My happy place

I'm in my happy place this morning. I took advantage of no doctor being in the office today and took the day off. I woke up to the most beautiful new fallen fluffy snow. After throwing a load of laundry in I bundle up and head outside to feed the birds. My birds LOVE me! It's going to be a good day. Seems like I'm happiest when I have absolutely nothing I HAVE to do. It's the greatest feeling when I get to putter around on my own time.

The snow started about a week ago. Craig and I groomed the snowmobile trails for about 5 hours last Saturday. Another beautiful day on the trails. You might be surprised to know that Craig is selling all our snowmobiles. After years of threatening that "this is the year I'm selling the snowmobiles" this is THE year to finally act on it. Craig says that the aggravation factor has finally outweighed the enjoyment factor. Many factors made the decision.... seems like they are always broke down, the price of gas is outrageous, if we are lucky we have only a few weeks a year we can even use them, they take up a huge amount of room in the garage, etc, etc. Craig listed them on "Craig's List" and within 24 hours one had already sold. Two others are interested in another one. Gotta love Craig's List.

But don't think that Craig is giving up his love of the sport. He still has plans to be active with the snowmobile club which puts in and maintains the trails in our area. He love driving the groomer.

I snapped this photo of Seadra and Zoe this morning. The dogs are not too happy about this weather. Zoe seems to tolerate it better than the other two. Seadra and Fiona fight it all the way. Can't you tell by the look on Seadra's face? She's such a spoiled whiny baby.

Mr. Squirrel was playing with me this morning. He lets me get within a few feet of him. I bet I could get him to eat out of my hand if I was patient enough. I think the squirrels understand that I feed them. This time of year I pick up "critter food" in addition to bird seed.

Have a great day... I hope you are in your happy place.

Beauty is Everywhere

There is beauty everywhere! We finally got significant snow in the last 24 hours and it is still coming down. I absolutely love getting dumped on especially when it is the weekend and I can stay all hunkered down and cozy at home. It was barely light outside this morning and Craig and I were outside playing in the snow. Craig was blowing the drive and making paths around the back yard for the dogs. He also blew paths to all my birdfeeders. I was filling all the feeders and chasing the birds around with my camera.

This is my FAVORITE bird feeder. We had a huge tree cut down in the back yard last spring. Craig saved two pieces and created this bird feeder for me. It weighs a ton and isn't about to be moved or knocked over. I'm not the only one that loves it. It's a favorite with the birds too.

Winter is my favorite time to photograph cardinals.

I have a lot of titmice. They don't stand still for too long.

My beautiful friendly chickadee.

Needless to say my birds are spoiled. But they give me so much joy in return.

New Year, New Living Room

I wish we were motivated more often to do home renovations. But when we are we really go all the way! It all started pretty simple, we needed new carpet. Our carpet is 9 years old and with 3 dogs it was really needing to be replaced. We even went and picked out the carpet we wanted. But the more we thought about it the more we hated to put carpet back down. We REALLY wanted hard wood floors. So hard wood floors it is!

Last weekend Craig ripped up the carpet. The tricky part was getting the floor level in preparation of the new floor. There was ply wood down on half the floor that also had to be ripped up.

Just tonight Craig and Caleb finished leveling the floor and we are now waiting for the hard wood floor company to get back to us. I'm so excited!!!!!

The room has a fresh new coat of paint thanks to Jordan! She painted every speck of it on her own. I never even touched a paint brush. She does an amazing job. My favorite was her signature she left on the floor. That girl has a great imagination.

My family has jumped right in and I so appreciate it! I'll post our progress, stay tuned.

Ringing in the New Year

Happy New Year! Last time I looked at the clock last night it was 11:45. I can't remember the last time I rang in the New Year. I'm not the partying, pop the champagne while singing Auld Lang Syne type. Craig and I spent the evening at home. About the most exciting thing I did was get the camera out and snap a few photos of the fury kids.

During the day we did go to Grand Rapids and spent the day at the Grand Rapids Public Museum. We went specifically to go to the "Bodies Revealed" exhibit. It was pretty good. They have real human cadavers displayed to explain the different systems. Being a nurse I enjoyed it. Although, being an OR nurse I've seen most all the innards of a human being while they are still alive so the dead ones just don't compare. But it was still interesting.

And besides the "Bodies Revealed" exhibit the rest of the museum was just as good. They had a display of taxidermy birds and wildlife that I throughly enjoyed. It was a good day.

Well, today is the first day of 2011 and like the rest of the world I have made a few resolutions. I'm not a big one to make resolutions but this year I decided to join in and make a few resolutions at becoming healthier. I am generally a happy content person. I love my family and I love my job but I am increasingly becoming dissatisfied with my physical well being. Specifically my weight is making me uncomfortable and I don't have the energy I would like. I've made myself a goal to lose 20 pounds in 3 months. OK, so I need to lose more than 20 pounds but I set a goal that I feel like I can accomplish. When I make that goal then I'll go from there.

I started this a week ago. I haven't been perfect and I've fallen off the wagon a few times but the encouraging part is that I haven't gotten discouraged and thrown in the towel. I'm still feeling really good about it and constantly thinking of ways to meet my goals. I'm taking little baby steps and am making progress that way. Instead of going all whole hog and feeling persecuted I am trying pick up healthy habits in small ways and hoping that they add up to bigger things.

My little baby steps so far are trying to avoid flour and sugar. The sugar part is easy for me. I've never been attracted to sweets. It's pastas and pizzas that are my downfall. And in those areas I'm practicing portion control when I feel like I am going to cheat. I haven't gotten on a scale and have no intention of for a few weeks. I think that would be too discouraging to step on the scale every day.

And I am well aware that exercise is an important part of being healthy. That again is one of my downfalls. I'm going to start out walking. Maybe Zoe would like to join me. She could afford to lose a few pounds herself.

I'll be blogging about my progress.... stay tuned.

Jordan is painting the living room this week and it looks wonderful. Next is the floor. We have decided to lay a hard wood floor rather than carpet. Craig thinks it will be easy enough to lay ourselves, we'll see about that one. We are headed to Menard's this afternoon to pick out what we want. Stay tuned on that one.....

Happy New Year to all my Family and Friends!!!! You were a blessing to all of us in 2010!

It was good

Christmas is behind us and we are looking forward to the New Year. Life is good in the Mullauer household. We had a wonderful Christmas and I will share a little bit of it with you in the photos that follow. Happy New Year....

My Favorite Gifts.....

These amazing people in my life are without a doubt my favorite gifts this season.

Puppies are high on my list as well. I have this photo framed in my office. Patients actually stand up and walk over to the photo for a better look. They just love this photo and so do I.

Even naughty puppies warm my heart.

And ending the year with 3 healthy puppies is a really good thing!

What a surprise gift this was! We just love her and so does Caleb.

This photo was taken the first day Caleb introduced me to Bailey.

What joy it is to see the pride in his face.

Driving 7 hours in a blizzard to see Jordan's Christmas Orchestra Concert. OK, the blizzard part we could have done without but it was worth it!

Having the love and support of an extended family is a huge blessing.

Knowing that Mom and Dad are always there is a big comfort.

And being able to raid their garden all summer is fabulous!

Seeing Jordan well adjusted at college is answered prayer.

Watching Craig be the father he is to our kids is the greatest gift.

Day trips to fun places with my camera is another of my favorites. And coming across a mother duck and her babies makes it perfect.

Taking the Jeep to Silver Lakes, Jeep rides on warm summer evenings.... all gifts from Craig.

Is it time to go camping again yet? I love our travel trailer. It means we get to go to fun places, go kayaking..... be together!

I saved the best for last.....

Two Weeks Until Christmas!

We are under a winter storm warning. Usually I love a good winter storm, especially when it's the weekend and I can hunker down at home. But of all days for a nasty storm to be rolling in.... tomorrow Craig's flying home and we have plans for me to pick him up at the airport and then we were suppose to head straight up to Big Rapids for Jordan's Christmas symphony concert. It doesn't look like it's going to happen now. We're just going to play it by ear and see how things look tomorrow.

Do you like my tree? I love it. It doesn't change much from year to year except the shape maybe since we buy a live tree each year. I was happy that when Craig was home over Thanksgiving weekend we were able to get the tree.

This cardinal clothes pin is one of my new ornaments this year. You can't tell from the tree but he's a tiny little thing, only about a half inch. He's totally lost in the tree but I know exactly where he is.

It's already Dec. 11th and I FINALLY did some Christmas shopping today. And I actually enjoyed it. I went to this antique shop in Kalamazoo and it just so happened that they were having a Christmas open house. They really did it up. They had a group walking around the store singing Christmas Carols. Boy, could they sing! And they were all decked out in furs and jewels. I wish I had my camera with me. But the cutest was this little boy who was dressed up as Tiny Tim. He was walking around with a limp and a cane. He was also carrying a big basket full of wrapped presents and handing them out to the customers. I loved it!

Bailey and Craig made Christmas sugar cookies about a week ago which lasted all of two days!