Merry (Early) Christmas

Today CJ became the proud owner of a PSP, which was his early Christmas gift. He's really excited about it and having fun playing the games that were included with it. It is very rare that he gets anything that is just for him, and truth be told, I will probably be playing on this thing at least part of the time. I guess we really didn't need more video game entertainment in our lives, but a special treat for CJ was long overdue. It is going to be a great weekend of playing with his new toy, and HOPEFULLY getting some backyard cleanup done.

We Elf'ed Ourselves

Click the picture above to view the Sweigart's Elf dance.

(Thanks YoEddy for the great idea)

Relaxin

Tonight concludes our stay in Seattle. It has been a very nice, relaxing week filled with some nice time with family and lots of time to just sit and relax. It was a much needed break from our every day life and while we didn't really do anything too exciting during this week, we definitely had lots of time to enjoy each other and our family. Here are some photos of our trip to Alki Beach yesterday...

Brunch with Buster & Georgia

I just love this picture! Early this afternoon, CJ and I had breakfast with his grandparents ("Buster & Georgia"). We had such a great visit with them. We ate at the family favorite "Huckleberry Square" cafe and really enjoyed it. Georgia told us lots of cool stories about their younger years, when they first met. It was very nice to get to spend time with them...just the four of us.

Lost in Seattle

So for some reason, it never really registers for me that Seattle is really huge and we're going to get lost. This morning I proclaimed, "let's go to IKEA", and was headed out the door as CJ was explaining that we needed to Google it first. CJ says, "Do you know where it is?" To this I responded, "No, but we'll just drive around until we find it". Thank goodness CJ and his Aunt Wendy got some directions for us as we headed on our way.The first part of the day was spent 'window-shopping' at IKEA. I definitely think I'd like to redecorate one of our rooms with their products, but certainly will not be doing it when we don't have a car to bring our things back to Boise. There was no way we were going to buy anything bigger than our carry on bags, so our IKEA trip just consisted of us just walking around and getting some decorating ideas. After tiring out fighting the crowds at IKEA, we were headed to Chipotle to grab a burrito for lunch. We have a friend who raves about this place, and since we don't have one in Boise, we had to check it out. We drove around for nearly 2 hours trying to find this place! By the time we got there, that burrito needed to be made out of pure gold for us to be impressed :) But it actually was really good and inspired us to get Burrito fixins to make our own burritos when we get home.

Raccoons Thanksgiving

Wendy and Nancy have a family of raccoons that come up their doorstep and steal their cat's food. Usually I'd say that I really hate these little guys. They look like they are wearing robber masks and gloves. They are nature's bandits and I can't stand the terrible noise they make. But this one seems really cute to me and was very friendly. Too bad I couldn't feed it some Turkey leftovers :)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hope your Thanksgiving was as good as ours was. We were very blessed to be able to spend Thanksgiving with the entire Sweigart clan (except for cousin Ben). We rented out space at a church and got everyone together for a big feast. Everything was beautifully decorated by Aunt Becky and it was such a nice time. Here are my some pictures from the event, but checkout the entire Thanksgiving album by clicking here.

Taco Time Seattle

We got in around 6pm. Flight was smooth, CJ and I played pinball on our laptops during our flight. The guy sitting next to us was playing an awesome football game on his little PSP, which made CJ ultra jealous.

One of our favorite things to do when we visit new places is to go to the exact same restaurants and places we would normally visit at home. We were in Seattle nearly 10 minutes before we happened upon Ciege's favorite...Taco Time! The signs looked very scary, very vintage, but luckily the restaurant had been updated and we found a great deal on Crustos (.64 cents!).

We spent most of our first evening chatting with Nancy. Toward the end of the evening, we watched some America's Funniest Videos and teased Wendy about the 6 remotes it takes for her to watch television. :)

Waiting for our plane

Here we are waiting for our outbound flight to Seattle. We should begin boarding in about 2 minutes, so this will be a quick post. So I asked a perfect stranger to take this picture and embarrassed myself a little, but I don't care, I am tired of not having any pictures of both of us! Also, I am currently SO annoyed with Southwest airlines. They are trying out this new numbering system, which is supposed to be better, but people are still waiting in lines so they can get an optimal seat. I hate Southwest, but I am so drawn in by their low price fares. And what is it about crowds of people standing in line? Everyone has a huge frown on their face and the mood level is really grim. Come on people! It's the holiday! Cheer up a little. Meanwhile, Ciege and I refuse to get in the line of cranky people and will remain here with our laptops until we are called.

Seattle, here we come

Our bags are packed...well almost...and we are so excited to be spending the holiday in Seattle with Ciege's family. I love the Seattle Sweigarts! From the beginning they have always made me feel at home and part of the family. Ciege's grandma and grandpa, "Buster and Georgia" are awesome and always have us busting up laughing. We can't wait to catch up on family happenings and it is the first time in a while that all of the Sweigarts are in the same place. It's going to be a great Thanksgiving.

The picture above is the cover of a book I made for the family gathering this year. I found this great website that gives you free book making software. You just pay for the book prints. The company binds the books for you and sends them to your home. Of course this is my first book, so I kept it simple with pictures only...but I'm hoping that everyone will really love it. You can preview the book by clicking here.... (first 15 pages only)

We'll give an update on the great Thanksgiving happenings when we return. Happy Thanksgiving in advance to all of our friends and loved ones! I'm truly very thankful for you.

Cheeky Picture

We've been spending the last week sitting on this futon doing our work while nursing Bachelor through his ordeal. I got up to get a drink and noticed that the 'boys' looked really cute.

Despite the looks of this picture, it is not Bachelor's back legs that are hurt. He is snoring and somehow doesn't care at all that his entire back end is hanging off the futon.

Lady of the House Rant

Ok, I've got to rant. Ever since we've moved to our new house, we get frequent door to door sales people who try to hit us up for magazine subscriptions and various other things. At our old house, we never got these type of visits, but we've had at least a handful in the small amount of time we live here.

Never mind the fact that I am completely annoyed with answering the door while Bachelor is barking wildly in the background....they all do one thing that infuriates me! They all say, "Can you go get your Mom or Dad"? I'm guessing that I should be flattered that they think I am young, but instead it really offends me. I mean, I'm nearly 30, yet still being asked to go get my Mommy or Daddy! It is the number one thing they can say to me which will ensure that I will never buy a single thing from them. A few of them get it right and ask me if I am the lady of the house, but most of them continue to frustrate me.

I just had a visit just like this. The second visit in one week from two different people...both of which assumed that I either was a teenage girl or a 30 year old woman still living with her parents. Either way, I'm not buying :)

Bachelor's Surprise

My awesome Aunt Lori sent Bachelor a surprise birthday present and we received it in the mail today. It was crazy, but it was like he knew this present was for him the second I brought it to him in his 'recovery' room. This little pick-me-up is just what the little guy needed today...

I placed the package on the floor, opened it, and let Bachelor sniff at it through his cone...

Inside was the cutest card ever! The dog on the front of the card is balancing an entire hotdog on his nose. It is perfect and CJ and I laughed as we opened it. We think Bachelor needs to try doing this once he's feeling better...

And the surprise was an "Amazing Dog Trick Kit" which includes an instructional book, a clicker, a mini-frisbee, and a fun little bone toy. It is great!

Thank you Aunt Lori for bringing a huge smile to our faces and for cheering Bachelor up today! The gift was so thoughtful and the card was perfect. Even the cute doggie wrap was perfect! What an amazing aunt I have.

We love you!

Bad case of the 'Mondays'

Poor little Bachelor had quite the ordeal last night, and so did we. Ciege took him out for a walk in the foothills right before bedtime. They had a great time and Bachelor chased his first fox! It was the perfect evening walk until Bachelor got himself caught up in a patch of rusty barbed wire. He made a loud yelping noise, but was able to free himself and finish the walk with CJ.

When the two of them got home, we saw that his arm was cut wide open from his arm pit down to his paw. We put him in the car and took him to the Vet Emergency Room. We ended up spending most of the evening with him at the Vet, which he hated. We hated the whole experience too, especially the $600.00 Vet bill. We've had the worst financial luck as of late. He barked and was super uneasy and crying the entire time. So finally we were able to bring him home at 4am, and he is miserable...sitting around the house with his big cone head.

The poor guy has a drain on his wound that has to be looked at along with a warm compress so he's on high maintenance mode.

Here is a picture of the worst part of his wound....skip ahead if you're squeamish.

Wirestone Vegas 2007

Wirestone had it's annual employee trip to Las Vegas this last weekend and we're still a little exhausted! Each year, our work takes us on an all expense paid trip to Vegas so that we can do some team building and have a great time with our coworkers from all of our different offices. It was great. This year, "Second City", which is an improv comedy group from Chicago, came to our sessions to teach us some team building skills. After learning a little about how to better relate to our coworkers, we joined our coworkers at the MGM Grand for some Texas Hold'EM so we could steal their money. :) We were able to fill two private tables there and had a great time gambling. Craig did pretty good, ended up coming up a little ahead. I did ok the first night and did not so good the second night. The night before we left, we were up until 4 am playing Poker and it was awesome. Overall, the weekend was lots of fun and was a really good little mini-getaway. I wish that I would have taken some great pictures of us gambling, but once we were in Vegas, I pretty much abandoned my camera and purse and travelled light...so I'm posting the pictures we do have of the trip....

This is a picture of the hallway in our hotel...not an exciting shot, but it looked like a pretty picture to me at the time...

Just me and Ciege relaxing. A big bonus of working together is that we get to take this trip together. While everyone else was missing their spouses, I was experiencing my weekend by his side.

Ciege taking it easy before the plane takes off...this proved to be the only rest he got all weekend due to a terribly noisy hotel room and us staying up until the early morning hours playing poker.

New SweigartSpot Feature

Find that my weekly, sometimes bi-weekly posts are not quite enough? Do you lie awake at night thinking about what we could possibly be doing, or what we're eating for dinner? Well GREAT news! The SweigartSpot has just the thing for you....

So, I've been disappointed lately with my lack of things to blog about. We have lots of little things going on in our lives, but none of them are worthy of a blog...and I usually like to have a photo to accompany my posts. Since my picture taking skills are still lacking, and no one wants to see a bizillion pictures of Bachelor chasing his tail, I have fewer posts than I'd like. All of the time, I think of funny little things that are happening that I'd love to share, but that aren't really blog worthy.

So while browsing my friend J's blog, I found Twitter. At first I didn't think much of it, and it sounded really silly. Who could possibly want tiny updates on a continual basis on what we're doing? But I am already loving it. I can send updates from my cell phone, or from my IM, or whenever I'm online. This will give you instant access to the tiny details of what is going on in our lives...as well as tell you a little bit more about what I'm thinking. I'm hoping that the frequent updates will give me some great ideas for great blog posts, but in case my blogging frequency remains at about once or twice a week, this will give you an excuse to come back and see what little things we're up to. You don't want daily/hourly updates from the Sweigart household you say? That is okay. Actually the number one reason I do this, and our silly blog is so that I have a record of the daily happenings in our lives. Last year was the fastest year of my life, yet I remember nothing about it. I can tell you a couple highlights, but that is it. I can't recall all of the fun little details, the things that are so enjoyable about life. But with this handy blog and now the Twitter updates, I'll be able to know exactly what we were up to. And maybe our future kiddies and grandkiddies will get a kick out of our silly details.

Thank you J for introducing me to Twitter....so cool :) Oh, and for all of you lurkers out there who like to see fun blogs, check out J's blog. He is a funny guy, is the owner and entreprenuer of one of the coolest sites, Checkabiz (you must check-it-out), and I always find the information on his blog entertaining. If for nothing else, visit because he takes MUCH better pictures than me and gives great advice on movie picks :) And he won't waste your time with pictures of his dog chasing his tail...Have a happy weekend everyone!