Can't leave out our baby!! Daisy LOVES turkey and she even got some ma$hed potatoe$!! I used to be TOTALLY anti-human food for dogs, but I've done a 180 and now I much prefer feeding healthy human food to my dogs than the crap that they put in commercial dog food. Poor Ziggy, he didn't live to reap the benefit of my research and ate dog food his whole life...

GENERAL:
I'm only putting this in here because my mother and grandmother would want me to. I told Reese to take my picture because I needed a decent head-and-shoulders shot for my Facebook profile and he got a pretty good one!! I HATE having my picture taken!!

CHRISTMAS:
We put our decorations up the other day as I mentioned in the blog post below about our lost stockings (that are still lost...). I know many of you aren't going to be interested in our decorations, but I know my mom and my Gram are always interested in this kind of thing, so I put them in:

Here is Erik, enjoying the Christmas tree. He is being SO GOOD about not grabbing the ornaments, I really am amazed! He just sits and "talks" to the ornaments and lights and is as happy as can be. :o)

Here is just a general area. Nothing too exciting, but I managed to squirrel Mark's huge wooden boat away and into the rec room!! SO nice to have that extra table!!


This little area has an oil painting that I did last year and a little nativity set that I painted when I was about 22. The neatest part of this area is the white doily that my grandma crocheted for me! I like to bring it out only at Christmastime to keep it in good condition and to keep it special.

(Bored yet???)

These pathetic little figures are from two different Santa matryoshka sets that I bought when I was adopting Reese, and then Nikolai. Our precious dog Adam who died 2 months ago (sniff!!) chewed these little figures to BITS a couple of years ago. Because they were so special, I gathered up all the slivers of wood and spent HOURS gluing them back together while cursing his ancestors!! Obviously, I did miss some pieces, but it's as good as I could do. I was SOOOOOOO MAD at that dog for what he did, but now I treasure these pieces more than ever because they have his "mark" all over them. We miss Adam so much, as much trouble as he was! He was just so dumb he couldn't really be held responsible for all the trouble he was.

And some more little Russian figures. I think most of these were spared by Adam, except for the smallest Santa in the middle. You can see the crack down his left eye, poor little fella...


This was taken today of Erik, as he walked around with his walker. (His walking is REALLY getting good, along with other things - more on that later.) He is SUCH a good boy - he stood there for the longest time and just "talked" to the figures, but eventually, he reached up and tried to grab a little reindeer. I hollered "no" (I have to holler, with his horrible hearing), and he instantly stopped his reach and looked back to me like, "yikes!". A few minutes later he reached again, and stopped himself, and looked back at me to see if I saw him. What a good boy!!! I just love him soooooo much!!

Well, that's all the show-and-tell for today. Hope you liked it!! Mom and Gram, I hope you aren't crying or anything...

Adam was the kind of dog that made you laugh. He was incredibly dumb, but he used that dumbness to keep us all entertained!! We often called him "Fat Adam" or "The Fat Dog", though he, being a whippet, was far from fat!! Next to petite and tiny Ellie he was fat, but he started responding to the name "Fat" so we kept at it. LOL He was a big GOOF and wanted nothing more than to be loved and protected. He was also a big baby, and had an extremely low pain tolerance. If he'd stub his toe or walk into a wall, he'd cry and come running at me for sympathy, which I wholeheartedly gave him!! He loved nothing more than to play fetch and would almost panic if you told him to "go get your 'where'd it go'"!! (Toys were "where'd it go"'s.) He loved to run as fast as he could and loved to show off to you how fast he was going. He'd RIP around the yard and run in front of you leaving 3mm of space between you and him as he passed at 80 mph. When he did that, you DIDN'T MOVE, cause if you did, he was liable to crash into you and both of you would end up with broken bones!! Somehow he lived his whole life without a major injury. Incredible.

Adam will be remembered for a LONG time in our family for being hilarious, dumb-as-a-brick, lovable, adorable, naughty (he never met a garbage can or kitchen counter he didn't like!!), and a big woosy baby. And we wouldn't have changed a thing about him. He was only 6 (almost 7) years old when we put him down last Saturday, from a very fast-acting illness that went undiagnosed by the vets (my best guesses are that he ate a toxic lizard or had a brain tumor or hemorrhage). Adam was a pain in the neck, but we couldn't have loved him more. He was a good friend, and a good buddy, and a good son.

He will be sorely missed for a long time.