A poem by DQ

My Cats

My cats are very fat.  One is very smelly.  Another is really grumpy.

Even through they are all of those things, I love them.  No matter what.

It must be close to Spring

I just took this picture of the sprinkler going in the yard next door.  Unfortunately you can’t see it very well.  Unfortunaltely what you can see well is the two slats missing from our porch swing.  Note to self:  Fix that.   Our neighbor has an obsession.  He’s obsessed with watering lawns.  I’m rather certain that most of the water waste in the Denver metro area is due to this man’s crazy obsession with watering.  It has been in the 70’s this week and to be honest even we have taken the hoses out of hibernation and watered the backyard a couple times.  Our neighbor however has been watering the “yards” (he and his son live next to each other) since 7:45 a.m.  It is now 1:32 p.m. amd it doesn’t look like it’s going to end soon.  Last summer his frenetic watering was almost comical (you know, if you don’t think about the global effects of such overindulgence) as he would water only during the hours they tell you NOT to water.  And not just some of those hours (10-6.)  ALL of them.  EVERY day.  And mowing 4 times a week.  Wow.

Anyway, enough about him…The kids and I are going to start seeds in the house this year to see if we actually get some tomatoes to ripen and grow before it freezes.  We also plan to start some perennials for the new front yard re do and for a flower bed in the back.  And speaking of kids, DQ now has bangs.  She loves them and I think it’s the most exciting thing that happened to her this year.  I know this will change though as she has a birthday coming up and she’s getting a certain something she’s been wanting for a very long time.  Here’s a picture.  I think we may be more excited than she is.   Enough rambling.  Time to do some cleaning.

No, I’m not the latest thing to go under in this economy…

I’m still here.  Explanation: When we returned home from our vacation to Phoenix over the holidays we found that our computer died…alone…without us there to hold it’s…power button?  Anyway, we needed to save and wait for a certain check from the government to get the computer we wanted to replace the old desktop.  In the interim we were using a VERY OLD laptop running Windows 98.  Yes, old.  All that to say there was no way to upload pictures and it took forever to type out anything of length.  We got our new laptop last weekend and I love it.  Love it, love it, love it.  BUT I still don’t know how to upload pics because as far as I can tell there is no card reader, and without a card reader I need to call in the help of my in-house technical staff: Pip.  Pip has been busy lately, so I still don’t have any pictures for you.  Sorry.  Also, remember to back up your hard drive onto an external hard drive, because even though we did that, we had not done that since before our trip to Nashville.  This means that every picture from Nashville that I did not post to this blog is lost (or on our old hard drive that we can’t get to.)  Let this be a lesson to you.  And me.  I’ll be back with full color posts soon.  I am still alive.  Thanks for checking.

The Christmas Card picture

I thought I’d share with you all the attempt to get a photo of the kids for Christmas cards.  A better title for this post would be “Why can’t my kids be serious?” or “The many faces of DQ and TM”.

And the winner for Christmas card photo 2008 is…..

Back to summer…

So I’m slightly pathetic in the follow through department.  It’s a flaw.  I’ll admit it.  Moving on…

On a particularly hot day we went to check out the Opry Mills Mall where the have a Gibson guitar factory.

Pip was in heaven and while he was dreaming, I took DQ around the rest of the mall.  We were walking towards the food court to find some lunch when all of a sudden an explosion of pink blew us over as we walked past one of the stores.  I willed DQ not to notice, but alas she did.  There was a store (Libby Lu) that was completely devoted to spreading the message of the Sharpay in High School Musical.  That message being, “I want more”.  I thought she was going to hyperventilate and because I’m a sucker we went inside and I got her a replica microphone of the one Sharpay uses in the movies.

After the mall we went across the street to the Grand Ole Opry.  Not being big country music fans we didn’t shell out the cash to go see a show, but we were able to walk around.  While walking around we noticed a small gathering of people and a film crew.  Knowing this may mean we get to see someone famous we went to take a look.  They were filming for the finale of the show Nashville Star and this guy looked like he might be someone so I took a picture.  Right after I snapped the picture another guy tried to take one and the “lady with the walkie talkie” told him no pictures were allowed.  HA!  I really felt like gloating and sticking out my tongue at her but I refrained.  The guy in the picture is Coffey.

On the same property is the Gaylord hotel which is huge and very beautiful.  Here are some pics from there:

Other than all the sightseeing we enjoyed a lot of leisurely time spent with these little cuties:

I mean really.  Isn’t the cuteness too much?  There was a lot of guitar playing and singing:

And fighting spiders:

We spent evenings chatting over margaritas, wine and cookies while spotting fireflies flitting through the yard.  We watched good movies and bad movies and spent time soaking up the southern sunshine at the YMCA pool.  Before we left Jen had to make sure we saw what she calls “The Redneck House”. 

It was truly a sight to behold and you really can’t get the full effect until you see it big.  Go ahead and click on the photo to see it full size.  Just…wow.  I’m not sure if that thing in the front is a homemade pool or what, but it certainly goes well with all the animal heads and confederate flag.

We were very sad to leave and spent the better part of the drive home just being morose.  After the experience with the hotel on the way to Nashville, we decided to drive 15 minutes off the freeway to stay in a Hyatt Place in Overland Park, Kansas on the way home.  It was absolutely wonderful and $30 cheaper than the dumpy one on the way there!  Seriously, if you ever have the choice to stay in a Hyatt Place you should.  They did not pay me to say that.  I wish they did, but that is just pure customer satisfaction right there people.

In Hays, Kansas we stopped at a McDonalds to get sundaes and parked in the parking lot to eat them.  When we rolled the windows down a fly flew in and then it began…TM started screaming like the fly was in his face making death threats and this alarmed DQ so much that she joined in the scream fest.  Pip and I just looked at each other in the front seat and laughed because really?  A fly?  After said fly left our car to go terrorize some other innocent citizen, they both stopped and DQ said to TM, “It’s ok TM, you don’t have to tell me that I’m welcome in your world.”  I take this to mean she will join him in his world if his world invovles anything having to do with dramatics and completely over the top reactions to mundane things.

Such a good time.  We loved it so much that we plan to go back next summer and bring more friends with us.  May you all be so lucky to have a Miller family in your lives.

More Halloween before moving on and one for my mom

I realize we’re into November now but wanted to put these pictures up because my kids are freaky (a little too freaky for my taste, but whatever).

TM grew our pumpkin this year (we only got one) and we saved some of the seeds for next year.

Before:

And After:

And for my mother:  I cleaned out the fridge today.  I knew you would be proud.

Now we can have Thanksgiving without any discussion of the refrigerator.  Also, now the whole world knows the contents of my fridge.

Happy Halloween

Yes, I finished the costumes.  Here they are.  This was last Saturday night.  We’ll call it the dress rehearsal for tonight.   DQ is the “Spider Princess” (her own creation).  I found this great spider web print red satin at JoAnn for her skirt and the crown was a lucky find at Target dollar spot bins.  TM is clearly the aforementioned skeleton.  May you all eat way too much candy for your own good.

Let this be a lesson to you

If a child in your life should ever choose Inspector Gadget as their Halloween costume GO WITH IT!  I did not.  “Why don’t you choose something else?”, I said.  “It will be so hard to find a trenchcoat in a size 5.  Let’s try something else”.  He chose a skeleton and I thought EASY!  Lucky me!  All I have to do is cut our white felt and baste it onto a black t-shirt and sweatpants.  True, but this was before I realized we have ribs…a lot of them.  The cutting out of the felt has taken a lot more time than anticipated and I still have to sew them on.  I’ll be back after the costumes are finished.  Until then, true to form for me, I’m under a deadline.

We interrupt this vacation to bring you…

Finished Projects!

I have 2 friends that are due to have babies soon and they received these gifts from me.  The baby bootee pattern is the same one I used for these.  The pink ones have the ruffle around the cuff that is in the original pattern.  The burp-cloths are more of the same burp-cloths that there are a hundred tutorials for.  I used this one.  The pink fabric on the burp-cloths is Amy Butler fabric and the cowboy fabric I found at Hobby Lobby.  Oh, and the yard I used for the blue booties was Paton’s Grace.  The yarn for the pink was DMC Senseo.

Back to vacation posting next.

What we did on our Summer Vacation – Part Deux

Ok, we left off as we were driving into Nashville…that part is not particularly eventful so I’ll move on.

We really loved Nashville and if presented with the opportunity we would probably move there without a second thought IF Jen and Chad were still there, which is doubtful seeing as how they are freakin’ nomads!  They do provide us with interesting vacation choices though .  The day after we arrived we visited the Nashville Farmer’s Market which was oh so fun and filled with photo ops.

They had a bazillion peaches which was a treat because they aren’t in season here until mid-August (our trip was in mid-July…no comments about the time between then and now please).  We bought 500 pounds and went home and made a fresh peach pie.

We also got some of these lovely purple bell peppers.  Purple Peppers.  Say that 10 times…fast.  I’m not a pepper fan.  In fact I find them to be “the ruiner of all good things”, but Jen put them in a ravioli pesto dish that she made and I LOVED them.  Too bad I’ll probably never see them again.

We also bought enough tomatoes, various peppers and onions for Pip to make a vat of salsa.  So yummy!  We went to the Farmer’s market with a friend of our hosts who gave us the lowdown on some Tennessee history.  In Colorado you are taught about the Civil War but we found that we really know nothing.  People are passionate about the Civil War down there.  And we learned not to call it the Civil War as we were told, “There’s a Civil War memorial.  Well, the North calls it the Civil War, but there was nothing civil about it.  It was The War Between the States.”

In addition to various historical information we learned how to pronounce things correctly.  Nashville is pronounced Nashvull and a major street there called Lebanon is pronounced Lebnin.  Let that be a lesson to you.  That was not a lesson to DQ and TM.  On the way home from church on Sunday in Nashville we asked the kids what they learned in Sunday School.  DQ said she forgot.  We said, “Come on.  You must remember something.  It was just 10 minutes ago.”  She replied, “Yeah…I didn’t understand a word they said”.

The graveyards were of particular interest to Pip, as he’s really into morbid and creepy.  He suckered Chad into breaking into a confederate graveyard under cloak of darkness to take pictures.  I don’t think I’ve mentioned that Pip is into night photography.  He has to set up his camera on a tripod and leave the shutter open for minutes at a time to get a good exposure in the pitch black creepy night.  They hopped the fence into the confederate graveyard and just after Pip set up a shot they saw headlights coming towards them…you see, the graveyard is part of the Hermitage grounds.  The Hermitage being the former home of President Andrew Jackson.  Knowing they were in there illegally and not wanting to get arrested for being…well…morbid and creepy, they dropped to the ground and rolled away from the lights TOWARD the graves.  It was really dark and Pip could not see where he was rolling until he slammed his lip into a gravestone.  He scooched behind it and lay ON A CONFEDERATE GRAVE.  At night!  Let it be know you will never find me lying on graves, Confederate or otherwise, at any time of the day but ESPECIALLY at night.  That should really go without saying because who does that?  Pip and Chad, that’s who.  The security guard stopped and shone his lights on the graveyard but left without incident.  Probably because he saw one of them rolling and thought, “There is no way I’m getting out of this truck in the middle of the night to search graves for something I just saw moving towards them and disappearing.  I don’t get paid enough for this.”  Because that’s what I would be thinking.

You might think that that would be enough graveyard experience for them, but no.  A few nights later they went to Mount Olivet cemetery which is ginormous and dates back to…a really long time ago.  Did you like that?  How’s that for specifics.  I do my research people.  In this cemetery they have not just headstones but also mausoleums, statues and an old chapel.  All the better for taking pictures!  Here is one of the really creepy pictures Pip was able to get while there:

Pip said that he could barely see Chad standing a couple feet away.  He also noticed that though they were talking and acting normally, they were both constantly scanning the field of graves.  You think?!  Pip said he was really creeped out there because he kept hearing what sounded like two rocks banging together but no sign of animal or any other movement.  I would love to say that it was Jen and I hiding behind a headstone and banging rocks together but again…there is absolutely no way you would ever get me in a cemetery DURING THE NIGHT.

Oddly (or maybe not so) Pip’s paranormal experiences in Nashville do not end there.  Our family decided to visit the Hermitage while we were there, since it was right across the street from Jen and Chad’s house and since we had checked out a book on Andrew Jackson for the kids and read it on the way there.  If you’re ever in Nashville, I would say that the Hermitage is a must.  It was really great.  They had little headsets to wear that told you about various points in your tour and separate talks for the kids.  They loved it.  Here are some pics:

That last pic where Pip and the kids are standing in front of what looks like and is the grave of Andrew Jackson and his wife Rachel?  That’s the weird part.  We were all standing there and since Pip likes to take his time at places like this (don’t even get me started on museums), I took the kids and we went to look for butterflies and bees in the surrounding garden.  Pip came over a few minutes later and asked if I sent DQ over to get him.  I told that I had her with me the whole time.  He said, “Huh, that’s weird.”  I asked him what he was talking about and he informed me that while he was standing there he felt someone come up next to him and put their arm around him.  He thought it was DQ coming to get him and told her, “I’ll be there in a minute.”  He turned to look and there was NO ONE THERE.  My personal opinion is that it was Rachel Jackson and she couldn’t help herself because Pip’s so cute.  That or the confederates were pissed off and wanted to freak him out.  Either is entirely believable.

To be continued yet again…(it was a long trip).