Stogiemeister

I was looking back through some photos from a recent camping trip and found this bit of unbelievable cuteness. It had to be posted and adored by all. While I whittle one end of the smore stick Stogie helps by chewing the other end. Too bad that was the end I was going to put the marshmallow on... 

Stogie LOVES him some raw hide. The last one was gone in a matter of days instead of weeks. Well, those suckers aren't cheap so today Tab and I picked out this one. Pretty sure it will last a while. I'm also pretty sure it will be the raw-hide. of. his. life. 

(If you can't tell it's almost the same length as Stogie.)

To pierce or not to pierce

I have wanted to get my nose pierced for a very long time. Up til now I have been too chicken to endure the pain in order to have one. Several months ago I decided I was ready but then began questioning if I could pull off a nose piercing (you know, looks wise). These days it seems like you can do whatever you want style wise and people will get used to it so I'm thinking that will be the reaction to my new nose accessory. This morning I took a tiny silver sticker and stuck it on my nose to help me imagine what it would look like :) and was surprised at how much I liked it. I tried to take a picture to post so you could get the idea but the sticker just wouldn't show in the pic. At this point I am 95% sure that I'm going to do it. Several months ago when I first started talking about it one of my friends from work who had in her past had everything pierced said adamantly that I should not do it. Turns out everyone she has ever known who had a diamond stud nose piercing was snobby back stabbing and fake (you know the kind). Though she changed her mind since I was obviously none of those things. She just didn't want me to be perceived that way which I understood. (Four of my favorite people have nose piercings and all of them are nice, really genuine and sincere. Which is why I didn't realize people might assume some sort of snobbery about me if I had a piercing.) I then proceeded to ask everyone in my family if they would ever be able to look at me again if I got a piercing. They said: Tab- go for it she always wanted to do something like that. Melissa- would get used to it but she is totally grossed out by piercings and has been her whole life.(She's never even pierced her ears!) Mom- if Christopher likes it then that's all that matters. Christopher- he thought it would be pretty on me. (What a good husband! Couldn't have answered better if I had fed him a line myself!) Dad- was at work but Mom guessed that he wouldn't mind it. Everyone else I asked said I should do it and then after carefully inspecting my nose (awkward!) voted on which side I should put it. I have chosen the right side by the way. So now I am asking all of you in blogland what do you think? Am I too old? Can I pull it off style wise? Do you think my face can handle an accessory? Will I seem like a sorority girl wannabe? Let the voting begin!

Christmas in July

WARNING: This is a seriously long post! 

WARNING #2: My favorite blogs are the ones with lots of pictures so I plan to use an excess of pictures too! Just so you know...I know.

A bit of back story:

In the Sherk household traditions are BIG. We incorporate traditions into everything- camping, holidays you name it. It's kind of a running joke that if we try something new one year and everybody likes it then it's a tradition from then on. (Sometimes we carry them on even when no one really wants to anymore. But nobody wants to be the one to say it!) 

Well, several years ago I was on what I called my chocolate chip cookie diet (I hated them for years and upon rediscovering them I pretty much ate only chocolate chip cookies for a few weeks. If you can believe it I actually lost weight though that wasn't my purpose.) That was in the middle of July and during that time I watched what was then my favorite Xmas movie "Christmas in Connecticut." Tabitha watched it with me and had cookies too. That was how it all began- our Christmas in July tradition. We've carried it on every year since then. 

A few years ago Tabitha and Melissa started their own tradition of getting Starbucks and going to a Xmas tree farm called Sleighbells that has an enormous ornament shop that is open year round. They have everything you could need for your tree. It's crazy busy around the holidays so this year we combined traditions. First we were off to Starbucks with our xmas mugs, then to Sleighbells to buy ornaments and then to the girls' apartment for Christmas in Connecticut and chocolate chip cookies.  

Note the Christmas mug.

This is our favorite room. It's full of German blown glass ornaments.

You can't really tell but that's a shark ornament biting my nose. I thought it was funny because Tabitha is actually making shark faces and noises.

This year I bought a totem pole ornament (in honor of "his people" as Christopher calls them) and an elephant. I'll explain the totem poll in another post. 

While we were watching our movie Stogie escaped under the deck fence with no collar on and was missing so we all ran out to find him leaving Liberty (Miss' lab)  and Molly (Tab's pug) in the apartment. After several minutes of looking a neighbor returned Stogie and we went back to our movie. A bit later Tab reached for a cookie from the plate on the coffee table only to find Liberty had eaten every one while we were looking for Stogie! That was like eight huge cookies! We decided later that they had planned it together. Stogie got to run free, Lib's got to eat cookies and Molly got to... sit on the couch like always? So Molly kinda missed out but the other two hit the jackpot. Sneaky sneaky!

Happy Birthday to Me!

At 8:55 AM today I turned 27! I feel so old and am not ready to be in my late 20's yet. Oh well. Spilt milk right? Christopher had to work today so Stogie and I drove over to my parents house. Mom and I spent the day together and Dad took us out to dinner this evening. Thanks guys! I wasn't ready to face 27 by myself today. 

My beautiful birthday present!!!

Not my best pic but I had to post it so you could see the humor.

I had on long pants, a sweatshirt and was rolled up in a sleeping bag

Miss and Tab however...

decided to pretend it was warm out and wear swim suits.

Who do you think people were looking at like they were 

crazy as they passed by?

Hint: It wasn't me. 

PS Tab is not naked in this pic it just looks like it ;) 

PPS I hope they don't kill me for posting pics of them in their swimsuits! Hehe.

Preface-

Here in the Davis household we don't just celebrate your birthday we celebrate your birthday week. Christopher started it the first year we were married. His birthday rolled around and he started (jokingly) saying he should get to do whatever he wanted because it was "Birthday Week". Well I thought it was so outrageously cute (and unusual for him to try to get his way- he is very much a peace making non boat rocking middle child) that he got to do whatever he wanted all week. Next year he tried to make it birthday month! But again I'm a sucker for anything cute he does and so we had Birthday Month. When my birthday came I went back to Birthday Week. (You see his b-day is at the end of Jan so celebrating all month leading up to it made sense. My birthday is at the beginning of August and it just seems weird to celebrate for a month after my b-day is long past.) 

So that's the backstory. 

This year we had to split it up. Part of last week and part of this week we've been celebrating me! So far there has been: Batman, Happy Panda chinese food, Krispy Kreme donuts, window shopping at the mall, Mama Mia, Spaghetti Factory, a day at Cannon Beach with Melissa and Tabitha, next week The Davis and I will go to the beach, and last and best of all... JEWELRY!!!! I love jewelry and Christopher who in general does not understand my fascination with it bought me a necklace for my birthday! This is headline news people. I had seen a necklace at a beautiful jewelry store called Na Hoku and fallen in love with it. I showed it to him once when we were window shopping and he remembered it. It is very sentimental and reminds me of my wedding and honeymoon in Hawaii because of the shape and materials. I cried. What a guy that Davis! 

Disclaimer: I do realize that extravagant Birthday Weeks will only last until we have kids but until then it's fun to be celebrated for a whole week. 

Disclaimer #2: This is the most extravagant of all the Birthday Weeks so far since this year Christopher is employed and not a student. Years past usually included more outings that were free, rental movies, window shopping and fast food :) They were equally good times!

Jehovah Jaira!

Alright, fasten your seat belts folks because I am about to attempt several rapid fire updates. First things first- everyone rejoice with me, iPhone Day finally came! Because I used to/might still work for a certain company I cannot fully explain the saga of the iPhone. In a nutshell I can say that a year ago when they first came out I was the proud owner of a beautiful new iPhone only to discover that Verizon had me trapped in a contract for another year and with much sadness I sold it on Craigslist. (Verizon was going to charge me $350 to cancel my two lines hence, the waiting.) I was smart however and saved the money to buy one when the contract was up.  Last Thursday was that joyous day. There was great rejoicing and some jumping up and down and skipping. Really, there really was! Without further ado, here are the pictures I posed for and asked Chrispy to take with you my blog audience in mind. I think they capture the spirit of the momentous event.

  

 

I know, it's like you were there isn't it?!