Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone!

Thanks Gale for the adorable Halloween card! How cute is this! (above)

This year Duke will be a hot dog, compliments of my sister Laura.

Rissy got a sassy new Halloween collar her too, but what she really loves is Duke's bumble bee costume from last year. She seems to find the head piece to it all the time after I've hidden it.

On Saturday Colin and I will be going to the OSU Beaver's game with a bunch of good friends. Hope it doesn't rain! Hope everyone has a safe and fun Halloween!

Update on life...

Well things have certainly been busy at our house! We've been working on remodeling our bathroom. It looks really amazing, but we're still waiting to show pics until we build a cabinet. Colin has been really busy at work seeing many patients a day. He's really been doing a great job and I get to meet some of his patients when I work at the office with him Saturday mornings. I do some front desk work while Colin is adjusting. There are some really sweet people whom I get to chat with each week! I've been working like crazy. I work at Oregon State Univ, a local community college, a video interpreting relay center, freelance interpreting and at Colin's office. I'm trying really hard to get used to this whole waking up early thing and I think it's finally settling in! The last 2 days I actually woke up before my alarm...now that's progress!

Colin and I recently have been noticing our baby dog (8 months old) Rissy having pains in her knees or hips after she plays really hard. Finally after a long night of whining, decided we needed to take her to our vet. Dr. Braat, who's also our VERY generous neighbor, checked her out and had us come back a couple days later for some x-rays. When I went to pick her up later that afternoon I was expecting to get her and leave. Dr. Braat met me at the front desk and took me back to the the exam room to explain what he found. Her knees looked just fine but when he showed me her hips it was obvious that there was a major problem. She was diagnosed with Chronic Hip Dysplasia. Basically what this means is that the hip joint isn't inside the joint's pocket. The only thing holding her hips to her body are ligaments and muscles. We'll be going to the orthopedic surgeon sometime soon to see what we can do about it. From what the vet said, our options are either letting it go until it starts to become bad enough that she'll either need surgery or we'll need to put her down. Or we can just go ahead and get the surgery now. The only problem is, it's expected to cost anywhere from $4,000-$5,000. We'll know more when we take her to the actual surgeon. Poor girl is only 8 months old so we hope we're able to help her out as much as we can.

Other than that sad news, everything is going pretty good. I'll be heading up to Seattle next weekend to see my family. I'm very excited to take a trip up there since it's been while! We're planning on doing some wedding shopping or at least looking for my sisters wedding next summer. Hope everyone is enjoying the Fall weather, food and pretty leaves!

Great Sugar Cookie Recipe!

Wow it's been awhile since I've posted. I've been waiting to post pics of our bathroom remodel. But we aren't quite finished yet. I made sugar cookies today of Fall leaves and I dug out an old recipe I got from a magazine in college. I really don't care for sugar cookies because they leave a gross aftertaste in your mouth, but this recipe eliminates that with the use of cream cheese. Yum! Here ya go! And a picture of some cookies I iced for Colin's office.

1/2 c. butter
3 oz cream cheese
1 1/2 c. powdered sugar
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 3/4 c. flour
1/2 tsp baking soda

Mix butter and cream cheese in a bowl with a mixer. Add powdered sugar and baking soda. Beat. Beat in egg and vanilla. Beat in flour. Chill for 1 hour. (They still turn out fine if you don't do this.)

Roll dough out on a floured surface and cut out into shapes.
Bake at 375 degree oven for 7-8 minutes.
Cook and frost.

You've GOT to try this if you like sugar cookies!