HAPPENINGS.....

Let's see what I can remember, July has just flown by. I returned home from Florida on July 1st. Mark and I had a quiet 4th of July. We enjoyed hot dogs, potato salad and watermelon along with watching fireworks from our back yard. We can see at least 15 towns from our backyard. They are not up close but still extremely enjoyable. 

On Friday July 7th we went out to dinner with Adam and Gabby. They treated us to an anniversary dinner which was really nice. I was in Florida for our anniversary since my dad's birthday is the next day. Mark normally joins me in Florida but with the kids gone it means Skye has to go to the kennel so it was just easier for him to stay home. 

We went to a new place that we have been wanting to try. It is a wine bar and the food was fabulous. Mark had seen it on a local food show, Let's Dine Out, that he watches. The restaurant is called Vino Veritas Wine Bar.  It was a fun evening and they spent the night. I was the designated driver! 

July has been nothing but physical therapy twice a week and doctor's appointments each week. I usually run an errand or two as long as I am out and about. I just haven't had the energy to go to the show which has me very frustrated. 

Skye got a haircut on July 10th. It was with a new lady since the lady she has been seeing for several years now had left. I think she did a good job on her. I need to get my hair done soon. Hopefully next week. We each go about every 3 months. 

After I left Florida my brother in law took my dad out to get a scooter. He so desperately wants to drive and is mad at us for taking his car away. I feel really bad for him but it is for his safety and the safety of other's on the road. 

The scooter gives him some freedom from being in the house. He can now go over to the pool to visit with people or stop a a friends house. He can even take it over to the grocery store weather permitting. 

When we got our floors done they had told us that if we do a review on Yelp that they will give us a throw rug. Well we were very pleased with all of their work so that wasn't a problem at all. Well it is more than just a throw rug. I expected it to be smaller.....

They had 4 choices to choose from and we liked this one the best but we don't have a room to use it in right now. It has been sitting in the hallway since we got it. I think that maybe we will get rid of the rug in my office and use this one or we will change the colors in our bedroom which needs an upgrade. 

Before I left for Florida we had been at Costco and we came across a 55" TCL Roku TV which was $419. This is a new line of TV's which had great reviews at on of those conventions for those type of things. So when Mark's family was visiting he and Pam went to pick it up. 

I didn't want to be around for the change over so after I left for Florida Mark and Adam set the TV up in my office on Father's Day.  I love it, it is wonderful and very easy to figure out. 

Mark decided to try one of those wine clubs online and order a sample box of red wines. This particular company helps struggling wineries get a fresh start. It is naked wines.com and they are Angel-funded wines. Should be fun trying them! 

We got a surprise package from Mark's brother Jimmy. They had been talking about Jay's potato chips when they were fishing in Canada last month. Of course we lived in the Chicago area for 38 years before moving out to California and you can't buy them here. What a treat! 

Well this post ended up being longer than I thought so I will write another post with a medical update for you about my knee surgery and other happening. 

FLORIDA PHOTOS AND MEDICAL UPDATE

A few photos from Florida. I went to the pool a few times and really enjoyed exercising in the water. It was very easy on my lungs. I plan to start going to our neighborhood pool next week. 

Speaking of my lungs I had a follow up with my Pulmonary Specialist yesterday for the tiny nodule that was found at the bottom of my right lung from a CT Scan in December. (Post from March) I had a second CT Scan done right before I left for Florida. The nodule hasn't changed in size which is great news and my lungs looked in better shape overall. So the next CT Scan will be in December. They follow it for 2 years. 

I never really worried about this nodule because he had assured me it would most likely be something left over from a long infection but boy was I nervous yesterday! So after that I meet my bowling buddy Kendra for lunch at Chili's and we celebrated with margarita's. 

Palm Trees at the pool.....

Always love the Florida clouds.....

 Some of the visitors on the pond......

I also enjoyed watching three squirrels chasing each other up and down a big old tree but I could not capture a picture of them! 

Today is ornament premiere at Hallmark so I am going to pick up my pre-order of the ones that come out today. There are a few that don't come out until October and November. If you want to look at the ornaments this year you can look at them HERE. 

Hope everyone enjoys their weekend.......

MORE ABOUT THE HOLIDAY'S.....

These are my new ornaments for 2014.  I open up each box, collapse it for storage, take a picture of the ornament and then hopefully at some point I will get them posted on my Debby's Tree blog. I was doing this for future reference for my children but I've been slacking off a little this year. 

When I do get them posted I will let you know because I will be having a little give away of my favorite ornament this year. They are all awesome but one is just too cute so I want to share it with one of you! 

 We had some rain which brought 

snow to the mountain tops....

 and a rainbow! 

Mark and I had his office party on December 19th which was at Mario's Place in Riverside which is across the street from The Mission Inn who puts up four million lights each year. Here are a few photos I have to share with you.....

IT'S THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE YEAR

WELCOME TO OUR HOME AND WELCOME WINTER

Living Room Tree - white lights

Family Room Tree - multi-colored lights

 Snowman trees in the dining room....

My grandmother's wooden ironing board....

Our reindeer in the back yard.....

A few up close to share with you......

I just love how they sparkle at night.....

My Jim Shore collection.....

You may have heard me say that I was doing a "Less is More" this year. I have approximately 8 bins of decorations and 5 boxes of plush that I have not put out this year. I still have my miniature tree to decorate which has about 150 ornament on it! I thought Amber was going to do it but she never got around to it.

Please stop over to my post from last Christmas which will show you all that I have. I think you will find my collections to be unique and special......

DEBBY'S HOUSE 2012

 Someone on the scent of the Petco box that arrived.......

CHRISTMAS ORNAMENTS PART ONE AND TWO

Join me over at Debby's Tree for Part Two of the ornaments I bought this year. Part One can be find here. 

I am in Florida at my dads and will be home on Sunday. Amber has been holding down the fort while we are gone. I know Skye is missing us and Mark is off to the UK tomorrow! 

~ Have a wonderful weekend ~

WHAT I BOUGHT THIS YEAR

Join me over at Debby's Tree  and then again next Friday to see these ornaments up close and personal!

You may just see something perfect for someone on your Christmas list this year. 

You will have to hurry on over to your Hallmark store, ornaments start coming out in July and some are already gone.....

Also you may want to check out this years Keepsake Ornament Club pieces which I posted in July!

CHRISTMAS AT THE {PUCCI'S} 2012

 

On Christmas Eve I baked the Hoska (Sweet Bohemian bread) and I also went to a church service at 5pm. I was thrilled with the church I went to this year and will definitely be going back. Then when I got home Mark and I watched "White Christmas" and then I watched "It's a Wonderful Life" which I of course fell asleep to but that's okay. I did see it on the big screen not too long ago!

 

We were expecting Adam and Tristen between 1pm-2pm on Christmas day. I think they arrived closer to 2pm and we ate some Hashbrown Egg Nests and the Hoska. We actually didn't start opening presents until about 3pm since Amber still had gifts to wrap! The first thing we did was take pictures making sure I was in them too. Of course I had my new pajamas for the day, I had them all pressed and ready to go after my shower :)

 

Click to enlarge....

Then we had a moment of silence for those who were not as fortunate as we were and were missing some very precious loved ones this Christmas. Not just the families in Newtown, CT but everyone around the world living with grief in their hearts. Then we started opening presents and that went on for about 4 hours with some breaks for snacks and drinks. We actually ran out of time to have the Gingerbread House contest. It was a work day the next day and we still had to eat dinner. We ate around 8pm and the evening ended a little after 9pm. It was a blessed day and everyone loved their gifts. Of course Skye and Charlie had a great day too!

 

Those are our presents under the tree before Amber, Dylan, Adam & Tristen added theirs!!! We do one gift at a time, except for the dogs, they both need one at the same time or they will steal from the other. (or should I say Skye will steal from Charlie)

 

I didn't go out the day after Christmas but I ended up going out on Thursday to get some bags, boxes and bows. Also picked up some paper plates along with some other goodies for next year. I also needed to go to Kohl's to use my cash rewards that I had and found some things I couldn't possibly live without :)

 

Every day since Christmas Day I have been having my own movie marathon of Christmas movies. I had watched so many movies on Lifetime and Hallmark that I never found time to watch my collection of movies. So besides the ones I watch on Christmas Eve I also watched: The Family Stone, The Holiday, Fred Claus, This Christmas, The Family Man, One Magic Christmas, Prancer, Four Christmases, Christmas With the Kranks, Polar Express, The Santa Clause 1-2 & 3 and ended with Miracle on 34th Street even though I did see it on the big screen recently.  

 

Here are the decorated Gingerbread Houses. We ended up doing them on New Year's Eve. Normally it's just the kids doing them but since Adam & Tristen wouldn't be doing theirs Mark and I joined in but only for a short time. Amber & Dylan really worked on theirs for a long time and they came out so cute. I think Mark did his for about 20 minutes. Mark's is bottom left and mine is bottom right. We didn't do the sides and back like A & D did. (enlarge for better viewing)

 

 

This are gifts I received. I had shown Mark the Eiffel Tower ornament at Pottery Barn and also the mini glass ornaments from London so he bought them for me. I got some books I had asked for and some movies I've been wanting. Got the Pippa Middleton book too along with a popcorn maker and a skillet. (It's my first skillet) My sister got me the smaller Willow Tree piece and Amber bought me the larger Nativity at the after Christmas sale. She surprised me with that one on New Year's Eve!

 

 

So next week I will start to gather and take down our decorations. That should take at least all week for me. There are about 10 bins and 6 boxes to repack. Then the trees will be last. There are 8 ornament boxes for them. I may go ahead and leave the trees up a little longer depending on the time I have before our trip on the 17th. However, I never go past the latest date I've had my tree up which was February 5th one year. I had gotten pretty sick and just couldn't do it.

 

There is a new post at Debby's Tree with the remaining ornaments I bought this year. I didn't buy any ornaments after Christmas although Amber did buy one for me. I found it a bit different working on these two smaller trees, didn't get as much inside depth that I like. But I am happy with them. I just keep wondering what I will do when we retire and downsize. How do you get rid of precious collections when you have been buying them for over 40 years?

 

Have a wonderful weekend.....

 

 

DEBBY'S TREE

It was 2 years ago in August during our annual vacation to Mammoth Lakes when I came up with the idea for my Debby's Tree blog. I thought it would be a great way to have a record of my ornaments for my children. I use to do a post every Friday and then I started getting so busy reading posts from all my dear friends that I have made that I found I wasn't having much time in my day.

 

It also started to get harder for me to work on it for a few other reasons. I have taken pictures of every ornament I own, I did that two Christmases ago when I set up my tree. It is fairly easy to work with my newer ornaments as I buy them because the information is on the box.

 

The two biggest issues I have is when it comes to all my older ornaments which I have been collecting since the 70's. I must have around 900 now! I have to look each ornament up in a collectible book and it is very time consuming. That's because several years ago I got new containers for all of my ornaments and at that time I collapsed all the boxes each ornament comes in.

 

Believe me it saves so much time in setting up and taking down the tree when I don't have to open each individual box or find each box the ornament goes into when taking it down. It also saves the individual boxes from wear and tare which is important to collectors.

 

The second reason is Photoshop. I have sent each ornament photo over there but they changed their system and I find it very difficult, along with time consuming, to now frame and put the information on each photo. So that is what really slowed me down or pushed me away. When something becomes frustrating you start to become disenchanted with the project :(

 

I want to share all the ornaments that I purchased this year so I will be having posts up at Debby's Tree each Friday starting today! Also you may want to check the Hallmark Keepsake Club pieces that are available this year. Here is that post!

Hope everyone has a nice weekend.