Our Trip Part 1

Ian & I have been enjoying our trip to the cold gloomy midwest for christmas. We are not of course enjoying the cold gloomy part of it (neither is our poor car) but the puppies like that element, we just like being with family and playing all of our new board games and beating lisa :)

The dogs have taken mom's house over and are loving it. At home they are not allowed to sleep on the couches but sara's futon (or the click clack bed as we call it) is in the living room and it smells like dog from her past apartment, so we covered it with a sheet and let the dogs lay there, well, they spread out so only they can sleep on it, nobody else is allowed. Plus Annie decided one day when her & Jaska were home along with mom that the click clack bed isnt cutting it, and so basically demanding of mom (yes, she knows how to do that) to put a small sheet on the couch so she could lay next to mom. From that point on the click clack bed wasnt good enough for annie girl (or chabu chabu as mom has been calling her) so the couch has now become hers. She was sleeping soundly when ian came over and starting annoying her, you can see the annoyance in her eyes, but i still think its a super cute picture

We went to chicago to spend christmas eve with dad's family and christmas day and lisa & shawns. We had a good time, lisa posted about it so if you want to read about it and see pictures go to www.pisa9923.blogspot.com and check it out.

My poor car is having a rough time with the cold, probably all due to texas. Before we left I tried to find an ice scraper plus wiper fluid that was meant to be used under 32 degrees. Needless to say we never found an ice scraper or wiper fluid for cold climates in Austin, we had been doing ok with this until we tried to leave chicago. We were leaving the city and out window was just so cloudy from the icky type of snow that was falling, we were trying to clean the window and the wiper fluid just wasnt coming out. ian thought we were out, i knew we werent, i knew it was frozen. after about 20 minutes of panic on my part i finally got ian to stop at a gas station and sure enough there was a giant frozen block of ice in my engine. we purchased some wiper fluid meant to cold temperatures and luckily it starting breaking through the ice and we could finally see though our window. But since the original wiper fluid was starting to come through it was freezing on our wipers and feezing over the holes the fluid come through, it was a disaster until we finally got passed indy and it wamred up to 34 degrees!!

We are off today to the mannings for our final christmas celebration and then off to pick up the dogs so they can see their auntie lisa (they got kenneled when we went to chicago) so i am done typing for now, but look for more to come, plus we are gonna get some pictures of all of us later today or tomorrow!

June 2nd....

will be the date when baby richardson is supposed to join the world :) which means, to anyone on facebook that didnt see our beautifully written updates, that "yes, the rumors are true, i am 4 months preggo"

17 weeks along and finally happy to be feeling better and not so tired all the time, but that has just been replaced with being hungry all the time, not sure which is worse. but baby and i are doing fine, and we will find out the gender in less than a month (jan 13th) so im looking forward to hearing that news and seeing baby again, since last time i saw he/she it was at 8 weeks and we all know it was like the size of a grain of barley at that time :)

anyway, i promise to keep this thing updated more often now, i know many people will be relying on it for info, so as long as baby doesnt zap all of my energy like the first couple months i will try my hardest to stay on top of this

oh - and merry christmas eve everyone!!

Excited but not..

i am getting very excited that in less than a week ian and i (along with the puppies) will be in indiana visiting family and celebrating the holidays. however, i am not excited that in less than 1 week i will be trapped in a car with ian and 2 dogs for 16 to 18 hours straight, to only have to return in just a little over a week. yup, not excited about that at all.....

Is it seriously December already???

I can not believe its already December, very happy it is, but still shocked. Work has again been crazy, especially since I took off 6 days for Thanksgiving to spend with Mom & Eric for their visit. It was fun and we took some pictures of our Thanksgiving feast, but now I cant find the plug for the camera to upload the pictures, so hopefully when I get a day off on Monday or Wednesday I will really search and look for it.

Ian & I will be driving home to IN for Christmas, thats right, driving!! We decided to drive and bring the dogs along for a couple reasons. One, it will be nice to have our own car when we are there; Two, we wont have to kennel the dogs for the 11 or so days we will be in IN; Three, plane tickets were just crazy expensive, and as much as Im not looking forward to a 16 to 18 hour drive in one day, I know its the best decision. We will be leaving in 2 weeks tomorrow so it will be here in a heartbeat, I am getting quite excited. The trip is packed with trips to Chicago to see family, Muncie to see family, Indy to see family and Parker to see family, so it wont be at all relaxing, but will still be nice to be home for Christmas which hasn't happened in awhile, especially with both Ian & I home together.

Anyway, I have to get ready for work but I know its been awhile so I thought I would say hello to world. Have a Happy Holiday Season!!!