A New Tradition is Born

We laugh about the scene in "A Christmas Story" at the end when they go to eat Peking Duck on Christmas Day because the Bumpus' dogs ruined their dinner. Tonight we were Ralphie's family, minus the Bumpus' dogs.

My brother was supposed to come out from Wimberley, but earlier this afternoon let me know that he and his wife were not going to make it. We were going to do fajitas for dinner. Called Los Cucos only to find that they closed at 3PM, so no fajitas. Grrr. I still have a couple errands to run - pick up Craig's prescriptions, get a few last minutes stuff for breakfast and dinner tomorrow, and run to the Post Office to mail stuff once more. (God bless the automated mailing center!) Catherine and Craig explore dinner possibilities while I am gone. I suggest that it would be nice if I did not have to cook or clean dinner! (hint hint!)

Upon my return, we review the options and decide to go to Sakura, a Japanese steak and sushi place nearby. Gary really does not want to go, but we remind him that he said we could decide what to do, so he grumbles but gets changed. ;-P At the restaurant he is somewhat frustrated by the menu, not being familiar with this type of food, so Catherine and I suggest things to try. He ends up ordering hibachi chicken and shrimp, and even trying a little of Catherine's sushi.

In all it was great fun, watching the guy prepare our food, but even more fun watching the faces of the little kids at the table next to us. There were 4 of them, none older than maybe four years old. One of the girls had Shirley Temple curly blond hair, a bee sting mouth and huge brown eyes. She was the most fun to watch as the chef prepared our food. Her eyes almost popped out of her head!

So we have Chinese food the day before Thanksgiving and now Japanese steak and sushi on Christmas Eve. Tomorrow we will do our Christmas day ritual and go see a movie - probably Marley and Me. Back to straightening and wrapping. Oh another tradition in our family http://www.noradsanta.org/en/home.html (Tracking Santa) I remember listening for this on the radio long ago and far away. Sigh!

Ho Ho Ho!!!

Let the Holidays Begin

The last week of school before vacation is always challenging. Kids are hyper and teachers are worn out. After 26 years, not much has changed there. ;-) But all in all, not a bad week. We managed to keep the kids relatively occupied with a review, a test and then a 2 day computer activity. They were researching the stages in the life cycle of a star and creating a PowerPoint. They may not have finished their PPT's, but they sure spent quite a bit of time reading about all the pictures they were finding. And in the end, that is what mattered really.

They finally understood my fascination with these sites, too. During the unit, I would pull up photos or video clips that were pertinent to the topic of the day. One kid remarked that I must spend hours looking this stuff up. I agreed that I did, but I thought it was really cool stuff. Cue the eyeroll from students. Their teacher is trying to get us to do something "educational". Warning, danger Will Robinson! Danger! For two days, however, I was happy to hear "Hey Miss, look at this! This is cool!" and "Hey Miss, did you know...?"

So now I can concentrate on finishing the holiday preps. Finish decorating the tree, finish the outside decorations, finish the shopping, send out the cards, and most importantly CLEAN THE HOUSE!!! We have not had our housekeeper for several months now, and it shows. Even though she only came every 2 weeks, knowing she was coming helped us keep things picked up for the most part. We have gotten so lazy, there are piles of junk everywhere.

We are staying put for the holidays this year. I miss visiting with family either in Illinois or Florida, but honestly, I would rather go when it is not holiday time. It is just less stressful for everyone and we are not driven by a set schedule. And the weather is nicer everywhere later in the year. It is always so unpredictable, maybe snow and cold in Chicago, rain in Florida...even here in Houston. But at least we are at home. I can deal with that. But I still miss the family!

Holiday Spirit

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Happy Thanksgiving

Trying to think of something clever to say, and it just is not there. But as I sit here this morning watching the news, the dogs, and the kids start to wake up and come down, I am reminded once again of all that we do have to be thankful for. My list is pretty mundane and common, and includes many people who make differences in my life. It really makes me much more thankful, because they are there always, most times in the background, but coming to the foreground sometimes when least expected.

Everyone is here for the day, and we are going out for the traditional dinner. I figured I could do the official cooking at Christmas when everyone is home for more than 48 hours. I will miss the smell of turkey and pumpkin pie baking, but only for about 15 minutes! :-)

Happy turkey day, happy football day!

It Is Official!

Summer has left Houston! Last night at Chris' baseball game I wore jeans, a short sleeved t-shirt, and a long sleeve light weight jacket. It is always colder at the Bear Creek fields than home. I had to go back to the car to get two blankets I had in the back, and I still could not get warm!

It was down to the upper 40's - officially cold!!!

Nothing New

I just have to post something because seeing Abby's picture at the top still makes me kinda sad. I just wish we had more time with her, for the money we spent trying to get her well. Sigh.

Duke is now the king of the household. He seems to be OK now. He had his space intruded upon this weekend when Tucker came to visit. Old dogs and puppies do not really get along well at all. Old dogs just tolerate! He enjoyed being up on the bed, where Tucker could not bother him, most of all.

Chris and I have Tuesday off of school, because of the election. Lots of our schools are polling places, so the district decided to make it an inservice day. I have enough hours to get time equivalency, so I get the day off too! Don't know what we will do. Probably be lazy! Maybe watch Harry Potter 5 again and finish reading HP 6, the Half Blood Prince.

And thanks to Sharon, I did not forget to change my clocks. I would have, had I not read her blog this morning! Thanks Sharon!!! I will enjoy daylight in the morning once again, but darker earlier at night I dislike. Ah well, days will start to lengthen soon enough!

Till next time - failure is not an option!
(I was watching Apollo 13 tonight!)

Happy Trails Abby

We will miss you!

We had to let Abby go this afternoon. Sad day.

Saturday this past weekend, she threw up a couple times and was coughing a bit, but I did not attach a lot of concern to it. She was still acting OK. Thinking maybe she swallowed something and its caught in her throat. Give it a bit of time to work itself out.

Sunday she threw up a few more times and her breathing was starting to sound noisy. Monday morning it seemed a little worse, so I made a vet appointment for after school. Get to the vet's and they do a couple chest x-rays and tell us we have to go to a vet specialist. Ruh roh, that means either they don't know what to do next or can not deal with whatever is wrong.

At the Vet Specialists, they confirm that Abby has pneumonia, and that she also possibly has megaesophagus. This could have led to the pneumonia. They give me some antibiotics and a medicine for her stomach and schedule me to come back Tuesday to recheck Abby. I get a round of antibiotics down her Monday night, she manages to keep the food down, and I get a round of antibiotics down her Tuesday morning, but she is not very hungry, eating only two teaspoonfuls of food.

Back at the vet specialist office Tuesday afternoon, Abby's temperature is up, her breathing is more labored than yesterday, and her nose is now sticky yellow instead of sticky clear mucus. The vet tells me Abby has to be admitted to the "doggie hospital" so she can get 'round the clock care. They will e-mail me updates and we can also come visit Abby if we want.

This morning I had not gotten an e-mail, so I call the vets. They pass along that her temperature is down, and she appears to be a little more stable than last night. She is still throwing up saliva and mucus, though. About an hour or so later a student brings a message to my room telling me to call the vets NOW. I have a class and we are getting ready to use the laptops. If I can get them working I can steal a minute or two and use my cell phone to call Gary.

Gary is at the vets already. He was going to check on Abby at lunch. He reports that they were trying to call me as he got there. Abby took a turn for the worse in the last hour and she is deteriorating rapidly. Gary says she does not look good, and does not think she even recognizes him. After a short conversation we decide it is time. He stays while they administer the injection. Says at one point Abby maybe did recognize him and tried to get up and move closer to him. And shortly thereafter she is gone.

My class was working quitely so I found Chris, in the classroom down the hall, and let him know. He has a few teary moments then, and a few more when I see him in the hall between classes. By the end of the day he is focusing on the positives in the situation, but still feeling very sad because he did not get to say goodbye to Abby. None of us were ready for this, we all were thinking that she would pull through the pneumonia and would be back home in a few days. We will go pick up her ashes from the vets in 5 days and we will let Chris decide what to do with them to say goodbye.

I am glad she had some very good care through this. I am glad it all progressed quickly. I can not stand to watch pets suffer. She had a good life, although not as long as she should have.

Happy Trails, Abby. I know you are now running around in a field chasing those squirrels that you loved to terrorize in our yard! We love you.

Update: Gary picked up her ashes, collar, and leash Friday afternoon. The Vet Specialist clinic also made us a cast of her pawprint. We received cards from our own vet and the vet specialist clinic. Chris has arranged her collar, leash, pawprint cast, cards and box of ashes in a little memorial on the mantle. We will leave it there for a few days. Made me cry all over again to look at it.