A Day in the Life of Ruby..

This is Ruby.

She is one of our adorable Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. We have two. We couldn't say no after the first one. Ruby is the older of the two, however we actually got her after Rocky. Ruby is 9 years old and a retired breeding dog. According to the breeder she's had three litters, I don't know whether to believe it or not. We thought we were buying Ruby from a reputable breeder, however we've discovered several neglected things, teeth, ear infections, etc. So, we consider her our rescue dog, even though she isn't a true "rescue".

Ruby lives the life of luxury now and that's all that matters!

Here is some of how Ruby spends her days...

This is Ruby wedged in between my leg and the edge of the chair. She's taking her early morning nap! Right after waking up, going potty, and eating breakfast.

Oh dear, the flash disturbed her, well, maybe not...still half asleep.

This is Rocky and Ruby during their morning nap while mom is working from home.

Uh oh, something woke her up...

Let's bother Mom while she's trying to work and stand by her leg and scratch her until she scratches my ears, yeah, that's a good idea! I'll give her the sad eyes, those always work!

Well, that didn't work, kick that pesky puppy out of my bed and stretch out for my afternoon nap!

Maybe if we wait patiently in our crate while Mom makes dinner she'll feed us sooner!

Dinner is over and that little person that lives here is sitting still, I have more room in my chair when she's sitting there, so up we go for our evening nap before bed.

Yep, that's how I spend my days of "retirement"!

Blind Dates really do work!

One of the blogs that I read My Little Life has been having interesting Valentine's Day topics on her blog. One of the recent topics was Engagement Stories, so I thought I would share ours.
I have to back about 6 months from the actual "pop the question day". It was late February; I was almost 24 years old and still living with my parents. Up until that point I had been pretty OK living with my parents, but now having been dating Dough Boy for 6 months I was starting to feel like it was time for my own space. Dough Boy and I were talking about it one evening and he said "I really don't want you living alone, why don't you move in with me." I think I was kind of stunned at first. The first thing that popped into my mind was his roommate would have to move out; I wasn't doing the "Three's Company" thing. He said, fine. I told him I needed to think about it and discuss it with my parents. I was terrified to talk to them about it! We had never really discussed living together before marriage. I had no idea what their reaction would be. To my surprise they were OK with it, the only thing my mother cautioned me about was to make it very clear to him that I wanted to get married and that living together would not be a permanent arrangement. So I told him that and he said OK.
Fast forward about 5 months...July, I moved in that month (took a while for the roomy to find a place, etc.) our first anniversary was coming up in Mid-August. Somehow we got talking about the arrangement and I reminded him this wasn't permanent; I wanted a ring on my finger someday. He suggested we go shopping for one! So, we looked around at several stores and finally found one.
As we were discussing our first anniversary and how we wanted to celebrate he suggested we go to the jewelry store, buy the ring, and go to dinner. Needless to say I was beyond excited! We get to the jewelry store and they pull out the ring (little did I know he'd contacted them and had a larger diamond put in the center!). This is a small jewelry store and they size the rings on sight in about an hour! So, we went to dinner in the mall while it was being sized. We went and picked it up, me expecting to wear it home was a bit surprised when he said to put it in a box and bag! I was now bummed!
We are driving home, the ring is in the back seat of the car, he won't let me take it out and look at it, won't let me wear it, nothing. I told him "You have no idea how hard this is for me. It's something every girls dreams about. What if I told gave you a brand new car and wouldn't let you drive it, that's what this is like for me!" He never gave in. We get home and I go stomping up the stairs to our bedroom. There on top of the TV cabinet is a dozen roses, balloon, and card. I turn around and he's running down the hallway and slides into the entryway on one knee and proposes! He had planned it all along, but didn't expect me to go tearing up the stairs!
He's such a sweetie! He had actually planned on trying to wait until September as we had a vacation planned and he thought it would be fun to propose then, but he didn't think HE could wait that long!
What's your engagement story?

Not Me Monday!

I did not allow my child to have lemon buttermilk cake for breakfast because she had such a good parent/teacher conference the night before! Nope not me, I always make sure she gets a balanced and healthy meal before heading to school. I would never send her all sugared up!

I would never make my families favorite meal (Creamy Chicken & Red Potatoes)for a school dinner and not allow them to eat any of it! Nope not me, I always make enough for the family too!

Creamy Red Potatoes and Chicken

As I promised in my last post, in addition to the heavenly Lemon Buttermilk Cake I made one of my families favorite crock pot dinners. I found this recipe a long time ago on the Internet. It was a collection of crock pot recipes. I have no idea now where I found it or where to point you to get the whole recipe book, sorry!

Here is a picture of it bubbling in my crock pot! Doesn't it look yummy!

Here is the recipe:

Creamy Red Potatoes and Chicken

1 1/2 pounds of Red Potatoes - chunked (I quarter or half them depending on the size)

8 oz. Neufchatel Cream Cheese (this is the 1/3 less fat variety)

10 3/4 oz. can of Cream of Potato Soup

1 Envelope Ranch-style Dressing Mix (I used Hidden Valley, not the one for making dip, the one for making salad dressing)

12 ounces Chicken breast without skin - cut into bite size pieces

Place potatoes in the slow cooker (or crock pot). Beat together the cream cheese, soup and salad dressing mix (I never bother with this step, I just add everything put the potatoes into a bowl and mix it up!). Stir in the chicken and spread over the potatoes. Cover and cook on Low 8 hours or until potatoes are tender. Stir once after 5-6 hours (not really necessary if you aren't at home, I've done it with and without stirring doesn't make a difference!). Stir before serving.

There you have it, yummy goodness, quick and easy!

Enjoy!

Mama to One

Lemon Goodness!

Tiny Dancer's school has two Staff Appreciation Dinners each year. One during the Fall Parent/Teacher Conferences and one during the Spring (if you can call February Spring in the Frozen Tundra, I can't!). But I digress...

I wasn't able to help out during the Fall dinner this year, due to my broken foot back then. I volunteered to bring a dessert this time. I receive these quarterly recipe magazines from Betty Crocker. They are very fun, usually themed, like Summer, Appetizers, Cakes, Cookies, etc. When deciding which dessert to make I came across this Lemon Buttermilk Cake recipe. I had bought the ingredients to make it once before and ended up throwing out the buttermilk before I had a chance to make it, but I decided now was the time. And let me tell you, it is TO DIE FOR! I am not kidding you! I'm not a huge lemon fan, I like it just fine, but I'll pick chocolate over lemon any day. But I like variety, I like making new recipes and this one sounded good. Holy Cow! I might have trouble picking chocolate over this one.

Here is a picture of my half eaten piece!



Tomorrow I will post the Creamy Red Potatoes and Chicken I also made for the dinner. It is one of my families favorite meals and it's made in the crock pot, so it's super easy!

Enjoy!

Mama to One

We're back!

We are back home safe and sound. We actually came home on Saturday 1/30, it's just been so busy around here I haven't had time to post!

We had a fantastic time in Mexico. For the most part we had beautiful weather. A bit windy most of the time, so beautiful hair there was not! But it was nice and warm compared to weather here in the Frozen Tundra.

This was the few from our balcony, very pretty!

This is Tiny Dance hanging in the water.

We did lots of fun things while we were there. We went to Xel-Ha, a natural water park. We snokeled, swam, sat in the sun, and had a glorius time there.

We spent a couple of evenings wandering 5th Avenue in Playa Del Carmen. It was a fun street that was for pedestrians only, it is lined with all kind of shops, tourist stuff, hotels, and restaurants. Here is a photo of one portion of the street in the evening. It was very fun.

We spent a lot of time just sitting in the sun and swimming at our resort, but we split up on Friday. Tiny Dancer and I went horseback riding and Dough Boy went scuba diving.

Here is Tiny Dance on her horse and Dough Boy doing his Pool Dive.

So, in a very nutshell, that is what we did. I've got all kinds of ideas for upcoming posts, so please come back and visit again soon!

Mama to One