Sammie was neutered on Tuesday and consequently has been moving in some odd positions while he heals. He was asleep with his head behind those pillows, but woke up when he heard the camera turn on.



He is attempting to get up. This is how I feel when I do sit-ups.



Emily: "Hey, what the heck are you doing? You're shaking the whole couch."



Sammie: "I'm sorry. Can I sleep with you?"
Emily: "Stop touching me!"



Sammie: "P-l-e-a-s-e..."
Emily: "Fine, just be still."

Meanwhile, in the kitchen, Fuller keeps watch.

I spent last week with a horrible head and chest cold, followed by throwing my back out. Guess I shouldn't have been lifting heavy boxes full of books from the floor to place on a shelf above my head at the Scholastic Book Fair. (KJ and I volunteered there several days.)

Anyway, after the back pain got so bad I nearly fainted, David took me to ER on Christmas Eve where they gave me wonderful drugs. I'm now confined to bed and on a muscle relaxer, anti-inflammatory, and a pain med. I don't have internet access from bed so you won't see me around for a while.

Have a nice holiday season!

KJ and I rang the bell for the Salvation Army yesterday. We did an hour together and he did another hour with a friend. It was fun, but the wind was blowing REALLY hard.




The talent show, open house, and play performance went wonderfully well Friday night. As promised, here are a few videos. My apologies as the video capabilities of my camera are terrible.

These first two of are my tap dancing class. I'm the one on the far left in the back. We had some technical difficulties with the player skipping due to our tapping.








This one is KJ playing his drums. He also performed with two boys playing guitars.



Scenes (ones that KJ is in) from a modern-abridged version of Romeo and Juliet.
This is KJ entering as Count Paris who is supposed to marry Juliet.




This is when Paris (KJ) enters the banquet with Juliet. KJ is in the yellow coat and Juliet is in peach.



In this clip, Paris dances with Juliet's mother while Juliet is dancing with Romeo.

KJ made an "A" on his final and passed Biology with a "C"!

He did fine in American Music History too, a "B" we think, but Biology could have easily gone either way. This means he can continue to take classes at MCC. Phew! I think we'll research any science courses closely before signing up....

In other news, Me-Me died and her funeral was this afternoon so keep KJ's step-mom's family in your prayers.

The homeschool co-op's modern-abridged production of Romeo and Juliet will be this Friday evening. We're also having a talent show beforehand. KJ is playing two numbers and I will be joining my tap dancing class for a couple of numbers. Videos will be forthcoming...of KJ, at least.

Court update regarding TSTSNBD: It has been set for a jury trial in April.

Tomato juice fiasco

We've had an axe murder...

Not really, but we did have a %$#@ tomato juice mess! Thursday evening, I needed to run to Wal-Mart. Sammie was outside so I called him into the house as I was walking out the door. When David (he had gotten off from work) and I returned about an hour later, Sammie, Roscoe, and Curly were all confined to the kitchen with the baby gate. The smell was horrible!! KJ said Sammie was stinking up the living room so he put everybody in the kitchen. After doing some sniffing of individual dogs, we determined that Sammie had been sprayed by a skunk. It wasn't as bad as Curly a few years ago so I don't think he took a direct hit. I had not noticed the smell as he passed me when I was leaving earlier. Of course, by this time, it was 8:30 at night so the feed stores were closed preventing me from buying that skunk odor bath stuff.

I put David to work finishing up supper, while I tackled the Sammie problem. I happened to have a large can of tomato juice (which I have since read doesn't really help). It was in the fridge so I microwaved it so it wouldn't be too cold. Judging from the way Sammie was shivering, I had not warmed it up enough. After saturating a good part of Sammie's fur with it, he somehow managed to flip the bowl into the air sending tomato juice EVERYWHERE. It was all over the shower walls, including the painted area waaaaay up by the ceiling. It was on the toilet, the floor, my shirt, my hair, and dripping down my forehead. I switched to rinsing, followed by regular dog shampoo. He has his head tucked under my arm here.

I rubbed a little lavender oil into his back fur where he couldn't lick it off to try and mask any lingering skunkiness. I wouldn't let him in our bed that night, but by morning he was mostly odorfree. His ears still smell skunky.

This is cute, but may offend so view at your own risk.

I was clued in to this by One Sixteenth. If it won't load, go here.

Edited to add: I could never get it to load so just use the link.