Happy New Year!

We four wish you a healthy, prosperous and fun New Year!

GIMLI: I have to stay up til midnight? But, I'm sleepy now.

MERIDA: You go to bed, I'll keep the bottle company.

Gimli waves goodbye to 2014, Merida has already moved on.

Merry Christmas!

And I watched him exclaim as he frapped out of sight,

Merry Christmas to all!

And to all a good night!

We hope you had a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Festivus or a good holiday with your family and friends!

Days of Christmas - 12

As one ages, Christmases tend to blend into one another so that you remember them in flashes here and there.

One of these flashes takes me back to Christmas Eve as a child in Trinidad. There was ham in the oven, filling the room with the lovely smells. Carols on the radio and fresh bread anxiously waiting for the ham.

This is one tradition I've brought forward to our lives. Every Christmas Eve, I make a ham and we have ham sandwiches for dinner. The corgis are always close by and they are rewarded with a small piece. I am rewarded with gobs of drool on the floor. :)

Then, we horse around on the floor with the dogs, race up and down the hallway, and have plenty of cuddles. Right now, it's a waiting game for Gimli to go to bed. Then, I can fill the stockings without him obsessing over his and the cookies inside.

Days of Christmas - 11

What started out as a place to put our Christmas cards has now become overrun with other, non Christmas items so we have to put some of the cards on the half wall.

I think next year I will come up with a better method to store the Christmas cards. To Pinterest I will go!

This is a nice idea: Paperclip ribbon card display as is this one: Kitchen cupboard ribbon.

Time will tell on if I actually get it done next year!

Days of Christmas - 10

This year, I strung the lights a little differently. I found this method: Stringing lights and figured I'd give it a try.

The first thing: you use a bit more lights than usual. In this picture there are 6 or 7 strings.
Secondly, it's probably best to stick with one color or a multi-colored string of lights, else you may run out and have to locate an extra string that may or may not go with your color scheme. We ran into this scenario - usually, I put up red and purple lights, but I didn't have enough, so I switched to the red and white. It makes it look like a candy cane, so it's not too bad.

Our tree now has a wide assortment of Disney ornaments, and fewer regular ornaments. I keep joking to Mike that we need a second tree to handle Disney!

Days of Christmas - 9

Stuffed animal friends.

These little guys only come out for about a month each year and I position them around the house. Gimli doesn't pay them any attention, but Merida thinks they are hers to poke and investigate.

I wouldn't put it past her to steal one and de-stuff it!

Days of Christmas - 8

Ugh, I've been horribly late with the majority of these posts, but this one at least is ok.

One of the things I enjoy about the Christmas season is getting together with friends. Friday night, we went out for schnitzel. It was to die for!

This is the Husar Schnizel, which is pork with potatoes, bacon, and hot peppers. I ended up taking home a doggie bag and ate it for lunch the following day. Still good!

After dinner, we went back to our friends' house to hang out.

On Saturday night, we visited our neighbor's and extended the holiday merriment. On the drink menu were Hazelnut martinis and Blue Glowtinis, in a word - YUM!

At times, we become caught up in the hustle and bustle of the season and we forget that the simple things like good food and drinks with great people are what really matter.

Days of Christmas - 7

Our Throwback Thursday for this month:

Puppy Merida on her stocking.

Six years ago, this was us with squirmy little fluffy Gimli.

I miss having a fluffy puppy swishing around the house. Fluffs are so incredibly soft and Gimli was such a cutie at that age.

Days of Christmas - 4, 5, 6

So, dear friends, I'm sorry for missing those 2 days. Life, and work, gets in the way sometimes, but here I am now.

Monday and Tuesday were crazy busy days and I felt a little down,

However, there's nothing like receiving mail that makes things a little better.

I had ordered a corgi t-shirt from GiveAFluff and it arrived on Monday. We also ordered next year's calendar, some magnets and some mugs from Vistaprint and the shipment arrived on Tuesday. This, coupled with some snuggle time with Merida, made me feel a little better.

This is part of the Christmas spirit, having family to prop you up when you're feeling down. Of course, this face doesn't hurt either.

Our drink for today is tea in some fetching cups. Some days, only a cup of tea will do!

Days of Christmas - 3

The corgis have created their Christmas lists:

Gimli:

cookies
food
cheese
toys
a new wubba
apples
more cookies
tons of Marrowbones
more cheese
peanut butter
bacon
toys
an egg

Merida:

snow!
cookies
apples
some Marrowbones
toys
whatever Candy's eating
a toy with lots of stuffing that I can destroy
a new shirt to wear
peanut butter
my own big blanket to cuddle on the couch, in Mike and Candy's bed, on the floor, and other such places.
more toys

My dogs have a one track mind, as you can see.

I find, when making up Christmas lists, it's nice to have some hot chocolate with Baileys in it. Today's mix contained store bought hot chocolate mix, Bailey's Hazelnut, and whipped cream.

Yum!

Days of Christmas - 2

We received a rather large Christmas stocking and it seems both corgis have claimed it.

Gimli hasn't figured out that it's a stocking, he thinks it's a big piece of fabric. He is well aware of stockings and what can be found in them, though! It's at the point now where I cannot put out the stockings until Christmas Eve, after the dogs have gone to bed.  If not, Gimli will find it and he'll figure out a way to steal it or he'll sit in front of it all day.

I thought I had corgis, not children!

With the dogs hanging out with this large stocking, it's time for a nice glass of cider. I'm a big fan of Strongbow cider, and I'm a big fan of the Bacardi Breezers drinks, so when I saw this mash-up, I was intrigued.

Alas, it did not live up to my expectations. It contains cider and rum, and I didn't like it. It wasn't "cidery" and it wasn't "rummy", just something in the middle - as if you'd mixed apple juice and one of the Bacardi Breezers together in your kitchen.

I won't buy this one again, back to Strongbow it is!

Days of Christmas - 1

Here's another go round of our Days of Christmas themed pictures. I know I said I'd include drinks in these, but alas, no drink picture for today.

I will make it up in later posts.

Edit: There's a 6 pack in the picture, does that count? :)

For today's post, we have a sneaky creature by the Christmas tree. I wonder if she's scouting for the Grinch?

Wordless Wednesday - Waiting

5 things - December edition

1. I'm fighting a cold/flu/plague/disease of some kind. I have a scratchy throat and I feel ill, but not ill enough to take a sick day. It's quite frustrating, in that I cannot exert myself because then I become tired quite quickly. I didn't put in a run today, unfortunately, but I did some time on the TreadClimber.

I'm counting that as a win!

2. Merida has turned the corner on her UTI. The last dose of medicine is tomorrow morning. She's feeling better almost back to normal. She's still upset though, all her snow has melted away.

Maybe she'll get a white Christmas.

Gimli continues to look for his ducks when we go for walks, even though the ducks have been brought inside. If I even ask him about the duckies, he remembers and we have to go see them.

He's a silly bear, this one.

3. My birthday was last week and I felt quite special this time around. It's the first birthday I get to spend with Merida - last year, we were away. I took the day off and wandered around a local candy shop, had a large breakfast, and spent time with Mike and the corgis.

4. I'm planning to do the 12 days of Christmas again this year, but I'll be adding drinks to it as well. We'll see how that goes :)

5. I haven't yet seen the Muppet Family Christmas special on tv. This is one of the programs that gets me into that Christmas mood, plus it has the Muppets from Sesame Street, The Muppet Show, Fraggle Rock, and Muppet Babies.

Mike and I are quite different when it comes to Christmas specials - he likes the Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and Santa Claus is Coming to Town, while I don't care for those.

I prefer the Muppets, the Blackadder Christmas Carol, and Mickey's Christmas Carol.

Flat Corgi Friday - A girl and her corgis

the Disney Fantasy - May 2014

I had a lovely day with the doggies today - early morning snuggles in bed, a crazy play session, and a nice walkies.

On today of all days, that makes an excellent present.

Wordless Wednesday - Christmas fuzzies

Sorry for the blurries :(

Take 2 of these and call me in the morning

We're back from the vet's office and Ms. Merida does have a UTI. They found a small amount of blood and crystals in her urine, the poor dear.

She's on antibiotics for the next week, and with luck, this will be the last of it. She's no worse for wear though, she's running around with Gimli and continues to jump on him to wrestle.

A funny tidbit from today:

There's a vet student who works at the office and she was in with the Dr. to shadow. The student and the Dr. had a bet going to see who could guess where Merida's name came from.

The student won.

To the vet

We're off to the vet either tomorrow or Wednesday.

I suspect Merida has a UTI - she's been "dribbling" every time she's been out today and she had an accident inside. We were gone this evening for about an hour and half - usually that's no trouble for her, but not today.

I think it's in the early stages - ie no blood yet, so we're going to call the vet in the morning and see if they can squeeze her in.

This is the first I've dealt with a UTI, so I'm being overly cautious and watching her like a hawk. From what I've seen, they are going to need a urine sample, (Good luck :( ), and then she'll need a course of antibiotics. We'll know more once we're able to see the vet.

In the meantime, she's sleeping in our room in the event she needs to go during the night.

Flat Corgi Friday - Mini Cruisers

Possibly the only "corgis" to have been on a Disney Cruise.

Fox in the hen house

There are a couple homeowners in our subdivision that keep chickens, ducks, and geese. We've only recently come across the houses, which means Gimli's only recently learned about them.

To say he's interested in the birds is an understatement. I'm pretty sure he wants to grab hold of them and squeeze them until they squawk, at which time he'll squeeze them again.

Gimli knows the location of one of the houses and each time we pass by, he has to stop and look through the fence at the ducks.

Gimli's selfie

I was playing around with the camera and managed to take Gimli's first selfie. (Apologies for the crummy quality.)

We were cuddling and sharing kisses, while Merida was otherwise distracted.

I so love this little fluff.

5 things - November edition

I realize I haven't done this sort of post in a while, so here goes:

1. Mike has lost 20 lbs. Yes, that's right, 20! His pants are falling off of him and some of his shirts are now too big.

He still has more weight to lose, but he's quite thrilled with his results. I think I'm going to buy him a belt for Christmas.

2. I am run/walking up to 8k now. Provided I keep up this pace of adding half a kilometer each week, I'll be up to 10k in time for our race in January.

It still doesn't feel like we have less than 60 days to go, it's quite surreal.

3. It's beginning to look like Christmas in our house. Nearly all of the decorations are up, and most of the Christmas cards are addressed. I haven't started my baking yet, but I plan to start next week.

4. Gimli visited the vet on Saturday for his yearly checkup. He's healthy as can be - his coat is good, his weight and heart are good, and his teeth are in good shape for a 6 year old. He didn't like the thermometer in the ear, but other than that, he was his usual grumpy/happy-for-cookies self.

5. We have our first real snow of the season and Merida is beside herself with joy. All she wants to do is romp and pounce in the snow, regardless of the sub-zero temperatures!  She criss-crosses the yard with her tracks and digs her head into drifts looking for something to play with.

She reminds me of this panda: 

Bath day

We gave Merida a bath the other day. Gimli had gone for his grooming appointment, but we decided to keep Merida home this time around. Her coat isn't as unruly as his and she doesn't need as intense a session.

Instead, she got a turn in the tub.

Why am I standing in the water?

Oh, now I get it.

All clean and fuzzy!

Merida didn't make a fuss, she let me do whatever I needed to do. After her bath session, I dried her off as well as I could and let her go find Gimli. She took off frapping through the bedrooms and under the bed. I think it's a corgi thing to do. Gimli does it as well, even when we just wash his feet.

She smelled so good, it was all I could do not to sniff her like in the Gain commercials.

Flat Corgi Friday - Rusty Corgis

This spot is called Mount Rustmore.

I think if the real corgis were there, Gimli would pee on every buoy.

Bacon-ny Goodness

It should come as no surprise to you that I love bacon. If I could eat it at every meal, I would.

It should also come as no surprise that I have a good friend, Salar Madadi of MeatVentures, who makes his own bacon. Yes, that's right, he makes his own bacon. That and he won this year's Canadian National Bacon Championship, so he knows what he's talking about!

He makes all sorts of dishes with said bacon - like Tocino sliders, and a Bacon Fatty, which is bacon wrapped around meatloaf. Both of these are excellent, but the best thing he makes is a bacon creme brulee. I kid you not, all sorts of goodness - a nice slice of bacon in it, creamy goodness in the middle and bacon bits at the bottom.

I begrudgingly share it with Mike. Even Gimli gets in on the action.

He got some because it was his birthday.

He is competing today in Las Vegas at the World Food Championships and we wish him well!

Don't forget to check out his Food Truck IndieGoGo campaign too!

Wordless Wednesday - Peek a Boo

5 things about my corgis

Gwendolyn Rose Corgi challenged us to post 5 things about Gimli and Merida, so here we are:

Gimli

Gimli was named years before he was born. We are LOTR fans and I knew I wanted to name a Pembroke Welsh Corgi, Gimli. We didn't know if we'd get a girl or a boy, but even if it was a girl, we'd stash away "Gimli" for future use.

To get our attention, Gimli lies on his back and paws at the air. Every time he does this, I pounce on him for belly rubs.

People often mistake Gimli for a girl. We think it's because of his fluffy hair and eyelashes.

He does not like to be surprised. If you sneak up on him, he will bark at you and then "complain" in a very corgi speaking voice.

Him and I carry on conversations on a regular basis. I talk to him and he responds in his corgi voice. It's quite funny and I'm sure you think I'm crazy, but it's what we do.

Merida

She's Gimli's half-niece. Gimli's half-sister by the same father is Merida's mother. As a result, they both have the same tiny patch of white hair between their shoulder blades.

She's a snow/cold weather girl. In the Summer, she wants to be inside where it's cool. Now that the weather has cooled down, she wants to be outside.

She does not like anyone wearing a mask or balaclava etc. We were checking out our winter accessories and I tried on my face mask. She lost it! She barked and tried to jump on my head. The second I took it off, she covered me in kisses and was back to normal.

She loves to snuggle. One day, I will sleep a full night with her in bed, though Mike doesn't know it yet.

She is patient and likes to know what you're doing, especially if you are in the kitchen.

Saturday Smiler - To a T

This sums up their personalities so well.

Flat Corgi Friday - Edible pirates

GIMLI: I wonder if we can eat these?

MERIDA: I'm going to eat him before he eats me!

Wordless Wednesday - On a mission

I guess I'm a runner now?

It's finally happened. I thought it would take much longer, but nope, it happened today.

Mike and I went for a run this evening. I didn't feel well today - I thought I might have been coming down with a cold/flu and then a migraine hit in the morning. It was just one of those days, coupled with it being a Monday.

I was aiming for 6.5 km, but I did 5 and stopped. I didn't want to push myself, considering how crummy I felt in the morning.

Then, in the car on the way home, I complained that I only did 5 km.

I guess I'm a runner now.

Who needs a scarecrow?

Corgis are herding dogs. They were bred to drive livestock based on the farmer's commands. Somewhere along the line, those corgis who weren't good at herding stayed home and watched the farmhouse. They took care of rodents and kept things in order.

My dogs seem to have inherited the "keep things in order" trait.

As I've mentioned before, our backyard backs onto a farmer's field that's covered in corn. The local crows have started eating the corn and two of them decided to eat the corn that's right in line with our backyard.

I first noticed the crows the other day and of course, whenever one stands at the backdoor for any length of time, the corgis suspect you're looking at a "critter". They scampered over and saw two crows busily eating the corn.

I opened the door and off they went to scare off the crows.

Merida sounding the alarm and Gimli bringing up the rear. Now, every time they walk by the sliding door, they sneak a peek to see if the crows have returned. Those crows have wised up too, they moved down the row so they are in line with the neighbor's backyard - no pesky little barky dogs live there.

Saturday Smiler - Spoonful of cream cheese?

Nevermind what Mary Poppins says about a spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down, my dogs like a spoonful of cream cheese to help the heartworm medicine go down.

Anytime the cream cheese comes out, they come running because they know they get a large drop of it.

Flat Corgi Friday - Halloween edition!

Can you guess who we are supposed to be?

Throwback Thursday - the Evil Queen and I

We honeymooned at Disney and one of the highlights of the trip was attending Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween party. We got to trick or treat like little kids again and it was neat seeing the park done up with "scary" decorations.

But for me, this was the best part.

In case you were unaware, the Evil Queen is one of my favorite characters... as you can see from my shirt.

Wordless Wednesday - Zombie Goofy

I have to stop

I came across a pin the other day: "Slow progress is better than no progress." Sometimes you need a little reminder.

I've always been hard on myself - in everything. I've been calling myself a recovering perfectionist for years, though sometimes that perfect person rears her little head and messes with my brain.

I've been arguing with myself that I'm not further along. I thought I'd be fully running a 5k by now, not running/walking it. I thought I'd have lost more weight and more inches.

But then, I shut out the stupid voice in my head and I realize that every time I step into these sneakers, and run, it's more than I've ever been able to do, ever.

And, every time I go for a run, it's for longer and faster. I can run with Merida and she tires out before I do.

I'm still at the same weight, but my thigh cellulite is gone. My thighs don't rub together as much as they did before I started running. My calves are a little thicker, which means my boots have a tough time zipping up. My butt is better looking, not quite "buns of steel", but better looking than it used to be. My muffin top has deflated a bit more, but not quite gone.

I have a way to go still to be able to handle a 10k. Right now I'm at 6.5k - running/walking. Little by little, I'll get there.

Sleepy little one

I took this video after our day at Woofstock back in May. Both corgis were knocked out!

You can see her little ears working even after she starts drifting into dreamland.

Saturday Smiler - Pretty girl

:)