Holiday Festivities and Then Some

[Just a head's up, I can feel that this is going to be a long post but I will try to keep it a brief as possible.]

I can't believe that the holidays are already over!  Part of me is like, thank goodness, but the other part is like, how did it go so quickly?!  Everything went off without a hitch except that after Christmas I couldn't move my left hand and couldn't sleep because my arms and hands were aching so badly.  (I'm glad that part is over.)  I am clearly not cut out for being a chef.  Looking back at my calendar I don't know how we got everything done.  There were so many things to do in my Tasks area that all I saw was blue and purple on my calendar.



This is what the week leading up to Christmas looked like.  The week before and after looked very similar.  I had my days planned down to the half hour for Christmas Eve, Christmas, and the day after for Josie's baby shower.  It of course didn't end up the way I planned, but I seemed to manage to get everything done at some point before all the different parties.  I was the most stressed out Christmas Eve because I had tasked myself to do the most preparation stuff for Christmas Day and Josie's Baby Shower before we headed to Jen Jen's for Christmas Eve festivities.  I even had a list of things for Christopher to do since he was going to be my sous chef for Christmas day.  I think I would have been on schedule but since my mom was out running around to three different stores trying to find clams for our Christmas dinner she wasn't going to have enough time to make the cabbage rolls that she had planned to take to Jen Jen's house for dinner.  So I looked up a recipe and started making them in the allotted time that I had set for the Chicken Salad, which I had mostly prepared the night before.  Not only did that set me back in time, but they didn't taste good!  I was very disappointed by the outcome.  The seasonings smelled right, but I also like the smell of raw meat so I couldn't really tell.  It could have used a lot more salt and pepper.  We'll just say that it was high blood pressure friendly.  Anyway, so Christmas Eve was a blur of tons and tons of chopping and preparing for the upcoming parties.





Let's back up a bit.  Amongst all of the hustle and bustle with the holiday preparations and parties, Nick's parents were in town so I was trying to spend some time with them too.  They took me out to the Yacht Club in Walnut Creek for oysters and some good seafood.  I was unsure if I wanted to go because I was trying to get decorations and planning done for Josie's baby shower, but my mom told me that I better go since there was no way that they would be taking us there.  Hahaha, so I went.  This is the basket that I prepared for them before we met up for dinner.   Kuwait is a non-alcoholic country so when they are home the Fong's like to indulge in some beverages.  I got Mr. Fong a red and Mrs. Fong a sweet white since she doesn't drink much. In the basket is also a box of smoked salmon, smoked gouda, pate, an international cheese wheel, salmon spread, and water crackers.  My mom helped me wrap it all up so that it was nice and pretty.  After Christmas my whole family met up with the Fong family for dinner at a local Italian restaurant right before they left to go back to Kuwait on New Year's Eve.





Every year our family goes around and gives out gifts to the neighbors.  In the recent years my parents have been more selective of who they give these to since there are quite a few new families on the block who we don't really talk to.  However, for those 10 lucky families, they got a cute bottle of merlot from Cost Plus.  I was in the tag making mode after making menus and advice cards for Josie's shower so I made a little tag to hang on the bottles too.  Those are little paw prints going up the side of the vellum.







Aside from cooking and preparing for Josie's shower, these are the cones and menus that I made for decorations.


Homemade peach and strawberry preserves for the shower.

Christmas Eve:



Because Christopher agreed to help me with Christmas dinner, he was set to the task of preparing my garlic...and I use A LOT of garlic.  In the end I didn't need it all, but I didn't want to be scrambling around with my knife and cutting board while our family was arriving to chop more garlic.  After mincing about half of the cloves by hand, he started putting them in my Magic Bullet to speed up the process.






As Christopher was peeling the cloves and cutting off the hard end of the garlic, I was stealing them to shove into my giant pieces of prime rib that I was marinating for our Christmas party.  I slathered it with salt, pepper, minced garlic, sage, and EVOO.  Usually you would use rosemary for this, but we had sage and since it is one of my favorite herbs we used it.  The prime rib turned out fabulously the next day with my Dad's keen eye and prime rib cooking experience.  It was so tender and flavorful that I was pretty much patting myself on the back while I was chewing.

Just a few pictures from Christmas eve:



Nick was looking pretty happy here with the new microplane my parents gave him even though he wasn't feeling well.  He had been sick with a stomach bug the day before and had stayed home from work.  He managed to tough it out and come with us to Christmas Eve though.  Christopher was actually not feeling super well either, but I think his ailment was more like a cold than a stomach bug.  He didn't eat much during any of our parties.  More for me to eat!  At least they both got to take naps on Jen Jen's sofas.




I would have been nice if Briana could be here for the picture, but she was spending Christmas with her family in Colorado.

Christmas Day:



On Christmas day we always open our stocking stuffers.  Sometimes we do it after the party is over and everything is cleaned up, but usually we try to take a break from all the cleaning and cooking to sit down and open them together.  This is the box of a Scoutmaster Boy Scouting coin that Christopher and I got engraved.  Since he just stepped down as the troop Scoutmaster we thought it was something nice that he could hold on to...aside from all the pictures that we have on our walls now.




I'm regretting not taking a picture of the feast that Christopher and I somehow managed.  We got the dinner on the table by 6:15pm and it was actually still pretty warm!  Christopher was in charge of doing the all the appetizers, mashed potatoes, and salad.  He did a really good job.  Everyone loved the potatoes and salad.  This was our menu:

Salami, cheese, and crackers platter

Pistachios

Chips and salsa

Auntie Wendy's seaweed and crab appetizer

Cioppino

Spinach, walnut, apple salad

Prime Rib

Chinese clams

Roasted shrimp platter

Garlic green beans

Stir fried broccoli 

Roasted cauliflower

Garlic mashed potatoes

Rolls

Ice cream and pie

Everything turned out well except for my broccoli.  I was going to make my anchovy paste broccoli but we couldn't find our anchovy paste!  Instead I tried to substitute it by pasting up sardines like I originally had with the whole anchovies a few weeks back.  The outcome wasn't that great.  It had a weird texture, but it did taste okay.  Anchovies would have been a lot better.  We still haven't found that paste and I don't think I used it all last time I used it.



We had sooo many left overs.  This looks like a regular sized meal that we'd be ready to sit down to.  We  also had a ton of cioppino to finish, which I think my parents just recently polished off.


Gifts!



Last year Christopher and I challenged our parents to a game of Cranium and they won.  I was flabbergasted.  Christopher and I make a really good team and they beat us in the last round because we couldn't get all four categories answered all at once.  So this year I challenged them to a rematch.  We managed to beat them pretty quickly, which made it no fun so we went for a quick third round and they beat us again.  I feel an annual Parents vs. Kids Cranium tradition sprouting.  As it turns out, my mom is TERRIBLE at doing the sculpting, which is why we made her do it every time because it was so funny. Can you guess what the picture above is supposed to be?  The hint was a "thing".  Give up?  It was the Statue of Liberty!  Oh man, we were laughing so hard.  After that I started filming her sculpting.  I'm going to try to post a video of one of the very funny ones tonight on a different post, but no promises because I'm not actually sure how to go about uploading it onto the blog.  There's a little button for me to push to upload, but I don't want to do that while I'm at work because it slows down our internet. All I have to say is that I watched the video again and couldn't stop laughing.

Josie's Baby Shower:


I thought it went great!  I woke up at 8am to start my mini frittatats.  They turned out a little on the salty side, but were still edible.  So my cabbage rolls didn't have enough seasoning and my frittatas had too much!  Oh well, you win some you lose some.  At least my scones turned out well.  Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures from the shower because I was too busy running around.  I swear, if it wasn't for Nick helping me cook and then all the aunties coming later to assemble tea sandwiches it wouldn't have all been done.  I thanked Nick like twenty times when I got home.  I was so tired by the end that when I got home I willingly watched Jurassic Park III.  But all-in-all, it was a great success.  I'm not going to talk much about it since most everyone who is reading this was at the shower or has heard me yammerin' about it the last few weeks.  Thank you for all your help everyone!






Emmy is such a funny dog.  She was rooting around on my bed and doing her digging (she doesn't actually dig outside just in fabric like our beds, her beds, sofas, or back seat of cars) and then she ended up with the pillow on her head.  I was giggling so she popped her head up and rested it on the pillow to look at me like, what's going on over there?




It's been really cold and rainy so I haven't been wanting to go out as much.  Plus, all of the week after Christmas and last week I was recovering from lack of sleep and stress so I was too tired to take her for our normal 2.5 milers.  At first I thought she was just getting fluffly because all of her fur is growing back, but now I can really see the poundage that she's gaining because I've been bad and not taking her out as much.  We would go for short walks around the park, which my dad has mapped out as half a mile.  That is not nearly enough for her.  My parents even got me the headlamp that I was asking for so that I can take her on walks after dark.  By the time I get off of work it's always so dark outside now and I don't like to have to carry a flash light with me.  When we do go out at night I've been wearing my headlamp and a giant puffy yellow vest that Nick calls my life preserver.  I look pretty darn cool with my flashing red head lamp and life preserver on.  It's a good thing Emmy doesn't care about fashion.

In other news, I got new glasses for the first time since high school.  It's been 8 years!  I apparently still have the same taste because these don't really look that different from one another.  I'm pleased with them and they weren't that expensive.  I'm going to try sending in my receipt to VSP and see if I can get reimbursed.  If not, then that's okay, they weren't that expensive since I got them from Costco.  The frames were only $55ish and the lenses around $110.  Not bad at all.  I actually think these make my face look slimmer.  I don't usually wear my glasses out though so I guess it doesn't really matter.  It took me a while to find a blogger code for side-by-side pictures, but thank goodness for Google and people sharing codes and giving instructions for untechnical people like me.  On the left are my new glasses and the right my old.

I was hoping to get this in the mail before Christmas Eve so I could show everyone, but my new nail stamper didn't come until after the holiday.  I've been seeing a lot of videos pop up on Youtube lately for this Konad Nail Stamper.  (Click the link to see their poorly dubbed commercial.)  I subscribe to a ton of makeup artists because I find it fascinating what you can do to make yourself look nicer, though whenever I try to do makeup I look like a zombie.  One of the videos I was watching mentioned this stamper.  I figured since some of the people I watch think it's good I would try it.  The stamper and scraper was only around $6 and then each stamping plate is around $7 depending on the website you get it from.  I got mine from individual sellers on Amazon, but you can look at all their products on Wowsocool.com.  At first I was hesitant to get this because a lot of the videos I sampled to make sure I really did want the product were teenagers and I didn't want to look like one of them.  Obviously, I managed to convince myself over the months that I could pull it off without looking like I'm 16.  I'm so glad I decided to get it!







I bought three different plates and love them!  Right now I have the stars on that I did for the SJ Sharks game that Nick and I went to with Bonnie and her boyfriend, James.  I also did a fishnet look, but forgot to take pictures of it.  The only problem that I had with the fishnet look is that I have my Dad's monkey thumbs and my nails are to wide for the template.  It fit all my other nails, but since the design is so rigid with straight lines, you could tell when it didn't go all the way from one side of the nail to the other.  I tried to center the pattern so that it wouldn't be so noticeable, but gave up after two hours and put flowers on my thumbs instead.  Generally these stamps don't take that long, but since I couldn't get the thumbs right and it was only my second time using them it took me a really long time.  I didn't have the same problem with the zebra pattern on my thumbs because the squiggliness of the print made it so that it wasn't noticeable that it didn't reach all the way across my thumbnail.











This year for New Year's Eve I had Abby and Bonnie over for a nice dinner and some movie watching.  Since it's been hard to train Emmy for Separation Anxiety because there are always people at home, she isn't near ready to being left alone yet.  It's difficult to try to train her to be left alone when there is always someone in the house.  Haha.  She's getting better (I can leave the house for about five minutes and come back and she's not frantic) but she's not good enough to be left alone yet.  I can only imagine how good it would be if I could fully train her everyday with no one around.  It would be great.  But that not being the case, she's still her frantic self when she's alone so I opted to stay in and have my girlfriends over for dinner.  My parents went to the city to meet up with Uncle Baldy and Auntie Sue, Christopher went to Briana's where she was hosting a party for their friends, and Nick went to our friends Will and Lindsay's house.  Nick was invited to my get together, of course, but after hearing that we would be marathoning the old A&E version of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice he gracefully opted out.  James, Bonnie's boyfriend, also declined.  I guess they both knew that we'd be chatting the whole time and drooling over Colin Firth and the "pond scene" at Pemberley.  We all got very quiet when this part came on.  Hahah.

Overall the night was beyond wonderful.  I had a great time ladies!  For the appetizers I made a chili cheese dip, fresh mozzerella caprese salad, and Ina Garten's Roasted Shrimp Cocktail.  Apparently since I got the RR recipe out of the book that Uncle David gave me for Christmas a few years back it's not online.  If you want the recipe let me know and I'll email it to you.  It was super tasty and easy to make. For dinner we each had our own little chicken.  I got us Cornish Game Hens, which are pretty much baby chickens.  As Nick likes to say, anything in baby form tastes good.  And by George, he's right.  These little guys sure were tasty!  This is the complete menu:

Warm Chili and Cheese dip with Tri-Color Peppers and Tortilla Chips (Classic Rachael Ray 30-Minute Meals page 152)

Caprese salad

Roasted Shrimp Cocktail

Cornish game hens with garlic-sage butter over white potatoes, red onions, and garlic

Garlic green beans

Cheese platter

From top left:  Sharp cheddar, Feta, Brie triangles, Smoked Cheddar Swiss, and Gouda.  My favorite was the Smoked Cheddar Swiss.  It melts down nicely for quesadillas.  I knew that Abby was planning on bringing a scrumptious Pistachio Pudding pie with fresh whipped cream so having a cheese platter as dessert sounded really good.  For as long as I've known her, Abby has always been a great cook and baker.  So I was very pleased when she said that she couldn't get my green beans into her mouth fast enough.


On Monday Nick and I met Bonnie and her boyfriend James down in San Jose for a Sharks game.  It was a lot of fun.  They lost 3 to 4 against the Vancouver Canucks, but it was still really exciting.  The only thing that I didn't enjoy was the lack of heckling.  Bonnie and James, who were also college hockey fans, agreed.  There was some booing, but no "you sucks" or foul language during penalties.  I'm sure we'll get used to it, but it's so much fun doing all the chants and team cheers.



At the beginning of the game the Sharks players all skate out of the giant shark head.  The head raises up to the ceiling and its eye glows and flashes when certain chants are yelled.  As you can tell, we were pretty high up so we got to see the shark's eye up close.  It was kind of creepy at first.  In a couple of weeks Nick and I plan to have a San Jose day and visit the Tech Museum and hopefully get some last minute tickets to the game that night and to purchase more tickets and not have to pay Ticketmaster's service charge.





As we were walking out of the house I said, Oh I should get a scarf because it'll be cold in there, but I didn't because we didn't want to be late.  I should have!  There was air blowing down on us so I zipped my jacket all the way up my neck, which is why my head kind of looks like it's floating in a sea of black fabric.  I will know for next time.  Hopefully next time will be in just a couple of weeks!

Foodie update

We've been having a lot of good meals lately aside from all the wonderful holiday food.  A few weeks back Nick and I made this roasted chicken.  This is a good alternative to the rosemary-sage roasted chicken we made back in October.  The rosemary-sage butter chicken was probably one of my family's favorite meals, but there is just so much butter that we can't do it all the time.  At this point I can't remember if this recipe was off the top of our heads or a recipe I saw.  I've put a recipe below of pretty much what we did.  I do remember that we shoved garlic and red onions under the skin, which made it very tasty.  We tossed it in EVOO before shoving it into the oven.  We also made garlic noodles and my own concoction of anchovy broccoli.  Now, I know a lot of people are squeamish about anchovies, but they give such a nutty, full flavor to whatever you put it in.  I highly suggest trying them.  I've used the paste in spaghetti sauce before and it made such a difference.  This time I minced up whole fillets until it was practically a paste and threw it in with the broccoli.  It was soo good.  Since I'm not a fish lover I haven't tried whole fillets, but minced up for flavoring is amazing.

Roasted Chicken with Red Onions

5-7 chicken thighs and drumsticks, separated

2 red onions, eighthed

1 bulb garlic, whole cloves

Thyme sprigs

Salt and Pepper

EVOO

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Liberally salt and pepper chicken parts.  (I try to use more pepper than salt for my Dad's blood pressure.) Pull apart two pieces of onion so that you have a bunch of separate thin layers.  Gently lift the skin away from the chicken and slide one to two onion pieces and a piece of garlic in between the skin and flesh.  Place chicken, onions, remaining garlic cloves and thyme in a foil covered roaster pan.  Coat with EVOO and toss with hands so that they are all evenly coated.  Place chicken so that skin is facing up.  Roast in oven for 45 min to 1 hour or until juices run clear.  

Anchovy Broccoli

1 can anchovies in EVOO, pasted

4 cloves garlic, minced

3-4 bunches of broccoli, bite sized pieces

5-6 Tbsp water

Salt and Pepper to taste

Directions:

Mince anchovy filets into a course paste, reserving EVOO in can.  Sautee anchovies in regular EVOO until fragrant and then add garlic and reserved EVOO stirring constantly.  Add raw broccoli, toss in anchovy mixture.  Add water and cover for 3-4 minutes to steam.  Salt and pepper to taste.    

A couple of weekends ago we also had a crab night.  Yum yum!  My favorite thing ever!  Briana and I had gone to have Pho and then popped over to Ranch 99 to get crabs for my dad to cook up that night.  It was a pretty fun day.   Christopher had helped me get out all of our Christmas stuff, so I started decorating the tree while Briana did her homework.  I can't remember where the rest of the family was, but it was just the two of us listening to Glee Christmas in front of the fire while I got sentimental about all of our ornaments.  I'm turning into my mother.







I didn't think that crab would be enough to fill us so I made a soup too.  It was good, but we had way to much, as always.  If you want to cut back on the salt use less bouillon.

Soup Noodles

1 onion, chopped

4 cloves garlic, minced

3 jalapenos, sliced

1 32oz box chicken stock

4 cups water

5 tbsp chicken bouillon 

1 pack fresh Korean noodles (found in the refrigerator section of Ranch 99)

Baby bok choy, cut in half

Directions

Par boil noodles and set aside, strained.  In same pot sauté onions, garlic, and jalapenos.  (I didn't deseed the jalapenos.)  Once vegetables are soft, add chicken stock, water, and bouillon.  Bring to a boil and add bok choy.  Cook bok choy until they are bright green.  Portion strained noodles into bowls and ladle soup over noodles.  

Note:  If you have left over noodles, don't add them to your soup to store.  Keep them separate until you go to eat it otherwise the noodles will absorb all the soup and be gummy.  

Some Emmy pictures:






She wasn't very happy about this picture, but she knows to listen to her mommy when she's stuck like this.





A couple of weekends ago Nick and I went to a disco themed birthday dinner and roller skating for one of his coworker's birthday.  We got her a nice scarf and this is the card that I made.  Nick borrowed my Dad's shirt that he bought for canoeing.  We were all surprised that he could fit it since he is so much bigger than my dad.  In my Dad's defense, he needed something bright that wasn't cotton so that if he he got lost he would be easier to find.



The Meyer Sale. Ah, the Meyer Sale.  Meyer is an umbrella company for some well known kitchen retailers like Anolon, FarberWare, Circulon, Kitchen Aid, SilverStone, and Bonjour.  They also had a lot of Rachel Ray and Paula Deen stuff there too.  On Saturday Nick drove my mom and me up to Fairfield to have brunch and go to the Meyer Sale.  He had gone last weekend with his cousin and sister.  Mrs. Ryan usually tells us about it every year, but since she changed jobs and is now working for Lowe's and not Meyer, she forgot. When we reminded her she jumped at the opportunity and met us up there.  I made away like a bandit.  Not only was this their year end sale so everything was already marked down, but we also had a 30% off coupon.  I got myself new two cookie sheets, two cake pans, a pasta fork, slotted spatula, ladle, and new cutting board.  My mom got herself the rest of what you see below including some of the same tools as me.  We also picked up quite a few gifts too.




Size comparison for board.  It's 15x15 raised cutting board.  I love it.



Since I had gotten new cake pans I wanted to test them out.  I just used a box mix, but it was still fun to do.  I've never seen a bake pull away from the pan like this before.  I also made my own frosting out of powdered sugar.  I gave the cake to Nick since I don't really like sweets.  He said that the cake was kind of oily.  I guess I will have to do it from scratch next time.  I was just trying to take the easy way out and practice my decorating skills.







On Sunday I had an urge to try out my new cookie sheets.  I made butter cookies from allrecipes.  I can't find the link right now.  The cookies themselves are okay and didn't take that long to make the dough, but the press I used was the biggest hassel ever.  I won't be using it anymore.  I've been developing a little bit of carpel tunnel in my right hand from using my mouse and chopping so much garlic so this didn't help it at all.  I had to press so hard on the handle that both of my forearms were sore the next day.  It took me a total of 3.5 hours to make about three dozen cookies.  It's back to round cookies for me.  I think even rolling out the dough and using a cookie cutter is easier than this and I think cookie cutters are a lot of work!  But all in all, I loved the pans!  I was in a rush to finish the last few batches so unfortunately they weren't cooked all the way through my mom said.  I had to get to Nick's house so that we could go to Oakland for his grandma's birthday dinner.  Oh, that was yummy.  So much seafood.  Family!  Listen to this, Nick's family all fits at one big table!  Including his little cousins!  When was the last time our family was able to do that?










After all that baking I had to rejuvenate myself by doing a lot of cooking.  On Monday I made a shrimp scampi with garlic noodles, which was good as always.  Last night I tried something different.  I've been craving fish for some reason even though I don't like fish so I planned to make fish tacos.  The problem was that I ended up going to sushi with Nick's family the night before so I was all fished out.  I didn't think the fish that I made was that great and it was cold by the time I got everything on the table so no one else liked it that much either.  I did make my own Spanish rice and a stewed zucchini dish.  Those turned out really well.  The rice was so much better than the boxed Spanish rice.  I will definitely be making both again.


I did have a picture with my dad smiling but it was really blurry.



In other news, it's going to get really hectic around here.  Well, it already is, but it will become more so.  This year Christopher and I will be hosting Christmas dinner with my mom's side of the family.  I have everything planned out down to the half hour starting Christmas Eve.  I was originally planning to work a half day on Christmas Eve, but after looking at all of the stuff I have to prepare for I decided that I need to take it off.  The day after Christmas Jen Jen is having a baby shower for Josie, which I'm very involved in.  We've been planning for the last two weeks to figure out what we're doing.  Now that the time is getting closer we're both starting to feel the stress, but I think we have a handle on it now.  So for Christmas weekend I'm going to be very busy.  It's a good thing Christopher is helping me and Nick said that he would come and help with the cooking for Josie's shower and then take off before all the ladies come.  I probably would be broken out in pimples and have no hair if I didn't have their help.

Happy Holidays

Happy holidays everyone!  Not much to report this week since I saw most of you just a few days ago.  Well I guess there are a few things.  The Big Game was terrible.  The tailgate was as good as ever, but Cal lost sooo terribly that we were debating leaving early.  We did stay until the end though because I wanted to follow the band through the tunnel since this was the only game I went to this year. Nick was unable to go because he had a wedding to shoot in Santa Clara so Linda came with me instead.  Besides the fact that we were freezing and the Bears got creamed, we had a pretty good time.  We were really worried about rain, but it didn't start pouring until we were about to go home so my dad drove us down to the Bart station.  I was also a little worried that Emmy would have a freakout attack when Pierce was doggy sitting her, but he said that after she got over us all leaving she fell asleep and he watched Disney movies all day.  Not bad at all.

Table flowers

Chocolate stuffed cookies that I saw on Giada at Home.  I can't find the link to the recipe, but I won't be making these anymore because they were way too sweet and more work than I usually spend on cookies.

Linda keeping warm with a cookie and some wine.

Josie is having a baby!  She announced it at Thanksgiving dinner via Google chat and Jen Jen's phone.   I already talked to Jen Jen and I will be helping with her  baby shower.  How exciting!  Our family is growing in leaps and bounds.

In other news, I will no longer be going to Paris and Dubai with Nick's family.  We weren't sure when the exact dates that we were going were, but just found out that it's the exact same time as my parents' Panama cruise.  Originally Nick thought that it was going to be at the end of March to the beginning of April, which would have been perfect since my parents' trip is at the end of April to May.  We were having dinner with his sister when she set us straight.  That was the end of that.  All these months of looking forward to going abroad were squashed with one phone call to Kuwait.  Since Emmy is living with me now I can't just leave her here or dump her on Christopher when he has school.  We don't know what Christopher's school schedule is or if Emmy will be trained well enough to be left home while he's gone by the time I need to get my plane tickets, which is very soon.  She's making progress, but I'm not sure if she will be 100% okay to be left at home for hours while Christopher is at school.  I guess sometimes you have to make sacrifices for the ones you love.  I'm much more willing to miss a trip than Emmy not having a loving home.  There will always be other exciting trips to go on.

At first I was really disappointed because I really, really wanted to go to Dubai, but it was a pretty big financial burden that was lifted off of my shoulders.  I was already having difficulty saving for a plane ticket, but once Emmy came fully back into the picture I was really beginning to worry about what I was going to do.  I was planning on taking money out of savings so that I could go on the trip, but wasn't really to keen on the idea.  Now I don't have to worry about that.  Nick was very disappointed also, but he's still going and has been to both places multiple times so I told him he couldn't be more disappointed than me.  I've been to Paris before, but only for two nights and a day so it would have been nice to be able to see more of the city and do some shopping.  We just keep reminding ourselves that we'll have the rest of our lives to travel together and I'm sure there will be other opportunities.  Nick has been wanting to go to New Orleans so maybe when he has some time off we can go there.  I've also been wanting to visit Shanna in North Carolina so this might be a good thing for us.  With the big trip I didn't think I'd have any money or time off to do anything.  I'm feeling much better about it now, especially since Christmas is coming and I worried that I'd send myself into debt with shopping, training, and the plane ticket.

Just a few additional pictures that I took with my phone.  I really need to get a phone with a better camera.  Whenever I try to take pictures of Emmy I have to be stealthy and pulling out a camera usually makes her turn the other way.  She doesn't seem to mind the phone as much, probably because I'm always texting on it and she doesn't associate it with a giant eye being pointed at her.  Maybe it's time to invest in a smart phone with a good camera.  I also use it a lot just because it's close by and I'm too lazy to go get my camera in my room.  Hehe.


It's a "Where's Waldo" Emmy





I've realized that Emmy prefers going to play frisbee more than our 3 milers (as if I should have been surprised) so I've been lazy and driving her to the park to throw the frisbee with her.  We did do a walk today since it wasn't that cold, but I've been really lazy about walking this week.  The park that we walk around has huge fields so she has plenty of room to run.  This one is in an area that isn't very open and fewer people and bikers go by.  When we walked by it this morning she really wanted to go play but realized that I didn't bring her frisbee along.  Having this field makes it easy for when I don't feel like walking but she needs some good running in.


Belly rubbing by Uncle Christophee


I got up one night to go to the bathroom and Emmy was sleeping belly up on her bed.



Spending some quality time with Nick


My mom's new fridge.  She's been wanting one for a long time and finally broke down and got a bigger one.  



Emmy and I also have started Clicker Training (I actually bought this lady's book and clickers) this week.  We've only been doing it for a couple of days, but she's responding really well.  I have a book on how to train different things, but so far we're just working on her being okay with me taking my keys out of the drawer.  She's getting the hang of it. When I take my keys out her tail starts wagging.  Good enough for me!

Walking

I should rename this blog "Updates on Allison and Emmy".  Today on our three miler Emmy was the model doggy citizen.  There were dogs that were far worse than her (thank goodness).  I've actually been noticing that there are plenty of misbehaved dogs more lately because of the books I've been reading.  We have encountered a number of doggies who did not do as their owners asked/demanded.   There was one dog this morning who was lunging and barking at Emmy while she stayed as calm as she could and walked around him with a little whining and a small bark.   That's pretty good for her and I barely had to use muscle to hold her back.  In the past I would have had to use both hands to get her under control.  There was another dog who clearly wanted to play with her when his owner didn't want him to.  It was a gangly black lab of a puppy who saw her and wanted to go sniffing.  She just looked at him and then looked back at me like she was saying, look how good I'm being.  I don't know if it's because we have been going out everyday to walk or play frisbee, the training I've been working on with the Separation Anxiety (SA) in the house, her muscles are sore from running so hard for the frisbee yesterday, or that I feel more relaxed after reading one 30-paged booklet on SA and 50 pages of the Control Unleashed: Creating a Focused and Confident Dog (CU) by Leslie McDevitt book that the rescue lady recommended for me.  Whatever the case, I was pleasantly surprised and was writing this blog post in my head all the way home.  I'm so pleased!  CU has already taught me that her behaviors that I thought were bad, like crouching in a stalking position when she sees other dogs is really just instinct.  I knew that she had what is called the "Border Collie Eye" where she follows her "work" (frisbee, ball, bike, children) in a crouched stance and is very intent on herding, but whenever I would see her do the stalking when we were on walks I would correct her because I didn't like the look of it.  The book, which isn't even Border Collie (BC) specific said that BC's are the acception to the attentive rule because that's their instinct and what they've been bred to do.  Silly me!  In my desperation to get her to do what I wanted, I was really just making her out to be worse than she really is.  Today I didn't correct her at all on it and she was much, much calmer walking by all the dogs.  I think what I was worried about is that the crouch makes her look like she's going to pounce and I didn't want the other dogs or owners thinking that she was.  But she was fine!  After a while we would get closer and she would stop crouching and walk past.  What a good girl!  I was just being an unaware owner!

Like I've mentioned, I've only read 50 pages of CU so far but I feel so much better about Emmy.  Right now I'm in the introductory chapters where McDevitt is just explaining concepts, theories, and training techniques, but she also puts in case studies.  There was one that was just like Emmy.  The dog was basically stressed and very unsure of himself and the dogs, bikes, people, birds, worms, etc. around him, which made him lunge at everything and potentially/actually hurt them.  Sounds like Emmy in a nutshell, especially when it comes to cousin Ruby.  It was all because the dog didn't know what to expect and this was his defensive mode.  McDevitt was able to train the dog and he is a-okay now.  This helped me in a bunch of ways.

1. Now I know that Emmy really is fixable. 
2. We're not alone.  There are other dogs out there with pretty much the same problem!
3. She lacks confidence and is a "reactive"(over stimulated) dog because of it.   
4. I am more attentive to her and not just the things around her.  When we go on walks I don't listen to music because I need to be able to hear if there are bikers or even runners that might make her want to chase them. I've been keeping my eyes and ears open as usual, but also watching her reaction to our environment much more closely. 
5. I'm less tense because I know that we can do it.  I think this is why she had such a good walk today.

As I was at the beginning of last week, I still remain hopeful that she will be a cured dog who I can trust to go to dog parks and play with other dogs while children run around too and who I can leave alone while I go out to watch a movie or have dinner with friends.  Our SA training has been going pretty well.  I can pick up my keys without her barking and sometimes even get my purse and walk out into the garage for five seconds before I come back in to get her.  The strategy that the book gave was to fill her Kong with peanut butter and then pick up keys, then take away the Kong.  She has learned very quickly to eat as much pb as she can before I take it away from her.  I think this means she's learning.  The book said that the dog will pretty much be like, "Hey, I wasn't done with that.  Ohh you're picking up your purse again, gimme, gimme, gimmie."  It seems to be going that way, which I'm very pleased with.  I also do random desensitization by going downstairs to pick up my keys and then put them down and then go back to work.  It really must be body language, because she sure does know when I'm picking up my keys to leave for real and not just to condition.  

Emmy is really starting to settle in here and take us more seriously since the training started.  This is good because she responds to us better when we're out on walks and she's distracted.  Last week Christopher and I went for a run.  We were jogging along and a big dog off leash came chasing after us to get her.  The furs on the back of the other dog's neck were raised as he was sniffing Emmy.  Christopher was holding her leash so I made sure to grab the very top of her leash by her neck just in case.  I could see the owner running from who knows how far away, she was very out of breath.  Right as she got there the other dog started growling and went for Emmy's face.  I shoved her head between my legs because she was already sitting to get him away from her butt.  That made it easy for me to control her head.  Thank goodness her owner had gotten there in time.  He kind of looked like a American Mastiff/Boxer mix and was towering over Emmy.  Normally Emmy would have gone right back after the other dog, but I kept telling her to "leave it".  Phew, it seemed to work even if it was just minimally.  I'm not sure if shoving her head between my legs was the right thing to do, but at least it didn't get in a fight.  The apologetic owner sounded just like me when Emmy tries to steal other dogs balls when their owners play with them.   

Until next time, happy training!

Budget Blown

Now that Emmy is with me, my budget seems to have gone out the window.  I've always had a soft spot for getting Emmy things that she really could live without.  In her opinion all she needs is her frisbee.  She is now all stocked up on Kongs, IQ toys, glucosamine supplements for her joints, a new poop bag dispenser, training treats, training treat pouch (for me), seatbelt attachment, a new portable water cup, and plenty of frozen marrow bones to keep her teeth clean.  The UPS man has been stopping by to drop off boxes since Tuesday.  Needless to say, there has been quite a bit of money spent.

As I said in my last post, I also purchased a few books on dog training too.  I finished the booklet on Separation Anxiety last night.  After I get some peanut butter for the recommended training, we will begin.  It is going to be a long and tedious process, but I think we can do it.  The book says that most cases can be cured in six to eight weeks.  Reading the cases about other dogs who would run through class windows or chew at their crates so much that their faces were all cut up, I'm glad that Emmy isn't that bad.  She's pretty bad, but not that bad.  If they can be cured and feel secure, then she can too.  At first when I started reading the book I thought that maybe she was just a bad mannered doggy who tears at stuff and slobbers all over herself just because there is no one around to tell her not to do it.  As I got further in, it was very clear that she definitely is a dog with a serious case of Separation Anxiety.  (It would have been much easier to train her if she just had bad manners.)  So, after I get some peanut butter to stuff in her Kong, I'm we're going to start the whole processes with me putting on socks and then taking them off.  Yup, she starts to get upset and knows you're leaving as soon as you put on socks.  By the time you go for you keys she's beside herself that she will be left alone.  The book did a great job of spelling out how slowly you have to take the steps.  The vet told me to casually walk out the door, wait, and then come back in without acknowledging Emmy to build up her tolerance for when we leave.  This book, however, tells you how to do it step-by-step for things that I hadn't even thought of.  Instead of just walking out and then coming back in, the book says that I need to start making her feel "happy" before I'm even out the door.  For her, happy will be a pb stuffed Kong.  We better continue on our three mile walks otherwise she'll be a very pudgy doggy by the end of the training.

On top of all the Emmy purchases that I have been making, my windshield wiper blades broke so I had to buy new ones.  They were expensive!  All I have to say is that they better last me at least five years in this mild weather otherwise I'm going back to the cheapy ones from Walmart and replace them once a year like usual.   I also decided this week that I'm going to take out my plugs, the earrings that look like fat screws, and go back to regular earrings.  I haven't worn regular earrings since college!  I got these today from endless.com.  They are perfect: silver so my ears don't flare up and itch, and stars.

Emmy!

Emmy is mine!  As most of you know Emmy was staying with Julie, but now she can't stay there anymore because she kept getting in fights with her cousin Ruby.  With a 1-year-old toddling around it just wasn't safe for anyone to have Emmy and Ruby together.  Emmy was trying to make herself the queen of the roost and Ruby was defending her territory.  The two motivations just didn't mix well.  With Edward traveling back and forth between Davis and NY he couldn't really take her with him where ever he was going.  So this last week when Edward came to get Emmy from my house he asked if we could keep her otherwise they would have to take her back to the rescue.  They had already sent out an email to all the vet students at UC Davis to see if anyone was able to adopt her, but no one could.  My family agreed immediately because one, we really wanted her and two, we didn't want her going back to the rescue in NY and maybe even be put down because she doesn't get along with some dogs.  I say "some" because she got along with her cousin Potatoes beautifully, but that is because he's a very submissive boy.  It makes me very hopeful that she will eventually get along with dogs in the future.  I actually don't think that she even minded little Eddie pulling at her tail that much, which is good if I ever want kids, though she might try to herd them.  When I explained to the vet today what she does with all of my cousins he said that she is probably trying to herd them when they all run around.  I was hoping that I could get her acclimated to children and their editable natures, but I don't know if that will happen.  I can however, train her to not rush people at the door to say hello.  We've already started training her to wait and be calm before whoever is at the door is allowed in.  Since it's usually Nick or Briana she sits and gets really excited to see them.  We make her sit about four feet from the door and stay there.  Last night when she saw Nick her tail started to wag immediately and she wanted to greet him, but as soon as she stood up I closed the door and made her start all over.  She's starting to get the hang of it.  If she wants to say hello, then she needs to stay put until invited.  We've been doing the same thing for when she wants to chase squirrels in the backyard.  I've switched treats with her regular kibble dog food so that she doesn't get too fat.

So far I'm training her myself and have ordered a bunch of books about behavioral issues, separation anxiety and one on Border Collies.  I already know quite a bit about BC's but the reviews of the book said that it's not just general information about being a good pet owner and normal BC tendencies so I thought it would be a good read.  Also, the lady from the rescue that Ed and I got Emmy from recommend a book that addresses dog-dog aggression so I'm feeling hopeful that I can gain some insight and maybe help her a bit before I spend the big bucks on training.  I've already called an in-home trainer who says he can help with the aggression and separation anxiety.  They are ranging around $600-700 for a five month program, but I'm ready for it.  There is another trainer who the vet recommended so I'm going to give them a call too.  I don't want to get a second dog in our house, but I would like her to at least be able to go to the dog park and play with other dogs...not that she does.  She would rather go to the far end of the park and throw her frisbee.  It's only when other dogs get in between her and the frisbee or try to steal her frisbee that she nips at them.  If we just go off on our own away from other dogs she's happy as a clam.  She's also really good on a leash.  She can greet dogs and then keeps going once she's had a sniff or two.  Sometimes I think she thinks she's a human.  I'm not sure if she wasn't socialized properly as a puppy or what, but she doesn't seem to have that much interest in playing with other dogs.  I wonder if I can teach her how to play with other dogs.  I think "play" just isn't in her.  Everything for her is about work.  Her frisbee is her job.

I'm going to try to help her myself first with the separation anxiety and also the bike/skate board/skooter/roller blading chasing and then go to the trainers if I don't see a difference.  I know that a lot of dogs have problems with chasing so I should be able to find videos and more books on how to stop the behavior.  Once that's in place I will feel much better about when she goes to the front of our yard since there are kids down the block who zoom by on their razors.  I will have to do more research on it.  I think the biggest challenge we will have is training everyone in our family.  I'm a firm believer that there are no bad dogs, just bad owners.  We all need to whip into shape before Emmy can become a better dog.  It definitely didn't help her that for the last year or so she's been bounced around between Julie, Edward, and myself.  Now we need to be really consistent and let her know who is boss.  So far so good though.  She's been really receptive with the coming and going of people with the positive reinforcement that we've been giving her and she knows that she's no longer on allowed on the new sofa.  My mom was tired of having sheets always on the sofa so we put a bed for her by the coffee table to lay in.  At first she looked upset that she was dethroned, but she's used to it now and it's only been two days!  I have hope that she'll be a nearly perfect dog.  She already has a really good temperament around adults, we just need her to be okay with other dogs and by herself.

In preparation for her coming to stay permanently, I bought her a new bed from Costco.  I had a little round bed for her, but it was too small so her legs would pop out of it.  I think she likes this one much better, though I always call her up onto my bed where she stays for the whole night.  Neither of us move much since it's such a small bed, but I think we both enjoy it.  I'm seriously thinking about getting a bigger bed, but then my whole room would be bed.  You'd walk into the door and hit the bed.  We'll have to see.  Usually if Emmy spreads out I end up in weird positions and my back hurts.  For now we're doing okay and I guess I can always tell her to get off and sleep on her bed.  It's so fluffy and soft I could probably even curl up on it.





I also reacquainted her with her her new squeaky chicken.  She didn't really like it that much at first, but after a while she seemed to remember that she used to really like the toy.  I also have a bunch of toys that are coming from Amazon.  It's a good thing that Nick has Prime so that I don't have to pay for tax or shipping. Hehehe.  It sure makes it easy for me to order her stuff.  For now I think we're all set.  I just got one of those dog treat bags that clip onto your pants to train with.  Usually when we go running she's just into her running and not really other people around her so I don't think I'll have to use it that much when we're out, just when we're training.


Emmy is officially part of the Chin family now.  We had a vet appointment this morning to have her microchip on file and to verify that she had be spayed. To register her in the county you have to have proof that she's been spayed in order to get the discount in registry.  I had to have the vet verify because I didn't have the original paperwork from when the shelter spayed her.  I sent in the registration today and she's all settled in with her new vet.  She was less than happy to be there, but I like this vet.  The poor girl was quaking so hard that it looked like she was cold.  She did a great job though and was very happy to get out of there.  I got the recommendation from Shanna's family since they have been going to this vet for a very long time.  He is quite the older man so I hope he doesn't retire anytime soon.



In other news, this weekend I went to the gem show that comes around every year.  I got myself a couple of pendants.  The purple is amethyst and the other is blue topaz.  I wanted them both set in white gold because it doesn't tarnish and my other settings from last year's show were in white gold, but I had Emmy's trainings and other expenses in mind so I stuck with the less expensive silver.  I'm quite happy with my decision.

Boo!

I hope all of your Halloweens went well.  Nick and I had a good time watching the Giants game at a local micro brewery called EJ Phair in downtown Concord with a bunch of friends.  After that we did normal Halloween-y stuff around the area.  Only a couple of us were actually dressed up for going out.   I only had my mask.  Since it was so simple, I put on bright, glittery blue makeup to match the glittery blue of the mask and majorly curled my hair using bobby pins and a hair dryer.  Man, being a girl is hard work.  Of course while I was looking very unlike myself and more like I belonged next to Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, I saw a mom of a high school friend at the brewery.  She recognized me when I was sitting across the room from her.  I waved and made sure to put on my mask so that she knew that it was part of my costume.

This week we have Emmy since Julie and Edward are at a conference.  We've been walk-running almost every morning this week.  I always come back red faced and sweaty, but she doesn't even look phased.  At least it calms her down during the day when I'm working and can't play with her.  By the time Christopher comes home she's ready to play all over again like she didn't even go for a three mile walk with me!  I wish I had that much energy.  Since she is home though, I haven't been going out much.  My family likes it because I cook for them.  On Tuesday we had my chili and cornbread that we bring to the Big Game every year.  I made it on Monday so that it would be nice and tasty for when we dug in for our Tuesday night dinners.  I also made pumpkin pies for the occasion.  Last night (Wednesday) I made Coq au Vin and tonight I plan to learn to make Ox Tail Stew.  Yum yum!