Christmas 2010

I got sick to death monkeying with this video... for some reason when I uploaded the audio and video became miss-matched and it started smearing and skipping so this is as good as it gets!

Love to you all!!

Watch out Lexi

7 steals... 6 rebounds.... 2 points and 1 dad that keeps track of her stats... for the win 15 to 13 today!!! Liv is catching up with her big sis fast!

Lexi and the Billies played in a tournament this weekend and took second place, way to go babe!!

I cannot believe Christmas is in less than a week, I would like to hit the rewind button please. I will be starting my 3rd month of internal medicine on Monday. Not a big fan of working 10-12 hour days and feeling like a complete idiot for 9-11 of those hours... thank god for lunch!!

Here are some of the highlights from my last rotation:

Attending: "How did you do in organic chemistry?"
Me: "Oh I was an average student, organic chemistry is a tough course."
Attending: "If you didn't do well in organic chemistry you should have gone into interior design."
Me: Jaw drops, quickly close my mouth, nervously smile and say, "Oh, uh huh" meanwhile, think to myself, "If I close my eyes will I just disappear???"

Attending asking one of his patient's: "Do you hunt squirrel?"
Me: with scared look on my face.
Attending: "My wife has a great squirrel stew recipe. Saute the squirrel in some olive oil and garlic and then add some sausage and chicken.... some veggies, it's great. The stew isn't any good if you don't add the squirrel. But you don't want to eat the red squirrels... they are a little tough and chewy. You know when a red squirrel moves into a territory all the other squirrels leave, they're terrible."

Attending: "Do you know what's wrong with medical student's these days?"
Me: "No."
Attending: "They don't know anything. The quality of education is horrible, you need more exposure to the basic sciences... in my day.... blah blah blah.... and did I mention that both my sons have PhD's in organic chemistry... blah blah blah.... etc."
Me: thinking to myself, "I would rather die than spend one more day with this redneck asshole who clearly hates me and every other medical student that walks the earth!"

This can't end soon enough... give me the strength to keep my mouth shut, put a smile on and the ability to get back up the next morning and do it all over again!

Hope you are all finished with your holiday shopping and get a chance to relax and enjoy the next couple of weeks!

For those who may have needed an update on our super boring lives

This is basically a post about nothing, I have been in Clarion, PA for the month so we haven't really been doing anything to interesting these days.

The girls got their school pictures back awhile ago, like any good mom I buy the cheapest package and scan them in. Awesome, I know. Now I have two kids that smile with their mouths closed... I can't win.

During Thanksgiving weekend we threw up all the Christmas decorations. I have been so sad that I am not home every evening to turn on all the lights and enjoy my Christmas trees. Baby of course being the naughty little elf below... no respect and no class.

Bella is just the sweetest little thing, aside from the fact that she wants to kill and eat all other animals.

Me and Liv getting cozy in front of the fireplace, I can't wait to be home for good this Friday. I miss the girls and Nate so much, it has been a lot harder than I thought being away.... probably much harder on Nate than me.



This weekend we (I) cleaned Georgie boys cage out. Liv played with him and tried luring him around with some broccoli, she gave him a bath and then of course tortured him by holding him... reptiles are such fun pets :-D

The best part of any weekend is waking up with two cute furry animals and snuggling all morning. Both the girls had basketball games this weekend. I raced home Friday night so we could go to Lexi's and then Liv had one Saturday morning. Lexi is learning that being the only Freshman on the varsity team isn't as glamorous as she would like, we are hoping for huge wins or huge losses so she can get more playing time!! Liv is improving by leaps and bounds, the girl was in there gunning for the ball and playing some great defense. It is so much fun to have them both play the same sport for once!!

We finally finished our Christmas shopping this past weekend so it will be nice to spend this coming weekend relaxing when I get home! Happy Holiday's!!!

Gobble, Gobble

The pre-show:

The main event:

Family photo time with thankful hearts and full bellies:

The Aftermath:

We are going to devour some pie and then we are off to catch the new Harry Potter flick... hopefully I didn't miss much since I only saw the first two and that was ages ago! Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving, we love and miss you all!

Scrimmage Saturday

Today both girls had their first scrimmage of the basketball season. Lexi made the varsity team... wooo hooo and Liv made her basketball debut on the recreational league. Unbeknown to the girls they both got assigned the number 20 jersey.

Liv's game was first, they played 3 mini games of 16 minutes each. They won their first game and lost the next two... better luck next time! It was so much fun to see her play.

Lexi's scrimmage was rough, they played a team that is in a higher division so they won't play this team during their regular season. She is the only freshman that made varsity, she did a great job... made a couple of baskets and played some great defense.

Soccer Banquet

The soccer season has ended and this afternoon I took Lexi to her Banquet. It was a delicious 5 course meal at a local restaurant, Falleta's.

Following dinner the team captain's handed out awards and t-shirts to all the girls, and thanked their amazing coach. They did such a great job, what a fun afternoon! She has been invited to the Varsity team's banquet so Nate will take her to that next week.

Lexi, with her friends Katherine and Tori... so cute!

Halloween

Despite buying Lex a pumpkin to carve, she just never found the time to carve one. Liv was only willing to wait for so long and finally decided to go it alone.

She did a great job, this is the first year Nate and I let her use all the sharp objects all by herself. Super spooky!

Nate was able to make it to the Halloween parade at school, unfortunately this is the best picture he got of Liv. She is the blue crayon hiding behind her hat, what the? This child of ours is so strange sometimes!

Her and her friend, also named Olivia, dressed as blue crayons together (sitting next to her in the picture above) and went trick or treating tonight with a big group of friends.

Best part of the night, the sorting of the candy!

Nate and I stayed in with the animals to pass out candy, here you see the varying degree's of Baby's bitch-i-ness. Baby also did a ridiculous amount of barking, and Bella had a near escape when she was almost quicker than my cat like reflexes that snatched her by her tail and hauled her back in the house!




Lexi was off with her friends for trick or treating as a nerd and sadly I didn't get a picture of her (I am sure she will post some of FB)... I am losing my finesse, maybe I never had any!

In other news:

I still hate rotations. I can't think of anything nice to say so I won't say anything at all... still hoping that things will eventually get easier.

And.... Lexi was invited to play with the varsity soccer team during their playoffs (the only player they pulled up). She has been able to practice with them after school every day and during the first game got to play the last 20 minutes. This has been a really good opportunity for her, it is amazing the difference in skill and the level of play between JV to varsity.

And, also... Liv will be starting recreation basketball this coming week, so we are looking forward to that. Lexi will also be trying out for the school team in a few weeks so between the two they will keep us plenty busy.

Hope you all had a Spooktacular Halloween!

A party with new friends

Today we invited Liv's classmates over for her 10th birthday party.

Every year I say, "this is the LAST time we are having the party at our house, it is too much work" and every year we do it anyways!

Liv decided she wanted to do makeovers. So I let them loose with some makeup and I recruited Lex and her friend Anna to help me paint nails.

Here Liv is puckering up those beautiful pouty lips she was born with!

Every body's fingernails turned out beautiful.

Liv was showered with some fabulous gifts... clothes, jewelry, books, stuffed animals, crafts, makeup, even a lava lamp... I guess we can't be cheap when she gets an invite :)

Here we are with one of Liv's friends mom. Her name is Kimberly Thompson and she is the author of the book 'Toulouse on the Loose' among others. She gave Liv a signed copy so we snagged a photo with her before she left.

Then it was time for ice cream sundaes... the kids were slightly out of control, especially when it came to the whip cream.

Then with a nice sugar high they turned up the music and boogied down and struck a few poses. It was a pretty fun party!



A few other things that have been going on:

The tortoise formerly known as Gary is doing great, he has been renamed George.

The furry animals are doing good too. Bella doing her best to fit on the love seat with me.

Baby has started to curl up in one of the baskets I keep some throw blankets in... filthy animal!

The Homecoming Dance was a couple of weekends ago so here are a few pictures of Lex and her friends. She went with a group of her girlfriends... of course they met up with some boys later on.

They all met at one of her girlfriends' home for some before pictures.

Lexi and ONE of the cute boys she has been hanging out with lately... this gives me stomach ulcers!

Liv has been helping me take care of my friends cat this weekend. We had to lure him out of hiding with some treats to get him to come close to us the first day. Sorry for the crappy picture quality, all I had was my phone.

But we all became fast friends!

He loves Liv... belly rubs and being craddled like a baby, I am going to have to ask my friend to take regular vacations so we can spend more time with him.

I am thinking we NEED a cat.... he is sooooo cute and cuddly! Nate and his damn allergies, I am sure I will eventually come up with a plan to have one of these.