Merry Christmas!!!

We went over to Mike's sisters house for Christmas day!!  They were kind enough to let us bring FIFA along.  He had a great time playing with their dog Ruby!!!

I actually didn't take a whole lot of pictures this trip.  Getting the nephews to cooperate with photo taking is like pulling teeth, so I gave up after a bit!!!  Ah....teenagers :-)

Mustache on a stick!!

Our traditional Christmas socks!

Crazy Glasses!

Me and my sweetie!!!

Doggone fun!!  :-)

Ruby!!!

Me and my other sweetie!!

Martian Poop soda and the Chihuahua movie (you have to admit that the dog looks like FIFA!)

Everything is better with Bacon!!!

FIFA's first snow

We're pretty sure that this trip was the first time that FIFA has seen snow.  Since we were lucky enough to get a white Christmas, we let FIFA have fun shoveling on Christmas morning with us!!  Lucky dog!!!

Bartlesville Christmas Parade

We went to the Bartlesville Christmas Parade tonight......it's always a fun time and was actually a fairly warm evening (for once).  We skipped last year for fear of frostbite!  The parade highlights small town businesses and organizations.....(I think next year that Mike and I are going to enter our own float!).  Why not??  Anyone want to come ride on it?  It makes perfect sense to do so, when you see our parade!

So....here we are hanging out waiting for the parade to start.....Reese is a goofy child :-)

Reese and some of his soccer teammates...

The parade starts..... 

It's not a parade without a band.......go Bruins!!

Santa is always last in the parade.....could that be the unmistakable glow of Rudolph's nose???

On closer examination, it appears that someone has shot Rudolph and several of his woodland friends and forced them to ride on a float in the parade.........

We should have known that it was the taxidermy float.  

Hundreds of children are likely traumatized this evening!!!

Wait!!!  Look below.....Could that be the unmistakable glow of Rudolph's nose that shows it's time for Santa???

Nope....that's the Southwest Paranormal Investigators (see why Mike and I need our own float?)

Wait.....I see a glowing red light!!!

Santa got rid of Rudolph and switched to a Chevy!!

Yay Santa!!! Merry Christmas!!!

We now have 12 months to plan for our own float and are eagerly taking your suggestions, so please don't hold back.  It's too bad we didn't think of it this year, because we could have totally gone Mayan :-)  Instead, we're considering an alien type theme.  More Roswell than Sigorney Weaver.  Don't want to traumatize the poor kids like the taxidermy float did.  We're going to cover the truck in green lights, play the song from Close Encounters and have lots of little alien creatures walking alongside the truck.  That is, if no one can think of anything better!  Apparently anything goes at this parade.  We can't wait until 2013!!!

Olympic Development Program

Reese is participating in the Oklahoma Olympic Development Program for soccer.  It's a pretty cool program that takes the top kids in the state and gives them additional practices and games during the off-season.  Right now, they have been scrimmaging the boys to see who will make it on a traveling team to play against some development programs in other states.  Reese had his first scrimmage games towards the beginning of December.  It was a lot of fun and once again.....I got a lot of pictures.  Reese even scored a goal against a really tough older keeper from Stillwater!  Way to go Reese!

Score.....Reese is hidden, but those are his black socks with orange stripes that are scoring!

Camino (2003-2012)

We are fortunate to have had such wonderful pets in our lives, and Camino was no different.  I remember going to pick him out in Steamboat Springs, Colorado.  There was a swarm of black puppies and one little yellow one.  Because we couldn't keep track of the wiggling mass of black puppies, we decided to go with the yellow one.  Best choice we ever made!  We named him Camino because Mike was driving an El Camino at the time, and I joked that we would have the dog longer than he would have the car :-)  So true!!!  Camino has been one of the family for so long, it will take a while to get used to not having him.  He (or his nose, or legs, or tail) are in almost every photo we have taken over the years!  We are going to miss him terribly, but we are left with so many wonderful memories and the joy of having had him in our lives!

Jingle Bell Rock

Another race for Reese and Tracy this morning!  Reese got a personal record (PR) and finished in 20:50.  Tracy didn't do too shabby either with a finish time of 28:59.  This race was in downtown Bartlesville.  There was a bit of a computer mix-up after the race and the system added 4 years to everyone's age.  Yikes!  Reese was 17 and Tracy was 48!!!  Ouch to both!!  Mike got some good pics of us!!

Great shot of the starting line!

And....they're off!

Coming into the finish!

Who thought this would be fun?  Almost done!

Proud of that boy!!

Finish line!

My two handsome boys

Me and Tommi!

The Miller Family!

Cute boys!

Oh yeah.....with the new photobucket photo hosting account the folder we have set up is password protected.  The password is:  smalltownfan   

Dog Update

Camino is still doing pretty well.  He wants to play a little ball (although we only throw it a few feet for him).  His appetite is good and tonight he even ate some of his old dry food, that he had been refusing for the past few weeks.  We still spoil him with lots of steak, chicken, and we've been buying big cans of stinky wet dog food!  He has gotten pretty skinny though and certainly isn't as strong as he used to be!  At least his spirits are up!

He's been having to sleep in our laundry room at night.  We have him penned off with dog gates and pee pads.  So far no accidents in there.....but we get up in the middle of the night to let him out.  The prednisone makes him incredibly thirsty, which gives him a full bladder.  We learned the hard way!  In the daytime, he and the little dog are kept in the family room.  Now that we have a system for him.....all is good.  I don't think he cares for our system though.  He feels a little snubbed at night.

The tumors and lymph node swelling have gone down dramatically.  The vet said we had a pretty good chance of forcing him into a short-term remission.  So, we're happy the medicine is doing it's job and that we're getting to enjoy some more time with him!

Camino

Our dear, sweet Camino was diagnosed with severe lymphoma on Tuesday. We are giving him prednisone, which has brought back his appetite and is making him want to play with us a bit. We are thankful for the extra time with him....however long that may be.