Week in review

Long time no post :-)

Alot's been going on since I posted last... it's been a busy week and a half!

Russ's brother from Alaska came in last Monday, then the rest of their Texas relatives flew in on Wednesday-Friday, so the week was pretty busy. (In case you don't remember me saying, Russ's mother got married this past Saturday.)

This past week, every night has basically consisted of a bunch of people coming over to the house and partaking in some alcoholic beverages and/or hanging out in the hot tub. Friday night was the big 'rehearsal dinner' for Russ's mom, since she wasn't going to have anything big after the wedding itself. So this dinner Friday was more like the wedding reception, you could say.

The dinner was awesome... it was nice to see all Russ's relatives (well, MY relatives now, too) and meet the ones that didn't get to make it in for our wedding. The first hour was spent in a separate smaller banquet room for cocktails and appetizers. Russ and I went and got a glass of wine and were chatting it up with another couple when a lady came by and offered us stuffed mushrooms...and I LOVE stuffed mushrooms. They looked a little messy but I couldn't resist. As I bit into it, some of the butter from it ran RIGHT DOWN MY CLEAVAGE and a piece of mushroom fell on my dress. Guess I can't eat and stand up at the same time. LOL. Luckily, no one noticed as I slyly tried to wipe down my boobs with a cocktail napkin... but I was still a little paranoid that I would smell like a stuffed mushroom the rest of the night.

By the time cocktail hour was over, I had just gotten my third fill-up of wine and was beginning to feel pretty darn good. Thank goodness for dinner, because I was in desperate need of food in my stomach. Russ's uncle paid for the whole dinner, and went all out. There were three different stations for food... one was turkey and all the trimmings, another was the 'seafood buffet' and the third was a pasta station where you tell them how to make your pasta/what you want in it, etc... and they'll make it right in front of you. I filled my tummy with some yummy food and kept right on drinking.

Now, let me say that I HARDLY EVER DRINK. I mean, Russ and I still have bottles of alcohol left over from our wedding over 2 years ago. We have a fully stocked bar downstairs that rarely gets used. Why am I telling you that I hardly ever drink?? Because I only had 5 glasses of chardonnay and a small glass of champagne from the toast, and I was TRASHED! And these glasses of wine were over the course of 4 hours and a large dinner! What the heck?!

I guess by the time we were ready to leave, I was telling some of our close friends that my Nuvaring was due to come out Saturday...and God knows what else I told them. But at least most of them were three sheets to the wind too, so not everyone remembered. But OH, my husband remembered. He informed me the next morning of what I said/did the night before. I woke up arond 9am and he goes, "Hey honey... do you remember the ride home lastnight?"

Of course the answer was no. (Well, I remembered PARTS of the ride home. I remember singing and dancing in the car, that's about it.) But then my husband informed me that I tried to undress him in the car and made the car go in neutral a couple times. Then he said that as soon as we got in the house, I stripped off my clothes and went to bed. "But you left your black thigh-high hose on...that was pretty funny," my husband added. Then he said I went in the bathroom for about an hour.

"Was I naked in there?" I asked him.

"Yes. It was funny."

"Hey honey?" he then asked me.

"Yes?!"

"Do you remember telling everyone your 'ring was coming out?'"

"Ugh. Yes. I do."

(laughs) "Well they do too."

Evidentally my husband had gone to the hotel where his relatives were staying and they were all talking about how drunk everyone was the night before, and they mentioned me and what I had said. But my husband made me feel better when he said that lots of people had a little too much to drink.

At that point, I stil pretty much wanted to dig a hole and jump in it for the day. LOL.

I mean.... 5 glasses of wine. FIVE! Two during cocktail hour, then 3 while in the other room. I seriously remember EVERYTHING from the dinner... so why is the ride home always a blur?! I truly don't remember ANYTHING from the time we got home until I woke up the next morning. That SCARES ME! My husband said I staggered up the driveway and insisted getting the mail out of the mailbox, then about fell over our landscaping once I got back down the driveway. Ugh. At least I was with my husband. If I hadn't been within his sight all night, I would have sworn someone spiked my drink.

Now I know why I don't drink. All this past week, Russ's brother and his buddies have been over at our house in the hot tub drinking, and I haven't had ANYTHING to drink. I made my favorite drink, peach schnapps and cranberry, and took two sips and couldn't drink anymore. I just have no desire to, whatsoever. I guess I just have to have one good drunken episode per year. I think the last time I drank before this was my cousin's bachelorette party in August 06, right before I found out I was pregnant. So yeah, maybe that's why 5 glasses of wine did the trick.

Anyway...enough about me turning into an obnoxious embarrassing lush.

The rest of this week has been pretty busy, like I said. We had the wedding dinner Friday, the wedding Saturday. Russ's mom had a little reception afterwards, just drinks and appetizers. Later that night, about 20 of us had a reservation at JC Wine Cellars restaurant. Their food was AWESOME! Some of his out-of-town relatives got lost on the way (even though they were all following eachother, who knows...), so they showed up late. THe restaurant closed at 9pm, but they were nice enough to stay open late for us.

Sunday was football day. I dressed ALyson up in a pink and white Pittsburgh Steeler onesie! Unfortunately they lost.... better luck next week.) Later that evening, a bunch of us had dinner together...

Monday we had Alyson baptized. A few mutual friends of Russ and his brother had their son Adam baptized also. Alyson was SO DARN ADORABLE in her christening gown. Russ's mom had bought it for her awhile back. It had a matching cap, socks and shoes. His mom also bought her THE cutest little baby bracelet with a little cross on it, so she got to wear that during the baptism. After the baptism, we had a party at our house. There were about 25 people here. THank goodness we had the thing catered. (Russ's idea.) One of his buddies owns a restaurant so he and his brother catered the party for us. It made things SO much less stressful. They set everything up and tore everything back down, so we didn't even have much to clean up. THe party lasted until about 9pm, then all the guys took their wives/kids home and came back to our house for the 'afterhours party.' They all stayed out on the deck and in the hot tub until at least 3am. (It's been like this just about every night.)


Tuesday and today were pretty relaxing. I've just been spending time with Aly and cleaning up the house. Russ has been pretty busy lately, so he hasn't been getting home until late evening. He's already in bed, Aly's sleeping, and his brother, who's staying with us through the end of the week, is over their friend's house...so I'm taking the opportunity to use the peace and quiet for some blog much needed blog updating! I started this post a few nights ago, but never got back to it until now.

Anyway... I don't think anything's planned for tomorrow as of yet, but who knows. We'll probably end up barbecuing or something. Friday we are having a cookout at Dean and Joelle's house. Weekend plans are still up in the air.

So that's about it. There are the updates...all I can think of for now, anyway.

Here are some baptism pics...

From L-R: Steve (Russ's mom's new hubby), Russ's brother Jon, Russ's mom Susan, Russ holding Alyson, Father Jack, me


From L-R: Joelle (godmother), Adam, Jon (godfather) holding Alyson


L-R: Grandma Jane, Joelle, my mom (still with the walker and the cast...) and dad, Jon, me, Father Jack, Russ and Alyson, Steve and Susan


Here's a pic of the cake we bought for Aly and Adam...


And last but not least... this is Alyson after we opened her baptism gifts. Mommy was having a little too much fun with the bows.

A little bit of everything.

9 days since a post... I'm slacking!

I've been pretty busy lately... I thought that since I'm not working full-time, I'd have more free time, but no. Seems like it's one thing after the other!

Russ and I had our 2nd anniversary this past Monday... it's so hard to believe it's been 2 years already. 2 years and a little baby! Russ had a pretty busy Monday work-wise (his secretary is out of town--she just got married) and so he's had to play catch-up with alot of stuff.... so we just went out to dinner Monday. Russ's mom and her fiance watched Alyson and brought her back later that night, so it gave Russ and I some time together. While at dinner, I said, "Yeah, last year at this time we were in Cancun...." And then Russ had to add, "Yeah, that's when we conceived Alyson!" (He swears that's where it happened, but I doubt it... I just let him think that, though.) Maybe next year we'll be somewhere tropical again for our anniversary...only without bringing home another 'little souvenir,' if you know what I mean!! I want to go to Aruba, or Punta Cana or something. Hell, I just want to go SOMEWHERE!

In other news... Russ's mom is getting married at the end of the month. She's SO excited about it. She's been by herself for over 20 years, so we're all very happy for her. When she's with her fiance, it's like she's a teenager again...she's all giggly and giddy, with a permagrin on her face...lol. Russ's brother is coming in from Alaska for the wedding, so since he'll be in town, we're getting Alyson baptised October 1st. A few friends of Russ and his brother's are coming in from DC, and are having their son baptised too... Russ's brother will be their son's godfather. So it's going to be a DOUBLE baptism! We still don't know who Aly's godparents will be. Well *I* know who I want to be the godparents, and it SHOULD technically be a given... but Russ doesn't agree with me. He's upset because they picked other godparents for their children... people who are NOT good role models whatsoever. Russ goes, "I wasn't good enough to be a godparent for them? They picked HIM, and he's a big a**hole!" *sigh* This is what I go through. In the end I'll win out though. *evil laugh*

So now, we have tons of stuff to do at the end of this month/beginning of next month. A rehearsal dinner, a wedding, and then a baptism a few days later. Now we're in the process of planning a party afterwards at our house. (Which, the party planning will mainly fall back on me, I'm sure.) We're figuring it'll be 20-25 people once it's all said and done. I think we're doing the cookout thing on our deck (burgers, hotdogs, MAYBE steaks or something), but Russ is kicking around the idea of having it catered. A friend of ours caters,and has offered numerous times to come cook the two of us dinner, (WHY have I not done that yet?!) so we might go that route. I just don't want to spend hundreds on a baptism party, when I'd be happy with cake, snacks and some alcoholic beverages...lol.

New subject. My beautiful little 'punkin', Alyson.

(I can't very well post without talking about Alyson!)

She's just so darn entertaining lately. It's been something new with her every week, whether it's a new sound or face she makes, or a new milestone she reaches. She just makes me SO happy and I swear my face hurts because I can't help but smile constantly when I'm around her. She's holding her head up pretty steady now, and CONSTANTLY wants to be sitting up looking around (hence it being such a necessity for me to buy that bumbo seat! What a godsend!) She'll bat at toys you hold in front of her, though her little arms still flail out all erratic sometimes... it's so cute. Oh, and she's made a new discovery over the past week or so. Her feet. When she's laying on her back, she's gotten into the habit of lifting her legs back toward her head, so I think that started it. Then, when she's leaning back in her boppy or sitting in her bumbo, I'll catch her lifting her legs up and staring intently at her feet with a puzzled look on her face. I take her socks off and put her foot in front of her face and say "Look at the tootsies!" and she'll smile and open up her mouth real big and coo. It's one of those 'melt mommy's heart' moments. She has a lot of those :-)

On one of the pregnancy (and new mommy)message boards I visit, a June mommy mentioned a sale Target was having on the Rainforest Jumperoo (which I had been wanting to get for Aly eventually.) The jumperoo is normally $80 but was on sale for $60, and if you bought it online and used a certain promotion code, you got free shipping and an extra $5 off. I ended up getting the Jumperoo for $57 brand new! Sadly this sale isn't going on anymore, or I'd pass on the info. I checked the website and it's back up to $79.99.

Anyway, I COULD NOT wait to get Aly in that thing... so I sat Aly in her bumbo seat so she could watch me, and put the jumperoo together right after it came to the house. I was SO excited!! She just kept looking at everything with this puzzled look on her face while I put it together. However... by the time mommy got it together, Aly was a little tired. Mommy had taken a little too long.

I figured, "What the heck" and picked Aly up out of the bumbo and placed her down in the jumperoo. This is what happened.



Yes, she FELL ASLEEP right when I put her in the seat. She looked so tiny in it, and her little legs didn't even come CLOSE to the floor. She was just hanging there, fast asleep, with her face resting on the seat. I had to laugh, though I was a little disappointed that we couldn't have more fun with it that day. (Ha... "we"... yes, I enjoy it too!)

I carried (well, 'pulled') the jumperoo upstairs and put it in the nursery, figuring it'd be awhile (like a month!) before we'd use it again. But a few days ago, Aly was fussing and I was bored, so I took her upstairs and put her little butt in it. And guess what? SHE. LOVED. IT. She was smiling and cooing, and batting at the little toys, even though that darn jumperoo dwarfed the poor girl. I kept turning the seat around so she could see all the toys. She especially loved staring at the lights on it. So at least I can get SOME use out of it for now, even if she can't touch the ground yet :-)

Here are a few more pics....

This is one I took on her playmat. Yes, she's asleep. Again. She had played on it for about a half hour and I think she wore herself out kicking the inflatable ball and batting at all the toys :-)



And last but not least...



This picture cracks me up. She does this everytime I have the flash on my camera. Her eyes get all huge. She looks like she's been caught doing something she shouldn't. LOL.

Well that's it for now. It's getting late, but I'm not that tired yet, unfortunately. This is bad, because these are the times I end up just checking out stores online, and usually end up buying something out of sheer boredom. I'm the same way with infomercials. If it's late and I can't sleep, I'll flip through the channels and watch an infomercial, then be convinced for that half hour that I really could use a juicer... or a swivel sweeper... or a steam iron... or a roomba... or some other crazy thing. And we won't even get started with the exercise infomercials. If I could lose weight just by BUYING exercise dvd's, I'd weigh, like, 10 pounds. LOL.

Well, nighty night! Take care :-)

A little weekend update...

Work went well the other night, I guess. I didn't want to be there, but what could I do. I didn't cry ALL DAY, until about 9:30pm, when I knew I had to start getting ready for work. I walked out in the living room and figured I'd sit and watch some of the football game with Russ. Aly started fussing, so I picked her up. As SOON as I did that, my eyes started welling up with tears!!! I mean, it was only ONE night to have to work, and 8 hours, but I still hated to leave my baby :-( I tried to hide the fact that I was crying, but I know Russ still noticed. I could tell out of the corner of my eye that he was looking at me.

A little later, I went back and put some makeup on and put my scrubs on. I walked back out in the living room and I couldn't even LOOK at Aly, or I'd start crying. I didn't really have to leave for work until about 10:40, but 10:30 rolled around and I said, "I have to go or I'm just going to start crying." Russ goes, "Aren't you going to give her a kiss goodbye?" I kissed her on the head and there the tears came again. Luckily I got it together before going into the hospital!! I don't feel bad though... everyone I talk to said they cried their first day back to work when they had to leave their babies too. It just sucks!! I asked Russ, "Do I REALLY have to go?!?!" LOL.

It was just so hard getting back into the swing of things again, dealing with staying up all night. That was the first night I've had to stay up in about 3 months (well, the first night that didn't involve me staying up due to a baby!)...it was ROUGH! But being that I only had an 8-hour night, it wasn't too bad. It was go-go-go all night, so that kept me awake.

The only good thing that happened as a result of me going back to work was that I got to go to Walmart buttcrack-of-dawn early, right after work. YAY! I missed that. I DESPISE going to Walmart in the afternoon, and that's what I've had to do while I was off. It takes twice as long in the store during the day, because of there being SO MANY PEOPLE. It never fails, everything I want to look at, there is someone standing in front of it taking their good ol time. Either that, or I get behind someone in one of those motorized chairs and can't get around them. OR...I practically get run into and/or over by about 10 people who think they are in a shopping cart version of a Nascar race. Ugh. I'll stop here. I could go on a rant about Walmart.

This past weekend WAS alot better than last weekend, I must say. Saturday, Russ and I took the baby over to my parents' house and we had steaks on the grill...yummy! I feel bad though... my mom's just kinda bummed. She's trying to keep her chin up about things, but I can tell she feels bad. She told my dad she feels like a burden to him...I felt so bad when he told me that. I'm going to go over there again tomorrow with the baby and help her with housework and whatever else she might need. I told her, "Gee mom, this is like role reversal. A few months ago after I had the baby, you were over MY house doing MY cleaning, watering MY flowers, and everything else." She was so good to me, and I'm glad I can repay her. Hmm.. maybe I'll make them dinner tomorrow. Sounds like a plan :-)

Well, I'm gonna try to get some sleep now...my eyes are burning. Before I go, here is a new slideshow of my little princess. She's getting soooo big, not to mention she's looking more and more like her daddy everyday!(And he LOVES that! In fact, my Grandma Jane (she's in the slideshow) has nicknamed Alyson "Russelina" because she looks so much like Russ! LOL) Aly's already 13 pounds, incase I didn't say that before in here. She'll be 12 weeks on Thursday... boy does time fly!

Have a great Monday :-)

Getting better...

Much better news this time around :-)

Well, my mom got home yesterday around 1pm and is doing great. She's getting around with a walker instead of crutches, and is doing so well with it. Not to mention, she's hardly having any pain! I took Alyson over there yesterday to cheer her grandma up :-) My dad's friend's wife made a big lasagna and this ABSOLUTELY YUMMY cheesecake dessert (fat free and calorie free! Yeah right...) so we all ate that. My aunt Becky and cousin Brenda came over too, with Bren's daughter Olivia. Olivia and Aly were playing together..it was so cute! (As much as Aly can actually 'play'... it was more like Aly sitting there staring at Olivia, while Olivia was smiling and bonking Aly on the head...lol)

In other news... tonight is my first night back at work. (sniffle sniffle...) I hate to leave Alyson, even though she'll more than likely be sleeping or ready for bed when I leave. She sleeps through the night, and doesn't usually wake up until 7 or 8AM, so the only thing Russ might have to do is feed her once. I really hate to do nightturns anymore, but right now they're the only things that work for me and the whole 'babysitting situation.' It just sucks because this is going to be the first night in awhile where I'm going to HAVE to be up all night. Ugh. Wish me luck, that I don't fall asleep at work. Oh well... at least it's only 1 night and it's only 8 hours. Then I don't go back until next Thursday. (I like this whole PRN work status alot better than being full time! I'm only doing 1 day a week for now.)

Well, I better go start dinner, then try to get a shower. Aly hasn't let me do that yet today...she's been SO AWAKE and just wants to eat and coo and look at things, then eat and coo and look at more things. :-)

Have a great day!

*sigh*

If I hadn't looked up in the sky to make sure, I would have SWORN it was a full moon this past weekend. This weekend wasn't the best.

Saturday was pretty uneventful... but SUNDAY was the bad day. For starters, my husband and I were supposed to go out on the boat but Alyson decided to have one of the fussiest days ever. (I think it was a delayed reaction from the 4 shots she had to get at the pediatrician's on Friday. He said she might get fussy.) I didn't even have time to take a SHOWER Sunday, let alone go boating. So I was kinda upset about that, and also because Russ had a work party at the marina for his employees later on that same day... I couldn't even make it to THAT. As a result, I was ticked, Russ was ticked.... blah blah blah. He called me later in the evening basically giving me a 'thanks for not showing up, that was rude and inconsiderate' comment on the phone, and then I proceeded to tell him rather sarcastically, 'thanks for not sticking around the house this morning and watching Aly so I could at least take a shower' along with 'i don't get any help from you'. Our conversation ended with him saying, "I'm staying on the boat tonight" and me saying "whatever." So then we hung up without even saying our usual 'I love you's'....and I cried. I thought of all this good stuff that I SHOULD have said to him (You know, you never think of these things until after...) and then he called back apologizing and saying he'd be home soon...and this time we said the I love you's.

Not even a half hour later, he called and said, "Um, honey... I'm gonna be here awhile." I asked why, and he said, "Some drunk motherf****r backed right into the back of my boat when they tried to leave the dock." Russ did manage to get their info even though the people were so drunk they could hardly walk or talk...they ran their mouths to Russ and ended up leaving. Russ had to call the cops and file a report, and then the cops went to go find the people because luckily some witnesses knew where the people normally dock their boat. (They don't usually dock at the same marina we do.) Russ said they did a decent amount of damage to the back of the boat. I haven't heard any updates as of yet... I haven't thought to ask Russ, due to having even MORE on my mind.

The 'more on my mind' being the fact that at 9:45pm Sunday (2 hours after Russ's bad news phonecall to me), my dad called and said, "I'm at the emergency room... your mom fell down the attic steps and broke her ankle in 3 places." ARGH! (Mind you, I still had no shower at this time, and had acquired a whole day's baby spit up on my clothes and hair.) I took THE fastest shower ever, and Russ and I left for the hospital around 10:30, once his mom got to our house to watch the baby. All I could imagine was that my mom was in the ER in excruciating pain, more than likely moaning and groaning and/or screaming. I mean, those attic steps are killers. They come down practically at a 90 degree angle, and I've always hated going up and down them.

So we got to the ER and she had already been admitted and was upstairs in a room. We got up there, and to my surprise, she was sitting in the bed just smiling and answering the nurse's questions as if nothing was wrong! If I hadn't picked up her sheet and looked at her leg, I'd have sworn she was perfectly fine. They had put a splint under her foot and wrapped her right lower leg in an ace bandage just for overnight, and she was to get surgery Monday morning. What surprised the heck out of me was that immediately after she fell, up to the time we got to her hospital room, she had NEVER HAD ANY PAIN WHATSOEVER! Was God smiling down on her, or WHAT!
She said that she just couldn't bear weight on it, and it 'felt tingly', so that's why she went to the ER. I guess what led up to this was that she and my dad had planned on taking my grandma to a music concert... my mom was coming down from the attic carrying blankets and chair cushions to take into the stadium. She went to grip the grab bar my dad put next to the steps, and just missed it and took a tumble. She said when she landed, her right leg 'seemed like it was bent funny.' (She cracks me up with her, uh, vivid descriptions.)

So this morning around 11am, she had surgery (an open reduction of the fractures), and had pins, screws, etc put in her leg. Everything went really well, and she received Demerol in recovery to help with pain, which she said was pretty bad right after surgery. Once she got up to her room around 2pm, the pain was completely gone, and was still gone when we left around 5pm! She looked so good for just having surgery. I'm just so happy things went great and that she's taking things well. She hasn't had to be in the hospital except for when she gave birth to me, and she's never broken any bones until now, so that's why it's still so crazy to see her laying in a hospital bed.... :-(

Tomorrow (Tuesday) she gets fitted for crutches and learns how to walk on them. When the surgeon came out to the OR waiting room and talked with my dad, he initially said he thinks my mom will be in the hospital until at least Wednesday, because "she'll be in alot of pain, so we'll be monitoring her... and she'll need to walk around on crutches." But seeing how well my mom is doing and that she's not having much pain, maybe she'll get to come home tomorrow if everything looks ok. We'll see :-) For now, I'll keep praying.

So that's all the bad news from the weekend. When it rains it pours, eh?

Such a lifesaver...

Since Alyson is getting bigger, I figured I'd try out her new bouncer. I had a lot to get done this morning, so I was looking for ANYTHING that would keep her attention for awhile. She's getting too big to just lean back in her boppy... she's a wiggle worm now, and so she slides right down it. Plus, I think she gets a little bored staring at the couch cushion!

So this morning I put her in her bouncer figuring she'd probably just start crying, and to my surprise, she LOVED it! She just sat there in awe staring at the toys hanging down, and I think she enjoyed looking in the mirror at the baby staring back at her :-) Here is a picture of her discovering the little toys!



She wore herself out and decided to take a little nap. Ahhh, at last, I had some 'me time.....'





Bouncers.... every mommy should have one.

Pittsburgh, here we come... or maybe not...

Sooo.... did everyone have a good weekend?

Was Monday as wonderful as ever? (sense the sarcasm there...)

My weekend wasn't bad. Saturday I just relaxed. I really didn't have any other option since I didn't feel that well, so I just kinda lounged around the house like a bum. I was hoping I'd feel better by Sunday though, because Russ and I had made plans to go to Pittsburgh. Thankfully I felt better by then!

Saturday night, Russ told me, "You know hun, we're gonna have to leave the house early in order to have enough time to spend there before coming back home." (We were going there in the boat to meet up with some friends.) By "early", I figured he meant 8, maybe 9am... but no. He wanted to be out of the house by 6:30am. 6:30! Aaaah! I am SO not a morning person!

This wouldn't have been SO bad, except for the fact that, like I said, I wasn't feeling so hot Saturday. My stomach was just majorly upset and I was, uh, "tossing my cookies" throughout the day. (And NO, I am NOT pregnant again...lol... I know some of you were just thinking that!) I just ate something that wasn't so agreeable to my stomach.

Anyway... as I was saying. I didn't feel well Saturday, which led to me staying up late-- as in 2am on Sunday late. I had set my alarm for 5:30am so I could 'wake up' a bit and then grab a quick shower. Lemme tell ya... when I finally fell asleep, it didn't seem like I slept but an hour, and my alarm was going off. I SO did not want to wake up. I think I remember saying a few choice words to the alarm clock, as I covered up my head with my pillow. The only thing that kept me awake was the fact that my husband (who had gotten, like, 8 hours of sleep...) kept pushing and poking me, saying "Honey... hey honey... hun... HUN! Get up! Wake up! We gotta be out of here at 6:30." To which I replied "Hmmmph... mrrrhfpp... mmmmm.... I don't wanna goooooooooo.....don't want to get up....sooooo tiiiiiiiiiiiired......" (This led to more poking and pushing from my husband...)

FINALLY, I drug my tired butt out of bed and made my way out in the kitchen to get a drink. Still rubbing my eyes, I look up to see one of the pillows from our couch sitting on the floor in front of the kitchen door. (We usually leave the door open since we have a doggy door in it, so the dogs are free to go in and out during the night.)

I picked up the pillow and immediately went in the living room to inspect the couches and do a pillow count. (The dogs have a very extensive history of pillow-chewing.) First of all, let me say that NORMALLY we have 3 pillows on each couch. But when I did the pillow count, there was a total of ONE pillow on both couches combined, plus the one I had just picked up. Already cranky and SO not in the mood for anything like that, I shouted "Those @$$holes! All the pillows were there 3 hours ago when I went to bed!!" I hear my husband say, "What? What happened?" and I told him, shouting some more expletives on my way out the kitchen door. I found one pillow on the deck right before the steps, and one on the steps. (Thankfully both in one piece.) THe other two were goners... out in the yard torn into a gazillion pieces. The pillows are stuffed with that poly-fill type stuffing, so it looked like it had snowed out in the backyard. Russ had a wonderful time picking it all up shortly after, and the dogs got a nice butt-whooping out of it.

So that started out Sunday morning with a bang.

Russ's mom came over around 7am to watch the baby, and we left the house about 7:15am. Once I had gotten a shower and was awake for awhile, I must say that I was actually looking forward to our little day trip.

We went through a nearby Lock and Dam (which was actually pretty neat, I must say!) then had another 20 miles to go before we had to go through the next lock. Russ called ahead to the next one to let them know we were on our way (makes the process a WHOLE lot quicker that way, if they can get the lock ready), and when they answered us, they said the lock was SHUT DOWN for repairs, and that it could either be a few hours or an all-day thing. Barges were tied up all over the place waiting to get through, so we knew it was going to be a long time before it'd be our turn. So there went our trip to Pittsburgh... we couldn't go any further down the river.

It still ended up being a nice day though... we anchored near a marina somewhere in PA (don't know WHERE we were though...)and just relaxed for a few hours, ate some lunch, and drank a few beers in the process. It was nice just to spend time alone with my husband, not having any distractions! Here are some pictures...

My hubby :-)



I was just trying to uh, take a picture of the scenery. Yeah, that's it...


View from the boat. I was trying to pretend the water was turquoise and we were surrounded by palm trees, but it didn't work...lol. Oh well, it was still a beautiful day!


Another shot of Russ...


Pulling up the anchor (which he had some trouble with because it was dug pretty deep! We thought we were gonna have to cut the rope and leave the anchor there!)


Me!


We got back to the marina in the early afternoon, and then some of Russ's buddies came down to hang out for awhile. After that, Russ and I had dinner with my parents. All in all, it was a great day, but I was never so happy to get home and GO TO BED!

So now we're planning another attempt at a trip to Pittsburgh, probably within the next few weeks. A bunch of people want to go, so it'll be nice to make a day out of it and just hang out, have a few drinks and RELAX! Not many more weeks of boating left, so we gotta enjoy it while we can. Next year it'll be nice since Aly will be older and we'll be able to take her with us :-)

Well, that's all for now. Have a great Tuesday!