Merry Christmas

Cricket enjoyed opening his present from Great Grama... 6 pig ears!!!

My mom's present to us... a beautiful handmade Home Sweet Home cross-stitch

Bruin showing off his new Laptop bag!!

WooHoo! My new sewing machine!!!!

All this present opening tuckered Cricket out...

Merry Christmas!!!

Say Cheese :)

This past Sunday, our friend and co-worker Matt, came to the house to take the 'Official Robinson Family Christmas Picture'. Posing for pictures is really weird and awkward to me but Matt, along with his lovely wife Jenna, did a fantastic job. It's hard enough getting people to cooperate but throw in a dog and it just gets plain complicated. Jenna did a great job of getting Cricket's attention (and then ours, of course) so that Matt would have the perfect shot. And it worked, because the pictures turned out beautiul. We were very, very pleased. And talk about turn around time! We had our prints the next day. It was awesome. Here are a few of our favorites. Enjoy!

Party Time!

Bruin and I had our company Christmas party last night. We had a fun time hanging out with friends, eating good food and waiting with anticipation for the announcement of the winners of the door prizes... unfortunately, we didn't win anything this year :(

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

We have finally decorated for Christmas - outside and inside. Here's the evidence:


It's hard to tell but there are white lights wrapped around the porch railing and bows tied at the top of the stairs. We also have a beautiful wreath our neighbors gave us on the door. The lights in the windows on the 2nd floor were my grandmothers.



I begged for a real tree and got one! We bought this from Lowe's for only $25!!! We put tons of colored lights on it and decked it out with all sorts of ornaments from Bruin and I's childhood, along with some we've collected so far.

We can't wait for Christmas now!

Cherry!......Cherry!!!........Lemon :-(

Hey all,

It's Bruin, the other half of this blog. Nicole has been bugging me to blog about my trip to Las Vegas for 3 weeks now, so I figured I'd oblige. (Of course, I think it's because she can only blog about Cricket so many times before you guys get bored and stop reading.) For those of you who didn't know, I went to Las Vegas recently for........uh.......a christian men's conference? a Retreat of Silence? Ummmmm, no. I went with a couple of friends from work to gamble (on a budget!), eat (buffets galore!!!), drink (Waitress: "Here's your bourbon and coke", Dealer: "You've got blackjack!", Me: "Hit me!") and be merry. What I didn't plan on was the LVPD being so darn strict. She told me she was 18!! HA! I kid.

The only lady I paid any attention to all weekend was Lady Luck, and she is a coy mistress. We landed in Vegas at 7, and by 10 pm, I'd already lost $60 of the $300 I had budgeted. But I'd had a plate of Volcanic Nachos and a Perfect Margarita at Margaritaville, so I was okay with the outlook of coming away with nothing but memories (consequently, I pitched the idea of Shirley Templeville to a Casino manager. He was not impressed). But Lady Luck smiled, and I didn't lose much more after that. In fact, after winning $20 at Blackjack the next evening, $40 at Texas Hold 'Em one afternoon, and $200 on a penny slot machine (how bout those odds!!!) I ended up leaving Sin City with a full belly, a clean conscience, and $20 extra dollars in my wallet, even after paying for all my food, chotskies, and some Las Vegas wear for me and the missus.

Bruin-1, Las Vegas-0.

Here's some pics of the trip:

The Excalibur, where we stayed.

The Strip at night.

The Buffet at the Wynn. Best $35 I've ever spent. I think I'm still full from it.

The best burger place ever. I can understand why Paris would drive drunk just to get a Double Double. If your computer is fritzing out, I apologize, that's my drool coming through the blog.

The fountains at the Bellagio. I was hoping they'd play Clair de Lune from Ocean's 11. Unfortunately, they played Celine Dion "My Heart Will Go On." I still felt like the King of the World.

The front of the MGM Grand

The Lion exhibit at the MGM Grand. I can NOT believe how big these things are in real life. Craziness.

Bruin's 3. Danny Ocean, you got nothing on me.

So that's my trip. Thanks for checking in. You stay classy, blogosphere.

Bruin

Over the river and through the woods

To Papa, Nana and Grama's house we go... Mommy and Daddy know the way to steer the car through the lines and lines of... traffic?? Okay, maybe I'm not the best at nursery rhymes yet but I'm learning! So, as I was trying to say, Mommy and Daddy and I drove up to Papa and Nana and Grama's house for Thanksgiving. We did a lot of sleeping and eating and reading and sleeping and eating and watching TV. This was my first Thanksgiving at Papa and Nana and Grama's house. It was fun but Papa and Nana and Grama don't like me to sleep on the couch, so I was happy to come home. Although, I DID get to sleep in the bed with Mommy and Daddy. But it isn't all that it's cracked up to be - Mommy hogs the bed and Daddy moves around a lot. I was better off in my kennel. Anyway, we are back home, safe and sound. I've got my great big yard to run in and my nice comfy couch to sleep on.

Nap time with Daddy.

Daddy and I reading.

There were lots and lots of leaves to play with.

I knew I smelled something good!!!

Mommy loves me so much.

Are you SURE I can't come up there with you?

And then there was grass...

After 9 months of staring at dirt and weeds (as well as the River Robinson when it rained), we now have grass in our backyard. The Lord blessed us with a perfect day and even more with amazing friends who volunteered a Saturday morning to help us out. With 6 people helping, it took us 2.5 hours to finish. Not too bad if you ask me.

The whole process started yesterday when the builder's landscaping company came and re-graded the yard so when it rains, the water will now run down along our fence line instead of right through our backyard. But in order to maintain this swale, we had to put down sod.


The white mark around the trees indicated the area we wanted to keep 'natural'. I.e, we plan to put mulch in that area and figured we'd save on the sod. We also marked off an area right off our deck that we plan to cement in to make a little patio (for a table and chairs).


Matt and Wes enjoyed some homemade Hashbrown Casserole before we started.


We started at the back of the yard and worked outwards. The landscaping company was nice enough to drop the pallets in the backyard so it was easier to grab the grass.


The guys were just rockin' it... I couldn't believe how fast things were getting done.


Bruin is quite proud of his grass.


Almost done...


What a nice backyard!!!!


My beautiful view (from my Kitchen window).

Cricket's Reaction:

I think he likes it :)

FALL IS FINALLY HERE!

A little tree in our backyard has braved the warm weather and decided to exchange it's green leaves for more beautiful red, orange and yellow leaves. I couldn't be prouder. :) Fall is a great time of year, isn't it? The cooler weather, the beautiful colors and the impending holidays... it just doesn't get much better than this.

The best form of birth control

They say the best form of birth control is babysitting. Well, Bruin and I were able to put this into practice this past Sunday. We FINALLY got to baby-sit our favorite (and only) nephew Riley!!! Man, I maybe bias but he is the best baby EVER!!! So cute and soooooooooo good... we loved it. But yes, as the saying goes, it WAS good birth control. :) For all our loyal readers (Mom R, that's you!) we still plan to wait a few years before someone can baby-sit for us. For now, we are content with our baby, Cricket :)
Because the "Little Man" basically slept the entire time we were there (he's only 3 months), we don't have many pictures. But Bruin was able to snag a quick one while I fed him.

P.S. Sorry for the delay in posts. Bruin was in Vegas last week (he promises to post pictures soon) so I was on my own and really didn't have anything interesting to blog about. But check back often cause we are very busy over the next few weeks... I'm SURE there'll be good stuff to blog about!!!

The Battle for Bobo

Friday night, Cricket's best friend Barkley came over for some play time. Barkley, being the considerate guest he is, brought his Bobo for them to play with. As you can see from the video, Bobo caused quite a stir... (Keep an eye out for Cricket's Body Slam Finishing Move)


(The quacking/squeaking sound is Bobo saying "Hey guys, can't we all get along?")

Where did all the Trick or Treaters go??

Unfortunately, Halloween in our new house, in our new neighborhood was a little disappointing. We had a total of 5 Trick or Treaters. Apparently, the place to go is the neighborhood down the street... Oh well! Maybe next year. Cricket got some good practice watching out for the kids though.

Happy Anniversary to us!!!

Yesterday, Bruin and I celebrated our 2 year wedding anniversary. Neither of us can believe it's been two years already... it goes by SO fast! We've had such a blessed two years - from getting Cricket to building our home, we are grateful for every moment. To celebrate, we decided to 'treat' ourselves this year and stay the night in a bed and breakfast. After some searching, we decided on Beaufort. Neither of us had ever been and we heard it was a cute little town. So we found this beautiful B&B called the Cuthbert House Inn.

Our room was called the Mariner's Suite. It was on the lower level of the house and had it's own private entrance, along with an amazing view of the water.

After checking in, we took a quick walk around downtown. Unfortunately, since it was 5pm on a Sunday, nothing was open. So we decided to head back to the Inn for an evening social. The Inn Keepers serve wine and appetizers while the guests mingle and chat in the Inn's Living room. We met an older couple who were on a driving tour of the South. They were very nice and we talked for a while. But all that talking made us hungry! So we headed out to the 11th Street Dockside restaurant for dinner. Along with some good seafood, we saw one of the most amazing sunsets ever. It started off light blue and purple but within an hour, turned hot pink and orange!

The next morning, we woke up freezing! But soon warmed up with some coffee in the 'reading room'. It was probably my favorite room in the house mainly because of the view but also because it was just so cute!

Afterwards, we enjoyed a delicious southern breakfast of pancakes and orange Grand Marnier sauce. Mmm!!!

Check-out time was 11am, so after breakfast, we gathered our things and said good-bye to the Cuthbert House Inn. All in all, we had a fantastic time celebrating our two year anniversary.

What's your political view?

Let me start by saying I find politics boring. Very boring. But Bruin made a good point today - the 2008 election is going to be a HUGE deal and I should take my vote seriously. I have never been able to identify with just one political party- in past elections, I simply based my vote on the person instead. Interested in where I stood however, Bruin found this neat little survey online that helped me. All you have to do is answer 24 questions (yes, no or maybe) and POOF! you've got your political view. The cool thing about this survey is it will also tell you which candidates are most like you. Turns out I'm a moderate. Bruin is a moderate/ republican. But we both have the same top 3 candidates. Strange. But it goes to show that it's important to vote for the person and not just the party.

If you're not sure where you stand, take a few minutes to fill out this survey... then be sure to vote next November!
http://politicalquiz.net/

On other fronts, Bruin and I have been super busy!!! And it's only going to get busier with the holidays coming up. This past weekend, I had lunch with the 'Little Man' and his chaperon (a.k.a. my two-month old nephew Riley and my sis-in-law Chara), Bruin played flag football (and slightly sprained his finger!) and we had a birthday party for one of our friends (pictures below).

The birthday girl, Missy and Jaime


Matt and Bruin enjoying some pizza


Missy and Christen acting out 'Speed Dating'.
Christen thought it meant speeding through a whole date... at this point, he's at the 'make-out' stage. Thank goodness we stopped him before he got any further!!


Wes, pouting. Why?


Cause the girls are finally winning!!! (unfortunately, not for long...)


Mmm... Cookie Cake. Happy Birthday, Missy!