Holiday Cheer

One of my favorite parts of Christmas are the Holiday parties! We attended two this weekend and had such a good time at both! On Friday, we went to the third annual Hanukkah potluck in Crawfordsville. Our dear friends, Peter, who was the swim coach at Wabash, and Allyson are Jewish but were always too far away from their families on the east coast to really celebrate Hanukkah. Scott, another Wabash staff member, decided that this was unacceptable and offered to host a Hanukkah potluck. So the tradition began... an evening filled with fabulous traditional Hanukkah cuisine (brisket, potato latkes, kugel, and some Manischewitz--but mostly just for looks) and the lighting of the menorah. Peter and Allyson moved to Maine two years ago, but the tradition continues.
Edible Dreidels--A funny little Hanukkah snack for the wee ones.
Push a pretzel stick in one end of a large marshmallow. Add a dab of peanut butter on the other end (it acts like glue) and attach an unwrapped Hershey kiss (My favorite this time of year is the peppermint!). You can't really play the game, but what fun to eat!

On Saturday night we ventured to Beth and Dave Price's house for their annual Christmas party and "Dirty Bingo" extravaganza. "Dirty Bingo" is a type of white elephant with a twist. Everyone at the party writes down 10 numbers between 1 and 30. When your number is called you take a gift from the pile in the center of the room. Once all of those gifts are gone, you start stealing from the other party goers---of course you don't know what you're stealing because the gifts are wrapped. Some gifts are perfectly usable--a bag of gumballs, coffee beans, bottle of wine. Others are funny little leftovers of someone's past--Indiana Beach T-shirts, vasectomy advertisements...you get the idea. Nick and I use this party as our personal "Goodwill" drop off. This year we took themed bags. The "stationary" bag held a pencil holder that doubled as a clock (the clock didn't work) and a very large Wabash College notepad, that wasn't even sticky like Post-Its. Our "romance" bag held random votives, a speedo, and one of those cheesy romance novels set in the 1800's. For an added touch, Nick copied pictures of our faces and taped them over the faces of the characters on the cover...hilarious! You get the idea. We must have played our cards right because at the end of the night, we had peddled all of our junk off to several other unsuspecting souls and we came home with just one gift, a bottle of wine.
One of the highlights of the event is always the lime sherbet punch, and let me assure you, it certainly packs a "punch." I asked Dave for the recipe and apparently there isn't really one. Here's how to start it out:

1. A little lime sherbet in a blender
2. Add champagne to a desired consistency
3. Blend
4. If you're feeling extra sassy--add a few shots of vodka before blending

It's what I would refer to as a "DD" kind of concoction--delicious and dangerous, even in small amounts. Remember friends, slow and steady wins the race!

Thanks for the fun Beth and Dave!

Little Lainey's Story

Many of you might be wondering how Lainey came to be in our lives since Abby is--was-- such an only child--not that there's anything wrong with that! On Halloween Little Lainey was wondering the neighborhood of a wonderful woman I use to work with, Carol. Lainey followed all of the kids around like she was their dog, but at the end of the night, Lainey really had no home to call her own. Carol, who has a heart for animals, couldn't bear to see such a loving dog out on the streets, so Lainey had a home for the night. Carol's neighbor is a vet and agreed to take Lainey and quarantine her for the week, making sure she was healthy and had no contagious diseases that could harm other dogs, and figured out that Lainey was a Boxer mix. At the end of that week, Carol sent out a plea to all the dog families she knew asking them to open their hearts and homes to Lainey as a foster dog or as a permanent pet. To seal the deal, she attached a picture of Lainey Beans which melted my heart.

This email arrived in my inbox on a Friday. Nick was attending the funeral of a fraternity brother's father in Michigan, so I used a little self control and didn't immediately say, "Yes, we'll take her." I mentioned it to Nick when he called, but he didn't say too much about it, so I resigned myself to the fact that we would continue to be a one dog house. On Saturday, I showed him the picture that Carol had sent and when I hopped in the shower, Nick called Carol to say that we would foster Lainey. Lainey came and didn't stay far out of reach. If was obvious that she loved people. She even positioned all 35 pounds of herself carefully on my lap. Everyone was happy, except for Abby. So Nick and I set off to find Lainey a home, contacting anybody we knew who had ever mentioned even liking dogs. By Wednesday, one of Nick's co-workers and his girlfriend came over to have a peek at our precious. They called later that night saying that they wanted to keep her for the weekend. This is about the time that I started to wonder if maybe Lainey wasn't meant to live on Sherry Lane. I had such a hard time thinking about letting her go for the weekend, let alone forever. On the other hand, I was going to be devastated if they didn't love her and want to keep her. There was only one solution that would make me happy--Lainey needed to stay.

So now, lovely Lainey is ours. She and Abby have come to some understandings like whose food bowl is whose and what furniture Abby is willing to share and what furniture (i.e.the couch and blue chair) are for the black dog only. All in all, things are going well. This afternoon, all four of us took a nap in our bed--that was first! I'd post a picture, but seriously who would take it when we're all napping. Lainey starts puppy class after the holidays. Abby is thrilled, it means 2 hours of peace and quiet for her on Tuesday evenings, and hopefully, Lainey will come home tired!

The First Post

Hello everyone! This is the first post of the Collins family. We recently rescued a new puppy. Her name is Lainey & she loves to play and sleep.

Abby is getting used to her new shadow.