The Whole Family,

We had visitors recently - well, now its been a couple weeks, but we're still excited about it!
Anne's dad, step-mom, & brother visited partly during the week and over the MLK weekend. It was good timing, since I (Anne) had just started back to classes, and didn't really have any homework yet.
We had fun hanging out, going to the coast, and visiting the Pearl. Sandi got to visit my camups, PSU while I was there, but I didn't have my phone with me (so I didn't get the message - literally). Blah!
Enjoy our pics of the trip, plus a little digital 'evidence' that our little BSL house pretty much survived Katrina - the only 'sweet spot' less than 3 blocks from the beach w/in 90 miles!



Our House in Bay St. Louis. It reads, "Water Damage," assessed in October!

- A

Merry January

We had such an amazing holiday that "we" forgot to post for a while! Paul & I had little whirlwind tour of the Midwest Triangle, mobilizing from Chicago to Iowa to Missouri, back to Midway. Airport food is yucky, and Chicago rush hour going INTO the city on Friday afternoon is worse than Portland going out! We saw EVERYBODY on Anne's side except for Grandma V., Matt's girlfriend and Aunt Jeanne, Uncle David & Scott (thanks for not passing on the Bug). The not-so-great part was that I already had my own bug; caught it on my Birthday. Now that I'm "ancient," a 20-day cold doesn't seem so odd. Anyway, I spent much of our time sitting around sniffling , sipping, and groaning. I felt a little 'out of it.' In fact, the picture of Luke & I in his trench coats was taken before I got the only exercise I would experience on the entire trip: a walk around the block with Bobber. It was strenuous.

The kitties had a pet sitter (very good - rainy day pets, Portland), so they got some attention while we were away. Luckily, we had other pets to hang out with: Sarah, Boo-Boo, & Emma the cats, and Bobber (with Paul). I brought each cat a little home-made catnip toy with special White Lightning catnip in them. It appeared that all of them adored their new toy. It makes them swoon, drool, fight, & carry it everywhere like a blankey... or crack.

Christmas was way bountiful. We received sweet treats up the wazoo (yahoo), a few things to wear and a few things for the house. It was Merry! Kudos to the Blog Wishlist. Try it out...
Well, now it's January and the heart-shaped 'stuff' has already replaced red & green goods. Hopefully we'll survive that one too. Wonder when they'll start making chocolate busts for President's Day.
- Anne