Ahhh....Oregon

We had a friend visit us this fall:

Yummy, huh? In case you can't tell how big it is, here's my piggie friend for comparison:

My piggie is bigger than my thumb. Spidey was somewhere between a nickel and a quarter... but he was just as thick as he was wide! I just can't wait until all his little babies join us this spring...

Merry Christmas!

Despite some lingering teriyaki tummy issues and a headache that I am also blaming on the Chinese food, we had a good Christmas!

Caleb likes his new Santa-dog...

Enough to eat it!!

Come on, Mom, let me have it.

Time to go play chow-the-santa. Merry Christmas everybody!

A True Story

Well, it's just after midnight, and not surprisingly, I can't sleep. So here's a little story about why things around here haven't quite settled down yet. Literally. Oh, and by the end of this post you'll know me a little better. Fair warning...

'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.

The fake log fireplace had been lighted with care
In hopes that some warmth would soon fill the air.

And Caleb was settled all snug in his bed
While visions of rawhide bones danced in his bed.

The Christmas Eve service had gone off with no hitch,
So I had just sat myself on the couch to cross stitch.

When up from my tummy there arose such a clatter
I sprang from the sofa to see what was the matter.

My insides were churning so violently
I knew there was something very wrong with me.

I ran down the hall, my heart beating with fright
To the bathroom at last, a most welcome sight.

I leaned over quickly and with one massive heave,
I sadly watched my dinner violently leave.

As Caleb looked on, his ears perked with concern,
I tried to make sense of this unwelcome turn.

"What happened?" I wondered. "What could I have ate?"
Then I remembered my dinner at Eden's Gate!

My lonely holiday had seemed the perfect time
To take a night out for a solitary dine.

For knowing he hates it, and not wanting to be rude,
I wait till Andy's out of town for Chinese food.

They treated me like royalty, a girl on her own:
A free appetizer they said was home grown.

That dish which I fondly recalled finger-lickin
Was now named "That foul, cursed Teriyaki Chicken!!"

And now, hours later, I sadly comprehend
That I'll remember this Christmas as the night with no end.

For who could forget retching with all of my might?
Happy Food Poisoning to all, and to all a good night!!



Merry Christmas everybody! (Uh...I really do mean that, despite current conditions...)
Merry Christmas! :)

Confessions of a closet introvert

Everybody wonders what's going on out here in Oregon while Andy's back in Indiana. Believe it or not, I've always been a little introverted (try to contain your shocked expressions), and I really enjoy the occasional stretch of alone time. Wonder what happens when I'm here all by myself? Watch and learn. Just for the record, I'm not bragging. But you asked what I do all day, so here's today's "Andy-was-gone-and-I-had-no-obligations" log:

11:00 AM- wake up. Now, before you judge, remember two things: 1) I have a nasty cold and took a nice dose of Nyquil before I went to sleep, and 2) this was at 2 a.m. when I gave up on falling asleep on my own. (I tried to go to bed at 11 o'clock... read a book for an hour and wrote a story for another 2 hours, but had to give up and take a sleep aid.)

11:15 AM- laundry. Sorted the wash and put a load in. Great fun.

11:20 AM- let the dog out, fed the dog, readied my BIG OL' JUG of water for the day. Considered eating. Took a drink instead.

11:25 AM- exercise time. Normally on a Saturday I would have gone to a step aerobics class in the morning, but I slept through that a long time ago. Plus, still feeling a little sickly, I don't feel ready to exert quite that much energy. I settle for 20 mintues of Dance Dance Revolution Workout instead. Without a whole lot of jumping. I'll do more tomorrow.

11:55 AM- laundry. hang it up, put another load in. I called Andy to cheer myself up, but he didn't answer.

12:15 PM- having failed to get Andy on the phone, I head for my next-best chance ot cheering up- out to the mailbox. Maybe I'll get a Christmas present! Here's where I make a confession. While I wholeheartedly believe that America as a whole has gotten completely out of control with materialism and totally lost the true meaning of Christmas, I'm not gonna lie: I love presents. Seriously. It's great to be with family, and I feel warm and fuzzy about the baby Jesus and all that. But I feel warm and fuzzy anytime I think about what an amazing thing God did for me, and I enjoy being with my family any time of year. But at Christmas, come on. I get totally psyched when there's a mystery package to unwrap. Who knows what treasures await me? Yummies? Fuzzies? Toys? Sparklies? Electronics? (I am married to Andy, you know.) I can't help it. I'm like the worst five year old you've ever seen. Dangle a present in front of me and watch me dance for it. Now you know my secret. I am desperate for presents and surprises. To love me is to gift me. So anyway, I'm off to the mailbox in high hopes of Christmas cheer. Stupid mail lady didn't go yet. Empty box! Curses!

12:20 PM- no luck with talking to Andy or getting surprises in the mail. Time to go to the last resort: Food. Lunch time. Before you call me a dangerous emotional eater- pounds I've lost since Andy's been gone: two. I'm actually gonna LOST weight this holiday season! (And put it all back on when I go back home in January, but whatever.) Lunch is leftover nachos from last night and an orange, accompanied by a chick movie. I watch girlie movies when Andy's gone. This is the only time I ever do this... and yet I don't know why. I hate chick movies. So unrealistic. And rather stupid.

12:45 PM- doorbell. Neighbor. Darrell brought me a Christmas present!! The day is saved.

1:20 PM-pause the movie: laundry time. There's always laundry. My life is laundry.

1:35 PM- time to get out the computer. Paperwork calls. Time to do the paperwork that I've ignored all week, pay some bills, and update lots of files. I do this every week. Sometimes it goes quick, sometimes it takes forever. Today, it takes forever. Old recorded episodes of Jeopardy! accompany me while I work. Yes, I tape Jeopardy!, and yes, I'm a complete dork. I am aware of this.

4:55 PM- paperwork is finally done. Laundry isn't. Back upstairs to more laundry... on the way home I snap this picture:















Someone is seriously bored with my Saturday. Normally we would have taken a really long walk by this time with Andy out of town, but it's cold, rainy, and nasty... and I still have a cold!


5:00 PM- practice time. Gotta get my parts down for church tomorrow and the Christmas Eve service. This is tedious. My shoulders hurt.


6:00 PM- download and listen to last week's sermon. I was too sick to go to church, so I stayed home. But I like to listen to them in order.


6:25 PM- hungry again. Seems only logical to keep working on that bag of chips, so I have some more nachos... why create more leftovers, eh? I watch the rest of the chick movie while I eat... pleasantly surprised that it was more about the guy than the girl. Still a chick movie, but I think this actor is funny while I really can't stand the female counterpart. I actually enjoyed this one. Not telling you what it was, though. While I eat, this sits next to me and stares at my plate:















7:00 PM- I'm tired, but can't go to bed yet. Come on, awake for less than eight hours? I'm pathetic, but not that pathetic. I figure I'll watch another movie, win this game of Solitaire that I'm playing on my laptop (yes, while I'm watching), and then think about bed. (Awake for nine and a half hours is completely acceptable.)

8:30 PM- oh my goodness, the movie is over and I'm still trying to win the same game of Solitaire. (It's a sickness.) Put another movie in...

8:35 PM- perfect time to paint my nails...

8:45 PM- ...and continue watching the movie and playing Solitaire while the nails dry.

10:00 PM- NOW I can go to bed.

10:05 PM- I'm not even going to try. I take a Tylenol PM.

10:10 PM- Hey, why don't I post a blog that shows just how pathetic my day was?

10:40 PM- finish blog, and realize that while I didn't leave the house today, I still accomplished a lot. I did, after all, finish all my laundry and all my paperwork. I'm ready for church in the morning and for the services on Sunday. I didn't attack the Christmas chocolate tin. And the kitchen is totally clean. (Forgot to put that in there- every time I finished eating I cleaned up the kitchen.) Besides, this is totally the only day I can do this sit-around-the-house thing. I'm working Christmas Eve, New Year's Eve, New Year's Day... I'm very productive this season. I'm not a total waste of space. I'm just relaxed. Ahhhh... solitude.

10:45 PM- that Tylenol is really kicking in. Good night!

Quick update

It's been a busy couple of months and I haven't updated for a while! Here's what's been going on the last few weeks:



Andy made a visit back to Indiana in August. He was home for grandpa Bently's hundredth birthday! Papa George turned 100 on August 7. After a steak dinner at the Cork n Cleaver everybody went back to his apartment to enjoy some cake and some chit chat. We're so proud of Papa!



Andy also visited the rest of his family, my family, and his friends in the area. He stayed a few days at Mike and Amy's and met who is officially the cutest puppy in the world- immediately after Caleb, of course- Mocha. She's brand new! Apparently they had a lot of fun wearing her out by playing with her. They also went to a race day at Mike's track, which was a big success.



In September we had a great trip to California to see my old band buddy Bill play with Ceili Rain, his new band. It was the first time we saw Ceili Rain in concert and it was fabulous. It was great to see Bill wailing away up on stage again doing one of the things he does best. For my birthday, Andy got me a computer and (with some help from his dad) a telescope. We've only had one or two opportunities to use it thanks to Oregon's fabulous fall weather, but the nights we got to use it were great. Cold, but great. Mom and Dad also came out for a few days and we had fun hanging out, enjoying the local cuisine, and of course watching football. While we were shopping in Woodburn we had a typical Mennonite-game experience. We were walking down the sidewalk and who should we bump into but Joshua Miller- our friend from Middlebury and First Mennonite! It's funny that you can even play the game all the way out here in Oregon.



October kept us busy getting ready for a marrage retreat our church hosted at the end of the month. It was great to both be working on a project together! I helped lead worship with a couple of our friends and Andy ran the sound for the event. There was a great turnout, especially considering that this was the first year the retreat was held.


Other than that, we haven't been doing too much besides hanging out with friends, band practices, bible studies, worship practices, Christmas practices, extra massages, shopping at IKEA, watching the Colts...oh, and working, eating, and sleeping...I guess we've been a little busy.



I added a link on this page to some more of our pictures! They actually go all the way back to 2003 because of a little organizational project I've been working on, so you can see some of the things we've been up to for the past few years. Including that little wedding thing we had!

Caleb's walk

Andy is in Indiana for a couple of weeks visiting family and celebrating his grandfather's 100th birthday. Since I am missing the festivities, I'm concentrating on keeping the dog from pouting the entire time- he HATES it when Andy is gone. So, I thought I would take him on one of our favorite activities- a walk along the railroad tracks downtown to the library. He loves that he can explore both sides of the tracks and the trees.

However, I didn't factor in that it was sunny and hot, so Caleb didn't want to do too much walking on the tracks themselves. He wandered off into the bushes where it was shady...I didn't notice until we got all the way to town (about 25 minutes of walking) that he had gotten into some burr bushes. Little fuzzy burrs were tangled in the hair on his legs, feet, belly, and face- he even had them stuck in between his toes. The poor dog was panting like crazy from the effort of walking with those mean burrs stuck in his paw pads.

I didn't have any choice but to walk him back home, by which time he was limping pathetically. I tried to cut out the burrs myself, but I stopped after 20 minutes, I had counted 250 burrs removed, and not made a visible dent in the appearance of the burr infestation, and the poor dog was so stressed he just whined the whole time. I gave in, called PetSmart (the only dog groomer open at 5:00 on Saturday), and took him down there for their professional help. I think they may have just given him a bath and roughly brushed the burrs out, but at least he was mainly burr-free by the time he got to me. He still had a few random burrs in his beard and on his belly, which didn't make me very happy about the $35 bill...but at least he could walk again.

Four days later, though, he's still limping...so we had to cancel our trip to the beach for a few days until his little tootsies don't hurt anymore. I don't think I did a good job of disctracting him from being depressed while Andy's gone- poor little dog!

Andy's Birthday

Andy turned 31 on July 21. I decided he needed a well-deserved break for the weekend so we headed off with, as always, the dog in tow.

We started out downtown Friday night at what is possibly our new favorite restaurant, Pasha's. For those of you who remember Nashville, it's the closest thing we can find to the House of Kabob. It's great Greek food served Kabob style- minus the sticks, of course. Anyway, we met our friends (who introduced us to the restaurant) for dinner and loved the fabulous food just as much as we always do. It was a great start to the weekend.

The most fun for me was that poor Andy had no idea where we were going the entire weekend. He probably didn't love that part as much. But anyway, after dinner we drove out to the base of Mount Saint Helens which, of course, made Andy think that we were going to see the mountain for his birthday. But, on Saturday morning, we headed up to Seattle instead to visit the Experience Music Project, which was a fun hands-on music museum. And, as luck would have it, was in the same building as Seattle's Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame. Well, if you know how geeky we are, you know we had a great time. We started out with lunch in the Revolutionary Bar and Grill, in the museum lobby. All the food was great, but these were the best fries we've ever had- they were garlic/parmesan cheese fries. Sounds disgusting, I know, but it was amazing! You'd have to try it to believe it. After that, it was into the museums. We saw Jimmy Hendrix's guitars, Nirvana's smashed up drum sets, Altaira's costume from Forbidden Planet, countless Star Wars costumes, and a life sized Robbie the Robot. They didn't allow cameras, of course, or we'd have a picture of Andy hugging Robbie, but we had to settle for my heroic efforts to keep the building from falling on the birthday boy. I think I did a great job. Seattle has yet to call me and offer their gratitude for preventing an architectural disaster.

Caleb wants to give Andy his present.

After a long day in Seattle we had another great meal at Bahama Breeze. Back at the hotel, we planned on exploring Mount Saint Helens the next day, but it was very cloudy. Instead, we had breakfast near the hotel, then headed back to Sherwood where we relaxed the rest of the day. Andy got to play with his new phone and I got to cross stitch...basically, our favorite kind of day.

VBS

In July I helped out with VBS at church. The theme was "Avalanche Ranch" and the kids were supposed to be on a wild ranch adventure all week long while they learned all these great attributes about God- God is Real, God is Strong, God is With us, God is Awesome, and God is Love. Anyway, we needed a cowboy to be the funny thing that teaches the kids all these things. The cowboy had to do lots of stupid stunts and things that make little kids laugh, but make adults roll their eyes at the stupidity of it all. So anyway, they needed a cowboy. Guess who?














One of the most fun skits was teach how God is Strong so we don't need to be brave and I had to act afraid of the "little doggie" that I was trying to rope. We used a funny little dog that belonged to one of the ladies at church. The skit was funny- me being afraid of this silly little furball, but it was more fun to bring her home to play with Caleb for a little while. Those two just played and played and played and played. It looks like Caleb is killing the little dog (Chloe) but she kept going back for more. Since Chloe was so tiny and fit perfectly into Caleb's mouth, she went back to church basically just a big ball of slobber. Yum.

And just in case you missed our vicious creature:

Family visits

In May, my aunts and uncles on my dad's side came out to the West Coast for a trip to preview some trip sites. Aunt Sandi and Uncle Bill run a tour company that takes people (mostly Amish people) all over the US to see all the sights. Anyway, they are planning a trip next year to the West Coast and that meant they stopped in to see us, and I got to spend some quality time with my aunts and uncles! In Portland we went to all of my favorite places- the Rose Garden, the Columbia Gorge, and a couple of my favorite restaurants- and saw the Japanese Garden, which was my first time there. (This picture is what the Rose Garden looks like when it's in bloom- not how it was when we were there because I forgot to take a camera with me the entire visit.) After Portland, we drove up to Mount St. Helens, which I was excited to see for the first time. Then we headed up to Seattle and had a great tour of the city with some other midwesterners and east coasters who couldn't figure out why people in Seattle dress like hippies. It was a lot of fun to see all those things, but it was more fun to hang out with my aunts and uncles, whom I've never really spent a lot of time with! We live so far away (Oregon, Indiana, and Florida) so it's a big deal for us to get together. I enjoyed getting to know them a little bit better and can't wait for them to come back out here next year- even though there will be a big van full of people that time. :)

Over Memorial Day I flew home to hang out with Mom and Dad. We did a lot of relaxing and had lots of fun. Of course, the only thing I remember from the entire trip is the infamous story of the groundhog. Groundhogs. (Animal rights activists and tree huggers, please stop reading here.) It all started when I had to kill a baby groundhog while I was walking in the woods. (Remember, baby groundhogs only grow up to be big groundhogs, which are basically the rats of the midwestern fields.) Later the same day, mom and dad's dog treed a big groundhog. Now, for those of you who don't know, groundhogs are just rotten. They serve no purpose except to ruin crops and create big holes in the fields that my dad has to avoid when he's riding horses or three wheelers- and we all know how endeared we are feeling towards those particular holes since dad's accident in April. Anyway, the usual procedure when the dog gets a groundhog up a tree is for dad to go after it with a gun and put the groundhog out of its hole-digging misery. However, dad was at work this day, so mom was kind enough to give ME the gun and send me after the giant rodent. Well, I've never shot a gun before in my life, so the outcome of this can only be predicted as disastrous. It was. A half a box of bullets and 27 shots later, the groundhog finally fell out of the tree, only to reveal 27 bullet holes and the fact that I had killed it with one of the first shots...I just kept shooting because it didn't fall out of the tree and I thought it was still alive. Turns out it was just stuck in the tree...and full of bullet holes. Yeah, I wouldn't be very good on a ranch out west. (I was going to post a picture of the groundhog but figured Andy wouldn't appreciate a bloody groundhog on his blog. If you want to see my massacre, by all means, I will email you the picture.)

While I was in Indiana, Andy's mom came out here to keep Andy company for a few days. They had a great time- lots of shopping all over Portland and enjoying the great late May weather that Portland has to offer. They went to the Portland Farmer's market and lots of the cool shopping that you can only do out here. They also got some cool lamps for the living room that look great and make my stitching a lot easier. I was alternating between a teeny tiny little lamp and an LED booklight when I wanted to stitch. MUCH better now.

Apparently, Caleb didn't like the fact that I was gone for so long. We get faces like this a lot- the spoiled little dog is only happy when BOTH his parents are in the house heaping love upon him. Oh well, he survived until I got back, just like he always does.

Summer Fun

Wow, the summer just flew by! It was pretty routine for us, but I'll try to update on some of the highlights. It will take a couple of posts, so bear with me.
We kicked off the summer with a quick anniversary trip to Cannon Beach. We packed ourselves and Caleb into our new car (Honda Fit- can't break the Honda tradition) and drove off to the coast. In the fuel efficient (and VERY roomy) car Caleb had the whole back half of the car to himself and loved barking out the windows at everyone that he saw. (That is the end of my Honda commercial.)

It was almost more of a vacation for him than it was for us- we spent a couple of nights at a pet-friendly hotel on the beach. A welcome basket was waiting for the dog with treats and water bottles but nothing extra for Andy and I- I guess we're just supposed to be happy with fresh towels. But we really did love the hotel - what was supposed to be a "peek" view ended up being a great view of the beach and haystack rock right from our room. And it was of course just comfortable enough for us to kick back and watch Survivor- hey, it was Thursday. Anyway, this was our view. Not bad for being the cheap seats! If we had only had a Goonie coin, we could have found the buried treasure. (5 points to the first one to validate that reference. (: )

The beach was great! Being early May it was very unpopulated. We were free to wander at will and let Caleb off his leash quite a bit. His favorite activity at the beach is to RUN. And RUN. And RUN. If you look close, you can see that he gets so excited running at the beach that he even goes airborne. He's rather tired the next day, but it seems to be totally worth it, because he does the exact same thing every single time he goes to the beach- runs until he practically collapses. Then he looks grumpy like this when we make him stop. But he especially runs if there are birds, which were absolutely covering Haystack Rock this day. Haystack Rock is the most prominent feature of Cannon Beach, and depending on where the tide is, you can climb up to the base and see all the little sea creatures in the tidepools. It is really fun- very colorful starfish and tons and tons of barnacles cover everything that is normally below high tide. The overzealous gaming protection people were standing out in front of the rock this day to keep people from climbing too far, so we didn't spend too much time there, but rather threw some blankets down on the sand and soaked up the view. Check out King Caleb with the wind blowing the royal ears- it was very windy and pretty cold, but very beautiful. The Oregon coast is one of those wonderful places where it is equally amazing in cloudy and sunny weather. Instead of plain stretches of beaches spreading out to flat water, there are rock formations and cliffs that make it very majestic to view. It's one of those places that I love to go- because I can look all around me, take a deep breath, and sigh with the wonder of God's creation. I feel so lucky to be living so close to this beautiful place!

Of course, our trip wouldn't be complete without having tried a few great coastal restaurants. We found my new favorite (in America) place for Fish n' Chips. And Andy had a great Tilapia that he's still talking about. A quick stop at the Tillamook Smoker Outlet and the Creamery and we were back home after our too short vacation. But it was great to get away for even a couple of days, and we had a wonderful time celebrating our anniversary and remembering our wedding two years ago on a very different beach. It's hard to believe we've been married for two years- it seems to have gone by so fast, but time flies when you have fun, eh?

It never rains, but pours

So, just when we thought things were moving calmly, smoothly along and the world was finally going to slow down a bit, it all comes crashing to a halt. On Satuday night I got a call from Mom that Dad had been in an accident. I know what you're thinking- oh, no: THE CALL. That's it, they only call when it's REALLY BAD. Which is exactly what I was thinking. Then Mom continued: "He was riding the three-wheeler..." Ok, stop. Again, I know what you're thinking- "Really? A Three wheeler? How old are her parents again? And I thought it was a real accident." Which is exactly what I was thinking. What was my dad doing racing around on a three wheeler at night? Well, I know my dad, so it wasn't that much of a stretch. But really, how much trouble could someone get into on a three wheeler? You can tell I've been out of the fields for a while, because it turns out- quite a bit!

So Dad was racing the dog (you have to know us for this to not sound funny) from the river back home. According to him, he was winning, which is probably important to the story. :) But, he hit a groundhog hole and went flying. Luckily for us, a neighbor saw the accident and rushed to his aid- put him in an ambulance and then contacted my mom. But, Dad did quite a number to himself- a broken collarbone, a broken rib (or ribs), a bruised spleen, a concussion, and a punctured lung. He's been in the hospital since Saturday night and everyone is hoping for his release tomorrow. But, he'll probably be out of the crane for a while- and most disappointing to me, no driving to Oregon! But that is a selfish way of looking at it. I am just grateful to God (and our neighbor) for watching out for my father and bringing him back to us alive- perhaps slightly slower for a while- but back to himself soon. Dad has never been anything but the healing force for all of us, so I am sure that he will use some of that strength to bring himself back to the fun loving, green-horse-riding, three-wheeler-racing guy we all know and love.

As if this weren't enough for us all to deal with, we got another call this morning that Grandma Kempf was in the hospital again- she had a fall that is still unexplained. Her head hurt her pretty bad but the doctors don't believe it was a stroke or anything that caused the fall. She's going to be in overnight for observation, but hopefully will go home tomorrow too.

In the midst of all this craziness, God is still faithful! Dad and Grandma will (hopefully) both be ok eventually, and people are pouring out of the woodwork with helps and prayers. And my massage clients have been very forgiving of my slight distractedness while I'm working. (I hope.) :) And instead of Dad driving out here to see Andy and I, I am flying back in May to help out a bit, hopefully play with a new baby horsie, and generally make myself feel better that my Daddy is ok. Meantime, this is how Caleb and I felt when we found out that Grandpa was sick:
Oh, but we'll make it too...Dad will be back to let furry doggie sit on his lap soon enough.

I told you not to expect much!

I told you I wouldn't be posting very often. I'll try, I'll try! We've had a very busy few weeks here at our house! I got a new job that began with some crazy hours- the job in itself was taking a couple of massage shifts for a girl who was getting tired out and needed to back off. Well, right after I started, her shoulder completely gave out and I had to fill in much more than I expected! Long story short, for the past four weeks I've done over 20 hours of massage each week. I don't know what you all were thinking when I went to massage school, but that wasn't in the plan! I'm heading back to my nice 10-15 hours a week starting next week. I can't wait. If those crazy hours kept up, my own arm was going to be in a sling!

Andy has kept busy at work and been fabulously understanding of my tiredness and lack of cooking. He even understood when he came home and found me already in bed at 6:30...twice...and yes, I slept through the night, and overslept the next mornings too!

For Easter, I spent a lot of time at church- I played the keyboard for the band/choir songs which meant I was at four- count 'em, four- Easter services. Three services (the usual worship team commitment) is kind of a lot, but ok...add that fourth one, and it's pretty tiring! Luckily, our friends rescued us for dinner. Knowing we were going to be exhausted, they invited us to have Easter dinner with them and their family. We had lots of good food and lots of good fun, and learned how to play Pass the Pigs. I forgot about that little gem from the band bus.

I would find some pictures for you all, but to be honest, I'm too tired to search. Sorry. There's nothing interesting going on anyway! Later, all you gators!

Our kid

If anyone is going to be reading this blog, you have to understand about our kid and who he is. That's right, it's time to admit it: Our dog is so spoiled that he's just referred to as "our kid". At least we don't call him "our baby" and dress him up in little sweaters and stuff, but yes, we give him much more attention than we should. He shares the bed (mostly Jozi's side) and stares at us during meals hoping we'll toss him something. When we cook he stands at attention waiting for us to drop something so he can pick it up. (Who needs a vacuum cleaner? I haven't mopped my floor for two years.) His favorite words are goforawalk and wannatreat and goforaride and all we have to do is LOOK at the drawer that his leash is kept in and he goes ballistic until he is out the door, strapped securely (HA!) to his owners. I mean, look at this:
Seriously! Who can not love that face?

Ok, I admit it, he doesn't look like that anymore. You have to understand I got Caleb from the pound when he was a wee six weeks old. From the beginning, he was a very good dog: he came intinctively house-trained- he went to the door and whined anytime he had to go out. He stuck his chewing to the toys I gave him (only two shoes ever met their untimely end to his gnaws) and he never barked. Good boy!
Everybody loves him!! (As Lisa is showing so beautifully.) Anyway, he's been with me (and us) ever since then. Caleb moved from Anderson to Tennessee (and five different places in Nashville) to Oregon (and three different places in Oregon) and he has been such a good boy through all those moves.
He loves to travel and always finds the cushiest part of the car to lay on. He hangs out in hotel rooms whether we're there to babysit him or not. And even though he's almost nine, people still think he's probably three or four because of all his energy and friendliness. Oh yeah, also, everyone he meets is his new best friend. He thinks. Most people do agree.


This summer we had a very bad scare. Our lovable hyper little dog stopped jumping, running, playing, and eventually walking and eating. He just stared at us from wherever he was laying down and if we made him take a step he cried each time he put his foot down. The vet told us he had a subluxated disc, and we could take a chance medicating him and hope it went away, but if not he would need surgery. "Surgery" to us means, "Put Caleb to sleep" because much as we love him, we certainly don't have the money for something like that. So, we gave him his medicine and prayed. For a full week he was confined to an airline crate where all he could do was shift his position about three inches either way. We had to carry his crate outside, open the door to let him do his business, then put him back in the crate and carry him back in. The next week, he could walk from the crate to the door, but we had to carry him up and down the stairs. The next week, he was allowed to be out of the crate, but only when we were in the room to make sure he didn't have too much fun. After four or five weeks of recovery, Caleb came through like a champ, and is none the worse for his episode! In fact, he's even more energetic and hyper than before. Praise God! I know He knows the number of hairs on our heads, but He also cares for those we care for, and He took care of Caleb when we thought we might lose him. He gave us a Superdog!!


Well, I think that is enough gushing about our dog. I just figured you were going to hear enough about him (and probably see lots and lots of pictures too), so I better let you know who he was. And now I hear snoring from the next room, so I better to wake him up and play.

I just want to warn anyone who might be looking at this blog...I am historically the WORST person ever for keeping things updated, keeping in touch, following up on details, etc etc. But I thought I'd give it a try...jump on the bandwagon with everyone else. So if you check back here often, try not to be disappointed if you just keep seeing the same thing over and over and over again- it's because I am too lazy to update! But hey...this sure beats MySpace and all that nonsense that you have to look at there...
Here's a picture of the happy couple (awww, ain't we sweet) this Christmas at Andy's mom's house. Don't ask why you see it on here twice. It's such a happy picture! We're happy because we just got a box and a video game. And also because we're basking in the glory of our love...
Live with it, we're happy. Don't like the yucky love stuff? Better go somewhere else!
Ok, I'll try to tone it down...