party

Tonight we threw a surprise 30th birthday party for my friend and neighbor, Amy, over at Tom & Wendy's house (my other neighbors).  They had pizza and all kinds of goodies.  I snagged cutie Audrey with her cheese pizza face.  The party was a hit - Amy didn't have a clue!

It's been a very busy month and the next two months aren't going to be any better, so I figured I'd get a post in now while I can.  So what have I been up to - let's see.  Working, working, and uh, working.  Wedding and camping last weekend, wedding this weekend, 4th of July party next weekend, huge family birthday bash at Mom's the weekend after that.  Five days later leave for Holden Beach, North Carolina (yay!).  Home for a  week,  training class at work for a week after that, then off to San Jose, California for an SEO conference for work for a week.  My head is spinning!  The only thing keeping me in check is my excitement for both of my upcoming trips.  I get to see my long time friend, Ginny, and her sister Katie for the first time in 15 years and I'm so excited!  Beach bumming like the good ol' days when we used to do beach vacations with our families every summer.

And I'm really looking forward to my California trip!  I've never been and Jason is going with me.  We have a few days after the conference to do the touristy stuff so we're heading to San Francisco to see all the sites.  And we should have plenty of time in the evenings to see some of San Jose as well.  There will definitely be lots of photos generated from both trips!  If anyone knows of any sites or places we should visit let me know!

In other news, the fish pond is looking great now that we have it landscaped.  Just trying to rid of the algea problem.  We're attracting a lot of new birds and dragonflies - it rocks!  Poor Lois Lane, my jack russel mix, had a siezure on Friday.  She's done fine since, but we're waiting on blood work to come back this week to see what's going on.  And we're watching her closely to see if it happens again.  I hope I don't have an epileptic dog and hoping it was just a fluke...we'll see.  Luckily my brother-in-law will be staying at the house while we are away on our trips so he'll be able to keep an eye on her as well.

Sadly, that's about it for any updates.  So now I'll leave you with some photos (of course).

Mocha, Mom's 12 year old chocolate lab:

Backyard pond lily:

Baby mockingbird:

Obligatory Blue photo - accompanied by Hardy & Lois Lane:

Welcome 2009!  It's going to be an interesting year.  Portia turns 16 in a couple of weeks, Jason is working for himself full time and I'm vowing to get in shape - and am actually going to do it this year.  Business is booming, friends are plentiful and life is good!

Speaking of friends, we had a great turnout for the New Year's party last night.  I think we had about 30 people in the house.  It's been a while since we've thrown a New Year's party and we had a blast!  The night went so fast, as it always does when having fun.  We slept in until 9:30 this morning, cleaned up from the party aftermath and are focusing the rest of the day on vegging out and relaxing - a rare occurance for us.  I'm relaxing so much that I changed out of one pair of pajamas in trade for another pair of pajamas!  Can't beat comfort.

Some other miscellaneous updates.  Jason has started his new finance blog called Understanding Finances.  This is something he's been wanting to do for quite some time and I'm glad he finally got it started.  Also, Emily, my mother-in-law, started her own blog for her wonderfully delicious recipes.  You don't want to miss out on the Marvelous Recipes blog!  Both blogs are highly recommended...no bias at all, nope.  ;)

All the Mesker critters are doing well.  Pip the mouse is growing, but still isn't big enough to go in a cage.  We have discovered that Pip is a girl, so at least we can stop calling her s/he.  She prefers to keep to herself for the most part and mainly comes out at night to play and eat.  She's a bit intimidated by Hazel, one of the pet store mice who is the biggest girl in the cage, but I think in time they will get along just fine in the long run.  I can put my hand in the cage now without freaking them all out too badly, so progress is being made.  I hope to have more photos soon.

That's my update for now.  Happy New Year to all!  I hope 2009 brings you much peace and happiness.

Last night Jason and I went to an awesome Christmas party, hosted by Charlie & Christina.  Wow, they know how to throw a party!  Great food, a hilarious white elephant gift exchange and great company.  It was so nice to get out for a night and kick back and relax and catch up with old friends.

John & Jenn put together a very nice video slide show here.  It was great to see everyone again and we had a great time.  So good, in fact, that I think we're going to invite the same gang plus some out for a New Year's Eve bash at our place!

Every year I tell myself that I will start Christmas shopping in October and save myself from the stress of last minute brain wracking and penny pinching. And every year it comes down to two weeks before Christmas and I have barely started. This year is no different. Here it is, the 11th of December and I have one, yes ONE, gift purchased...and that is a stocking stuffer for Portia. (We did have one early Christmas family gathering already with Mama Rosie, so at least that portion doesn't fall into play in the next couple of weeks.) I really want to do my shopping online, I detest crowds, traffic and rude holiday shoppers, but if I don't get my butt in gear soon I'm going to miss my window for on time deliveries. It would help if I even had a clue of what I am getting for everyone, but I don't even have that.

I am also having difficulties in finding time to do everything that needs to be done. My Christmas tree isn't even up yet - usually it goes up the week after Thanksgiving. I did, surprisingly, manage to get my Christmas cards done this year - even counting 30 hand made ones....because I started in October. Success!

Jason and I were invited to three parties this Saturday and had to choose one...I hate missing parties and turning down gracious hosts who take it upon themselves to add even more to their December by hosting great parties. But the one we are going to will be a blast! We're even doing the White Elephant gift exchange - I love those! And best of all, they are free! I'm very bummed that we're missing our Flickr holiday party though. We always have such an awesome time with the gang, though I know there will be many photos of the festivities for us to see in the days following the party. Still no New Year's Eve plans yet, though I'm sure something will come up. It always does.

Even with all my complaining, in the end I am very grateful for our friends and family, good health and blessed lives. I wish everyone a safe and memorable holiday season!

After an hour and a half of play time there is a party room with a throne for the birthday kid to sit in (which Taylor was so excited about). After cake and icecream gifts are opened and one of the staff members takes care of keeping track of who each gift was from, giving the family time to just relax and enjoy the festivities. I really wish they had something like this when Portia was growing up...how much easier things would have been! Here are all of the photos from the party for anyone with little kids that may be interested in having a party here...and of course for any friends and family members that visit my blog to see photos of Taylor's big day!

Jeremy & Taylor - First trip down the big slide

Princess Taylor

Ahhh finally!  A nice long weekend!  With Monday being Memorial Day and a work holiday for me I decided to go ahead and take Friday off as well, even though we only work until noon.  I have lots of vacation time to use up and it's another day to sleep in.  PLUS I have to finish getting my house cleaned up because Jami & Larry, my dear friends from Indy, are coming to visit for the weekend!  *happy dance*  They visit every Memorial Day weekend and we always have a blast.  This year we are all heading to Mammoth Cave on Saturday with our local friends, John & Jenn to take a cave tour, then back to the house to grill out some dinner and hang on the back porch.

This brings to mind several years ago when Jami and Larry visited.  We had a rather large party that weekend.  The next day as they were getting ready to head home a nasty storm came through, tornado warnings and all.  So we're sitting out on the front porch watching them roll in with our neighbors when all of a sudden in the field across the street what seemed to be smoke appeared.  What we thought was smoke turned out to be a tornado forming.   Jason, Larry and Tom, being the "brave" boys they are, decided to run out to the field to check it out.  As soon as they got about half way to it they abruptly turned right around and started hauling ass back home, waving frantically and yelling for us to all get into the basement.  Turns out once they crested the hill of the field there was not one tornado, but two heading our way.   So down to the basement we go - 4 adults, 2 teenagers, 3 dogs, 6 rats, 1 rabbit.  Lucky for us the tornados were fairly small and popped back up into the air before they could cause damage...though they did touch down again in the neighborhood behind us.

As if that wasn't enough Kentucky excitement for Jami & Larry, on their way home just 30 minutes from their house bad storms were moving through the Indianapolis area.  Once again they had to flee to cover when a tornado came barreling down the interstate towards them!  So now we are always sure to check the weather closely before they come and visit.  My fear is this year John will be with us also...which brings about a whole other realm of stories for another time!  ;)

So I haven't blogged in almost a month now...that's what holidays will do to you! Even as I sit here now there are a bazillion things I should be doing, but procrastination is my specialty. This week has been insane. I had training all week for work, Friday night was Jason's company party (where Jason won me a gorgeous new gold/diamond necklace - yay me!), yesterday was Christmas with Mama, today is Christmas with Mom, Dad and the entire Parson clan, and tomorrow is Christmas Eve service at church and then Christmas with Jason's family. By Monday night we'll be all pooped out. Then Friday it's Christmas with Celeste who will be visiting until New Year's Day. Luckily for us we're on vacation for the rest of the year.

Also during all of this we had all the carpet torn out upstairs and replaced with Pergo...and loving it! It was a pain to be shifting furniture and dealing with all that along with all of the above, but it's done and it looks fabulous! Bye-bye allergies!

And of course Christmas is always a good time for photos...all Christmas photos of the gang can be found here.

Merry Christmas!