A Trout-y Christmas

Robert and I made our annual pilgrimage to the Trouts' this Christmas break and it was, as always, a wonderful holiday treat! We hadn't seen Christina and Rob since Christmas last year and so hadn't yet met little Gianna. She. is. adorable!!!  Little G was not afraid of strangers at all and let us hang with her quite a bit. She's such a good baby! Of course. All of my friends have fabulous babies that are friendly and well-behaved (in front of us, anyway). It's a conspiracy! Robert was, as expected, goo-goo for G and Chrissie did her best to play the baby card to try to persuade us to get in on the fun soon. (You can send her thank you card to us, Bob, and we'll forward it along. :o)  )  We always love catching up with everyone and had a great night of food and games. So much fun!!! Thanks to the Trouts for hosting everyone and to Christina for letting us horn in on the occasion.

I actually swiped this photo from Chrissie's Facebook page - it's Gianna on her first Christmas morning. I love this pic.

Robert is all aglow with baby fever. Again.

I told Rob we were going to send this photo out to unsuspecting  friends and family as a  "surprise!"  He seemed okay with it so it could still happen...

Little G has her own room at the Trouts' and it's absolutely adorable. Hopefully that means she'll come for visits more often!

G was a good sport and wore her Santa hat for us for a good chunk of the night.

Baby Gerbe!

Woohoo! Gianna Marie was born on Sunday, February 27th, at a healthy 6 pounds, 3 ounces. Christina was kind enough to post some photos of the little gal on Facebook so I'm taking that as an okay for me to post'em on the blog... ! I'm so glad Christina took a moment to share a few pictures because I was dying to see the newest Gerbe! I don't know when she'll make her inaugural visit to CA but I assume it won't be for quite a while. I'm so jealous of all their East Coast friends who get to visit so soon...

Congrats, Christina and Rob!!! She's a cutie and you guys look so happy. :o) Can't wait to see you all!

I can't believe how much hair she has!

Thanksgiving @ the Kidders'

SO! It is Friday the 17th and I have officially been done with my first quarter of the vet tech program for 8 days. And it's. been. fantastic! Soooooooooooooooo, so nice. I have loved having the time off just in and of itself but especially because it's before Christmas and has allotted me time to decorate at my leisure. I put off anything and everything holiday-related until finals were over and once they were I felt pressure to get goin' on all my stuff. (So much so that at 8:30 in the morning following my last final my eyes popped open and my brain started whirring. So, when I say "at my leisure" I mean it more in the sense that I had time to relax and do nothing after frantically rushing to put everything up all at once instead of my usual weekend of frantic decorating followed by going to work.) But I have finished the decorating and so now have time - and a bit more of an inclination - to post a few things that have been piling up in my queue. First up: Thanksgiving!

I actually don't have any photos of Robert and I at either of our parents' celebrations but, y'know, it was all the usual stuff. The next day, though, we were invited to a soiree at the Kidders' house that was a Thanksgiving/Christmas party/baby shower because Christina won't be able to fly out to CA for Christmas this year. (Boo.) As always, it was so much fun and Robert and I were happy to once again be included in the festivities. The best part was the 'tacky sweater' competition; the sweaters and decorative goodies were provided and all we had to do was gaudy up our sweaters as best we could. I definitely don't have a problem with, ahem, loud holiday wear (Christmas is a time for sequins and sparkle, damn it!) so that aspect of the design wasn't a problem for me. I am, however, super anal and in love with symmetry so it WAS very hard for me to just grab a bunch of stuff and slap it on my sweater haphazardly. Plus, my sweater had a design on it already and I just could not add things to the sweater that didn't go with the established motif! Needless to say, I didn't win. But I did get to keep my sweater so in a way I did. :o)

Here we are in our Christmas finery:

Robert just loved his doofy armband - he was convinced it made his sweater "couture."

And here I am with Chrissie and Emily. (Yes, I was the only one who kept their sweater on after the contest was over. I'm nothing if not festive!)

The little fluffball in my arms is Oliver, Emily and Paul's 5-month-old Maltese/Shih Tzu puppy. He was a big hit all night, as you can imagine... Though he was a big difficult to photograph!

More Memorial Day Pics

Christina took MUCH better photos of the Trouts' Memorial Day festivities and since she just uploaded them all to her flickr account, I went ahead and downloaded'em. (Thanks, Chrissie! Good work with your tripod!) My eyes are actually open in most of these so yay me.



L to R: Christina, me, Robert, Rob, Mrs. Trout, Mr. Trout, Amber, Jim, Mrs. Kidder, Paul, Emily, Mr. Kidder

Memorial Day @ the Trouts'

Our good friend Christina and her husband Rob made it to CA for the holiday weekend so Robert and I were invited to a BBQ at the Trouts' on Sunday. I had two papers due on Tuesday so I spent Friday and Saturday rolling around on my office floor trying to bribe anyone and everyone to write them for me. No one went for it so I eventually hunkered down and got the papers written. (Yes, I knew about them at the beginning of the quarter. So? What's your point? Maybe I just work better under pressure, did you ever think of that?!) As such, I was able to frolic about on Sunday unfettered by obligations and it was very nice indeed. :o)

The Kidders brought a croquet set over and I think everyone but Robert, Mrs. Trout and I didn't play. I wasn't really feeling it, to be honest, and I didn't really follow the rules, even though they were explained 256 times. (Though, to be fair, I wasn't really paying attention any of those times. I'm rude, not dumb.) From what I gathered, people enjoyed it.


The spread was huge. There were strip steaks, sausages, hot dogs, pulled pork sandwiches, shrimp, potato and cheese casserole, pasta salad, asparagus salad with avocado, green salad (provided by us - hi yo!), strawberries and watermelon with homemade apple pie for dessert. Even I found lots to eat and you know how picky I am.


Chrissie's brother, Jim, and his girlfriend, Amber, enjoying one of the many heat lamps. They were a lifesaver! For me, anyway. I think everyone else was fine but I was cold the entire night. I'm a wuss. (And I am totally making Robert get some heat lamps when we actually have a real yard.)


Emily's mom, Emily, Robert, me, Mrs. Trout, Jim and Amber enjoying the festivities.


Every year when I see a photo of the three of us, I think "Gee, I really need to lose a few pounds before we next get together!" So does not ever happen. But I always think it!

The Trouts are big game-players, so we busted out Cranium and pitted the guys against the girls. The girls were, unfortunately, trounced the last time all of us got together so it was sweet vin-di-cay-shee-own to win this time around!!! Ha ha! Suck it, fellas.


Here Jim is trying to use Rob to act out a curtsy. The guys actually got this one. Kind of annoying.


I believe Mrs. Trout is trying to act out opening gifts here with Christina. We guessed 'wrapping gifts' so we didn't get it. 'Cause the guys are sticklers. But we didn't need any pity points! We still won! Hoo hoo!! (When it was my turn to get up and perform, I had to do it alone and I had to act out lobster, shrimp cocktail and clam strips. Clam strips!!!!! But all three were guessed correctly, though (sadly) not due to my awesome charade skills. Still, is that not impressive? We were good!)



I'm not entirely sure what Robert is doing here - he had to act out the names of three TV shows and I don't know what this corresponds to.

As per usual, we had a great time and appreciated my parents letting the Funk hang at their abode for 8 hours on their holiday... :o)

Holiday Photos

Well, today is the crappiest of all days - the day I was forced to head back to stinky ol' work after a two week vacation. :o( A vacation I didn't get to truly enjoy because of my sickness(es). [I know you know that already but I'm wallowing in self pity here for a moment - indulge me, won't you?] Plus, today is the 1st day of the winter quarter here at The Bay so things are craaaaazy. I've already had 6 disgruntled students find their way to my office and me no likey! I am also woefully behind in all my regular entertainment blogs so I'm feeling a lot of (self-imposed) pressure to catch up. I'm frazzled here, people!! And I think I'm just going to have to stay behind, entertainment-wise. I told you 2010 wasn't doing much for me. Pleh.

To make matters worse - or, at the very least, not any better - I misplaced the battery charger for my camera sometime after getting back from Hawaii and so had no camera with which to take oodles of holiday photos! My parents let me borrow theirs a few times, though, so I was able to take a smattering of photos. Nothing to write home about, really, but here they are:


This is my mom with Quigley* about 5 minutes after bringing him home on Christmas Eve.


Quigley catching a nap. Little dude is only 3 pounds!!! He is TI-ny! But a spunky little guy; he plays really well with Garfunkel and vice versa. It's so nice that my poops has a new friend to play with everyday!



I really like Quigley's coloring - gives him a bit of pizazz, I think. He's just the cutest little fluff ball... and he loves to give you kisses! If you don't like puppy licks, don't get near this little guy. I have to say, though, as much as I like Quigley, I am a wee bit reserved around him. Everyone thinks he's so cute and everyone thinks my poor Funk is a maneater. :o(

I'm jealous on Garfunkel's behalf and very protective of my little poop. He's cute, too!! And well behaved (... most of the time)!! Really! Big dogs** are so prejudiced against. They do the same things little dogs do but because their teeth are bigger and their barks are deeper people automatically assume they're uncontrollable beasts that would rip your throat out as soon as look at you. Gah! The topic gets me very worked up... Sorry. Moving on.



Robert and I headed over to the Trouts' on the 28th for some fun and games with the Gerbes, Saitos and Kidders. We started with Battle of the Sexes, which we all took very seriously. As you can see in these two photos, the men took aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaages to pick just the right question to try and stump the ladies. Didn't always work - we ended the night with a 1-1 draw.


Waitin' for the guys...





I say this every year but it's always a good time with Christina and her family. We get spoiled in the winter because she's here for both Thanksgiving and Christmas. Now that it's the new year, I don't think she'll be back for quite a few months. Boo.


* Quigley was a name I offered up to my parents because my mom loves her some Tom Selleck. Magnum was a no-go but Quigley turned out to be a keeper. (In case you don't immediately get the reference, Tom was in a movie that three people - my parents and aunt - saw in 1990 called Quigley Down Under. Oh, Alan Rickman - what were you thinking?!)

** I should probably qualify this statement as not ALL big dogs are as prejudiced against as particular breeds like Dobermans, Am. Pit Bull Terriers, German Shepherds, Rottweilers, etc. People don't seem as intimidated by misbehaving Golden Retrievers...

Thanksgiving @ the Trouts'

Christina came to town for Thanksgiving this year and invited Robert and I over to celebrate a belated Thanksgiving with her and her family on Saturday. It's always great fun to catch up with Christina (and her parents - I love them!) and since Emily and Paul came, too, it was even better. We had a great night just eating, talking and playing games*... I look forward to seeing them all again at Christmas. :o) (Well, Emily and Paul I'm sure we'll see sooner but you know what I mean.)


We had to Rock Band it up, of course. Robert hates packing up the drums and dragging them along but Chrissie had never played Rock Band before and it's always more fun to play with a full band. I believe we were called ToneMunch. I think we were supposed to be the Tone Munchkins but it took Christina too long... ;o) Besides, not everyone present was a munchkin.


Chrissie couldn't handle the foot pedal her first time out at the drum kit so she had Emily do it for her.


Emily sang!!! Black is white! Up is down! (I was very happy we were finally able to persuade Em to sing.)


I just like Christina's face when she plays... hee!



Robert shot a couple short videos of Christina singing and they are hilarious! As Robert said "I could listen to her sing all day." It's true. She is such a good sport and really gives her all but - hooboy! - she's not the greatest. (Love you, Christina!) She is a kick, though.

(It's too bad we didn't get any footage of her singing the Beastie Boys' "Sabotage" because it was the best. I've never heard anyone sound so happy singing "Listen all y'all! It's a SAB-o-tage!" Too funny. Plus, she said migraine instead of mirage, which I thought was hysterical.)

* The low point of the evening was when Christina screwed Emily out of her rightful victory at Disney's Scene It! You guys who were there know it's true... ;o)

Trout BBQ

In keeping with the tardy posting I've been doing of late, here's a bit from back back on June 14th...

Christina's brother, Jim is headed to WASU - with his wife, Karen, of course! - to pursue his Ph.D. As such, the Trouts gave Jim a going away party and Robert and I were invited. Rob couldn't make the trip out to CA with Christina but it was a great opportunity to catch up with Christina... and a good way to get our butts out of the house to meet up with Emily and Paul, who live about a mile away from Robert and I but with whom we never really get together because neither Emily nor I like the phone. So there you go. :o) I always enjoy hanging out with the Trouts, as I've said before, and I was glad to have a chance to see Jim and Karen before they left. (Karen was always a friendly face in a sea of strangers at both Emily and Christina's respective wedding showers!) I feel so bad for Mrs. Trout - now all her kids live out-of-state. My mother would shrivel up and die!! Mrs. Trout definitely looked like she needed a hug a couple times throughout the night... Anyway, the food was fantastic (Robert had three full plates! I have a picture of him eating but he looks a little... less than his best so he's requested that I omit it from the post) and the company was better so what better way is there to spend a Saturday? I just hope Christina makes it back to CA sometime before next year...

Emily, Paul (with Moochie), Christina & I

Moochie is THE CUTEST dog ever!!! After seeing him that weekend and then hanging out with my sister's dog last weekend, I am having some serious puppy pangs. Robert is not excited.

Yes, it's June and yes, we are wearing parkas. Actually, Emily is tougher than I am - I have a thinner jacket on under my parka!! (All three jackets belong to the Trouts... I was stupid and didn't bring one. Did I mention it was mid-June? C'mon!)

The Gerbes

As I mentioned in an earlier post, my good friend Christina got married in NY on March 29th and, unfortunately, Robert and I were unable to attend. I chatted with Chrissie a bit last night and while I didn't get a boatload of details about the ceremony, it sounds like it was exactly what both Christina and Rob had hoped for - I couldn't be happier for them. :o) She forwarded some photos to me this morning so I thought I'd share a few:

Robert has always said he wants little people on our cake and I have always told him "No way. I don't think people do that anymore, man - it's old school!" (I don't even want a cake so the point may be moot anyway...) So what does Christina do? She shows me up by putting little people on her cake!! Selfish!



Both Chrissie and Rob look so happy - they're positively radiant! I'm very sorry Robert and I couldn't make it but I very much appreciate Christina passing some photos along. Now, I just wouldn't be me if I didn't rag on her a little so... It seems like just yesterday Christina was crying in 6th period over a breakup with her latest boyfriend, only to be making out with him by the time I drove past them in the parking lot after class. :o) And now my little Chrissie is married!!! Time flies when you're making fun of your nearest and dearest, I guess...