Pup Pouches

These little items of awesomeness arrived in the mail today. We plan to use them on an upcoming adventure that you'll hear more about in a few weeks. We were frankly expecting these pouch carriers to be a total failure, but they work surprisingly well. There was an initial struggle when I put the first guinea pig (Errol) in the pouch, but as soon as he was strapped in he totally relaxed and was perfectly content to be walked around the house. I carried him for about 10 minutes, during which we looked out windows he normally can't reach, in mirrors he can't see, and at countertops he rarely visits. He LOVED it. In fact, when I took Errol out of the pouch and replaced him with Fang, Errol started throwing a temper tantrum to be let back in. Fang's reaction to the pouch was similar, so I assume they must think they're pretty comfy. Anyway, you'll hear more about why we purchased these seemingly silly carriers in a few weeks. Hopefully you won't think we're totally insane pup-parents after that.

Errol, riding in the pouch of awesomeness: he's too cool to look at the camera

Errol again

Fang says, "Check it, no paws!"

Cool clouds

We had a nifty shelf cloud roll by the house tonight. Thankfully it brought a nice cool breeze along with it (it's been high nineties here every day this week). We thought the repeating layers shown in the top picture were pretty cool.

Captain Fang the Fearsome: Pirate Pup

Aaaarrr!

Beaker

This is pretty cute - a surfing coworker found it today.

We found this one surfing tonight - you're gonna cry (with laughter).

What's in your fridge?

I have accepted Emily's "What's in your fridge?" challenge. The rules are simple, open your fridge, don't touch anything, take a picture, and post. So, here's ours:


I think my favorite part of our fridge right now is that one Rubbermaid storage container that seems to be just nonchalantly tossed in the back of the fridge. We're clearly so very casual about our food storage here at the House of Boy and Girl.

This is pretty much what it looks like most of the time. Milk, water and random drink items (happens to be root beer today) on the top shelf, breads and whatever else lands there on the second shelf, leftovers and lunch items on the third shelf, beer and dog food and more random leftovers (I think that's a partially used onion) on the fourth shelf. Then a drawer full of lunch meats and cheeses, followed by a drawer full of short term veggies and fresh herbs, and finally a drawer full of long term veggies and fruit. The fridge door holds Jeff's pickle and mustard collection on the top shelf (who knew that one boy needed four types of pickles and four types of mustard for daily sandwich making?), our olives and Asian condiments on the second shelf, jams and very old sauces that I should probably throw away on the third shelf (ooh, and pickled ginger, which I am soooo addicted to), and tall condiments and salad dressings on the bottom shelf. It's weird to look at your fridge contents in a picture - you see all kinds of things in there you forgot you had!

On the freezer side, we have a lovely box of el-cheapo brand popsicles for summer refreshment, some frozen stock leftover from making corned beef at least a year ago (we thought we might turn it into a nice sauce someday, but that day never came), then the shelf of death, which is currently featuring bacon and frozen pizzas, then a shelf of hamburger and a blue ice that one of our houseguests accidentally left behind last time they visited, then the pork chop drawer, and finally the over stuffed frozen chicken parts drawer (we stocked up on those this week). In the door we have blue ice that does actually belong to us, some form of frozen potato item, lots of frozen veggies for use when we are too lazy to make fresh ones for dinner, our butter stock, overflow chickens, and finally the hot dog/sausages and parmigiano reggiano shelf! If you've actually read all of this, I'm shocked. I had fun writing it, though, and that's all that really matters!

I will issue another challenge - show Emily your fridge, and then show ME your pantry! If anyone actually does, I promise I'll post a picture of ours...

XLS+ Certification Party

We went in to work tonight for the Citation XLS+ certification party. Yes, they actually made us come in on a Saturday night, but that's okay, because they fed us dinner and let us crawl around in the airplane and gave us lots of free goodies to make up for it (engineers can't resist food and free stuff).

Jeff designed the new throttle quadrant for this airplane. Michelle didn't do anything on it, but happily accepted the free food, mugs, pen, keychain, photos and lanyards.

Here's a picture of us standing in front of the airplane. It actually came out rather well. It's rare to see a picture of the two of us together that wasn't taken from Jeff's outstretched arm length, so enjoy!

Schwarzwälderkirchtorte

Today Jeff finally got around to making a Schwarzwälderkirchtorte, or Black Forest Cake. He's been meaning to make it for some time, but never quite got around to it. Of course, first one has to have a recipe, which he didn't have. After consulting a German and a French cookbook, as well as the web and a food science book, he finally cobbled together something that he thought was adequate. And after several hours of baking action, it turned out pretty well.



Oh, the recipe is available upon request, but it's a pretty complicated one that would take an awfully long time to type up...

(Editor's note: This is Jeff's FIRST EVER BLOG POST!!! YAY!!!)

Finally Fourth

Ah, the Fourth of July. The day has finally arrived, much to our relief. You see, for the entire week leading up to (and truth be told, for a couple of days afterwards) our corner of town is inundated with random pops and booms that just set Fang and Errol into a tizzy. There is barking, there is scrambling from front window to the back window to the office window to the front door to the back door, and chaos and noise reign. We happen to live near the county line, which means that all of our neighbors think they can get away with setting off the big stuff that's illegal in our own county, but is legal, and is sold in abundance less than two miles away. We also live in close proximity to two professionally put on shows, one at a ranch just about a mile SE of us, and one at a country club a little to the NE. This is cool, because we get to see some pretty awesome fireworks every year from the comfort of our back deck, but it's also uncool because we pretty much have to spend the entire evening on our back deck, as it's the only place that Fang and Errol seem to be able to calm down a bit. If they can SEE the fireworks, they're ok, if they just HEAR them, it's NOT GOOD. We have had a bit of relief this year, as Errol has been quite sick and lethargic for the last couple of days and the noise doesn't seem to be bothering him quite as much as usual. We'll see how the evening goes. Perhaps we'll try and get some video or shots of the crazy amount of fireworks we see for you all to enjoy.

Champagne, cordite, and two fraidy pups

The show from the ranch to our SE

No need to leave home to see fireworks!

Old friends

We had a lovely visit with some old friends, Caleb and Sophie, last night. They and their two kiddos spent the night with us, as they do every now and then. We just happened to finally get a picture of them this time around. They'll be back again next week, so perhaps we'll get some of their very cute kids then.

Caleb and Michelle were friends in high school (the kind that played many pranks on each other), and when Sophie and Jeff came along, we added them in to the group (but not for playing pranks). Caleb and Sophie are part of the force behind Ezra Ministries, and I have a link to their website in my sidebar. They previously served as missionaries in South Africa, and before that traveled all around the world serving on a Mercy Ship.