting to think that adopting a real person would actually be easier.

After much work and communication with one pet rescue I learned two things.

1. Rescue dogs can be severely needy and unstable for an active household.

2. Rescue dogs can be more expensive than just buying a brand new one and many aren't even house trained.

In fact, one rescue wouldn't allow us to adopt their "puppy mill" dogs due to their fear of our schnauzer and Grant. Really...Ranger? Grant? Okay, well yes, I can understand that concern.

That's when I started to watch the website for Pound Puppies and found this cutie. It only took 74 visits to find a female, non-shedding dog that behaves well with children as well as gets along with other dogs.

Meet Princess Penelope, which we will call "Penny".

She's now got her "furever" home with us!

We had to wait an extra ten days before meeting Penny, which the shelter called "Sally Jo" due to getting Kennel Cough due to being placed in confinement. Poor little girl! Miss Penny is a Shih Tzu or Shih Tzu mix and arrived at the pound lost and was found wandering 16th and South Street here in Lincoln. Her teeth tell us that she's about 1 - 2 years old and that's about all we know about her. Apparently, her previous owners didn't microchip her, come looking for her, or even feed her very well. She weighs about 10.5 lbs. The shelter also had to spay her, which hadn't been done before.

Penny's a very timid dog and was extremely nervous when we visited her Friday night. Then when we introduced Ranger to her, she quickly stopped shaking and she probably thought, "Oh, good, they aren't going to hurt or eat me. They already have a dog and he's looking quite content." That's when we knew she was the one for us.

Deciding on naming this little girl was extremely difficult. If you saw my Facebook post, I received around fifty-four ideas for names. I found a lot of them very cute including Junie B., Latte and Molly. Tyler quickly suggested the name Penny after the Nebraska character in the sitcom "The Big Bang Theory" and eventually he won out. I would have preferred a non-human name, sorry Penny Laschanzky (my scrapbooking friend), but everything suggested to us seemed to sound like a great person name too. I even found a website for top dog names and saw that the name "Penny" comes in 33rd place out of a hundred for dogs. You might want to check it out to see if your name is a popular choice for canines.

I thought I'd try to get some doggie photos, which proved to be a very challenging task.

No longer the "Lone" Ranger and Princess Penny

Oops...another miss!

Finally, two faces!

And if you are curious...Ranger is liking his new friend just fine.

Presidents' Day

Happy Presidents' Day to you!

Hope you enjoyed your day off, if you got one. I, myself, had an Elementary Plan Day. So, no school for Madison today and a quiet day at work for me...cleaning my classroom and ordering supplies for the next school year.

I can't say I've ever "celebrated" Presidents' Day before. I should do something since my kids all have presidential names. Just think of all those scrapbooking opportunities I've let go by over the years....hmmm? Well, we did have Cherry Pancakes tonight in honor of our first fore father of our country, George Washington. This wasn't my idea, but that of E-Mealz. A food program that I am still loving. Of course, the cherries were suppose to go on as the topping, but we (Andy and I) thought it would be more adventurous to put it in the pancakes or panpakes like Grant likes to call them.

The batter does make for a nice looking Valentine pancake, I think.

And boy do those cherries retain their heat!

Here are recent photos tonight of my favorite
Commanders in Chief

John Tyler - 10th President of the U.S.

James Madison - 4th President of the U.S.
(Interesting fact: James Madison married Dolley 206 years earlier on Madison's birthday, which is September 15th.)
Now you are probably wondering why I know that weird fact?
Wikipedia, of course!

Ulysses S. Grant - 18th President of the U.S.
Wouldn't Ulysses be proud of a character like Grant?

The pancakes were good, but I think that there would have been better flavor if I would have left the cherries for the topping. I'll remember that next time! ;)

February Blahs

I've been having the February blahs lately, so I turn to crafting. I created this wall art out of a kit from Archiver's. I can't take any of the credit, it's designed by the Archiver's people, but I did adapt it to fit five pictures instead of three. I love the color combination. I think I may make another one too. It was fun and pretty quick to put together.

Part 1

Then I found the cutest classroom valentines off of a craft blog. I bought all the supplies and found two cute girls to make them. I helped a little, but did more of the photo taking.

To complete the project one needs Smarties, Lifesavers, Gum (long stick kind), string, labels and rubber bands.

Then the assembly begins...

Kate is a neighbor and friend of Madison's.

Madison and Kate were busy for over two hours.

They made the cutest airplanes!

Part 2

This is Tyler's Team B Basketball Team.

They look thrilled. I like how one (Nate) hid from getting in the photo.

Teenagers are awesome to photograph...not.

Tyler's team played on Saturday and lost 19 to 39. Only one more game to go.

Part 3

Today was Youth Sunday at church.

Madison gave the Pastoral Prayer...

in front of several hundred people.

She was a rock star! I am very proud of her!

Part 4

We are on week 3 of E-Mealz. We did skip last week and I regretted it. It's been very helpful in creating quick, healthy choices for the family. No more..."What's for dinner?"

We have noticed an increase in complaints from the minors in the household.

Apparently, we've feed fish sticks, corn dogs and chicken nuggets to our kids for too long.

Above is a picture of Beef Pot Pie. It was good and brought me back to memories of those frozen Chicken Pot Pies my mom use to buy from the store.

This was a lot better!

Tell me what you are doing to keep busy in this technically short (but seems forever long) month?

Snowdays = Productive Days

I so love snow days! I like that I can't really go anywhere and I'm not expected to. I dislike having a school year where I never get to use even one up. However, I am hoping we don't exceed our 5 snow days or we will have to make them up like last year. That's a bummer!

I haven't blogged in a while and I'm thinking I'm losing my touch to keep it up. There's just so much to do and so very little time it seems.

Here's what we've been busy with lately....

Tyler decided to try his hand at basketball. I was a little shocked that he's not decided that this is the sport for him in the past, but I believe a beautiful, young girl had something to do it. Tyler has a girlfriend who loves this sport, so of course, Tyler does too. How sweet, huh?

Tyler is number 42.

I love action shots, but terrible at taking them. I so want a Canon Rebel and a photography class to go with it. I wish cupid would bring me one for Valentine's Day.

Tyler's played two Saturdays now and hasn't done too bad.

He scored 4 points in his first game and 2 points in the second.

Madison got to attend a free girls' soccer clinic at the University on Saturday.

Madison had no problem going alone, knowing she'll have a blast.

Madison dreams of playing soccer at the University.

I tell her...live the dream, work hard.

I'd just be happy to know that she could play at a high school level.

I am delighted that she LOVES something this passionately, especially since it's not BOYS!

Andy and I got tickets at the last minute (okay, in the last 12 hours prior to the performance) to the Blue Man Group.

It was PHENOMENAL! I find that kind of humor...hilarious!

I also won my second charm from Two Dog Pond.

I feel a little embarrassed now, so I guess I won't be playing the game for awhile.

It is so darling! Thanks Rachel!

Yesterday, snow day #1, Andrew cleaned out cupboards and organized my spices alphabetically. I did laundry and cleaned toilets. Too bad this neatness can't stay this way!

I also made chocolate chip cookies. This is how many are left.

Then I organized some layouts from my last crop.

This is the most recent picture wise layout.

It was taken on January 10th, which was our very first snow day.

I love to do sport layouts. I am glad Tyler decided to try basketball.

I needed some more variety.

This is my favorite layout.

I love Halloween and the color combinations in this design.

Andy's cousin, Janelle, called me this afternoon. She works for the Community Blood Bank.

She told me that they are in dire need of O negative blood.

So, I went and gave. I got an awesome t-shirt and a free whopper at Burger King.

My snow day is now complete!

Getting Crafty Today with Spray Paint

Today is Martin Luther King's birthday (MLK), so we had the day off of school. It's also suppose to be the saddest day of the year with holiday bills due, forever gloomy weather and broken New Year's resolutions. Just hearing about this made me feel depressed, so I decided to do something fun and crafty. I thought I'd decorate for Valentine's Day on a small budget.

I got crazy with some spray paint...

and found some junk at the local Goodwill store.

This owl is kind of creepy looking, but I saw the cutest owl decorated on another blog. I just had to copy the idea. I wanted to find a larger owl, but this was the only one I could locate without using eBay. He was $3.99 and in desperate need of a facelift.

Isn't he darling now? Really..."Whooo do you love?"

Do you think his heart is little too big? I'd like to find a smaller one.

To help with the the height problem, I used two vintage books from the 1950's. The Little Women one is from my grandmother. She always wanted me to read it. I've tried, but it's a little dull with the text being rather formal and dated.

Then, I found these metal candleholders at the Salvation Army.

They were 99 cents each.

I cleaned them up and changed the charms (to hearts) since some were missing from the original pieces. I found discounted red candles at Pier One for a dollar each.

Then I filled two jars full of clear and red stones (on sale at Hobby Lobby) to create heart trees. One tree for school and one for home. Madison found the twigs from behind our house that I spray painted white. The foam hearts were hung from the branches. I used one of the extra hearts for the owl's neck.

I haven't arranged the Valentine decor exactly the way I wanted yet, but you get the idea. What a great way to celebrate MLK day!

Hope you had a fun filled, happy day also!

Happy New Year--10 Days Late

This is my first post of 2011. As you can see...my resolution is not keeping up on my blog! ;)

Here's a belated New Year's photo of two of my kiddos. Tyler spent the evening with a friend, so he wasn't included in our New Year's fun or whatever we might call it. This picture was taken at 11pm since we couldn't keep our eyes open for our own New Year (Central time zone). I guess there were lots of fireworks going off around our house, but I was sound asleep at that time.

I mentioned that I was going to come up with some resolutions that I could keep this year and here are a few.....
I am no longer keeping single socks around so incase we might find it's mate. It's unbelievable how many mismatched socks we own. Of course, I did all the possible laundry before letting go of these single socks. I used many of these for cleaning the house before pitching them.
I am also no longer picking up my husband's laundry that didn't make the hamper that is less than a foot away. He crabbed at me the other day for taking his pants to the laundry room that had his wallet and keys in them. Then he realized that they were actually in a pile on the floor...untouched by me. He can now trip over them until he decides they should be put in their rightful spot. Now if I could only do this with the kids' laundry in their rooms.

My last resolution has to do with the toilet (no photo). I thought I'd spare you the sight of one. Yuck! Well, I can't stand seeing an open toilet seat, so I'd always yell..."Who left the seat up??" This went on with me just getting crabby and the toilet still remaining open, so now I am committed to just putting the lid down by myself. Stress be gone. Ha! So, with these resolutions I can say that yes, I am still committed and living up to them!

This sure beats trying my hand at weight loss, exercising or eating a balanced meal!

On another note...I won a contest! I love charms and found yet another gal, Rachel, who makes them. Two Dog Pond has a weekly contest to come up with a title to the photo she displays on her blog on Mondays. The winner is announced on Fridays and I was picked this past week. Yay! The charm came in today's mail.

My quote for the little boy in a tutu reads "After enlightenment, then laundry". It's a Zen Proverb that I found online. I thought it was fitting with the laundry hanging on the line behind the boy.

Today was also a snow day, our first for the school year. Very exciting and good to have one since Grant was throwing up at two in the morning. His bug was short lived (thankfully) and hopefully self-contained. This allowed me to sleep in, which I thoroughly enjoyed!

We probably received 8 to 10 inches of snow. The kids scooped the walks and did some sledding by our house. Another opportunity for some snow scrapping photos!

I love this last photo of Grant. It makes his eyes look so big!