Shrimp, crab, oysters, my birthday, oh my!

Good times. Small family...big hearts.

My step mom and Aunt Loretta came again to visit me for my birthday. I have a very small family and it seem's some how it's just me and Aunt Loretta, as everyone else has passed on. So we take care of each other. For several years she has drove from Seattle to see me for my birthday. And every year that makes me happy. I was so excited to see them both again as we don't see each other very often cause of the miles between us. We went out and had a light lunch and ended up eating all day it seemed. We visited, looked at photos, talked about old times, sat outside beside the ocean and enjoyed our whole evening. We also drove out to the oyster farm to get fresh oysters for dinner. We rented a room on the ocean with a great view and shared our evening. Aunt Loretta bought a fresh crab and it was so so so good. We had crab, bay shrimp, snacks, oysters, cheese, salad, wine and a great evening. Derrel fried up the fresh oysters for dinner and I made salad and parmesan bread. Blucky oysters. I won't eat them. I bought a very small piece of halibut for dinner and cooked that with a bit of lemon~ it was good! It was a fish kind of day. It was a great spoil Susy day...it was a good day...I enjoy my 42nd birthday very much.

♫ they say it's your birthday...~ happy birthday to me... ♫ http://blip.fm/~e8huo ♫

Were off now to DQ for ice cream for my birthday! Mm I will not be stepping on the scale tomorrow...Back to being good in the morning!

42 and all is good!

Company and Oysters...

Yeah...My step mom and aunt are coming today! Just waiting now...

We have a wonderful dinner planned, some wine, an ocean room. I'm really looking forward to spending some time with my small family. Every year they both try to come visit me for my birthday if they can. I don't have a lot of family on this earth left and I'm so glad they spoil me and I get a visit from them. So we rented a room on the ocean rocks on bonus time through our timeshare for c.h.e.a.p. It has a kitchen, 2 bed rooms and a great view. Were stopping and buying fresh oysters for the gang and Derrel is frying those baby's up tonight. It's kind of a tradition when they come to the beach for a visit. I made a salad and bread and mom is bringing some wine. Blah to the oysters but I'm stopping and getting a small piece of halibut and I'll be good~i don't eat much!

Until later...I've gone out to play for my birthday! I shall return with pictures.

4 eyes...

Susy got glasses...











It's a bitch to get old and you go blind. 42 next week...how the hell did that happen??? One thing I can say for sure is I feel better at 42 than ever in my life.

I wear contacts @ work, and I tend to just wonder around blind. I wear reading glasses to see my computer or read. I can't shop or see print without readers anymore. Not a good idea to shop and not be able to see the price tags. I look like a goober walking around stores with "ladybug" or "blue" glasses on that are from the dollar tree. But without them I can't see much. I've even been driving with glasses on more and more as I age.

So I went and got a fresh eye test and got new reading glasses at Costco, minus the ladybugs and goober like glasses.


WOW...i can see!

More hiking in 2009

Today we didn't have to work...so we hiked. I asked Derrel if he would take me to the new Goodwill store that was opening today down the coast a few miles. So we did...went for breakfast and headed to Goodwill. I packed apples and grapes as we planned to take a ride and a hike also. We took a ride through the forest on the forest service roads and then hiked some. I've lived in Oregon most of my life and never seen a lot of these place we have seen this year from hiking and moving. Well I've seen them, just from the car. I did not realize what I was missing all those years.

Beautiful hike today. This hike went down to a cavern called Devil's Churn and around the cliff's of the ocean.

This is Devil's Churn along the Oregon coast. It's a cavern that the ocean flows into. The water crashes against the rocks making a churning motion. I took a few pictures before my battery's went dead.

http://www.paulnoll.com/Oregon/Tourism/Coast-Walport-Florence/Devils-Churn-view-top.html

So here's some of the photos I took today of another one of our hikes in 2009.

More on Facebook: www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=111240&id=544116917&l=429c5e3437

I'd pay 99 cents for a dream

This was kind of cute so I thought I'd share...


Man, this recession is so bad, dreams aint even free no more. What's next? Five dollar love?















I stole this from aplusk on twitter
http://twitpic.com/ivtm0

Fall rain

Raining today...candles are lit. Cloudy and rainy days I almost always have candles burning. There my sunshine☼ sometimes. Today makes me think about how much I'm not looking forward to winter. Fall is my favorite time of year! Temps are great and the colors are better. Today we get rain...boo We have at least 2 more hikes we have to try to get in before winter's rain and cold sets in. I'm a weenie and I hate being cold and wet. Chances of me hiking in the rain or wet are slim, but you never know we could get a mild winter. We can only hope. I'm hoping for a beautiful fall this year. No rain to take down the leaves before there time. I love the fall leaves. It was such a nice ☼summer here and I think it's about to end. This morning it was almost chilly enough to turn on our house heater for a bit but I didn't. NOOOOOoooo not yet.

I was out and about yesterday and meeting my friend for lunch and I stopped into the woman's second hand clothing store I've used forever. They keep me dressed now & while losing 147 pounds. I traded a lot of my old clothes off to her on consignment little by little, bag by bag. She sold them and I got credits in her store. Those credits have just kept going and going. And each time I pick up something I never have to drop cash...I have store credit. Love it! Free shopping! Well I hit her up for a job yesterday while chit chatting. Perfect job for me and I would love, love, love to work at a woman's consignment shop! So I told her that *crossing fingers I get in sooner or later* I left her my business card and looked right at her and said "I would be good at this job and I'd love to work here"! :) She's small but I know she has 2 employees~ so you never know? This week I also applied for a job at a candy shop. Cool huh...face my fears head on! LOL ~Fat girl living in a skinny body get's job in chocolate store. PERFECT! I'd love spending my day around chocolate and candy all day. Better than standing as a checker all day at Wal mart. Needless to say...still looking for more work, more money.

Friday I'm going to get a eye exam at Costco. But this time it's different. I'm buying glasses. I've bought contacts before and only had to wear them when working with paper at work. At home I wear dollar store glasses, not contacts. Now it's to the point I can't see shit anymore. So I find myself walking around places wearing these stupid funky dollar store glasses looking like a goober in public with these crazy glasses. I have glasses with lady bugs, blue ones, purple ones, pink ones. Fine for home but not in public. There every where in my house because I'm blind! So I guess I just admitted by making the appt. that I'm old and blind and going to buy glasses for everyday life. Can't wait to see again. :) This should be fun...I've never picked out glasses for my face. Hm My hubby keeps telling me it's a bitch after you turn 40. I told him "i feel better @ 41 than i did @ 20... im just blind"! so there! LOL He's poking fun at me cause I'm about to turn 42. It's all good~Life only get's better!

Other than that I don't know much I guess. It's raining, I know that &...blah

Just thought I'd check in & saying HEY I'm here.

...hey!

Monster trucks and tractors oh my...

Yesterday we went the harvest festival. Greasy food, lots of dirt, kettle korn, monster trucks, tractor pulls and modified trucks ~oh my. It was hot, loud, fun and we had a great time. Jon took along a friend too and they loved the trucks. I packed us lunch, took fresh apples and skipped the sugary, greasy foods and there prices$. Yeah us! I was silly yesterday and took pics of all the wonderful smells and food I didn't' eat. Silly Susy. Food porn Susy didn't eat. LOL Here are 4 pics from the day and a link below for more pictures from the day.

This year has been a good year for me and us. Last year I met my weight loss goal and this year I've got to live it. I have walked, hiked, joined along, more this year than all years put together and it still amazes me almost 3 years later. I enjoy showing my family pictures here so that's what I've been sharing lately on my blog~Life off the couch. Life has changed so much for me. And everyday I still hop, skip and jump of this dream I must be dreaming. The number does not so much matter as how I feel. More then just weight that has been lifted from my heart or body. I can't even put it into words. It's just a feeling that is staying with me. It's been a good summer seeing new places close and far. And most of our little hikes out and about has not cost us much money. A parking pass here and lunch there.

Well I'm off to pick some of my tomato's. My garden did great this year. We have been eating a few tomato's the past few weeks and most of them are red these days and yummy too. It's too bad winter is coming...gotta love the fresh veggies.

If you wanna see a few more tractor pull pics I've added a few more on Facebook~

www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=108334&id=544116917&l=688cd1c488

he he he

Dog gone stains...

weight 145.7

Hate going to the laundromat. Dryer died...school starts tomorrow...OH no, the boy needs clothes. So off to the laundromat we go to dry. First one we went too Derrel came out after checking to see if there were dryers open and said "you ready for this hunny?" Um "I guess not" ~I'm thinking" "whats wrong"??? 4 people in there and a dog...drunk & partying and not one of them were doing laundry. It was just a place to hang and drink. Lordy...So we moved on to the next town to dry. I don't miss it a bit. We have a new dryer coming tomorrow. I'm not surprised the other one quit working as it's been a piece of shit for more than a year. 3 hours to dry laundry...crazy. Happy to have a new one coming that will work. Anyway snapped this photo of me and Rufus doing laundry together yesterday.

You can't even get those "dog" gone stains out of clothes anymore! LOL We take Rufus everywhere with us. He's spoiled!

I'm doing a happy dance as school starts tomorrow! 3 cheers for school!

D is off tomorrow from work, so I think I'll go for a nooner!

Later gators!

Back to School~The most Wonderful Time of the Year

Sharing our Vacation...

Well were home and unpacked. Had a great vacation with lots of smiles and memories. 7 out of 9 days went well and only a few times did someone get angry or mad at each other but then again we stayed pretty busy. Yesterday I unpacked all our shit, went to the grocery store, did laundry, watered and cleaned my house. We had friends stay at our house while we were gone so the house would be safe and things would get watered while we were gone. Were all tired and need rest but it's back to work. We got to Lake Tahoe Nevada on Wed. after stopping in Klamath Falls Oregon for one night. We went to a great restaurant there called Wingers and went swimming and to the hot tub. I even wore my new swim suit out and about and felt good about it. Klamath Falls in half way to Tahoe so the trip up was not fast and we stopped a lot. We drove straight home on our return and we were ready to get out of the car. Took us 14+ hours to get home with only a few stops to pee.

We shopped, went swimming, rode the ski lifts up the mountain, played mini golf, movies, went hiking, bowling, got a tattoo, drove around, ate lots, played with chipmunks, walked, rode the MS Dixie boat, went to a Pink Floyd laser light show and hiked to a castle and ate some more. I stuck to my salads and egg whites and yogurts and fruit while gone and I maintained my weight on vacation. I also got a bite or three of a hot dog, had some cheese cake, ice cream, so I had some fun too.

The shops by the Gondola @ Heavenly in Tahoe we so expensive it wasn't even funny. But we had to shop and look while dad was playing slots. So we walked all over town. Jonathan and I took a half of day to shop for souvenirs and peak in the expensive shops. Some were so fancy we would peak in and smell the money and jump out fast. The Gondola is a very fancy ski lift that takes you to a observation deck over the lake. And in the winter it's a lift to many trails for skiing. There were forest fires in the area so our view kind of got ripped off but it was still a blast. I was scared to death riding and climbing that high but I did it. I think i can~i think i can... Once up on the deck we did hike a bit and got to the highest point we could get to. We hiked to 9,817 feet. That my friends would of never ever happened 3 years ago. Oh what a feeling! After getting off that mountain top it was time for my tattoo. One night waiting on my men to return from the movies I gambled a bit. Lost $20 bucks in 8 min. and I was bummed. I decided I didn't want to throw away my money, get pissy and I wanted to get something I could take home forever. I had spotted the tattoo shop when we first came into town. So we went and talked to the artist, made a deal and I did it. Had a good time to me, I enjoyed it very much. I've thought about what I wanted to get for a long time and getting it on vacation is a good memory and I'm very happy with my new tat. We went on the M.S. Dixie boat which is a 2 hour cruise to Emerald bay on the lake. Derrel and I did one of the timeshare meetings and they gave us 2 boat tickets and $40 bucks for food on the boat. That was worth over a hundred and twenty dollars and worth our hour and a half it took. First they offered us 4 free dinner buffet? I said "Ewe~that's not healthy, we don't eat buffets", so next they offered us boat tickets and lunch. We said "no thanks" to there $10,000 timeshare="give us our boat tickets", and so they did. We drove to Reno on Sat. night to spend the night there and go to a Pink Floyd laser light show. Reno sucks now as all the casinos there are closed up and gone. What used to be full of lights and sky rises is not boarded up hotels. Only a few major casinos left there now within a few blocks. Whores and crack heads galore. I don't think well ever go back. The Pink Floyd laser light show @ the planetarium was the best eye candy I've ever seen. You lay back in your chair and watch the colors and objects move around the round movie screen and that tells a story with Pink Floyd tunes. I wasn't even buzzed but sure felt like it ~Oh the colors....It was awesome, loud and cheap. We love PINK FLOYD around here. After the movie we walked Reno to check out the lights and crack heads and we went to the greasy spoon called the Nugget. Mm good! Jonathan and I shared a all beef foot long grilled hot dog...and it was good. Our last day we traveled around the lake 76 miles in our car. We hiked down to a castle in Emerald Bay. Down, down, down then up, up, up... It was beautiful down there by the lake. There were chipmunks that would come right up to you for food and sit on your lap. As long as you had food they were your friends. We all enjoyed this a lot. We stayed a played with the chipmunks for 2 hours I bet. I got tons of pics and I'll never forget it. True fun! I've never got that close to chipmunks and the best part was they loved it. I loved them! The simple pleasures in life~those are my favorites!

By the end of the week we are all fried and tired. Each day we were up early to go, go, go. On the drive home I was so tired that Derrel drove all the way home for us. We stopped by his mom's house, picked up Rufus and crashed once home. There was not enough coffee to keep me focused that day. Derrel did 16 shots of espresso through out that day on the 700+ mile drive home. Must of worked cause we made it.

1700 + miles, 450 pictures later were home...back to life!

I've uploaded my photos to Facebook and Photo Bucket. Only difference is I add a ton more to my Photo Bucket folder. You want to see all the scenery and photos...click that link.

Facebook~ http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=104198&id=544116917&l=927d10ebf9

~119 images

Photo Bucket~ http://s165.photobucket.com/albums/u59/derrelandsusy/Lake%20Tahoe%20NV%202009 ~257 images

One night on vacation...

20 min. ago.

Check out this really cool picture I took tonight of the moon, smoke & sunset out the front deck.

La La land...

Just a quick post. I was looking at the pictures I've taken so far today on our vacation and I had to share a couple. I have some fun pictures to share after I get home and have time to upload. Were having a really good time. Drove here, got our grocery's, went swimming, went shopping, played mini golf, rode the ski lift over Lake Tahoe, hiked, walked, and walked some more, and ate plenty. Jon is getting a kick of walking from California to Nevada over and over. Were right on the state line here so we keep walking from here to there over the state line over and over. I tried gambling a bit and I got mad cause I knew I could of got a new shirt or something I could take home and keep...so I did just that! Picture below... We still have a few days left and I'll be home to reality soon enough. Until then I'll share a few pictures but I have some really fun, pretty pictures to share. Were walking around Reno and and doing a Pink Floyd laser light show tomorrow night there. I'll share more pics and some fun stories when I get home and settled back into life.