Sentimental Birthday

Eric turned the big thirty five today! Woot! I can't believe how much time flies..it feels like we just celebrated his birthday yesterday. I'm always at a loss as to what to get him for his cake day, aside from cooking something he really likes. He has the same problem with me when my birthday rolls around. We're challenging like that, lol. 

If you're a consistent reader of my blog, you'll remember about Cali passing away last month...it was pretty rough because she was extremely loved by all of us. The person it hit the hardest was Eric since she was his pride and joy. Before she passed away, I managed to get some paw impressions from her since I was gonna make some sort of shadow box with some of her trinkets in it. In the midst of getting idea's of what to make, I rolled across Mug Revolution. It's a site where you can get a beautiful ceramic mug custom made. I shot off an email to the owner who was incredibly nice & very helpful, then went ahead and ordered a 16oz mug in which I can have Cali's paw print put on it, a glaze called "Earth tone" which borders on the colors she had in addition to a little heart on the thumb rest since she had a heart design on her chest. 

Luckily, it showed up just in time for his birthday and it came out beautifully! 

Seriously, I couldn't be happier! 

It's a very sturdy, 16oz mug with the "Earth tones" color scheme. I love how the "thumb button" came out with the little heart...Cali's tag was a heart, plus she had a heart pattern on her chest. 

When I gave it to Eric, he completely lit up and got this massive smile on his face. I gathered that he really, REALLY liked it. So much in fact, that he ended up taking it with him to work so he can have it on his desk :) He told me while messaging back and forth on Facebook, "I love it a lot and very appreciative of having it.Very happy with it and it makes me smile when I look at it at work."

Not to pump myself up or anything, but I think I did a pretty good job getting him a memorable birthday gift. In addition to that, I'm bustin' out with some Cajun Chicken Alfredo (he loves it) and I already baked a bunch of coconut macaroon cookies for him. Such a hard life, right? Then we'll be going out on Friday for a Date Day since he has the day off, so I'm sure we'll go catch a movie or something :) 

Another year down, many many more to go! 

Read More

Damn you, red ball.

This is a red ball. 

A simple...red...squeaky...rubber...ball. 

I wanted to buy said ball for Cole since he's the destroyer of all things that squeak...and yet...we ended up with....

Grimm.  

 

On Tuesday, Eric and I were making our way home from the Commissary since we needed to pick up some additional groceries since he was going to be home all week. Since we were in the town of Bocholt to look for some special salt for a friend of mine, I remembered that there was a pet store in the town so I could just pop in there and grab a toy for him. 

That, folks, was our downfall. 

In the midst of looking at the various toys, Eric disappeared to the back of the store where the puppies were kenneled because, hey, who can resist puppies? I wasn't really worried about it because I didn't think they'd have any particular breed we would've been interested in. Yeah...I was wrong. In fact, very very wrong. They had two bulldog puppies and two Dachshund puppies. If you know us, you know that Eric has wanted a bulldog forever, and we have an obvious weakness for Dachshunds. Of course, I play with the doxies and he's looking at the bullies...those lil boogers were a thousand euros a piece! GAG! The dachshunds, not so much..hah. So of course, we're making our way out of the puppy area and the owner comes in to see what we think of the puppies...and I think he saw how inlove Eric was with the bully babies. A thousand euros is absolutely out of the question since that could go towards our mazhout order (stupid diesel used over here to heat the homes)...THEN the guy tells him "I have a six month old bully for sale. He's three hundred euros and his name is Hummer". Oh, lovely! So, he brings Hummer out. he's insanely cute, very very sweet and gets along well with other dogs. If we didn't use our brains, we would've taken him straight home...but...the main factor that clicked in is: Macie. 

Macie is Eric's pride and joy..his defender of the house...his little body guard. She DOES NOT like other dogs very easily. In fact, she's earned the nick name of "Puff" because she puffs up double her size and basically hulks out on other dogs. Sooooo bringing a bulldog into the mix would be hazardous. Luckily, the guy said he'd hold Hummer for us since Wednesday and Thursday were Belgian holidays, so they'd be closed anyway. In addition to holding Hummer, he also held the little male Dachshund for us since I was wondering how Macie would react to him. Over the two days, we flip flopped back and forth a lot...ultimately decided we'd see how Macie would act and go from there. Wellllll...when we introduced Macie to Hummer, it went over like a lead balloon. I've NEVER seen her try to crawl up Eric's leg to get away from another dog, not to mention, she made so many ugly faces..it was kinda entertaining (to be honest). After about fifteen minutes of trying to introduce them to one another, it was VERY clear that it wasn't going to work out with Hummer. I, of course, was bummed for Eric because I know how badly he's wanted a bully, and he got attached to Hummer. Then, they allowed us to bring the baby Dachshund out...talk about a complete one eighty! She was instantly intrigued, kept sniffling him and started wagging her tail! Eric and I were both shocked because she never does that sort of thing. After letting them walk around one another for a bit, it was clear that she didn't have any sort of problem with him and basically gave him the thumbs up.

 We filled out paperwork and got a "Welcome home puppy" box, then we were on our merry way with the newest edition to the Hall house. 

 He even got an official "Puppy Passport" so we can keep tabs on his vaccinations and what not. Cool, right? None of the other dogs got little passports like this, so it'll definitely be easier to figure out which one is his when the time comes to move.

Over the last couple of days, it's been a riot with Grimm getting adjusted to the house, not to mention, gaining three bossy sisters and a dopy big brother. For the most part, Grimm just lounges around on dog beds, gets checked on to make sure he's still breathing, then he doses off for a few hours before running around and causing havoc with Piper. 

 Here's a pic for some size reference as to how small this furball is. Izzy wasn't even this small when we got her at 10 weeks old, so I'm kind of at a loss as to how tiny Grimm actually is. He's using Pipers old collapsible travel bowl set to eat from since the portion size is appropriate for him. Thing is, I have to collapse it all the way so he can actually reach the food! Otherwise, it's too tall for him and he knocks it all over the place by trying to stand on the ledge in order to get the food. His belly is about an inch and a half from the floor, he weighs about a pound and a half and he's the length of Eric's foot (size 13). His paw is the size of my thumb! 

LITTLE DACHSHUND! HUGE personality!

 Oh yeah..and I noticed something hilarious that Grimm does when Eric hold him. Eric tends to cuddle him like he's a baby, so of course Grimm goes limp because he likes having his belly rubbed...then I noticed the faces he makes. 

It took me about ten shots for me to actually get this pic cause I couldn't stop laughing... no, Eric isn't doing a choke hold on him. He just makes this derpy face when he's getting his belly rubbed. Epic cuteness, right?

The girls have been super inquisitive and try to figure out "what" he is since he's so tiny, while Cole on the other hand, follows him around and plops close by to keep an eye on him. Macie took all of us by surprise because she acts like she's his mother / protector and tries to keep the other dogs away from him. Definitely wasn't expecting that! Grimm is completely oblivious to all of this and just runs himself ragged in the mean time.

We've had a bit of a heat wave here in Belgium...and by heat wave, I mean someone turned the outdoor temperature setting to "HELL". It was in the low 90's yesterday while it was in the high 90's today...very hot and very miserable, especially since our house holds all the heat in despite all the windows being open & having fans circulating air around. All of the dogs found a way to cool themselves down throughout the house except the littlest derp. So, we gave him a bath to cool him down a little bit since he really looked like he was struggling to find some sort of relief.

 Wet weenie baby is not pleased.

After his quick cool down and a fast toweling, he was off and running around like a bat out of hell to pick up where he left off in terms of harassing Cole and gnawing on his baby Kong toy. Tomorrow's his first visit with our vet to make sure everything is on the "up & up" in terms of his vaccines and anything else he might need to be checked out for. Grimm fits in PERFECTLY with our family! I really couldn't have asked for a sweeter puppy...really, I couldn't have. His little tail goes a mile a minute, plays wonderfully with the other dogs and knows how to sleep in (that's a MAJOR plus in our family!). 

 He's definitely a total love bug!

*** To those of you who could possibly be making comments about us having "another" dog, which brings our total to five k-9's...in all seriousness, shove it & keep it to yourself. Our dogs are our kids who are extremely well taken care of, they have a "forever home" with us and all are spoiled rotten. I refrained from posting about him earlier or even posting pics of him on my Facebook because I don't want ignorant & judgmental people making brainless comments about our decision to add another fur baby to our family. But, screw it. On that note, Tah! ***

Read More

Tapis de fleurs 2012

'Tis that time of year again! The flower tapestry in Brussels has returned!

 Here's my post from when Eric and I checked it out in 2010. Since Eric's still recovering from his surgery, I ended up venturing to Brussels on my own in order to do a "smash & grab" type of adventure in order to get some pictures of the tapestry. As much as he wanted to go, it's for the best that he didn't attempt it due to pushy tourists in addition to uneven cobblestones everywhere.

I left bright and early this morning...and if you know me, early and I don't mix well. At least I was able to catch up on some of my reading while cruisin on the train :)

 

Once I made it to Brussels, I waddled my way down to Grand Place since that's where the flower tapestry was waiting for massive hordes of people to "ooooh" and "awwwweee" over it. Keep in mind, the official opening time for it was 9am...I got there at 8:55a and there was already a massive line of people waiting to get into the Grand Place hotel in order to access the balcony for a view. 

This isn't the line...

......this is.

Here's a map to get a better idea of where I was. The red star is the train station, the green is where I walked, the yellow star is the end of the line to get into the Grand Place hotel, and the orange line is...well..the line to get into Grand Place hotel. 

Luckily, the line moved along fairly quick...I think it took about twenty five minutes to get into the hotel itself, so in the mean time, I managed to take some pictures of the buildings and whatever else I fancied.

The fabulous balcony everyone migrated towards in order to get a better view of the tapestry itself:

 

While I was going through and editing all the pictures, Eric really liked this one :) 

Once I managed to actually make it onto the balcony (after seeing a few people get kicked out of the line for not respecting the "no pictures" rule for inside the hotel), I kinda had to fight my way to the front so I could get some pictures of the flowers. 

Oh, and right before I  made my way into the building, I noticed they were selling t-shirts of the whole event...the image was one of the patterns from the tapestry, but in the shape of Africa. Kinda confused me, but I just guess that was the theme for this years' carpet. SO, I hopped online to find some handy dandy information for ya about it and here ya go:

The begonias are traveling!

This summer, you will have the chance to escape to faraway lands, while staying at the heart of our capital city. No need for any philtre or strange potion to get there... The magic will work on its own and when you visit the Grand-Place, you will be transported to the centre of a mysterious continent: Africa! An extraordinary tapestry of shimmering patterns recalling designs from the tribes of Ethiopia, Congo, Nigeria, Botswana, and Cameroun, a harmonious fusion which will carry you away for a magnificent trip.Such a breath-taking result takes months of preparation. Landscape architects, technicians and hundreds of voluntary participants, colour specialists for the occasion, took part in this most unusual adventure. This extraordinary weaving of begonias will be exhibited during 5 long days. A mad challenge for an unforgettable event, which you will be able to admire from the Grand-Place or the balconies of the town Hall. All roads lead to this multicoloured rendezvous...

Why Africa?

This part of the world stands out for the extraordinary diversity of its populations, its landscapes, its cultures and its colours. It has the power to make us dream to the rhythm of its dances, its drums and its performing arts, reflecting age old traditions. And so past and present echo one another, as do the here and the elsewhere, old Europe and young Africa, permanent contrasts. The continent has lessons of life to offer and proposes other perspectives and alternatives to the systems that we have used for so long.It is this diversity, so rich and inspiring, that we want to honour and represent this year: a carpet of flowers, of course, but enriched with an even more enchanting palette. Our artists have combined the begonias with barks, precious materials, sands, soils and pigments...
Come and walk along its borders, wander around the equator of our city. Enjoy recognizing the origins of the beautiful patterns which make up this strange fabric that unfolds before your eyes.
 

A worthy challenge

It's a double bet this year. The first aspect is symbolizing an entire continent, so rich and mulch-faceted, on 1.800 m2. The second is the duration of the display: the flowers and materials will stay fresh and bright throughout the five days. They will enchant you thanks to the attention and care which they will receive over the course of this beautiful event.

Annnnnnd here's a video I managed to get while getting poked and prodded by various tourists smushing in to get pictures:

Alright...why the random door latch? OK, you're not allowed to take pictures within the hotel, but when I was making my way outta there once I was done with the balcony, there was a room on the right hand side that caught my eye. It's a large hall that looks like it's used for ceremonies of some sort. Of course, I couldn't get a picture of it due to the rules (and a guard standing there to ensure people didn't take pictures)...but I was totally enamored  with the door handle because of it's design. Isn't it cool looking? After a little bit, the guard asked me "Do you want a picture of that?"...of course I jumped at the opportunity cause I don't know how I'd go about describing this thing. So, once the coast was clear, I snapped this pic and went on my merry way and the guard gave me a thumbs up for not looking like an obvious tourist :)

Here's another pic once I made it back to the ground level and made my way through the sea of tourists that ended up doubling in numbers while I was in the hotel. 

This kinda gives you an idea as to how packed all those flowers are throughout the entire tapestry. The crazy thing is that they don't get blown all over the place when the wind picks up! Then again, they've been making these sort of tapestries since the seventies, so you'd think they'd have it down to a science by now, ya know?

Oh yeah, and there's an official Hard Rock Cafe now in Grand Place! So, of course I had to make my way over there to get myself a hand dandy and oh so spiffy  bottle opener to go with the rest of my Hard Rock collection :) 

AND, there's this guy who does beautiful beautiful water color paintings from around Brussels.

He was actually working on another painting, so I got to watch him for about fifteen minutes while he was painting the actual flower carpet and then moved onto the sky. I gotta hand it to the guy, he's got some serious patience while he's working! Tourists were asking him everything under the sun, he was selling stuff and painting...handy dandy!

Last time Eric and I were there, we picked up two different panoramic paintings of Grand Place, so this time I opted to get two different styles since we have a thing about getting paintings from various places we visit. Since we wasn't there, I just picked whatever I thought were the prettiest :)  

After all that, I was spent. Totally spent. There's a super hot heat wave here and it's absolutely miserable, especially in Brussels since it seemed like the cobblestone was making it 10x hotter than necessary, LOL. Keep in mind, by the time I was catching the train to come back home, it was 10:15a and it was already sitting at 80*. I wanted to die. Despite being a Californian and all that nonsense, Momma don't do hot. As I'm writing this out, it's 6:44p and it's still 84*. BLUH. I'm sure there's some people reading this and laughing because they probably deal with hot weather all the time. Well, live in Belgium for a bit and then have a heat wave sprung on ya. I betcha you'd be singing the same song as me! lol....SO, when I was waiting on my train to show up, I think I earned a fabulous raspberry / blackcurrant frappachino from the ever so wonderful Starbucks that opened not too long ago in Brussels Centraal station. 

Made it back home, plopped in front of a fan and made it a point to hammer out this post for ya. If you haven't seen the floral tapestry and you live in Belgium, by all means, you should check it out. It's absolutely gorgeous and it's amazing to realize how much time went into making something like that for people to see. I mean, there's folks who travel far and wide to check that thing out. So, if you have the chance to just hop on a train (which you can travel for only 15 euro round trip this month!!), take the time to go do it! Besides, help yourself to an awesome Belgian waffle while you're at it. 

Read More

Dressed To Impress

Mother Nature is definitely an interesting character. As I was driving the other day, I noticed this cow in a pasture and I did a double take because...I could've SWORN that the farmer (or his wife) was making this cow look extra girly by sticking a bow on the top of her head. Of course, I thought it was silly and kept driving because there's no way she'd randomly be rocking a bow.

Sure enough, I drove by her again today and I pointed her out to Eric and said "Is it me, or is that a bow on her head?"..Keep in mind, she was a good distance away. After pulling over to check her out..sure enough, that's part of her pattern! How cool / cute is that? 

The black is very slimming on you dahhhhling! 

Some of us are just born "faaaahhbulous!" 

Read More

DIY Sushi Time!

I've heard from friends that you can pick up a cool sushi kit at one of the local stores if you're really wanting sushi without having to travel forty five minutes to an hour and a half to get your fix. Of course, I was talking to Eric about it and we agreed that it'd be fun to test this out at our house since we're total sushi addicts. 

I popped over to the store and picked up a Saitaku sushi kit. At first, I thought I got so insanely good at reading Dutch that I could CLEARLY read the instructions...and to my shock, they were all in English! ENGLISH!!!  

ENGLISH!!! AHHHHHHH!!! As Eric would say it... "ENGRISH"

Here's what comes in the kit:

Sushi rice

Sushi vinegar

Soy sauce

Sushi nori

Ginger

Wasabi paste

Rolling mat

Chop sticks

VERY easy instruction leaflet that has pictures that tells you how to roll up the rice / nori. 

Since Eric and I are huge fans of shrimp tempura, we opted to make some for the rolls:

Once the shrimp was all fried up, the carrots & avocado's were sliced, rice was finished, and we made our samurai sauce, we started working on rolling everything together. Not bad, right?

To my relief, they came out SO...SO good! We basically made spicy shrimp tempura rolls for our first attempt of ever making sushi at home! It was a lot of fun and it was extremely entertaining to watch Eric and myself cook something that's totally out of our comfort zone. I have no problems making Mexican, German, and even Greek food..but Japanese, even something as simple as sushi, it totally out in left field for me. 

SO, if we can do it, you can too! 

Read More