A "Heather Day"

I am SO ashamed to admit it but as of Dec 11th, 2009 my house has not been decorated yet for the holidays! Can you believe I had to take a day off of work just to decorate? Once the family left from the Thanksgiving weekend, I was too exhausted to even think about digging out the Xmas stuff. Then I was sick for a week with an ear/sinus infection and didn't feel up to decorating. Next thing I know, it is Dec 11th & I still haven't even hung a stocking. I know - I can hardly believe it myself! Talk about a disappointment! Don't worry friends....this will NEVER happen again!

SO, I ended up taking a "Heather Day" today and loved every minute of it. Spent my morning sleeping in and awoke to a hot cup of coffee made by the hubby. Off to a great start so far...

I spent the rest of the morning on the laptop & caught up on my DVR'd shows from the week! SO nice & relaxing! After an early lunch, Shane left to run errands, I pressed play on the iPod, turned up the volume & the Christmas music quickly got me in the mood to decorate the house.

First things first.....the tree. Shane was so helpful by getting the tree up from the basement so all I needed to do was fluff and decorate. I just LOVE our tree when it is all decorated! SO pretty! After a few hours, the house was beginning to look festive for the holiday season & I was starting to look forward to all that the season has to offer!

Hard to believe I waited to decorate so late in the month of December! I guess I will have to leave the tree up past the New Year holiday to make up for my late start!?! :)

Tis the season.....

80's Xmas Party

Tonight was the anxiously awaited 80's / Ugly Sweater Christmas Party hosted by our friends Ken & Keri. One look at this couple when I walked through the door & I knew it was going to be a fun night!

Shane unfortunately was sick so he ended up staying home while me & my ugly Christmas sweater managed to have a good time without him.

As the other guests arrived, the outfits kept getting better and better:

Nick & Melissa as "Maverick & Charlie" from Top Gun

Brian & Jill as "Cousin Eddie" from Nat'l Lampoons Xmas Vacation

After much food & beverage was consumed we all gathered around the living room to open gifts. Everyone was instructed to bring an "As Seen On TV" gift and we proceeded to do a "White Elephant Gift Exchange" where you can steal gifts from the people who opened gifts ahead of you. It was quite fun and there were some very interesting gifts up for grabs.

Here Rob models his HD Vision glasses he got as well as Melissa modeling her new Snuggie:

And of course no gathering with this group would be complete unless we all got together for a photo op! Thanks Ken & Keri for being such a great host & hostess and for a fabulous time. We are looking forward to the 2nd Annual X-mas party next year :)

Millie Milz

I got to pick up Millie after work today & I was SO happy to see her smooshie little face! When they brought her out to me, I sat down on the floor in the middle of the waiting room and gave her a big hug, tons of lovin's and smooches galore. Everyone in that room was staring at me but I didn't care - I was just glad to be seeing my baby girl :)

Her leg was SO swolen & bruised and has 18 staples in it! She is on a Fentanyl pain patch until Sunday so I hope that helps her with the pain. She is to put absolutely NO weight on that leg whatsoever for 2 weeks so we have to use a sling to lift up her back end whenever she walks. With a 66 lb dog that is easier said than done! OH - the vet told us that is what she weighed before surgery so she is down 6 lbs! GREAT news!

Once I got her home she went in her crate and that is where she is staying for the rest of the night. You can tell she is in pain & is acting "drugged" so the best thing is to leave her alone for the night. I hope she does ok.....poor Millie Milz :(

*This pic was taken several days later so the bruising & swelling has gone way down!

Millies' ACL Surgery

Today is the day that Millie goes in for her surgery :( It is a bittersweet situation for me. On the one hand I want her to get better but on the other hand I don't want to put her through all that pain.

As we made our way to the vet, Millie was as happy as she could be riding in the back of the SUV. This overwhelming feeling of guilt hit me for getting her in the car that she so loves to ride in knowing that this trip wasn't going to end up with Sonic ice cream but something much worse.

We got to the Ortho Vet, I filled out the necessary paperwork, put a deposit down on the surgery and then it was time to say goodbye. I held it together pretty well up until this point. I knelt down, hugged her & she gave me tons of kisses & then they led her away. As she was making her way towards the back, she stopped, turned her fat little neck to look back at me and gave me the most saddest look. That is when the tears started to fall :( All these thoughts started racing through my mind...Are we doing the right thing? Is she going to survive the surgery? Will the surgery fix her? Will I ever see her sweet face again? As I got into my car I said a little prayer and asked God to watch over her as well as the surgery team and to please give them the skills they would need to fix my baby girl. Then I headed to work.

Call me crazy for reacting the way I did but she is my baby girl - only difference is she has fur :)

I finally got the news around 4pm that Millie was out of surgery, was extubated and was doing well. Woo hoo - what a relief! The vet said the surgery went great, she is expected to make a full recovery as long as we do our part with her care/recovery and she will be able to go home tomorrow! Thank God!

When I got home from work I immediately missed her presence. She wasn't waiting for me at the top of the stairs throwing up her paw in the air waiting for kisses from Mi-Ma - it definitely made me sad but I felt better knowing she was ok and on the road to recovery. One thing is for sure, I made sure to give Bubba & Neo extra hugs before bed :)

It's a boy!!!

Today is yet another exciting day in the Freier family! My sister Jen delivered a BIG but healthy baby boy! He was 9 lbs 3 oz and 21 1/4 inches long!

Congrats to my sister and her family! Looking forward to seeing them all and meeting little Cael in January!

Introducing: Cael Garry Trustem

Happy Birthday Joslyn

Today is my niece Joslyn's 2nd birthday!

We were so very lucky to get to spend it with her and help celebrate. We had a little party for her after the days' festivities consisting of a BBQ pork sandwich dinner and cake for dessert. She enjoyed opening all her gifts from everyone & eating her Dora & Diego b-day cake!

Happy Birthday Joslyn!

Black Friday

Me, my mom, my niece and our friend Mary Ellen didn't wake up at 3am to go shopping. We instead enjoyed a nice breakfast, got showered and then at 9am made our way out into the craziness of Overland Park to a few stores to snag some good deals.

First stop was Kohl's. I should have known by the packed parking lot what we were in store for. But we all had positive attitudes going into it that there would be busy parking lots, lines to wait in and being confronted with rude people so we were prepared.

We started off by waiting by the registers for a shopping cart. We had our eye on one for about 10 min and just as the lady was done unloading it some other rude shopper cut in front of us and snatched our cart away & didn't bother to ask us if we were waiting for it. Gone...just like that! Amazed by her rudeness, a very nice lady offered her cart shortly after the incident and we were off. We managed to get several good bargains and after about an hour we made our way to the front to get in line. To our surprise, there was a line from the front of the store that wrapped all the way around to the back of the store on BOTH sides. It ended up taking us an hour to check out but we made it a positive experience by browsing as we stood in line and chatting away.

Next stop was Archivers which was not busy at all. That was a quick in and out. Then we were off to Hobby Lobby. This was a busy place as well but did not take long to check out. We all walked out of there with some new Xmas decorations, wrapping paper, etc and decided we were done shopping for the day. We stopped for lunch at Red Robin and made our way home for some rest & relaxation.

Thanksgiving with the Taylor's

The Taylor's ended up hosting Thanksgiving this year and welcomed 10 adults & 4 children into our home for the afternoon feast. This morning I was up at 6:30am to start Thanksgiving cooking festivities. With my mom's help, we managed to prepare all the sides ahead of time and get the birds (two 12 pounders to be exact ) in the oven all before 9am!

The rest of the morning was spent hanging out with the family watching the Macy's Day Parade, getting the table set and waiting for the guests to arrive.

Around 12 noon the Taylor house was hoppin! I was nervous about having that many people in our home and worried about where everyone was going to hang out at but it turned out just fine. The men hung out in the family room watching football while the ladies hung out around the kitchen. Once the turkey was carved, we all sat down to a dee-lish meal of turkey, stuffing, mashed & sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, corn casserole and enjoyed the blessings of good food & wonderful family!

Next up on the menu - dessert :) Meghan's family graciously brought pumpkin, pecan and chocolate pecan pies for dessert and we had White Choc Raspberry cheesecake as well. My brother doesn't like any kind of pie other than cherry nor does he like cheesecake (not sure what is wrong with him ;) so I thought I would put my baking skills to test and make him a cherry pie. I tried a recipe off of the Food Network website that looked good and seemed fairly easy to make and I must say my pie turned out perfectly done - if I do say so myself:

But the true test was how it tasted so I let my brother be the judge of that!

And it was a success! Not only did Steve like it but everyone else who tried it thought it was dee-lish as well!


What a great day it ended up being spending it with my family! I am so truly blessed to have all these wonderful family members in my life! I am just sorry that my dad, sister and her family couldn't be there to join us :(

Happy Birthday Shane

Today is the hubby's 36th Birthday. I had the day off since family was coming into town so we spent the day together cleaning & running errands. Not too much fun for Shane but he was a good sport about it.

My side of the family arrived around dinner time and we all enjoyed a pizza party while catching up with each other. After we ate, Shane opened all his gifts & cards & then it was time for some KU basketball. Family, gifts, KU sports - all in all, I would say Shane had a great B-day ;)

Wicked

It was time once again for our monthly "game-night" gathering but instead of our usual get-together of food & games, we opted to venture out for dinner & a musical.

The neighborhood girls & I met at my favorite mexican restaurant: Rudy's Tenampa - which is my usual "happy hour" stop after work for a margarita with the co-workers. These girls have heard me talk about Rudy's quite often so I thought it would be perfect to stop there for dinner since it was on our way to downtown.

After we stuffed ourselves on chips, salsa & tacos we headed downtown to the Municipal Auditorium for the musical "Wicked".

"Wicked" is the untold story of the witches from Wizard of Oz and what happened before Dorothy's arrival from Kansas. It was an awesome musical to watch with lots of funny one-liners, singing, dancing & an over-all great story! It made me want to run home and watch the Wizard of Oz after it was all over with.

We managed to get a picture all together in the music hall but were quickly scolded by the concierge that there were no cameras allowed - oops :)

Thanks girls for another fun evening! Until next time...

Busted!

5 days - that's how long the White Fudge Oreo's were hidden in the house before my husband found them. I went to the closet to enjoy a couple of these yummy cookies & imagine my surprise when I grabbed what I thought was an unopened box & found this:


Looks like I will need to find yet another hiding spot :)

SURPRISE!!!

This evening Shane & I headed up to the northland for my sister-in-law-2-be Meghan's surprise 30th birthday party. We all gathered at her sister's house and waited with anticipation for the unsuspecting birthday girl. We all hid in the living room with the lights turned off & as she came into the kitchen, the lights came up and we all yelled "SURPRISE"! By her reaction, to say she was surprised was an understatement! She couldn't believe everyone that had come to share in this special birthday with her!

After the surprise, we all dined on a fabulous taco bar, mingled with Meghan's family & friends & enjoyed a bit of cookie cake! Our dear friend Stetson was also there & sang a beautiful version of Happy Birthday to Meghan which brought a round of applause. Not only can this man bake a dee-lish cheesecake but he can sing too. He is such a talented man:

Here are a few more pics from the night:

Me and the hubby

The birthday girl is the one on the left :)


Me and my brother Steve