Merry Christmas!

We had a fabulous Christmas even our doggies had a wonderful Christmas! My mom had 4 stockings hanging on her fireplace, we just figured they were for me, Kristen, Terre and Cody......wrong.....They were for our dogs! Even they had a fabulous Christmas! Since we have 2 massive labs, of course their bones were massive too. She got them each a massive candy cane bone that they will be chewing on till next Christmas! We got to see everybody and even visited with some friends. We had a pretty big Christmas. Jed got Kim a snuggie (which she did NOT want) but it was super cute and came with a little extra something to play with! LOL! Josh, Cody and I had a book made for them. It is full of pictures about all of our adventures this year!Lucky for me.......Jedro picked out a pair of insulated coveralls for me! We need everything warm we can get because when we got back to Oklahoma......................

IT SNOWED!!!!!!! It is so pretty outside!

Hope everyone had a great Christmas!

Ice Skating anyone?

Since it has been below freezing for the past 2 weeks, all the lakes are frozen over really good! Cody was nice and broke a hole in a lot of them so the animals would have something to drink. It would freeze back over fast but you could tell where the animals would break it too.
We really need to invest in some ice-skates! The ice was about 5 inches thick!

He wouldn't let me go out as far as he went out :(

The last few days has been in the 40's and 50's and all the ice is melting away :(

Karen's Happy

I have been listening to my Ipod a lot lately. I don't know if it's because I have been going to town more and I need something to listen to on the 20 minute drive to town and the 20 minutes back out or that it's been -15 all week and I have taken 3 long hot baths everyday for the past week and need something to listen to, or I am just missing something that me and Cody used to share a lot and haven't in awhile.

The play list on my Ipod, that is the BEST EVER, is Karen's Happy. I bet I have listened to all 25 or more songs on that play list everyday, 3 times a day for the past week. Of course seeing family everyday would be #1 in the missing department, but coming in a close second would be dancing the night away with Cody. Every song on Karen's Happy is a song that is sentimental to us. To our favorite dancing songs or songs that tell our story better than we could or random songs that Cody has heard on the radio and then runs home to find on Itunes so I can hear it, because it reminds him of us :) We have spent nights dancing our hearts out over the last 7 years and there isn't any place around here to go. Sure we have our living room but it's just not the same. The smell of an old dance floor, the slippery powder in the corner that helps with the spins, visiting with friends, people watching, listening to one good country song after the other and loving everyone of them and saying, "man, I haven't heard this song in forever," or "I love love love this song!"

I am not sure why I love old dance halls so much. Every time we find one or go dancing it just brings a flood of memories to us. Our first date was dancing, well kind of. It wasn't really a date, it was more like, "hey, I think you two would hit it off, you bring your friends, I will bring her and her friends and ya'll could meet." So we did. Cody was so shy that he didn't say one word to me all night, but we would all be on the dance floor shaking it and a slow song would come on and somehow our eyes always found each other and we would just smile, that's all it took. Then we would fight the crowd and eventually make our way to each other and dance the whole 3-4 minutes of a song and not say a word....hahaha, but still feeling a connection with him. We still laugh about that! We even found a little dance place on our honeymoon in the Dominican Republic, although it was not my cup of tea in the music department......we had a great time!

Maybe that is why I love to go dancing so much with Cody. That is how we connected and how we became us and how we came out of our shyness with each other. Dancing in the living room on carpet just isn't the same.........I need a dance hall :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkXQnJZiph0

There's a place I like to go
Where the fast songs meet the slow,
And people come from miles around
Just to hear an old guitar sound.
Call your friends and I'll call mine.
We'll have ourselves a country time.
Get there early and have a few drinks
Loosen up step out on the dance floor
Now what do you think?

Yeah, It's a good night for dancing.
It's a good night for you.

A nice two-step might start out the night
Pretty soon we're half steppin' and the rythym's right.
A line dance and the cotton eye Joe,
I spin you around and here we go.

Yeah, It's a good night for dancing.
It's a good night for you.

Well it's last call and the lights begin to come on
And they announce it's the very last song,
I grab your hand and lead you on the floor,
Hold you in my arms and dance till we can't dance anymore.

Yeah, It's a good night for dancing.
It's a good night for you.

Brrr.....

It has been in the low 20's every morning and in the 30's during the day all week. Well today it was in the teen's and the high was 27! Right now it is 15 degrees with a wind chill of -1 and IT SNOWED TODAY. In the morning it will be 6 with a wind chill of who know's what with a high of 24, brrrrrrr! It really isn't as miserable as I had imagined it would be, it's a different kind of cold and as long as the wind isn't blowing 90 to nonthing, we are good to go. I have been extra worried about the dogs, so I brought them in yesterday to bath them just in case they needed to come in and sleep. They stayed in the laundry room for about an hour to dry off and the whole time Drake is acting like he is about to have a heart attack and Duke just chewed on a bone the whole time. They couldn't wait to go back outside, they ran straight back into their pen! Cody did put about 3 feet of hay in their shelter for them, plus in their dog house that is in their shelter and they love it. Well today in the 10 degree, snowy weather I felt bad for them again and brought them in and it was hard getting them in, they didn't want to, but I finally managed and after 30 minutes they were ready to get back outside and ran straight for their shelter. I decided to get in with them and I sat with them for about 15 minutes and I was comfortable. As long as your out of the wind, your good!

And the 3 feet of hay was pretty darn comfortable!
This is how it looked today when we woke up! I was soooooo excited!


This afternoon we went and rode around on the ranch to see if we could see anything and all the lakes were frozen. We might need to invest in ice-skates!

While we were out a blizzard came through. A little exaggeration but it looked and felt like a blizzard. We could barely see 5 feet in front of the truck it was coming down so fast, but it didn't last long. Jeff's yard was covered good when we got back to the house! The wind/snow was still coming down so fast that the picture turned out blurry and you can't tell how fast the snow was coming down :( but trust me......it was!

I sure could get used to this weather! It really isn't as miserable as it would be in Texas if it was -1!!!!!!

Bottle feeding again...different animal.

Luis and Gisella went to Texas for a Quinceanera (sp) 15 year old birthday party. Gisella was trying to explain the tradition to me and they go ALL OUT! It's on up there with a white women's wedding! They didn't go home for Thanksgiving and they aren't going home for Christmas, I guess they were saving up their days for this party! ANYWAYS........these people love babies. Luis somehow manages to catch baby rabitts, baby turkeys, baby turtles, baby snakes, baby, baby, baby! I, on the other hand, am a sucker for baby animals and feel like they belong with their mother, as in, "Stop, catching babies and bringing them home.!" They hadn't brought any home in awhile, thank goodness! Well they also have a dog, a pitbull, and I am deathly scared of these animals. They keep her in a pen though. Well they decided they needed some puppies, so they let her out to mate with a neighbor dog, I think he is some kind of cow dog, not sure exactly. Then, last time Fransisco came down he brought a male companion for this female dog and it happened to be another pitbull! UGH! Well they don't get along at all, so the female dog dug out and gave birth to 8 puppies. 4 died, we went home for Thanksgiving, Luis accidently ran over the mom dog, now they have 4 puppies to bottle feed, they need to go out of town, I get stuck bottle feeding puppies!

I actually look happy to bottle feed these puppies, but it took 3 days to get attached and this pic is taken after the 3 days! I was so depressed when Cody first brought them over. They had been feeding them regualr milk. That is so not good and no wonder 4 died. So when I get them, they are all weak and stink and freezing and crying constantly and my heart can't take this. I am a sucker for baby animals. I wanted to sooooooo bad to take them to the vet, but I knew Cody would think I was crazy, so it took everything I had not to, but I did call a vet :)! I went and got them the food that they need and they have been thriving since they are getting the nutrition. They still need to go to the vet and get shots, and wormed and all that good stuff and that breaks my heart because I know they won't take them. They never took their dog to the vet, and she has even given birth a couple of times :( It's so sad to say, but I am kind of glad they accidently ran over their dog, hope they don't get another one for babies!

These little stinker's also got a bath today. I thought you couldn't give puppies a bath, but the vet said I could dunk them in some warm water and get the smell off of them. They are simply irresistable now! I have no idea what they are gonna do with them, hopefully give them away!

How do you tell someone to get their dog fixed in a nice way? We have 2 labs, I take them to the vet probably more than I should (I am so gonna be one of those mom's that freak out when her kid has a runny nose!) they are overly taken care of and we even got them fixed. Everyone made such a big deal about it, since they are purebred and have papers, but who cares! GET YOUR DOG FIXED especially if your not gonna take care of them like you should!