October Week 3

So, I had no idea this weekend was sweetest day. We planned a wonderful Saturday. We woke up around 6:30 planning on leaving the house around 7:00. Our plans was to head to Campmor in Paramus, NJ (outside of NYC). Jason needed to purchase some items for his upcoming trip with Jacob and I wanted to get some new winter hiking shoes along with a winter jacket. Campmor was tons of fun. A huge store. I told Jason we only had 1 1/2 hours in the store because we were going to head to the NJ coast to visit a light house. I found very nice Merrels for 99.00 that are Gortex. They are high tops, which I'm not fond of, but the more I wear it the more comfortable they will become. After the store we headed toward Highlands NJ to visit the Twin Lights. They look like a castle and are really cool. We hiked to the top of the light (which wasn't far at all). Afterwards we headed over to a Fish Restaurant along the ocean front. It was such a nice and relaxing lunch we had. A view of the ocean and also a view of NYC. It's hard to believe that I live in such a cool place where we can take a day trip to the city or the ocean. Afterwards we headed home. We got home just in time to let the kids out to potty and then headed out again to visit the corn maze with Jacqui. We planned on doing it at night. We got there around 6:00 and started a little before 7:00. It only took about 1 hour to make our way through. We had a blast too.

October Week 2

1/2 way through the week my breathing started coming back to normal. I was very excited to finally be able to catch a full breath. Well, full on my terms. This weekend I knew JaCob and Trishcabob were coming to visit and I would finally meet the wonderful Dakota. Dakota is such a treat. I really enjoyed visiting with her. I also missed Jacob and Trish so I was so thrilled to be able to visit with them again. Even though it was short. We went to Kings for a late night dinner. Then tried to watch Stick It. I was exhausted so ended up going to bed 1/2 way through the movie. When we woke up on Sunday we had breakfast at Front Street before Jay, Jacob, Trish, Dakota and Kenzie headed out for ta few days. They planned on hiking the NJ highpoint and also the NY highpoint. I was very jealous that I couldn't go but honestly, I probably couldn't have kept up. I'm not the fastest hiker in the world. Mainly because I can't breath. I totally would have slowed them down. They all had a great time though. Jason shared photos and stories with me. Maybe next time.

Oh yeah, I forgot, we also hooked up the hot tub on Saturday. That's why I was so exhausted.

Wow am I far behind. I didn't realize it until a few days ago. I have not blogged in 3 weeks. So, to make this easier I am going to split this blog into 3 different posts.

October Week 1

This week was a tough week on me. My mom called me in the whee hours of the morning on Wednesday telling me that my cousin Stephen had passed away. This came as a shock to me since he is only 21. Our families used to be really close and then we kind of grew apart. I don't even remember why. I think as we got older we just started to do different things. Anyway, so I told Jason that I wanted to head home for the funeral. We left after work on Thursday and started the trek home to Ohio/Indiana with all 5 of our furkids. We ran into traffic around State College which put us really far behind. We arrived on Friday morning around 3:00 - 3:30am. I knew my little sis was going to pick me up around 9:00 so I went straight to sleep. Obviously I didn't sleep much. Stac arrived around 9:00 and we headed out for breakfast. I was sick however I decided that it was worth it to visit my favorite hamburger spot Frisches. So, for breakfast I had a Big boy. Umm, was it tasty. I knew I couldn't last that long in the car so Stac and I timed our driving home to Indiana by the gas stations I could stop at. When I got to moms we sat and hung around just talking about how weird it was. How could someone so young die? And why? That evening we headed down to Jeff and Wanda's (Stephens parents, my aunt and uncles). It seemed everyone was there. Family from Cali, family from NY. We all had come together again. Danny and Bruce got out there guitars and started singing hymns. It was so nice and relaxing. Jeff and Wanda has not been to church in a while so it was nice to see Jeff getting together and singing again with everyone.

Saturday was the funeral. I HATE funerals so I was not excited to be there. Not to mention I seen my dad, whom I have not seen in a long time. Jeff was really having a tough time with Stephens death. He came up to me and my sis and told us to go and give dad a hug and tell him that we loved him. That was a really hard thing for me to do but I felt that I needed to for Jeff. Dad has never really loved Stacy and I. Our Christmas cards consist of him telling us "Love you, Eddie" Now why wouldn't a father call himself dad instead of Eddie? So the whole time he was telling us about how he bought a new house and was trying to be debt free. He can never ask us how we are doing. Seriously, he doesn't care. My sis has always had a time trying to make ammends so she ran off crying. I went off to be with her. The both of us have had such a hard time. Why doesn't he love us? Did we do something wrong? Why couldn't we have a normal life? So Stacy and I spent the rest of the funeral in the closet. I know that sound stupid but we found a closet and kind of sat and talked. The funeral was so tough because I've always thought, how would I feel if something happened to dad? Would I blame myself? Have I tried hard enough? I think this funeral was a wake up call for me. I'm spending so much of my time trying to make him love me. You can't make someone love you that cannot love. So, after speaking to many people about my situation I have decided to seek the help from a psychologist. My first appt is in a few weeks and I'm kind of nervous. However I think this is a healthy step for me. I need to do this for myself.

With all my crying I started to have problems breathing. More problems that normal. It was so hard that I started to have a panic attack. I was worried that I couldn't catch my breath. So, I'm also going to have some tests run. Hoping that I can finally get help with my breathing problems. My first appt isn't until Jan 2nd. I'm kind of nervous but also excited. How am I going to feel if I get this surgically corrected? What exactly would life be like if I could breath like a normal person? Imagine how I would love hiking even more than I do now. I could maybe fulfil my dream of hiking to the Everest base camp.

Ahhh.......

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CRAZY CARIE!

I'm Having Problems with this one......

That was the funny statement I made this past weekend. Jason and I have been working on installing the hot tub. It's been way too long since it's been up and running and it's almost winter. So, we spent all weekend digging a trench to bury the wire. The trench had to be 2 feet deep. Seems like a small task however we live in a place where the rain fall grows rocks. I'm not kidding either. These are huge boulders. So we basically spent all day Saturday digging a trench 5 feet long by 2 feet deep. I was helping with my trowel. Yes, I looked dorky with the smallest shovel known to man but the trench shovel was hard for me to handle. My arms were not long enough. So, here I am with my trowel. Trying to place it underneath what I thought was a small piece of slate I could break up. Ha. We ended up having to dig the whole much bigger than planned. The boulder the huge that we pulled out. This was the biggest one yet. So, hence the title of this blog.


Let's see, what have we been up to? Well last weekend was an agility trial down in Doyelstown. Doyelstown is just north of Philly. The trial site was very nice. We set up our camper just about 200ft or so from the ring I would be in all day. I had planned on blogging after the trial and uploading a piece of video from it. However, my new camera sucks and the file extension is not readable using my editing software. So basically all the footage I have shot since February is crap. Very very sad and disapointing. I plan on selling it on Ebay and spending some time looking for a different one. Anyway, Chase Q'd in jumpers giving us 2 legs. Woo Hoo. She also rec'd a 1st place. Taylor Q'd in her jumpers run giving her 2 legs in Excellent A and placing 2nd. Woo Hoo for her too. Standard runs were a different story for the both of us. Let's just say one of these days I may get my NA. I really can't complain though. Chase has come a long way. She's starting to listen very well to me. She's a great dog and I'm very proud to be her mom and handler. Also, I'm always talking about Chase, Sam and Taylor's Boyfriend Jynx. Here he is, jumping like a frog. Isn't he the cutest? Sam and Chase especially are in LOVE with him. He's a womanizer.

Let's see, now onto all of my friends......

Congrats to Jacqui and Gy. Gy was recently named the #1 PBGV in the country. He was invited to the AKC Invitationals being held in California this year. I was very excited to learn about good Ol Gy.

Congrats to Tammy on getting her NA with Simi. FINALLY! I feel your pain. Both of us have spent a year in Novice Standard. Maybe this month Chase and I will get it.

Congrats to Kim and Foster for getting all those 1st places this weekend in Franklin. I sure miss trialling with you two.

Now onto 2008 Traveling Plans and ideas........
2008 should be the year for our National Park visits. For those who don't know Jason and I have a plan to visit all the 56 scenic National Parks in the US. Now we have only been able to get 3 so far but our recent move to PA has put us a little bit behind. So, we plan on getting Shenendoah and Cuyahoga Valley this year. Shennendoah we may get this weekend. We have not decided 100% on that yet. Cuyohoga Valley we plan on getting Christmas time. Next year, however will be awesome. We are planning to visit Washington State late Sept early October and get the North Cascades, Olympic, Mt Rainier National Parks and Mt St Helens National Monument. I spent most of the evening last night starting to jot down our plans. We planned on backpacking 30+ miles of the Wonderland Trail however after discussions we decided to play tourist and visit the parks. We'll still backcountry camp but we'll just hike in and hike out the next morning. We'll day hike several trails in each park and hit come scenic spots along the way. I'm getting very excited about this trip. I have never seen a Rocky Mountain before. Not to mention a snow covered one.