Exercising Whiskey

Hopefully this video isn't too dark, but we managed to capture some of Whiskey's finer gymnastic feats.

Nap Time and Horrible Paint

Our downstairs bathroom is slowly but surely coming together. Right now Joel and Father Ditton are downstairs tiling the floor, yay! These past two weeks I have (slowly) primed the walls and painted them. Wait, before you look at the picture right below this and think "She chose THAT color??", let me explain. I knew I wanted to do green, and I knew I wanted it to be bright and cheery. Unfortunately, that was all I knew, and so my decision at the paint store was rather uninformed, which resulted in this color being chosen...



Don't worry. I'm just as convinced of its ugliness as you are. I don't even think this picture quite does its ugliness justice. Dr. Seuss came to mind first, followed by plug-in neon beer signs, and a plethora of other non-complimentary images. So that was primed over and I went with a much nicer color. I haven't posted a picture yet because I'm waiting until the tile is put in so you can see the whole effect. It's really quite nice.

This next picture is up here simply because I thought it was adorable. Napping is something Joel (and I) wish he could do more of and Kitten does far too much of.

Another week has gone by

And I'm still not posting as much as I would like. Even though we're on break, it's still been a very busy week. I (Christine) worked forty hours at Hall Closet doing inventory, and Joel worked more than his usual hours at the Church, plus he removed all the ugly floral wallpaper in our downstairs bathroom. Hurrah! I plan on painting it next week. I'm going to be wild and daring and paint it some bright color. I'm thinking green. I will post pictures, promise. But in the meantime here are some pictures from when the Phoenix Parents came to visit. We had a great time with them, although I didn't take as many pictures as I wanted to.

This first picture is a recurring theme throughout the Cohen Parents stay here. I have never seen so much untiring dedication to a puzzle as these three had. Their stamina was impressive. :)




Here we are around the dinner table on New Year's Eve. We had chicken and beef fondue, yummy!! Plus chocolate fondue for dessert and plenty of games made this New Year's Eve party a great success.




Happy New Year!!



On their last day with us we went to Coeur D'Alene and toured the cute little city. This is from the restaurant we ate lunch at. The drive to Coeur D'Alene from Moscow was close to a white-out, and Joel did a very good job guessing where the road was.



Posing next to the native moose statue

Lots to catch up on

We had a very busy and very fun Christmas and New Years. But now it is catch-up time, and that includes this blog. I have many posts in mind, hopefully I'll get to them sooner rather than later, so I'm not posting about our New Year's Celebrations in February.

So I suppose I'll start with the weather. It has been cold here. Very cold. Thankfully it warmed up to the 30s by the time our parents arrived from Phoenix, but the day after they left it dropped into the teens again. This first picture was taken about a week ago of the icicles outside our kitchen window. This is the first year they've gotten so big!



Kitten braved the weather to come and see what all the fuss was about



We have so much snow we don't know what to do with it. And apparently we will be receiving more tomorrow. It's certainly exciting in Moscow this time of year!



This picture was taken from my parent's house on Christmas Day. As cold and difficult as the snow may be, it really is breath-taking.



And this last picture is from our trip to Coeur D'Alene with Mom and Dad Cohen.

Whiskey the Wonder Gymnast

Silver Bells

Finals are officially over for both Joel and I, hurrah! We both had an incredibly busy last few weeks of school, so the relief of being done makes us fairly euphoric right now. I think I've commented the last three nights in a row that I would normally be doing homework, but I'm NOT because I'm FINISHED!! (The capitalized words mark the fact that I shouted them).
So now we're doing what everyone else does this time of year, finishing up the last minute present shopping, wrapping all the presents (one of my favorite things to do), humming Christmas songs and planning out what we will make for the Christmas feast. And of course, decorating our Christmas tree. It now has presents underneath it, these pictures were taken a week ago.





The extremely cold weather we have had lately created a lot of freezing fog, which has frosted all the trees in town. They really do look beautiful, and at night everything sparkles. Even for someone who doesn't like the cold (i.e. me), I can't help but love the way Moscow looks right now.

Artsy-Crafty

Last night was our church's Ladies' Fellowship get-together. It was very fun and festive, along with eating lots of yummy food and chatting, we also did some crafty projects. The first little Christmas decoration I made was a cute green yarn pom-pom. I would show you a picture of it, but alas I gave it to my cat to play with for a minute, and the next thing I knew it was in shreds on the floor. She's very vicious when she puts her mind to it. So instead I have posted a picture of the carnage. I promise you, it was a cute pom-pom in its time.



Perhaps I will make a new one, now that I know how easy they are. They sure do look cute on top of a Christmas present. The other craft is a paper Christmas ornament, shown here. So far it has escaped the ruthless claws of Whiskey, and I plan on hanging it on our tree, as soon as we get one.





Speaking of our kitten, I find it fairly disconcerting when I'm reading a book on the couch and I look up to see Whiskey staring fixedly at me from across the room. I'm not sure why this bothers me so much, but I've never had a cat who takes so much interest in me. I just try not to think about what thoughts might be in her little head. Probably none, actually.