Merry Christmas!

(Click to enlarge)

Happy Halloween!

The costume parade was not the only thing we did this year to celebrate Halloween. This year Erin said we could have friends over and carve pumpkins. We were very excited. Especially DJ who always want to play with knives. So we gathered up some pumpkins and friends and got to work.

Ooo so many to choose from.

We each picked a pumpkin and started gutting. D.J. dug right in. Erin said she should have made us wear our rain coats. We got a little messy. Jesse saw the mess and decided that holding the pumpkin was just as good as carving it.

Num...guts!

Erin made us sort the seeds from the pumpkin slim. She said she would bake the seeds for us later. I estimate that we got 9 cups of pumpkin seeds! We will be eating them for the rest of our lives!

I decided to carve a traditional Jack-O-Lantern for Halloween. They are my favorite. Erin helped me.

A little more off the side...and perfect!

D.J. wanted to do something a little more modern. So out came a stencil, a knife, and Paul, who helped D.J. with a Felix the Cat. It come out really well. But don't tell D.J. that, or we'll never hear the end of it.

D.J. I think that knife is a little big for detail work.

And Jesse, well...Jesse just held the pumpkin, saying something like, "pumpkins need love, too."

It's okay pumpkin, I won't hurt you.

I think Jesse needs a vacations. Too much work. Eventually we figured out that Jesse just didn't want to get dirty nor play with knives. Which is okay. We had plenty of friends around to help carve. And the results were awesome!

Happy Halloween!

In the end we had 7 pumpkins carved. For some reason Erin said we couldn't play with knives by ourselves. So from left to right is the names of the humans that helped us on each pumpkin: Erin (owl), Angela (spider), Savita (small pumpkin), Erin (traditional), Vijay (Trick-or-Treat), Paul (cat), and Amol (undetermined). Thanks everyone!

On a sadder note, this year while carving pumpkins I got injured. I was playing with the candles and got burnt. But it is a good lesson learned to be careful around the holiday times. Because being injured is no fun. Hope everyone has a safe and happy Halloween!

O Tannenbaum

It is so sad that Christmas has come and gone. We had a lot of fun having our first Christmas in our "new" house. My favorite was getting to decorate, especially the tree!

Erin left one day all bundled up and told us to behave. I don't know why she always tell us to behave when she knows us better than that. But we said we would because she promised a big surprise when she got back. A few hours later she pulled up to the house with something bundled to the car. It was a Christmas Tree!

Oooo...look a tree!

We were so excited. I must admit I wanted to go with Erin to pick the tree out and cut it down but no matter. Erin let us put the tree up all by ourselves. I got to cut the extra stump off, Jesse screwed the tree to the stand, and D.J. got in the way.

Timber!

We drug it into the house and before you could say "holy shepherd" we had the tree all decorated. Erin didn't even get a snap off before we were finished. Of course she says it was because she was too busy cleaning up the carnage we left in the yard from getting the tree off the car and onto the stand. But I stand by she was just too scared to come back into the house.

Pretty

After all that hard work, Erin told us to get cleaned up for pictures for our Christmas Cards. Of course we haven't sent those out yet. So if you are on our mailing list you might be getting a sneak peek of what our Happy Flag Day Cards will look like. (At least at this point it will take us to Flag Day to get the cards out.)

Our first real Christmas Tree.

But we couldn't stop with a tree. We wanted to have more fun. So we set the table with Erin's Christmas dishes.

We like snowmen.

And we hung the stockings that Erin "borrowed without permission" from her parents' house.

Hanging the rented stockings

While we were doing that, Erin took out her nativity set that her aunt Lori painted when Erin was just a kid. Erin told us not to touch. She acts like we break things.

Ooo..isn't he cute...

And then we took a closer look and ran away. The only thing I asked for Christmas was for Erin to never call this shepherd to sheep sit. That poor sheep. No wonder why there were no other sheep in the scene.

Can't breath...send help

After we called the sheep abuse hot line for that little lamb, we all had a great Christmas. But then just as it started, Erin said it was time to clean up and take the tree down. Which I didn't understand. I thought the tree was going to stay. It seemed nice enough just sitting in the corner, and best of all, it pooped presents! I mean, come on, what is better than a pooping present tree? But Erin said it would dry up and it might burn our house down. Which I think was just an excuse because she is a grinch. I mean she is starting fires all the time just on the other side of the room in the fireplace. I don't see the difference. Atlas, we lost our battle and had to take the tree down.

Heads up!

And of course, that means that Jesse and I had to do all the work because 2 seconds into it D.J. found a shiny bell.

BELL!

But that's ok. We had a system. I climbed in the tree and dropped all the ornaments down to Jesse below.

Angelic Bombardier

And it worked well because Jesse is good at color, thus a great ornament sorter. Although, Jesse also gets distracted by shiny things, too. So Erin had to step in and help me with the rest.

Ooo shiny

And we all said good bye one last time. And Erin wrestled the tree out of the house. You know I thought that tree was all nice but it didn't go quietly. Erin was right, it was dangerous. It took out our light on the way out. D.J. tried to fix the light but it was no use.

Duct Tape! Stat!

After a vacuum, it was all over.

Voom Voom

Good bye, Christmas. We can't wait for next year. Next year will be better. Next year I'm going to pick out a bigger tree. Because you know, bigger trees poop bigger presents!

New Years Resolutions

So it took us 4 days but Jesse, Chris and I finally came up with a list of resolutions that we think Erin should work on this year. I know it seems long but Erin has a lot of flaws. So let's get started. Here are top 25 resolutions Erin should do.

Exercise more...um...start exercising
Play with us more
Practice the stupid piano she bought last year
Read more
Lose weight
Learn to spell
Work on the house
Give us everything we ask for
Write more post
Work harder at work
Make some friends
Spend less money on stupid things (a.k.a. anything that is not for us)
Eat healthier
Give us chocolate
Finish all her sewing and craft projects
Keep the house clean
Get organized
Reduce stress
Wait on us hand and foot
Learn to count
Take us on extravagant trips
Help the needy...like us
Spend more time with friends
Love us more

After we showed Erin the list we negotiated. Erin said she would try to refrain from smothering us in our sleep. We agreed that that would work, too. Happy New Year!

Nice pillow...down pillow...

(P.S. Happy Birthday Erin's Mommy!)

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! And no we are not dead. Sorry for the absent posting. We couldn't let Marty and Jeremy have all the fun so we decided to move, too! How fun is that!? You might remember if you read back a few post, Erin was looking to buy a house. And she did and packed all our great stuff in boxes. Now don't worry, the move didn't stop us from having great adventures...we just don't exactly remember which box the camera was packed in. But as soon as we unpack all 29,042 boxes of Erin's crap we will have a slew of back post for you all. We can't wait, hope you can a little longer. Just drink some of that spiked eggnog and enjoy the holidays. That's what we are doing.

We'll help unpack this one!

Happy Birthday, Karin!

Easter Egg Hunt

Yeah, Easter! We woke up this morning to learn that the Easter Bunny had showed up. He came and took our eggs out of the refrigerator and let they lay around the house. Now, when we leave our food lay around Erin gets mad. But somehow she didn't seem upset that a random rabbit (who could have rabies) broke into our home, ransacked our fridge, and then colored on and let food lay all over. I just don't get her sometimes. Some days I just don't understand Erin. But she said it was supposed to be fun to go round up the eggs. I thought it sounded like work but the other lambs seemed excited about it. So here we go...

D.J. found the first colorful egg. However, the little lamb didn't really understand the concept the first.

Shhh...I'm hiding with the egg.

After Erin did a little more explaining that we were supposed to find and collect the most eggs to be the winner we all were a little more on track. Chris found the next one. It was a little gruesome.

This is your brain...this is your brain on too much Easter Candy...questions?

Ok, so far the score is D.J. - 1, Chris -1, Me -0. And, honestly, I was ok with that. I saw what finding an egg was doing to the other sheep mentally. I figured I would just stand in the hallway and not look. But then I found one.

I found one...I found one!!!

All tied up. Erin was right, this was fun! O but please, don't tell Erin I said she was right. You know how she gets.

D.J. found the next egg in the light that Erin calls, "The bad 80's porn light fixture." D. J. was a little worried becuase the the egg looked like it had caught something.

Um this egg isn't looking so well.

Erin explained the the egg had the chicken pox, a very infectious disease. But you can only get it once and it was best for the egg to get it now. Erin said it is a lot more painful if you get it when your older instead of younger.

At that point we got distracted because I spotted another egg.

I didn't do it. It was cracked when I got here.

Well I got a little dirty in that one. But I tied up with D.J. so it was worth it.

D.J. - 2
Chris - 1
Me - 2

Scratch that...

This one is already in a basket.

All tied up at 2. Erin said there was only one egg left to find. So it all came down to the last egg. We tore up the place looking for it. Then all at once we all found it on the keyboard.

I was wondering why I could hear that constant note.

Erin said we were all winners because we all found 3 eggs. Yeah, I'm a winner!

Happy Easter!

Happy New Years!

Happy New Year! It is a new year filled with new adventures just waiting to happen. We thought we would start the new year off right with a new adventure...grasshoppers. When Erin first asked us if we wanted to try a grasshopper, we thought she was trying to volunteer us for a Fear Factor show. But then we saw her make one. It's an alcoholic milkshake! Two of our favorite things. So we grabbed our spoons and started in. She even gave us a cookie! Bottoms up!

Why do you think they call them grasshoppers?

O, because the room starts to hop when you finish one.

Merry Christmas!

It's Christmas morning!!! You know what that means? That's right, PRESENTS!!! We got another present this year from our good friends Marty and Jeremy who live on the other side of the pond.

ooo...what do you think it is?

It didn't take us long to get the package open. We might not have thumbs but D.J. has razor wire on the teeth. So we ripped it open and LOOK!

Shaun the Sheep! Our favorite!

Erin told us that we could watch it right away. It was perfect because we were getting a little cabin fever from all the snow. It is still really bad here. But now we have something to do to pass the time instead of just watching Erin "work." So we got some pop and popcorn and put the DVD in. Which was an even bigger treat because Erin normally doesn't let us have popcorn on account of D.J.

Next year D.J. needs a popcorn snorkel for Christmas.

Ya!!!! Shaun!!!!

THANK YOU, Marty and Jeremy. We really really REALLY love your gift. And you saved Christmas for us. You see Erin ordered our Christmas presents and yours a long long time ago but on account of the weather the UPS guy can't deliever it. :( Erin is rather unhappy about it. She calls them daily about it. They won't even let her come and pick it up. But she says as soon as it comes we can redirect it to you guys in the UK. Anyway, we hope it doesn't spoil your Christmas. Merry Christmas, Marty, Jeremy and everyone else that reads the blog. We are expecting great adventures in the year 2009.

How to make Thanksgiving dinner 101

Preparing Thanksgiving dinner is not an easy feat. So we put together some easy directions to make sure your Thanksgiving goes off without a hitch.

Step 1) The Hunt

You need to go 0ut and find a turkey in its natural habitat. It's important to sneak up on it as not to startle the poor thing. Be prepared to wrestle it to the ground if it has a bit of a kick.

Shhh...don't scare the little fella

Step 2) Preparing

After you hog tie the turkey (we don't want it to wriggle away), you need to prepare it. First and foremost don't forget the stuffing, you can also put lots of goodies in the pan. This will help add flavor.

Step 3) Cooking

They say you should cook a turkey a half hour for every pound. But we say cook it until its wool catches fire and falls off. That will seer in the juices and make it nice and moist for eating.

Quick, shove it in before Erin catches us!

Step 4) Eat

Eat the turkey with lots of good food and friends. Gobble Gobble!

We're thankful for all the Doritos D.J. ate this year.

The End...

Ok D.J. gets to eat first because D.J. was "playing" the role of the turkey and because we got blackmailed. It was either D.J. eats first or Erin learns how the little sheep's bottom got blackened.

Nummy

Holiday Spirit

Well after Taylor's last post we got to talking and decided that if the stores were going to celebrate the holidays early we might as well too. The hopeless romantic in me curled up with a nice bottle of red. Threw on some Luther Vandross and was ready to kick back.

Not three sips into my wine, the little hellion comes barging in apparently in the Mardi Gras mood. Who knew a sheep could soak up so much. Luther Vandross was quickly replaced by an endless versions of "When the Saint's come Marching In." Really thought some of my musical tastes would have rubbed off by now.

Really we're good sheep, don't you believe us

Either way we had a fun evening and are completely in the holiday spirit now. Not sure we can make it last until the holidays occur but we'll see. We do have plenty of work getting our client/host/human to cheer up. Wish us luck

Permanent Holiday Pt. 2

Will it ever end? Another day, another trip to Wal-Mart and guess what we find. A section of Mardi Gras beads. At least those don't go stale like chocolates. Oh and for Chris, since I continually get into trouble for not carrying my camera around, here's a nice cell phone camera picture of part of the aisle.

Shiny Shiny...What were we shopping for again?

Permanent Holiday

Yeah!! We survived the holiday season, didn’t eat too many cookies, spared the pie and made it home without too many bruises. Those airports can be rough; we won’t even discuss the security screening. Get home, a little hungry after a long day of traveling and decide to go get some groceries. Hoof it on down to Wal-Mart (being a sheep therapist doesn’t pay well, at least the schooling is cheap) and wander our way collecting groceries. After grabbing eggs and dairy products we round the corner fly past the cleaning supply aisles and what do we see?

What no guesses, come on. We know you want to guess, trust us we won’t laugh.

Oh yeah, ok, maybe we’ll snicker a little, lets be realistic now.

Ok, so what did we see, we saw chocolates for Valentine’s Day. Now I don’t know about you, but if I gave my sweet heart stale chocolate I’d be sleeping in the dog house. Around here that’s not even a metaphorical threat…it’s quite real.

So I get to thinking, this aisle here was where the Christmas candy was, so what was there before Christmas. Oh my gosh. This aisle always has holiday candy. Starting December 26^th (although we’ve heard of sittings as early as December 23^rd) the aisle supports Valentine’s Day candy. After that it goes straight to Easter, with a small section for St. Paddy’s Day. As a side note if 2 month old chocolate isn’t bad enough, what do people do with 2 month old peeps. After Easter I bet its summer grilling and Independence Day. After that its college dorm room supplies. If you don’t think this is a holiday you’ve never raised teenagers. From there it’s Halloween and lastly Christmas.

It’s a good thing us sheep is poor. So many pretty trinkets to spend money on, but we skip the aisle and get to the important things, like the Alfalfa.