Video of Poppa

Marc is in Florida this week spending time with his Nana who has been sick lately. While he was there he got to have dinner with my Poppa, Aunt Shelley, Uncle Mort and cousin Jason. He took this quick video of Poppa. Can you believe he is almost 96!?! He's too cute for words, and rumor has it he is going to start reading my blog regularly. I am such a lucky girl to have a Poppa who reads blogs!



Love you too Poppa!

Another Scrapbooking Post

So I had to post another scrapbooking post, this time I'm not an idiot, I checked all of my dates, etc. and everything checks out. I am posting this time because I loved the idea that MaryJo had and decided that it is going to be a yearly project for me. I also wanted Marc to see what I worked on this week since he is in Florida and I am sure I will forget to show him when he gets home. I plan on doing this every year so when Marc and I have kids they can look back on these pages as they grow up and see where we were in life year by year. I am going to do it every year around our anniversary.

Here's what we did, it was an office theme so all of the paper looks like office supplies, super cute. I decided to do an "All About Me" page, I took pictures of my wonderful cubicle (hopefully next year it will be an office) and pictures of everything that is important to me, family, friends, career. I wrote about my job and places I wanted to visit. The little area with the lava picture opens up and there are pictures in there of my favorite things, my Poppa, dogs/Homer, cooking, pink, my husband, house, etc. So it is also an interactive layout and we learned the technique so we can fit more pictures into a layout. So simple but something I would have never thought of. Such a cool idea, MaryJo is so creative. The pictures don't really do it all justice. My next goal is to learn how to be a better photographer, I should put that on my check list!

My next project is to do the same thing for Marc outlining his likes, his job, etc.

Auntie Ski

Yay, I am so excited, last night my friend Woody (Jennifer) had her baby girl and made me an Auntie Ski. Her name is Annabel Riley and from the pictures she is quite the cutie. She weighed 7 lbs 14oz and I forgot how long Woody told me she was. Plus she has my favorite girl name, Riley, as a part of her name so she must be a cool chick! Marc and I can't wait to go out to Indiana the end of June and meet her and teach her that IU is way better than Purdue (dad went to Purdue and mom to IU).

I am also very excited that Woody and Nate started a new blog because that means I have another blog to get addicted to!

Congrats Woody and Nate and welcome Annabel.

Road Trip

Our weekend trip to Tahoe was great, we left around 7:30 on Saturday morning, so we only missed our departure goal by a 1/2 hour, which is pretty good for us. We stopped at Panera to grab some breakfast and we pretty much flew up to Tahoe. It was pretty smart leaving early Saturday morning since we really didn't hit much traffic and we were up there by 11:00. There was a ton of snow, especially considering our car was measuring the temperature in the low 40s, I think 39 was the lowest it hit. The snow on the side of the road was piled higher than our car and since the temperature was in the 40s I figure there was still some snow that had melted, they must have gotten an insane amount of snow. It was crazy how much snow there was but it made for an absolutely beautiful scene. I think snow is absolutely beautiful so I was soaking in all of the scenery (which was nice for Marc since I usually fall asleep on car trips).

We never stop at View Points but we actually pulled over going down the hill to South Lake Tahoe and got some great shots because the view was so spectacular. Unfortunately, when we arrived in South Lake Tahoe our room wasn't ready so we were stuck with Homer for a while so we couldn't go up to the top of the mountain. We walked around, grabbed some lunch. At about 1:30 our room was ready so we went and checked in and got Homer settled. By now it was after 2:00 so it didn't make much sense for us to pay the lift ticket to the top of the mountain for an hour or so, so we never made it up, I was pretty bummed about that. I was really looking forward to sledding! Instead Marc and I did some retail therapy, I got a fun winter hat and a North Face fleece jacket I have had my eye on for a few months now. It's so soft! The weather was beautiful, low 40s so it wasn't too cold and it felt great to be outside. Plus we tired Homer out which meant he would probably sleep all afternoon.

We met up with Anne and Doug at about 4:00 or so and went up to their room at the Marriott. Now when I say room, I should mention that the room probably had more square footage than our house. It was the hospitality suite at the Grand Residence that her company had rented out for the week. It was amazing, stainless steel appliances, a dining room, 3 bedrooms, washer and dryer. Much nicer than our dog friendly joint. We hung out for a bit and then Marc and I went to check on Homer, who was sleeping nicely in his crate (I was very worried he would be screaming all day and we would get kicked out of our room and have to spend the night in our car). We took Homer for a walk, played with him a bit, fed him and then met back up with Anne and Doug for dinner. Homer got his first taste of snow at this point since I walked him down some side streets that weren't as cleared off as the main roads ( and he got to wear his fun sweater). He was quite fascinated with snow, he insisted on walking on the snow evem though there were tons of cleared areas, after all he can walk on grass at home. Most of it was hard, as it had iced over but every so often he would hit a soft spot and sink at which point he looked up at me with complete confusion. After Homer experienced snow, we went to a sports bar where we watched the UNC - Duke game with some of Anne's co-workers and customers and then hit the casinos for a bit. I lost $30 and Marc lost $50, not too bad. The temperature really dropped at night so the walk home was really chilly. luckily I won the "1-2-3 Not it" game for walking Homer so I got to get in my flannel pjs and warm up in bed.

When we got home Homer was sound asleep in his crate. Marc took him out, walked him and let him lay in bed with us for a while since he had been cooped up for the entire day. A half hour or so later he insisted on going in his crate (he wanted a treat no doubt) so I put him in and said good night. At about 1:00 AM I woke up because Marc was watching TV and my head was flat on the bed because they had the worst pillows ever. We had brought a bunch of bed stuff in case the hotel was super shady (it turned out to be only half shady) so Marc went down to get the pillows. Homer woke up to the door closing and that was the beginning of a very long night. Marc walked him and then he let him get into bed with us again. Homer was beyond thirsty and then he started panting uncontrollably, his eyes were narrow and watery. I thought I would have to find a vet in the middle of the night and was afraid his heart was going to go out or he was about to have seizure. He was like this for over an hour while I tried to calm him down. Marc wanted to throw him in a cold bath to cool him down but I was afraid that would put him in shock so we just put a ice pack on him and I tried to calm him down. After a while he got up and went and laid by my feet where he fell asleep. Meanwhile Marc was snoring away and I was up every hour checking on Homer. Homer slept for 3 hours and then he stirred and Marc moved him which woke him up. So I was back to trying to calm Homer down since the panting started again while Marc dozed off again. I think the altitude really got to Homer. Lesson learned: Homer has no business out in the wilderness. But he sure looked cute in his Banana Republic sweater in the snow!

So needless to say with the time change and with the lack of sleep due to the dog, we were very tired on Sunday. The shower was also a debacle. The knob was broken so the shower went from freezing (it was 16 degrees out in the morning) to scalding hot in like half a second. I really needed a hot shower to wake up too. I figured it was best to let the shower win since I was either going to end up with pneumonia or 3rd degree burns. We got a late start meeting up with Anne and Doug for breakfast (and I felt so bad since I knew they wanted to ride the lift to take pictures and then go skiing on their last day) but we had a bite to eat and then Anne and Doug hit the slopes for some photos and their last day of skiing and we headed home.

Shenanigans: Of course! Would it be a Zimmerman trip without shenanigans? The drive home was much longer, Marc pulled over for everybody leaving Tahoe. At one point he turned around to me and said traffic was really light. I kindly reminded him that's because grandpa over there was letting everyone pass him. At least he admits he drives like a grandpa. We also got into a few shenanigans on the way home (would you expect anything less)…like stopping at AM/PM in search of "fun" food, lucky for the waistline they no longer carry soft serve. We also stopped at the Jelly Belly Factory in Fairfield for some Belly Flops. FUN!!! I was impressed, they had a little dog walk area too. And for those of you wondering we resurrected the "Nosh Disorder Kit."

Of course, Homer slept pretty much the entire way home and shot us dirty looks when we woke him up, like how dare us keep him awake. Marc and I were exhausted last night. Homer's doing fine so I really just think it was partially the altitude and partially stress of being at a hotel for the first time. We'll try one more overnight trip with him but probably something a little more posh, like maybe wine tasting. He was a complete mud ball since he was obsessed with the snow so he got a shower and then he slept the rest of the day. My delicate little flower.

Overall it was a great weekend, Tahoe was beautiful and best of all we got to see Anne and Doug, though the visit was definitely too short. The trip was very unlike Marc and I, since we usually plan extensively and don't just book a trip 4 days before we head out but it was a nice change.

Heavenly Village:

My new favorite picture (Homer's actually smiling at the camera)!

Serendipity

A few weeks back my friend Anne told me she was going on a ski trip with work, now she lives in Houston so I didn't ask her where she was going because I kind of figured it wasn't going to be Tahoe. Yesterday we were randomly emailing at work and she mentioned she was leaving Wednesday for Tahoe so work was kind of crazy. I asked her how long she was going to be there because Tahoe was only like 4 hours from our house and maybe over the weekend we would drive up if they would still be there. As luck would have it her husband, Doug, is flying in on Friday and they are staying through Monday. I thought I would have to talk Marc into it but he said yes right away as long as we could find a hotel. And since it must have been meant to be I found a dog-friendly hotel for super cheap (I figure it's probably sketch but since it's one night and we have the dog and we are driving, we are going to bring all of our own bedding). So Saturday morning we are going to leave to go see Anne and Doug for lunch and then have some snow fun!

What a wonderful surprise start to the week!

I'll be sure to take lots of pictures, especially of Homer's first experience with snow (good thing he didn't get his shave last weekend!)