Happy Thanksgiving!

Wanted to wish everyone a SUPER Thanksgiving Day! This year I'm thankful for our friends and family, especially my husband who has given us the opportunity to travel and meet so many wonderful people! I'm thankful for the opportunity to be building our new house. I'm thankful for the many men and women who are or have given us all the opportunity to live in this great country of ours where we have so many freedoms and privileges. I'm thankful for our good health and I'll really be thankful when I can finally take a nice, long, hot Jacuzzi in my new super duper, snazzy tub! :-)

Tess & The Black Pipe!

For some time, I've called Tess a MORON! She's a sweet puppy when she's not being head-strong and independent! For such an independent dog...she sure is a wuss! We've seen it many times before whether it's a leaf blowing, that hole covered with a grate and many other things but today...the black pipe topped the cake! :-)

The propane company is at the house installing the pipes to supply gas to the stove top, hot water heaters, fireplaces and dryer. They had drilled a hole in the great room fireplace frame and had a pipe sticking through it. It happened to catch Tess' attention as it was turning (they were connecting it down below the house). You would have thought she saw a ghost! She began barking and stretched out her entire body trying to figure out what in the heck it was! She wouldn't let her attention off the pipe! It had her baffled for sure! At one point Don or I tapped the floor and Tess jumped about a mile - straight up! Oh my gosh! Don and I were both laughing so hard, yet telling Tess it was o.k. Didn't matter to her! She was not going to let it out of her site! The guys working below told us that they heard her barking! Even 10 or 15 minutes later...she was still wary of that darn pipe! It may have been one of those things that "you just had to be there" but I wish you could have seen her!

BTW I still think she's a moron! She eats everything she finds around the construction of our new house! The workers aren't too great about picking up trash...especially after lunch! She eats wrappers off "things", instructions that come with "things", cardboard, plastic off of everything and now even picks up the wire that's cut off where the electrician is wiring!!! When we try to get her and tell her to "drop it"...she runs from us! She's not dumb (well, maybe you would classify eating wire as NOT SMART) but she's smart enough to go around so we can't catch her!

Some Interesting Neighbors!

These are actually some neighbors of ours. No, not where we're building the house, but near the RV Park we are at! The camel isn't always out, but the buffalos are! Today, when we spotted the camel, I had Don turn around so I could get a picture! I kept waiting for it to spit especially since it was "foaming at the mouth", but it never happened (and I was VERY thankful)!

I wouldn't have been surprised since Tess was in the back of the car barking non-stop! I wander what she (Tess) would have done if we had let her out of the car!

I have a funny (well, to me anyway) story that has nothing to do with the animals! Last weekend my mom, Ashleigh and I went to a holiday boutique. The local radio station was there having a drawing for tickets to a sold out "Hannah Montana" concert on Dec. 1st at the Alltel Arena in Little Rock. Being the good grandma, I signed up! The next day I got an early morning phone call from Ashleigh "Grandma, did we win"? I had to tell her that the drawing wasn't held yet, it was being held on the 17th. Saturday morning she called, "Grandma, did they do the drawing"? I told her that it was between 2 and 3 (after reading the website...I knew that if we didn't get called before today...most likely we weren't the winners). This morning, another phone call from Ashleigh "Grandma, did we win"? I had to tell her that "no, we didn't win". Being the good grandma that I am...I looked online at tickets (above I mentioned that they are "sold-out" through normal channels). Well, we won't be going to the Hannah Montana concert! Two tickets would cost over $400! Good I am, crazy I'm not! Ashleigh and I can listen to a whole lot of Hannah Montana CD's for $400!!!

Brian Turns Three!

Today was Brian's 3rd birthday! The unfortunate part is that he's in So. California and we're in Arkansas! Brian missed his Grandpa's birthday by just a few hours! Grandpa wasn't very happy about that! That's o.k. with Grandma though...he could miss it by as many hours as he wanted to! He came when he was good and ready! Brian is the happiest little boy! And he is ALL boy! He loves everything sports - even at three!

HAPPY 3RD BIRTHDAY BRIAN! WE MISS YOU!

Happy Birthday Don!

On November 14th, Don officially became old enough to collect Social Security! We spent the day with our friends, Glenda & Ray Roe. We had a great dinner of steak, salads and potatoes (don't ask about the squash that I forgot in the microwave)! For dessert we had carrot cake! We were also joined by friends of the Roe's, Donna & Al who joined us at the RV park in Shirley on Tuesday!

It didn't take us long to get acquainted with Donna & Al! We had them join us at the house for "happy hour" and also brought my mom along! After our happy hour...we all had dinner at Bentley's, a local restaurant!

Today, we once again went over to the house for happy hour, but we started by going to El Jefe's...for their all you can eat from 11-3! It was a little colder today so we had happy hour out on the "as of yet, uncompleted deck" (that doesn't make much sense does it)! Seems like you would want to be on a solid floor with some walls and windows instead of precariously perched on boards out in the elements! :-)

After that we stopped by the boat storage to show off the boat! The ladies took a quick glance and then headed to Dollar General for a quick look around!

Tomorrow, the Roe's and Donna & Al will head out. Glenda and Ray heading towards Las Vegas and Donna & Al to Texas. It's been a very quick visit but we were glad to be able to share our new adventure with them! I'm hoping that the next time they're through here that the house will be finished, but I'm NOT holding my breath! :-)

You can see the latest house building pictures here:

www.picasaweb.google.com/vickileith

A bird in the hand...

Don and I went over to the house today to "clean it up" a little before we had our first official guest! It's amazing how messy the workers can be during the week!

When I walked into the game room I was startled by a bird! Yes, a bird! It was perched on the window sill...except it wasn't outside, it was inside! It didn't attempt to fly away even when Don walked up to it. Luckily he had brought along some gloves so he put those on and gently picked up the bird. It was obvious that the bird had flown into the window. We needed to put the bird somewhere that Tess wouldn't get it so he took it outside and placed it on some tree branches that Don, Lewis and Bill (our neighbors) need to cut up for firewood! I watched it for a while then left to do something. Later when I looked...the bird was no longer there! Don't know if it flew away or fell to the ground, but it was gone. Later I went out to the garage to investigate something Tess was barking at. At first I thought it was a frog (that was from across the room) until I got closer and saw that it was another bird! It was the same species of bird and this bird didn't survive it's crash into the window! I hope they get the garage doors and the rest of the doors and windows in pretty soon so we aren't responsible for the decline in the bird population around Greers Ferry!

After a quick stop at the grocery store...we headed back to the motorhome. We were waiting for our friends, Glenda & Ray Roe to arrive for a visit! Luckily we arrived at about the same time they did! After they got pulled in and settled, we packed up the car with some chairs and a drink (or two) and headed back over to the house! We officially welcomed them as our first guests (sorry Rick & Joanne, Bill & Kathy, Kim, Tim, Ashleigh & Mom...when you all came over we only looked around and never sat down and made it "official")! We enjoyed our visit and the sunset but once
the sun began to go down...we needed to head home! The house is starting to really come together and we enjoyed having our first official guests visit! Hope we have many more friends and family stop by!

You can check out the progress of the house here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/vickileith