That dreaded phone call

My grandpa's 92, he's old, he's ready to go, his legs are giving him grief, he can't bowl. My dad has found a couple lumps in his armpits that he didn't have before. Both are going for tests this week. So when the phone rings in the early hours of the morning, we thought we'd know what it was about. We were wrong. It's my mom. This morning dad took her to emergency with a headache, stomach ache and a bit of vomiting. Her brain is bleeding. She's been there almost 12 hours and this is all we know. She's awake now, she seems fine. And we know nothing else. She sent us home because she just wanted to sleep. Please keep her in your thoughts.

Slo Mo Mojo

I haven't been doing much in my scrap room, other than tidying it up a little. I lost my mojo. This is the layout from January's class. I love my little owl, but can't find the right pictures for the layout.

I used my super cute mini milk carton die and my Big Shot to make these. They are cute but pretty useless for anything other than filling full of candy, like Kisses or cinnamon hearts. I'm practical, and this die was a huge splurge. Now I have to make it work and use it for everything, I'm definately using them at Easter. I'm thinking of things to put in them ... maybe dog treats, Kleenex, allergy pills, Cadbury Mini Eggs, jelly beans, money...

I didn't feel like re-inventing the wheel so I got my Stampin' Success magazine out and pretty much copied a couple of cards. I'm using up a pack of the 6x6 Designer Series Paper, Welcome Neighbour from the Sale-A-Bration mini. I really like it. The little houses on the milk cartons are from the paper pack too.

I also used the paper and punches and dies to make this, right from the Stampin' Success too. It's hanging above our bed in the photo and I forgot to take it down. Kerry was pretty excited when he got home.

Tonight's fight night, it's been awhile since the last one. One of Kerry's co-workers told me that they were discussing fight night and the fact I watch it, they also said that if Kerry and I fought, all bets were on ME. Kerry even said he'd bet on me. I guess I should feel good about this, Kerry said it's because I'm scrappy. Ya, that's me, scrappy!

All of these photos are SOOC with my flash!

Silly Putty

When I have treats in my pocket and camera around my neck, these two are almost like Silly Putty in my warm little hands. Well, Sally is, Linus is like that cold hard chunk of Putty that just won't soften up no matter how hard you try. Today, I taught the dogs about backdrops and props. Sally is sporting a very large flower clip from Fabricland. She doesn't seem to mind. She's sitting in front of a table covered with Amy Butler fabric.

Linus said he's sit, but he was not posing. He didn't even wash his face this morning.

I made this scalloped heart garland this morning, I was feeling all Valentinesy. Sally is posing on my bed on duvet. I found that scrolly white iron thingy at Home Sense a few years ago.

Linus is doing as little as possible for his treat. "Momma, my head's too heavy!"

All photos are SOOC. The last two are *gasp* with my flash! I am trying to learn to love it and with Rae's tips, I think it's possible.

Pants On The Ground - Larry Platt - American Idol [LYRICS]

Watch this and read on...

Pants On The Ground

Emily and Illi were doing their homework last night. They had to find a current event out of the news paper, cut it out, and ask a bunch of questions about the current event. Illi found the article about the 17 yr. old girl that let the contractor in his 50s into her house. She left the room only to come back to find him naked from the waist down. We can imagine what it was he planned on doing. After we discussed the situation, and how serious it was, Illi had a little fun with it, she started singing Pants on the Ground. These two girls are hilarious. The also discussed drugs and the number of kids in their school that do them. I asked specifically what kind of drugs are you talking about, Illi started listing them Pot, and that other green stuff, what's it call? Marijuana! To which my street smart kid says pot is marijuana! Ah...mystery solved!

They also discussed an article on the controversial pro-life ad with a hand holding an aborted fetus. It's very interesting to hear teen aged girls' views on these things. Emily might know the difference between pot and marijuana(there isn't any) but she can't say the word rape, instead she uses nicer words like "an accident".

Sometimes I complain that I'm home all day with dogs that don't really talk to me. I can pretend in silly voices that they do talk but really it's nothing compared to what happens when the kids come home. I'm very thankful to be able to hear their chattering, even it it has confirmed that I don't want 4 kids, I'll keep 2 and send the other 2 home. It means they feel comfortable enough with us to share what is going on in their lives during the time they are away from us.

Smokin'!

We have been watching a lot of Diners, Drive-ins and Dives lately. There's a bunch of great looking BBQ places that they visit, and it got us thinking that we should get the bbq/smoker out and try it. It was a perk from Kerry's work and we had it for about 2 yrs. before giving it to my parents, who kept it for a few months and then gave it back. We pulled it out of the box and got it set up. We picked up 2 racks of baby back ribs, and a pork butt roast. And using the 'magic' cookbook, I rubbed, rested,and smoked us some meaty goodies.

I also made Texas Style BBQ sauce from scratch.It took a while to put the smoker together, but it was worth it!

It's a good thing the smoker had this very accurate thermometer. After 4 hours of smoking the ribs were to-die-for! On the bbq shows we've been watching, namely BBQ Pitmasters, they say that good ribs won't pull away from the bone when you bite them. You should be able to leave a perfect bite mark in the meat. I think these were a bit over cooked, but pretty close to what they say you want in a perfect rib. The pork roast became pulled pork, I made sweet and sour coleslaw and served it along with the bbq sauce, on toasted garlic buns. I might just smoke all my meat from now on.

I did a bit of scrapbooking on Friday. Each layout still needs 'something' but I'm not sure what yet. While we were waiting, Kerry took a picture of me in my Yokohama fleece from the contest I won.

Oriental Supermarket Fun

After Emily's orthodontist appointment, she said those 2 words she says every time we go out, "I'm hungry." So we went out of our way to the Oriental Supermarket. She used to declare "It stinks in here!" when we walked in the door, but now she says she likes the smell. We must have been hungry because we bought a bunch of different things. She always wants one of these drinks, it's carbonated, and you have to whack the marble sealing it with the cap, the marble drops into the glass bottle and causes some of the drink to fizz up and out, but we got smart this time and did it all in a bowl so she wouldn't lose half her drink. It's not cheap, $3 for the bottle and it's probably 1/2 the amount that's in a reg. pop can. But she loves the whole Asian/gimmicky thing. These sounded good, how could dried yams not sound good? I must have been very hungry. They are just that, dried yams, not sweetened, not salted. Just dried. Not bad, but not good.

These are good. Some kind of weird potato snack, Italian Gratin flavoured. Everyone loved them.

These are definitely deep fried, but lightly sweetened, maybe even sweet/salty. But the texture will kill your mouth, kind of like crinkle cut fries but 400 times harder.

Emily picked this cup of ramen for her dinner. She boiled the water, followed the directions, for cooking the noodles. Then she drained the water and added the flavour packet and packet of 'oil', which looked like fat mixed with seeds. She said it was good and that she could eat it again, but she didn't actually finished it all, so I question how good it was.

One of the reasons I like taking her to the Oriental Supermarket is because she can read the packaging. She's taught herself to read Japanese, which is more than I can do. She can't read everything, but she can gets the gist of it and can translate for me. So when I saw these, next to something I recognized, I asked her to translate and sure enough it was exactly what I thought. And she knew what it was so we had to buy it. Naruto, swirl fish cakes. It's similar to imitation crab. You slice them thinly and use it to decorate your food.

Like this, our peanut sauce noodles.

Grandpa had a dr.'s appt., the dr. thinks there's a blockage of some sort because his pulse is weaker at his feet than anywhere else. He sent him for bloodwork and he'll be having more tests ASAP. Thank you for all the well wishes!

Today, I must scrapbook. I've got classes to prepare for and nothing to show for it. I hope my mojo shows up today.

Practicing

I've been looking for some funky fabric for a backdrop. I haven't found it yet, but I did find this quilt in the laundry room. My mom made it for Emily and she doesn't use it anymore. I thought it might come in handy for baby photo shoots. Baby Bear posed for me on Emily's mini chair.

Work it, Baby Bear! Linus wanted in on the action when he heard I was handing out treats for good girls and boys.

Sally's such a good sport, she sat on the mini chair for a long time while I fiddled with the shot.

I've just come from getting a cleaning at the dentist...my teeth are so sparkly. Emily has her first orthodontist appointment today, she's not too happy about it. I'm sure I won't be happy about the cost.

Solar Powered.

I know...
2 posts in one day....This one has pictures. Lots of them.

Because we live in a valley, and we pay that nasty sunshine tax, we suffer in the winter. Maybe it's part of that sunshine tax, I don't really know what that tax includes, I've just heard people say we have one, but anyways, it's usually overcast and dismal in the winter. So as soon as I saw the sun shining, I grabbed my camera and that stinky tennis ball and took the dogs outside.

Here the majestic Golden Retriever soaks up the rays. He needs them because he is solar powered and has plans on ripping up the grass with his mighty paws as he catches his prey, the stinky tennis ball. But first he must actually rip up some grass, namely my zebra grass, he then pulled two branches of my forsythia. You can see the stinky tennis ball sneaking up on him.

He sat around like a dope because I told him to stop demolishing the flora and fauna.

He caught the stinky tennis ball, made lots of steam, and had some fun. You can see his assortment of yard toys (and possibly a doggy deposit) in this one, the tree root, and the 2x6s he likes us to throw for him, only problem is I can hardly lift them, so they usually land on him or about 3 feet in front of me.

How can you not love this face? The dog breath, the grass in the teeth, the goobery jowls, the stinky tennis ball.

Then we went inside and ate candies.

I had seen a neat trick with Christmas lights that I wanted to try. I knew there was a reason I still had a box of lights that didn't get put away after Christmas. Linus helped with the set up. He was checking the mug of water to make sure it was okay. He actually drank the whole thing.

After he moved, I was able to get this.

And not to be left out, I had to get a shot or two of Miss Sally. She likes to high tail it when Linus starts his antics.

Questions answered.

1. -2 is cold, it's been above 0 for a long time. Flowers are tricked into starting to bud. Orchardists are worried that the trees might bud and then the real weather will come and wreck everything.

2. Gas is cheap, it was up to $1.17 a liter.

3. Amy, be more specific, asking if that's my mom in the first picture, there's a whole bunch of moms in that picture. Mine is the one on the left, the Japanese one. Funny but true story...Kerry and I were discussing the health of our family members. I said I didn't know of any Asians that had asthma, and I thought and I thought and then I said "Oh, whatever, I don't ever know that many Asians!" Kerry looked at me like the idiot I am. I said "Oh, ya, more than half the people I'm related to are Asian, silly me!" I believe none of them have asthma.

4. If you have a tv that is older than 5 yrs. but more likely 10 yrs. old and your parents gave it to you without a remote control, throw it out, don't try to keep it so the kids can have a tv devoted to Dance Dance Revolution. It's not worth it to drive around town, buying different remotes, returning those remotes, doing research on-line, punching in 3200 codes, making long distance calls because no Universal Remote will work with it. The very helpful Rolly at London Drugs pulled up the local want ads and told me to go and buy a used tv for under $50 WITH a remote and manual. I'm a bit sad for this tv, it's not the best quality but it still works, it would be good for someone that needs exercise, as you have to get up and push the buttons on the tv if you want to change the channel. Oh, wait, maybe will skip the Dance Dance Revolution and just use the tv for exercise. Kids will love it!

5.This is my grandpa, he's an antique, he's 91. He's not doing so well. And not that I expect him to live forever, I know all about the circle of life, I'm not prepared to have him go to the bowling alley in the sky. He's feeling pretty weak lately and probably can't bowl on Friday, mom says if he can't bowl, then what's the point? If I suddenly stop blogging in the next bit, it's because something has happened with grandpa and I'm needed elsewhere.