A good Norwegian man

My grammy tells everyone that I married a good Norwegian man. Though this is true, he is Norwegian-American rather than from Norway. It's his birthday today. His first birthday as a married man. I'm excited to get to take him out for dinner (after getting our church directory picture taken!) and give him his gifts. We'll have a family celebration on Sunday. I love birthdays! But I love nothing more than I love Einar!

Bella Tori

This picture was taken the night we brought Bella home. She was 2 days shy of being 8 weeks old. We met the breeder and 2 of her sisters at the big truck stop where I-90/94 and I-39 split. We really liked all 3 of the puppies we met, but Bella was the one we felt the best about. When we got her home, she fell asleep on the towels by the door.




This picture was taken one Bella's 8-week birthday. She was curled up on the couch while Einar and I got ready for work. We have since decided that she will not be allowed on the couch unless we invite her. Since she's gonna be a big dog, we don't want her to think the couch is hers. Humans first! She sure is cute, though!



This picture was taken the day after the picture just above. We were at Einar's parents' condo for a wonderful Mexican dinner prepared by a visiting cousin. It was the first time Einar's family got to meet Bella, and she was a big hit! Well, except with Chino (the Shih-Tzu). Chino wasn't sure what to think of Bella, so she pretty much just hid and tried to go unnoticed.



I will try to get more pictures taken one of these days - I keep forgetting to charge the camera batteries. She is already noticeably bigger. We are working really hard on getting her housebroken, and for the most part, she's doing okay. She just doesn't have a very big bladder yet, so her accidents tend to happen when we're at work (although I'm going home a couple times a day to let her out) or overnight. She'll get it. We're starting a puppy class on May 13 for 6 weeks. We can hardly wait!

Recession

I know I've written about the economy before, but I've been trying to avoid that topic, since it's all over the news and I feel like we all hear enough about it. But when I was reading the Planet Money blog today, they had this post about the IMF naming our current recession a "synchronous recession," which is not good. I continue to be thankful for my jobs and Einar's job. I continue to pray for all of the people who are unemployed or underemployed, especially my brother and others I know personally. I am trying to stay optimistic. . .

Belated

Yesterday was my sister-in-law's birthday. We'll be gathering with her and other family members on Saturday to celebrate her birthday. I'm excited to spend some time with everybody and to get to have some food off the grill! Last year, Ingrid and I had a super-fun time going to the Maple Bluff Community Garage Sale, and we just decided to do it again this year. Of course, that means that I need to figure out when that's happening, but I'm definitely looking forward to it. Get some coffee or chai and a scone from Manna and hit the sales!
This picture was taken during the formal pictures for the wedding. They were all waiting around for their turn, and Ingrid hams it up!

Blogs

Over the past couple of weeks, I've been put in charge of getting 2 blogs for Tweedee up and running. The first one is for Tweedee itself. All 6 of us will take turns writing on the blogs, and it will be updated at least once a week. Check it out here. We started the blog, in part, because we wanted to get "Samie the Intern" episodes available as a video podcast on iTunes. However, we ended up needing to start a separate blog for "Samie" to do that. You can watch the video episodes on that blog OR you can open iTunes and search the podcasts for "Samie the Intern" and download them. If you didn't know this, I am completely in charge of "Samie the Intern." I schedule the shoots, come up with ideas (with a lot of help from Samie and my bosses), shoot the video, edit, and encode as a QuickTime movie for the Tweedee Productions website and the "Samie" blog. It's a pretty fun thing to get to do. I hope that you'll check out the videos, if you haven't already.

Holy Week

As I've gotten older, I find myself enjoying the pre-Christmas season of Advent and the pre-Easter season of Lent more and more. I like the anticipation. I like the time to consider the impact of these major Christian holidays. For the past several years, I've been unable to attend the weekly Wednesday evening services during Lent because I've had to waitress. I feel like I miss out on Lenten contemplation because of that. This year, however, I subscribed to the daily email devotions published by Luther Seminary and Pacific Lutheran Seminary. These daily devotions helped me get into the spirit of Lent and feel the magnitude of Jesus' suffering. I will miss Maundy Thursday worship tonight and Good Friday worhsip tomorrow, but I will be thinking about the Last Supper, the washing of feet, and the horror of crucifixion. I will be worshipping in my own way.

Missy Karie

Today is my sister's birthday. I can't remember the last time I got to celebrate her birthday with her, but last weekend, she and her family were in Mount Horeb visiting our parents, and we had a little family celebration. It was great to be able to be together. Plus, I got to surprise her with some chocolates from her favorite chocolatier in Madison.

This picture is from last spring, when she and her family came down for the Steve Earle concert and stayed at my house.

Eek!

Today is my brother's birthday. I've been fortunate that for the past several years, I've gotten to celebrate his birthday with him in person, either in Chicago or Mount Horeb. In fact, the first time I met his husband was when I was in grad school and went into Chicago to have dinner with him on his birthday. This year, however, I'll be celebrating with him in spirit since he now lives in Vancouver, BC. This year, I'll be celebrating him! Happy birthday, Erik!This is one of my favorite pictures of Erik as well as one of my favorite pictures from our wedding.