ThThThThThankfulThursday.........

Let's get right to it!

1. Lint rollers.....its probably the only reason that Blue still gets to live! If Ty had his way, he would lacquer the poor guy!

2. frozen garlic bread...it compliments things so well and its one less thing to worry about!

3. Afrin.......along with the previously mentioned excederine, I would also like to marry Afrin. Is it still polygamy if the multiples are intimate objects????

4. Redbox/Netflix....we would be in deep if it weren't for the lack of late fees.

5. Free samples in the mail...I recently learned that Soy Joy bars are disgusting!

6. Airborne...it may do absolutely nothing but its a great placebo affect it that's true! Bring on the pink fizzy water!

7. pre-moistened face wash/makeup remover clothes.....otherwise I rarely remove my makeup at night which only tends to highlight my dark circles in the morning. I'm coming to realize its usually mascara:( (I never claimed thankfulthursday would be pretty)

8. PRAYER

9. windshield wipers....you will understand this one if you have ever gone without when it is snowing:(

10. Nail clippers!!!!! jagged, long, uneven nails are the torturers of my soul!

Did you know...

....that it is a physical impossibility for my dad to not talk during a picture?

We have tried for years to get him to shut his trap. I don't think I have one wedding picture without him talking. Or at least if I do, he didn't know someone was taking it until after it was done.

Every time a camera comes out, the jaw starts yapping. Even when we finally get him to not talk, he doesn't look like him because he is trying so hard.

We always thought we would just have to deal with it. Not that its that big of a deal, just one of those things that you have a good laugh about.

But then....to our great surprise, he starts to relax!

And I get my favorite picture in months!

Place holder.....

...lets be honest, this isn't a real post. Just something to prove to myself that I will continue to post more often:) A REAL post to come tonight!

Look! Its Blue Bunny!!!! No...not the ice cream but a real Blue "bunny"! Ha! I crack myself up!

It has returned....

...after an extended vacation to who knows where, ThankfulThursday is prepared to get back to work. So it is with great pride (humble pride of coarse) that I reintroduce our dear missed friend....

1. Excederine, I love you dear scientist who came up with this stuff! Will you marry me?

2. Half priced books....I could spend a sizeable amount of time just wondering the shelves.

3. treadmill warrenty..... my butt thanks you too.

4. coupons....lets just say that I have 11 digornio pizzas and 11 cases of soda that I paid a whopping $15 for.

5. Newspaper delivery.....although I am not a fan of waking up at 3:30 in the morning on the weekends, I am very thankful that we don't have a car loan because of it.

6. Craigslist!!!.....it wouldn't be ThankfulThursday with out craigslist! I have added several new purchases to my arsonal thanks to craigslist sense chrsitmas.

7. My calling....I'm stating to think that I wasn't called to be the young women's advisor, but all of the young women and the presidency were call to be the Audrey advisor.

8. Nikon D80....sigh.......love!

9. Memory foam bed......not real sure I could EVER go back to springs in a mattress again!

10. Under eye conceler........my saving grace!!!!

And we have a weiner....I mean winner!

So I'm totally loving reading all of the comments. I might have to do this little contest more often. Anybody up for it!

and the winner is.....

Scout: "Sweetheart, I want us to take ballroom dance lessons."

Blue: "No way in h&%@! Get away from me, woman!"

Congrats Andrea!!! You win the Panera gift card!

Snow fraulic!

Today was one of those days that when it snowed, it look like we were living inside of a snowglobe. You know that pretty, soft, lightly drifting snow that you wistfully think off ever year when you think about winter but really only comes a piddly few times a year? The rest is ice creating, devil sent, traffic making nastiness? Welcome to Minnesota!

Today was also about the first time that it has been above zero degrees in an inordiant amount of time so the pups and I went out to play a bit.

This is Blue...

Blue likes to hang out in the snow...

This is Scout...

Scout likes to run in the snow....

And jump...

And bound...

And run some more....

And run even more!

But her favorite thing...

Is to attack Blue...

I told you it was her favorite!

But eventually, Blue fights back...

"Its my turn now!"

"Oh, you don't believe me?"

"Thats what I thought!"

But Scout ALWAYS has a different idea and the whole thing starts again!

So now that you are thoroughly entertained, its time for a contest!!!

I have a $10 panera gift card that I will give to the person who leaves a comment for the best caption for the below photo. I want to know what you think they are saying! I couldn't stop laughing when I saw it and now its your turn! Click on it to make it full size to get the full affect.

Good luck! contest open until 7 pm tuesday (01.20.09)

The side-affects of -20 degree weather...

....That’s right I said 20 below zero! Now how many of you, my dear favoritest friends and family want to come visit me??? Besides just being a Aud-sicle, here are something’s that come along with the territory here in Minnesota….

1. you have a dirty windshield, what do you do?? Squirt some washer fluid on it you say? WRONG! This only causes the larger problem of an extremely thin layer of INSTANTLY frozen dirt in front of you that you just have to wait for the defroster to work its magic on. This is one lesson I never seem to learn.

2. I get to listen to Ty rant about how this is the ONLY place that reports the wind chill as the temp. Ie: this morning, they report the temp as –40 degrees and then admit that it is really only –20 with a –40 wind chill. This makes him very upset. That and the fact that the TOP story on the news every night is the weather.

3. Every morning when we wake up to let the dogs out to pee, we actually have to drag Scout over and bump her in the butt to make her get out there. She stands at the door for minute looking pathetic and cold before she realizes shes not getting to come back in until she does her business. Only recently did we realize how she gets back up to the door so fast to come back in. She’s been PEEING ON THE DECK! Blue however, is loving every second of this weather.

4. We keep our thermostat right around 60 in the winter because we are cheap. It’s a huge improvement over the 50 I kept it at when Ty was in Iraq or the 55 last year. 60 may sound pretty cold to some of you but when its this frigid outside, I actually get HOT at night! Last night I actually had to throw the blankets off me.

FINALLY DONE!!!!!

I FINALLY finished with Becca Denny........er I mean Mann's wedding pictures! I will post a couple now with more to follow later. She hasn't even gotten them yet so it doesn't seem to fair to post them all here yet :)

Mental Dump.....

I’ve honestly kind of been freaked out by the voyeuristic direction of my life. I hate that at any point in time someone can go on to facebook and know that ‘Audrey is painting the hooves of a wild boar with the intention of starting the very first ever horned beast beauty pageant’, or go on my blog and find out that I’m just a little bit crazy. It’s a great thing but at the same time, I think we have become so obsessed with it.

Now, I’m sure your thinking, "Audrey! You’re the one who posts all this crap all over the Internet for the masses to see!" And you are very right. I just think that it has taken on a life of its own! Pretty soon the computer will be sending me text messages and whispering to me trying to lure me in! Its evil like that. I don’t think I spend a concerning about of time on any of these activities but………...I don’t know, I just don’t like that I want to be nosey on other people’s facebook, myspace, or blogs. Updates are fine, but our society is obsessed with knowing each others business! That’s not okay!

So that being said, I resolve to not spend hours ‘spying’ on other peoples facebooks, to not care if I am the first one to post a comment on someone elses blog, and continue to post (more frequently that the last month) about the things that define me for me and no one else. These aren’t things that are problems in my life right now, I just see the direction that it could go by watching other people and I’m not going to be that person.
Well, now that is off my chest………Here is what has been on my mind lately! Remember! I’m crazy so don’t act surprised!

Ketchup packets – Whenever you order any sort of burger or fries the majority of people also ask for ketchup. Innocent enough, right? Wrong! Have you EVER met a single person who uses just one??? No! Not that they don’t give you enough of these little pillows of joy but if no one uses just one, why do they make them so small??? If they made larger packets, they would need to give out fewer, spend less money on packaging and save money because Burger King wouldn’t feel the need to give you 16 packets ‘just in case’. Am I right?

This Power Ade ad (I can't get it loaded right now but I will later today.) - I’m sure your thinking "What in the world could she find wrong with this??? Well, I’ll tell you. Just glancing at the ad, a normal, rational person would think, ‘oh, they have a pink grapefruit flavor.’ Well that normal, rational person would be sorely disappointed when they took another look at the bottle and saw that it was STRAWBERRY! Why put a picture of a grapefruit in an ad for a PINK drink??? I know it says ‘no grapefruit’ but it is stupid!

Overly stocked??? - I currently have about 40 bags of shredded cheese in my chest freezer. Did I go overboard? You never see it for $1.66 and I don’t want to pay $3 for it later.