New food favorite

Today has been a hard and hungry day for me. I confess, I have been limiting any yummy goodies in my house b/c I don't need to cheat and the rest of my family doesn't need the extra goodies either. We always have fruits and veggies in the house, but since I'm working to get back into a better fat burning state, I can't have any fruit. My diet is consisting of Medifast foods and my veggies and meat each day.

One decision I decided today was to begin to split my lean and green meal into two meals, so I can have 3 oz of lean meat twice (or 4 oz if I'm eating fish). It really helped me in the middle of the afternoon when it wasn't really snack time and wasn't meal time either.

I have discovered I really like kale. I like to toss it in olive oil, taco season, garlic powder and some pepper. Then I bake it in the oven till it gets crispy...like chips. Maggie likes it too.

It's very grey today. Maggie and I are working on schoolwork and some sewing.

A Wonderful Christmas

This has been a great holiday. We started our Christmas late this am. We had gone to church at midnight so we didn't get to bed till really late, hence no early morning for us. We looked in our stockings, which contained items my mom sent us (Santa Grandma) and my dad sent us a few things. I started playing with Maggie's flip video camera and recorded most of our present opening, however, when I unloaded the videos to the computer, I evidently forgot to save them properly, so all our tributes to Santa Grandma got lost. sigh. Peter did take a lot of photos, so I will have them later and I will video Maggie trying on all the cool clothes she was sent.

My best gift today was the video here of Peter riding with me and Maggie! We had such a great time. Then we ate Chinese food. Then we came home and Maggie played with her new Wii game, Wii cheer, and we watched her. I also got a Wii game called Wii Fitness Coach, that will make me a workout to do each day. Since I am trying so hard to get more movement into every day, it's one more part to my arsenal. Now we're watching White Christmas, which is something I have done almost every year since I was 12. While watching White Christmas I looked around on Itunes to see if I could buy the soundtrack to it because I love the songs so much, but it evidently was never released due to the contracts of the stars at the time. You can get a CD which has some of the original artists singing the songs from the movie, but it's not an actual soundtrack album. This was disappointing, but at least now I will quit looking for it.

I had it easy this year for shopping. We made the conscious decision earlier this fall not to buy (or receive) a bunch of presents, so our holiday has been a lot more mellow than usual. There has been no frantic shopping, which I have really enjoyed. I did decided to sew a few items for Peter and Maggie...mostly that didn't get finished but through the whole process I managed not to get worked up about it. As a result, Peter got his cool chef's hat, but not his pants, though they are in progress and the chances are pretty good he'll get them soon. Maggie was going to get a purse made out of brightly colored fat quarters, but that didn't happen either. And I was going to make Maggie a shirt, but no such luck. Lucky for me, I have a very understanding family, and for the most part, they would rather I not flip out trying to get so much stuff done.

We had Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve with Shawn and Alexa at his house. He made a standing rib roast which was very good, roasted veggies, mashed potatoes and I made 7 layer salad. Peter made Creme Brulee for dessert...all tasty stuff. Then we went to church, Shawn included, and Peter and I played music for the preludes section of the service, 30 minutes before the service began. Pastor Cathy evidently really enjoyed our music and has asked us to play something for Epiphany sunday in a couple weeks. So, we will have to get practicing.

Tomorrow, maggie and I are are going to see Marley and Me at the Movie Tavern and I will trim the horses's feet if it's not raining all day. I'm taking Fiera to my friend Teresa's house for a couple months to get her weaned and give her more room to run, and I need to do her feet before I leave her there. Liberty's feet area also pretty long, but I'm hoping after I ride him at Teresa's I can rasp them a little and not have to work at it so hard...also since it's supposed to rain, it will soften everyone up. I will need to buy a new knife and rasp soon. The rasp is getting old and the knife was never all that good. Then Sunday Maggie and I will head over to Teresa's to spend the night and ride. I have to work on Tuesday this week, but that's the only day. If the weather will hold, I hope to ride to the park at some point in the next week.

Family Christmas

We went to dinner with Peter's parents tonight. They are in town visiting for Christmas, and Stacy, my sister in law thought it would be fun if we went out and did something together instead of just hanging out in the house. It was great fun and the food was fabulous. We went to the Gaylord Texan riverwalk Cafe which was a bistro buffet style and it was really, really good. It was expensive, but tasty. We also looked around at the lights and Peter took a lot of photos. I ate too much, so I'm sitting up waiting for my food to digest before laying down for the night. After dinner, because the Gaylord was so crazy busy, we went to Starbucks to open presents. My MIL made most gorgeous quilt. I will post a photo. It matches Maggie's room perfectly. It turned out so nice. and Peter's dad made her a box to keep all her ribbons and photos in of her horse adventures with Dixie.

I got a great leatherman tool coupled with a sharp knife which will really come in handy and a polar fleece horse throw. Peter got a really neat quilt his mom made him as well.

I had a longer post started, but didn't finish about the CTR (and it's been a long time since I've had time to post) I didn't get to post about this, but last weekend Maggie and I went to the CTR and she got 1st on her horse and I got 2nd on mine. I also placed 2nd in horsemanship and she placed fourth in horsemanship as well. I'm taking Maggie to a bunch of rides this year...she might even win the division on this horse.

Christmas 2007

We had a very pleasant Christmas at our house! We stayed home and played with our new toys (I got a 4 gig Ipod, which was way, way cool) As usual I didn't get Peter anything near as cool as he got me. He's really hard to buy for, usually buys what he wants himself and doesn't tell me half of what he wants. I got him a new pan for the kitche, which he'd been wanting, but it wasn't exciting like an IPOD. I now know he really wanted one, but he wanted me to be so off focused of IPOD so that I wouldn't suspect, that he missed his opportunity for me to go shopping. Peter always takes so much better care of us than we can of him. I want to pay him back.

We had friends over in the evening to eat pasta and watch TV. One of the friends brought some limoncello, which is a lemon flavored liqueur. It was yummy and I found myself drifting to a mellow sort of place and time sort of stood still. I could tell I was tipsy, but all my friends said I looked and sounded perfectly normal. Good thing I don't enjoy that feeling and don't ever drink that much often. It just sort of snuck up on me. And to boot, I had a lovely headache when I woke up this am. The definite advantage to "partying" at home is that you don't have to drive. Peter drank a little but not much, so he was in better shape than I was.

Maggie went home with Shawn and Alexa and we've been spending the day rearranging and getting dish service installed into a new room. We are kind of moving a round robbin set of room stuff and cleaning as wel go. The front room has never been used that much and we are going to make it our living room/den for TV. Hence, the dish being added. It's a pretty big task and Peter isn't his usual energetic self...we've both been playing on the computer a lot. We're doing it partly to clean in anticipation of my father's visit on Sat. Though, honestly, I'm not sure they'll come over here. I don't think my dad's wife likes my house or my pets.

I did talk to my mom yesterday it was not a satisfying conversation. Maggie called her to wish her Merry Christmas. Peter dialed the phone for Maggie as I was in the kitchen getting stuff ready for my dinner and then after a few minutes Maggie brought me the phone and said "she only wants to talk to you if you want to talk to her". I thought it was a weird thing to say, but I said "of course, I want to talk to her". I could tell from her tone of voice that she was grouchy. In fact, she seemed so grouchy to me I didn't get a chance to say much to her before she told me that the set of CD's to learn russian was scratched and didn't play properly. I said that I would burn another copy she told me not to bother b/c she wasn't going back to Russia and it wouldn't do her any good to learn Russian. (Background: She had gone on a mission trip and liked it so much that Peter had bought the Russian cd's for her. I have had them for ages and thought she'd enjoy them as a present, so I sent them for Christmas) I was surprised at her irritation and asked her about wanting to go back to Russia. She said that wanting and getting to go were two different things so I should not bother. I was pretty surprised, b/c I thought that was in the game plan for the future. I just told her Merry Christmas and I loved her and she just hung up without saying anything else.

I know that I didn't get her a good present for Christmas. I told her before Christmas I was looking for one more gift and she told me not to worry about it. I did get her something else though...it just didn't arrive before Christmas. I'm not sure she believed me when I told her though. My sister in law told me that all she really wanted for Christmas was for us to come up. That didn't work out either. I just didn't want to travel anywhere. Shawn has Maggie part of this week and next. We are trying to start our own fun and our own traditions and I know that makes us selfish. I would love for her to come visit us here instead of us schlepping up there.

I can't please her. I know that already. Whatever I do, whenever I do it, I'm wrong. It's always been this way. I am the bad kid and Eric is the good kid. Eric's kids are perfect, my kid isn't. It's some weird competition that makes it difficult to be close to Eric and Cindy, which is something I desire. I try so hard to get along with her and I can never do the right thing. Quite honestly, I'm just done. I can't continue to get worked up over her reaction. I can't continue to anticipate what I think her behavior will be. I can no longer try to pattern my behavior after the reaction I hope to get, b/c I never get the reaction I'd hoped for. It makes me very sad. I would love to be able to call up my mom and talk to her about daily stuff. I wish I could talk to her like Maggie talks to me. I find myself sad, but resigned. I have to quit trying. Nothing seems to make it any better, so I have to quit stressing about it and just move forward. When I try to talk to her about this stuff, she gets mad and turns it back on me. It's always something I have done that is causing the stress.

After yet another attack on Willie, I have decided to send Frankie to the pound. I have alerted JRT rescue so they can find him a home. The problem has been that as long as I Have him in a home, they don't try really hard to find him a home. If I send him to the pound, they will find him a home. I feel terrible b/c he's so much fun and bright and energetic, but he's beating up my little dog and he and Scooby fight as well (though Thank God not recently) I have just grown so weary of taking care of him and protecting my other pets and food on the counters. I'm just done. I think if he had a one dog home he'd be much better off. I have tried to find him a home for over a year and it's just not working. When I meet people who may want him, I tell them about him and they don't want him. I always joke that I can't give him to anyone I like b/c then they won't be my friend. I can't go anywhere without taking him with, crating him or boarding him. He can't just be in the backyard ever. I hate to admit I failed, but I also hate the thought of going on like this for the next 10 years or so.

Playing Catch up again

Frankie and Willie had another go round this week. My friends say that the only reason frankie is still alive is b/c i love him. They are problaby right...I've never known a dog that is this big of a pain. I talked to the vet about putting him to sleep b/c of his aggression toward other dogs, but they urge me not to. I have tried, once again to find him a home, but I'm having no luck at all. No one wants him. If I tell people about him, they really don't want him...I can't imagine him being here for the next 10 years of my life, but then I can't imagine putting him to sleep either. I feel like if I just could get him enough exercise we'd be ok...so I guess more exercise it is.

I spent the day grocery shopping. My Christmas cooking is very expensive and detailed, but I won't be buying anymore groceries after this is over! I have food to be able to cook in the next week or two and that's good. I've been eating out way too much! After hitting a low of 198.8, I'm up to 204. I haven't done anything different that I can tell either, so I don't know what's different. I hate that! I lost it easily and gained it just as easily. sigh. I'm back to weighing each day b/c I find it helps me stay on track.

We have a nice couple of days planned...My food is mostly cooked in the crock, which will be nice. We're having a crock pot version of Cioppino for Christmas Eve and Shawn is coming over. I'm making Rachel Ray's Christmas pasta on Sunday. Both will go well in the crock so I won't be tied to the kitchen. Usually we go to the barn to play with our new horsey toys on Christmas day, which we will do again this year. Alexa is coming over for the Christmas dinner portion of the day...I have to get to the barn for a little while anyway...I'm not sure we have times set for eating yet.

The day after Christmas, we are going to rearrange our house as we often do this time of year. We're going to put the living room in the front room, like it was in the original days of this house. Our couch just fits in the room so that will be cozy. We were talking about how we need a flat screen TV to put in the room...but I don't think we'll be doing that this year. We're going to clean really well for my dad coming and move our office back into the big room so we have more space. We have a lot of "stuff" that will go into the room that we now use as a bedroom and it will be for music and massages and just a "quiet" place. I've already started to dump a lot of stuff like books and just other stuff. I get new stuff at Christmas and then I purge...or I purge before I get.

I finally got Peter something for Christmas that he'll like...took me awhile to find something. I did have one thing i forgot to buy b/c Cat was with me and i just got distracted. But, I did get him some things he'll like I think...More on that later.

We have my computer working for now, but it's not great yet. all of a sudden the wireless is working (don't know why) but it's still not burning cd's. If it keeps working, I'll try to get around in the next day or two and say hi. My sims are still going...they've been fun.

I had a lesson with Liberty yesterday. He's just doing ground work for now and he's going to be great. I have been paying Renee, at my barn to help me with him. She's a fantastic horse trainer. I hope to get with her again next week as well, but I have to wait and see what the weather is going to be like. I have been doing a ton of clinton anderson stuff and he's doing it really well. She's teaching him more John Lyons type stuff and he's learning that quickly as well. He's so smart!

I want an Alice of my Own

Well, my kitchen is now clean. I scrubbed it, baked in it and then scrubbed it again. I want an Alice...you know, Alice from the Brady Bunch. She cooked, she cleaned, she was always there to watch the kids...I want an Alice. Then Peter and I would never have to fight again about housework b/c Alice would be doing it. One room down and a few more to go before Christmas arrives.

Today I was able to stay home for the entire day. I have spent most of it on the computer, doing paperwork and paying bills and reading email. My new addiction to Sims 2 has affected my correspondence with my online friends! I made scones for Maggie's medieval party at school tomorrow. Shawn and Maggie will come by and pick them up any minute. They turned out pretty good and I managed to protect them from the dogs!

Christmas was supposed to be slow and relaxing this year for us. It was going to be just family here at home. Partly we planned it this way b/c it's an "odd" year (2007) so it's one of Shawn's years to have Maggie for the holiday. He planned to take her to the HIll Country to see his folks starting th 26th. Then we found out that Mizzou is in the Cotton Bowl and Dad and Shirley are coming down for that. Then I found out that Sara, Peter's sister is coming down the weekend before Christmas, possibly with his mother, which again changes things. If his mother comes down, I suspect she'll be at Nick's house, but we've already planned dinner here at home and invited Alexa to join us. So, I guess we'll invite her here for dinner, which means I have to clean my house a week sooner.

Nice thing about Dad and Shirley coming is that they won't be over here much since they don't like the pets...of course, I'd like to host them in my home. I found out that Shirley's kids are coming down to the game too, so I'm wondering if they're all staying at the same hotel and how much of our activities will center around them as well. I'm pretty jealous of time with my dad b/c I never get any with him alone. I wonder if the weather is nice I can convince them to come watch us ride just one time? My dad has never seen my ride my horse, nor Maggie hers. We're sharing his thing (football) It would be nice if he could be open minded and share mine...but I'm not holding my breath.

Then to make things even more complicated, Shawn forgot to put in for the days off and can't have her until the 2nd for his trip with her. This is fine with me since all of the other family is coming to town, but it's bad b/c one of the reasons we told Mom we couldn't come was b/c of Shawn and he's bugged out. I figure it's better to let her know now how it all went down b/c I hate for her to think I planned it this way. I just knew it wasn't a good year to travel and it looks like my instincts were right on. Too bad my mom can't come down here too since everyone else seems to be. It's also too bad that Eric doesn't have tickets to the game. It would be great fun to have his family here!

The change in plans sets my goal to redo Maggie's room back a week, but it give me an extra week to get the wall paper peeled off. I wanted to get her to take off the wallpaper so I could repaint her walls as a surprise while she's gone. Not really a Christmas present, but redone nonetheless. I want to take Peter to look at a bed she's interested in changing to. She wants a double bed instead of her singles now.

Playing catch up: Freeley was lame at six O and we had to pull. I had a vet look at him on Monday last and he said that he was “post navicular syndrome” which means he’s lame in one heal for no apparent reason and there are no changes on his xrays. This is good and bad news since it means that they aren’t finding anything wrong…but he’s still sore. WE put him on a round of bute and another steroid anti-inflammatory. After 5 days he’s much better. I had already pulled the shoes I had on him temporarily as he interfered so badly that it wasn’t to his benefit to stay shod. His soles are very thin, which I believe is part of the problem. Not sure what to do except to easy boot every time I ride, even in soft terrain. Of course, I did that the last hard ride I had before this lameness and he was lame anyway, so who knows? He’s getting rest right now and I will continue to trim him with him. OH, and the second vet says he’s not rotated at all, which is great news!

Maggie got sixth in horse and rider out of sixth on Joe Bear. We're happy though b/c she finished! She and Joe were so much more comfortable together...though Maggie will tell you that Brody was tons more fun to ride and more comfortable too. She says she really misses him, but I honestly am not sure he's great for her to ride anyway. He's young and while good natured, can be a little frustrating. He needs a more consistent rider and she's not that consistent right now. Heck,she's 10, so it doesn't worry me much. I found out that she and Brody placed 6th in the region as a team and he got 6th in horse. We're going to the convention, but Maggie doesn't know she placed, so it will be pretty exciting. Next year I"m planning for her to start competing Freeley and I will start competing Liberty. However, if he's not ready in March we'll fall back to Joe Bear for her and Freeley for me.

I'm going to change my account settings back to allow any poster to post comments again. However, if someone posts an anonymous comment, I won't publish it since I'm not crazy about publishing comments from people who won't admit who they are. I have plenty of room for dialog and don't even mind a discussion, but not without an identity.