Happy Halloween!

So, have I said that Halloween is my favorite holiday ever?

Chad and I carved pumpkins this weekend (my idea) and I made dried pumpkin seeds. On Halloween our tradition is: I dress up, this year I made my own nurse outfit, and we watch a scary movie while waiting for trick-or-treaters.

What do you all plan to do? 

Here are Chad's and my pumpkins from the outside, trick-or-treater's view. 

a star

Precious always thinks photo shoots are all about her. I should get a photo of Sylvester up here now, it feels like favoring one child or something. 

With the hogging of the remote...

Mine. Mine I tell you. 

Copy me

OK, so cg did this and listed me as one of the people she would like to see do it too. I love this stuff and would have done it anyway, but I'm honored. So here it is. It takes some time, but seriously, it's fun. I wanna see all of you copy this off my site and fill in your own answers. (And by this I mean: my husband especailly. He isn't much of a joiner, but a girl's got to try anyway.)

Here it is:

7 things I plan to do before I die
1. Visit Australia
2. volunteer my time for a worthy cause on a consistent basis
3. adopt a child
4. write a novel that is published (and not self published either)
5. live in the country
6. go to Marti Gras (I know, I know, coulda, shoulda)
7. ride around the U.S. on the back of my husband’s chopper

7 things I can do
1. cook great comfort food
2. plan a great surprise for my husband
3. make people laugh
4. grow long girly fingernails
5. write/type fast
6. write a newspaper article
7. read fast

7 things I cannot do
1. ever, ever grow out of my fascination with Halloween
2. stand centi/millipedes
3. play a musical instrument or read notes
4. eat water chestnuts
5. keep secrets from my husband
6. remember to change the oil on my car on a regular basis
7. find my keys immediately

7 things that attract me to another person
1. confidence
2. his hands
3. loyalty
4. the ability to do so called “man things” like home improvement, basic vehicle repair, ect.
5. a high libido
6. honesty/no head games
7. crazy/irreverent humor

7 things that I say the most
1. you’re weird
2. with the biting!!!! (to the cats) (I don’t know why I say this. NO! would be better.)
3. Damn it!
4. I can’t find my keys
5. Doh!
6. crap
7. the f word

7 people I want to do this
1. anybody? Anybody???
2. I’d take what I can get
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.

Oh. My. Word. Check out what my loving husband did for me. My new title bar (or whatever you call it) with the flowers? Chad made that for me out of pictures I took in our yard this summer. I told him what pictures to use ... but from there he just took the project and ran with it.

Isn't it the coolest ever? I totally didn't imagine it this cool. I knew he could make it look nice, but this is awesome!

Love ya baby!!!

Another one

Jose (my bro in law), Oliver and Tio Luke. Penny is in the background. 

Here it is

Well, the photo I tried to put with the other one in my last post wouldn't show up. So here it is. 

Sand sucks

Here's my brother, sleeping in his tent this summer and sitting by the fire when we went camping with the whole family. It's been nuts here this week so I haven't posted that he arrived in Kuwait last Sunday night. I guess my sister Katy sent him an email saying he was trading in snow for sand and he sent her back a two word reply. “Sand sucks.”



Here’s his last email, it’s pretty funny so I thought I’d post it. Hope he doesn’t mind…

Well I made it yesterday. It was a long plane ride. I slept almost the whole time. Then we got here and ate and I slept another 6 hrs. Nothing but sand here for miles. Chow is really good, better than Fort Campbell. So far so good. Using internet cafe that has desktops. Thanks for the pix mom. Oh I'm in Kuwait if u didn't know. There are no showers or toilets or running water so it will be at least a month b4 get to shower.
p.s. I hope u didn't believe all of that crap I'm just joking there is showers and running water.

And that’s all I have to say about that.
Holly

Mean momma

Ok, I need to go to work. But I just had to post about my kitties.

This morning I took them to the vet to get their little claws trimmed. They aren’t declawed and they don’t go outside so their claws have gotten unmanageable. They have like three approved scratching surfaces, an 8-foot climbing post with three platforms, a tiny scratching post with rope top from childhood days and a moat thingie with a ball they can’t get out, but love to chase in circles around a cardboard center for scratching. Plus, they have all the unapproved stuff, the carpet, the armchair, the dining room chairs and our bed. Really, we can’t control them. They do what they want.

Anyway, their claws were too long and they would accidentally scratch us, they couldn’t sheath them well anymore. And Sylvester was especially having trouble, she’d get caught in my sweaters and one claw would hook in the carpet every step she took. We tried to clip them but they wouldn’t let us get more than one done and then they’d run.

So we paid the vet $26 to trim them this morning. They were so scared when I threw them in the cat carrier, not really threw, and took them in. They shook and tried to bury themselves in the blanket I put in there. The only two other times they’ve been in the car (besides the trip to Jamestown) were when they went to the vet for shots (ouch) and to get spayed. (double ouch!!)

But the trimming went really well, they were scared at the vets and didn’t know the nurse or the vet so they hardly even struggled. We didn’t even really have to hold them down. Now they are all nice and trimmed and back home safely. I tried to tell them they we’re coming right back home and that they wouldn’t get hurt this time. But they didn’t believe me. Precious has already forgotten it but Sylvester is still holding a grudge. Oh, well, she’ll get over it.

Too old for this

I have a tiny little red pimple at the very tip of my nose today. I'm way to old for this.

U gotta try this!!!

This is the funniest. I read this on someone's random blog. All you do is got to Google and type in your name and the word needs. Here are the HILARIOUS results I got for "Holly Needs" And, no, I didn't click on the fifth one. Or any, for that matter. It's just funny.

Holly needs help in her Olympic efforts ...

Holly needs some free legal advice ...

Holly is a 3-year-old sable and white female with special medical needs … Holly needs your help ...

Holly needs some more detail to fire up her own fantasies ...

Dr. Campion needs to ascertain how much Botox Holly needs to be injected with. She needs to mark Holly with a colored pen …

Welcome to the addicted to Holly gallery. This gallery houses 1,861 pics of Holly… It is your No. 1 source for up to date pictures and it will fulfill all your visual Holly needs ...

Holly needs both male and female plants for maximum berry production ...

I think Holly needs to stop trying to sell her body and concentrate on singing a bit better ...

Holly needs her own TV show ...

More corny humour

Q: Why did the farmer call his pig "Ink"?
A: Because it was always running out of the pen.

The wonderful Erickson children

Justice, Glen and Michael

OK, so these are old pictures, Uncle Chad and Auntie Holly need to visit and get new material. But since these pics were taken before I got into blogging, I figured they could go up anyway. See the comments sections for explinations of which lovely child is in the photo.

 
 

 
 

Worker bee

 
 

He's got the look

 
 

Photo opp

 
Well, here's a picture of the Nordvick and Rittnour cousins the weekend we all went home. If the Wollin girls had been there it would have been all our cousins on my dad's side of the family. See the other photos and explination of the "occasion" below. I'm still figuring out this program. 

Quick update

 
Well, I thought I'd give this new program Chad discovered a try. This is, of course, a pic of my brother and newphew Oliver. Luke leaves for Iraq Wednesday. Of course it will take a while to get to Kuiwat and once there he'll be there for a month. So his one year "boots on the ground" doesn't start for a while. 

 
 

Forgot

I'd planned to add this cute joke to the end of that post but forgot. So here it is, you lucky people!

Knock! Knock!
Who's there?
Mammoth!
Mammoth who?
Mammoth is sthuck 'cause I'th been eatin' peanuth buther!

apples from here to ... florida

So I'm going to be really busy this weekend. I'd already made a few apple pies with the apples on our tree. I'm so excited we have an apple tree!! Last year we didn't really do anything with them it didn't produce a lot for some reason and I guess I just still didn't feel like it was my tree.

Well, now the apples are actually ripe. As I've said, I've made some pies aready, I've given some apples to my mom and best friend, and one night some neighborhood kids rang the doorbell and asked if they could eat some apples off our tree. Of course, one or two had already started, but it was nice of them to ask and Chad said sure.

Now comes the fun part. This weekend I will be apple cooking madwoman. I plan to make another pie, several more apple crisps (uncooked then freeze them, to cook later) and also some apple butter from a recipie I have for my crock pot.

My best friend, Jen, lovingly provided me with a apple corer and peeler that she says works really slick, so I'm all set up. It will be plenty of work, but I need to use up a chunck of the apples while they are finally ripe.

Snow, snow

Since we've already had snow in areas of North Dakota, I thought I'd put up some of these cheesy snow jokes I found on the Internet. Enjoy, or throw snowballs at me. One of the two.

What happened when the snowgirl fell out with the snowboy?
She gave him the cold shoulder!

What do snowmen wear on their heads?
Ice caps!

What's an ig?
An eskimo's home without a loo!

What do snowmen eat for lunch?
Icebergers!

Where do snowmen go to dance?
Snowballs!

How do snowmen travel around ?
By iceicle !

What sort of ball doesn't bounce ?
A snowball !

How do you know when there is a snowman in your bed ?
You wake up wet !

What do you get if cross a snowman and a shark ?
Frost bite !

How do you call an Eskimo cow ?
An Eskimoo !

'bout time!

OK, so the update.

Yes, we did have a lot of fun at the reunion. I wasn't sure how it would go, but it was great. I've heard that some reunions are no fun, everybody slips back into thier old roles. But we had a class of 20 and about 2/3s came, so with wives, husdbands and the one girlfriend, it was a nice size for everybody to mix. Everybody was on even ground instead of being as we were in high school, the popular, the not, the wierd the cool, the poor the rich, very seperated into boxes.

It was also nice to hang out with the family. Penny is getting cuter all the time, I can't wait to meet the new niece or nephew. She thinks it's a nephew, he's very active in there. Oliver, of course is so cute. And seeing Luke was REALLY, really nice. It was really sad to leave though. I cried a bit as we drove away. Thanks to everybody that has promised prayers for him while he's in Iraq.