If A Bird in the Hand is Worth Two in the Bush, How Much is a Whole Tree In The Bush Worth?

More wind, more trees down. We spent the day in the dark. The power went out from the 60-70 mph winds at 6:00am. Our neighbor's tree fell this time, right across our driveway! They called school off, but we wouldn't have been able to get out anyway. I like the snow still, but the other associated weather is starting to get old. Our poor lone spruce tree in the front is on its last leg. We thought it was going over several times today, and it's hanging on literally by a thread. It didn't fall over, but we're going to have to have it cut down in a couple of weeks...all of the roots practically are pulled out and we're sure it's dead. It's only a matter of time before it falls too. *sigh* We spent the day at Barb and Doug's--they had power. We are supposed to get another round of snow on Friday...hopefully with none of the attached wind or low, low temps!

Lily Laughs-A-Lot

Just playing...

I'm a happy girl!

Sleepytime...I'll just sleep right here...

Daddy can make Mommy smile, but not the baby!

I love being upside down!

The Weather Outside Is Frightful...

Lily got a little taste of the outdoors this afternoon in her new sled she got for Christmas. We thought her favorite thing would be the sledding, but it turns out that her favorite thing is eating snow.

Lily's First "1st Birthday" Present!

Our friend Katie, Lily's "Cyber" grandma, sent Lily her first "1st birthday" present today--her very own handmade sock monkey! Lily giggled while playing with it, and took to dragging it around by its tail. She loves Boots the monkey on Dora, and I have a feeling that this monkey will eventually have the same name. We also thought we could add a cape so that it could go easily with her flying monkeys from Chris P. in her Wizard of Oz bedroom! Thanks, Katie, you're awesome!

PlayTime!

It's Lily's World, We Just Live In It

Boogie Down to Dora...

Pensive, Contemplative, Mysterious...

Pensive, Contempla...wait, she's just watching TV.

Where's Lily? We can't find her!

The Entertainer...

Some new pictures of Lily. She's quite the little ham. The first couple of pics are for our friend, Karen...Lily wants to join the band! What do you think? (After we took the pictures, she tried to eat the little bells...just so you know!)

Lily's grandma took the hat picture on Friday when they went out to get a fish fry on the Indian Reservation. (They have delicious fish there...)

The straw pic is just like the one we have of Siobhan at the same age as Lily is now...time is flying!

The last picture is Lily's newest trick, pulling her toy box on top of her head and then getting our attention and laughing. She's pretty full of herself!

Season 7

Wow...American Idol returns!

Bathtub Bull

Lily loves to play in the bath...she stuck this ring in her mouth and looked just like a little bull! Ole!

Lily and Peyton

Our neighbor's son Eric came over to cut up the Spruce tree, and brought his daughter Peyton along to play with Lily. Lily loved having someone new over and tried to kiss Peyton immediately! The bottom picture looks like they are having a conversation, perhaps about Dora the Explorer?

Siobhan's 3rd Birthday!

Siobhan turned 3 on Thursday and we went over Friday night for a birthday party. Lily and Siobhan played for 3 solid hours, along with Siobhan's friend Angelina from next door. Lily helped Siobhan open her presents!

Tree Down...

We lost one of our big Spruce trees in the front yard this morning during a really bad wind storm. We're having 60 mile an hour winds and I guess the tree just couldn't take it. With the $6000 electric issue and the new $500 tires this month, plus paying off Christmas, we'll probably be living in a box on the street after we pay for this tree to be removed. We probably should have a bake sale...a big one.

Gastric Update...

Well, I'm down 100 pounds. I put the same shirt on that I took my "Before" picture in to see the difference...I can see it, and I can feel it in my clothes, but I wish that it looked a little more dramatic. I guess looking at myself everyday, I just don't see it as much, but others do. I specifically like that the Quasimodo-like hump is gone already. I can see the bones and veins in my hands, my waist has shrunk almost 10 inches, and my butt is becoming a bag of Jell-O. I've got another 100-130 pounds left to lose, but I am no longer Morbidly Obese. I'm just regular Obese. (Doesn't that sound like Oh, Beast?!?) If I lost another 100, I'll be the size I was when I was a junior in high school. If I lose up to 130...I think I'll weigh what I weighed in 3rd grade. Either way, I'm off the blood pressure meds, the diabetes meds, and I'd LOVE to be off the asthma meds, but I'm still on them for at least a little while longer. The diabetes and blood pressure being gone are well worth the surgery...I would do it again in a second! It really hasn't been difficult, except for that damn elliptical machine at the gym. I started at like 2 minutes on that thing and today I did 25. I could probably do 30 or 40, but I like walking on the treadmill too. Overall, though, things are good. This was a good decision.

Happy New Year!

We hope your 2008
Is better than Great!