Lola

Tonight I am grateful for surrogate puppy snuggles.  This is the seester's dog, Lola:

She's a 6 month old shih tzu and has apparently decided that I was put on this planet to rub her tummy, because every time I get within a foot of her she flops onto her back and gives me adorable face until I scratch her.  I'm the only one she does this to.  While I am grateful this little cutie seems to like me, I also feel like I'm cheating on my own puppies.  This feeling is not helped by the hubby sending me this

with the caption, "MOM, HOW COULD YOU?"  Poor Tallulah.  Now she's going to need therapy.  Let's not tell her that tonight's shoes are inspired by Lola, OK?  Please?

 

I'm pretty sure Lola needs duckie slippers.

I admit to dressing my dogs in outfits, but the hair bows?  I ust can't quite seem to get on board.  I think Lola is lovely without the hair bow.  Plus it might get in the way of her cow-chasing and cow-poop-eating ways.  Yep, she's classy that way, our Lola.

 

Aw...this one is adorable, and I would wear it.  Except that I wouldn't because my dogs would be mad at me for the rest of forever.

 

Also adorable.

Now if you'll excuse me I need to go get some therapy for cheating on my puppies.

Henry!

Today I learned (because the Pinterest Friend learned) that the Pumpkin Seed is actually a Henry!  So now she will have 3 boys, counting her hubby, in her family.  It's Facebook official, so I'm not giving any spoilers by posting it here.  Tonight's shoes are in gratitude for baby boys:

I do love me some plaid.

I love these. The gray parts look like dapper, little vests.

He would, of course, need a matching sweater to go with these.

So snuggly for a little Idaho baby!

I love all of the colors of the foxes.

I mostly found "girl" owl shoes.  What's up with that?

And of course some adorable hedgie hogs.

Yay, babies!  I'm having a sleepover at the seester's tonight, so I'm off to snuggle with Flower and Laughter while we watch the new season of Fixer Upper.

Advent

Today I am thankful that we are in the liturgical season of Advent, my favorite season.  A time when we look forward to the light coming into our darkness.  I needed that reminder today, needed to be reminded of the hope present in this season.  I won't go into the details of why and blah blah blah, instead I'm just going to give you 4 pairs of Advent-blue shoes, one for each Sunday in this season:

And now I am going to go to bed.

Friendship

Tonight I am grateful for time with nieces who aren't actually nieces (but please don't tell them that).  Pippi and Tink spent the night last night and had a sleepover with Flower and Laughter.  And me and The Bean, too, for that matter.  Pippi and Tink were a little annoyed at having to wait so long to hang out but between being sick, Thanksgiving, etc. yesterday was the first time that worked.  Plus, why not throw in a sleepover with 4 giggling, wild girls after a day of 50th anniversary celebrations?  Actually, I'll tell you why:  I'm old and now I'm tired. 😜 Anyway, one of the things the girls did while they were here was to make friendship bracelets, so that is what inspired tonight's shoes:

I like idea of both these pairs in theory, but they're just a little too busy for me in practice.  Still fun, though.

I like this one a lot.  I'd like it better with a different back, I think, but I still like it.

How cool is this?  Except I would never have the patience to make one, let alone 2.  I got about 2 inches of one bracelet done in something like an hour and a half and gave up.  I have to figure out how I made them in college, because I was either infinitely more patient (not likely) or I didn't do them the "correct" way (much more likely).

 

All the girls love fleep flops, so clearly they need to make each other friendship footwear!

I love all of my babies who are no longer babies.  I'm also not going to complain about sleeping alone tonight!

Oh, one more thing, in case you didn't see my post on Facebook today.  Laughter and Tink made up their own recipe last night.  They took jelly beans, wrapped them in Laffy Taffy, and rolled the whole thing in sprinkles.  Then they froze them.  My teeth hurt just typing that sentence! They were super proud of themselves, though, the little goofs.

50th Wedding Anniversary

Today is my parents' 50th wedding anniversary.  They didn't want a big party, but we celebrated with family and had family pictures taken.  They decided rather than cake we would have pie, which turned into a pie contest.  There were 7 pies:  pecan (me), cottage cheese (sounds weird, but it's super good, it's my dad's mom's recipe) (brother), ugly (actual name - comes from a children's book) (Laughter), coconut cream (Flower), mince meat (with actual meat, so traditional) (Doulble A), banana coconut cream (The Bean), and French silk chocolate (Auntie).  They were all quite yummy, and everyone "won" because Mom and Dad, as the judges, didn't want to choose, so everyone won in their own category.  Mine won for "best" pecan pie, etc.  Silly parents!

My cousin sent this shoe on Facebook today as an anniversary celebration:

Aren't they pretty and celebratory?

50th anniversary is gold, so I went looking for gold wedding shoes.

Their wedding colors were peach and mint green, so peach and mint green wedding shoes.  We also wore peach and mint green for family pictures today.

Mom's wedding shoes!  And Dad's weddings shoes, for that matter.  Also, Mom and Dad.  And a bridesmaid.  And possibly my grandpa.  And some guy's elbow.  And someone's face, but I'm not sure who.  I'm tired, can you tell?

Today I am definitely thankful for family, especially my parents and their 50 years together.

Strange

A quick entry tonight because once again I got caught up and almost forgot to post.  Today I am thankful for family.  I know, I sound like a broken record, but it's because I am home and spending time with them and trying to enjoy every minute.  Today involved a lot of prep for tomorrow, but I did also get to go for a walk with my dad, look through some old pictures with my mom, hung out with my brother a bit, and go to the movie with The Bean and Double A, so that was all lovely.  They movie was Dr. Strange, and that is the theme for tonight's shoes.  Actually, it's only one pair, from three different angles, but it's a pair that definitely committed to a theme:

Scenes from the movie, but drawn like a comic book.  Even the shape is strange, which I appreciate, because again, commitment to theme.  Double A and The Bean (as I've said before) are giant marvel fans, so they were excited about the movie.  I enjoyed it quite a lot, actually, despite knowing next to nothing about this part of the Marvel universe.  But now I must go to bed so I can get up in the morning and finishing preparations for The Big Day.

Happy Thanksgiving!

My 30 Days of Thankfulness are kind of going by the wayside, not because I lack things for which to be thankful, but because I'm having such a nice time at home that I keep getting sidetracked and forgetting to post.  Like yesterday, I hung out with the parents, Double A, and the Bean, and then the girls had a sleepover, and I was in bed before I realized I hadn't posted.  Which is silly because we wore awesome pjs that would have made for a great post:

As I said on Facebook yesterday, yes, I AM that auntie who forces her nieces to wear matching pjs with her.  Here is a slightly different view:

This is fro tonight, and see that awesome sock peaking out from my pjs?

Yep.  Totally owl thanksgiving socks!  It's quite the fabulous theme I have going on.  I actually feel slightly guilty for posting all of this cute owl stuff where the Pinterest Friend can't see it, when she isn't here to participate.  But really, it's her own fault for getting me obsessed with owls in the first. place. 😋  Speaking of the PF, she sent me this recently:

 

Flip flop turkey!  Hilarious and adorable.  Which brings me to the earrings I wore today for Thanksgiving:

Ridiculous(ly adorable) turkey earrings.

Today I am thankful for so many things:  time with family, good friends, yummy food, silly accessories, the list could go on an on.  Rather than keep you (or me) up any later, though, I will just show one more picture, which is of our first Thanksgiving meal of the day:

The girls decided they wanted a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving this year, so we had this around 11:30 and regular Thanksgiving tonight.  Good times.  And Good Night.  I hope your day was filled with blessings.

My Dad is Awesome

Today (as on all days) I am grateful for my dad.  He tells really bad dad jokes and he loves his kids and grandkids fiercely.  When I got home on Saturday night I found this on my bed:

He saw it at the clothing store here in my hometown and apparently decided that I needed it.  Isn't he just the sweetest?  So, in honor of him, today's shoes are all about dads and daughters:

Blue shoes!

These look more like dress shoes my dad might wear, and I had black mary janes when I was little.

I love this one.  Red shoes! Ruffle butt tights!  I don't think I could talk my dad into white pants and red shoes, though.

I probably had something similar to these as a kid, too.

My dad rocks, and I am very lucky to have him in my life.

Double A

Today I am thankful simply that I am no longer throwing up.  Laughter got sick Friday night, and then the entire family, except for Flower, got sick last night through this morning.  Yep.  Mom, Dad, Seester, Brother-in-law, Brother, Double A, Bean, and me.  Not a single one of us went to school or work today.  It was a rough one.  We're all slowly on the mend.  I've managed to keep down 2 pieces of toast today and I'm trying to stay hydrated.  Since today's thankfulness is about vomit, I really don't want to see what shoes would come up, so I'm going with the post I was going to do yesterday before the gunk attacked.

Yesterday Laughter called and wanted to talk to Double A.  They then spent roughly an hour and a half on the phone, first singing approximately 4 million verses of Old MacDonald, and then Laughter read to Double A.  Actually, she read the words she knew, and spelled the rest so Double A could tell her what they were.  It was adorable.  And Double A was so incredibly patient and sweet to her cousin.  She's always been a kind and sweet child, and now she's growing into a kind and sweet young woman.  So tonight's shoes are in honor of her.  I've already done shoes from her first name, so tonight's are from her middle name:

You can probably tell that these are all from the same designer as they are all fairly similar in style.

I know 2 things today:  NOT throwing up is lovely, and I have the best nieces on the planet.

Happy Birthday, Flower!

I got sidetracked yesterday and didn't post.  It's because I'm in Montana and there were nieces to play with and a seester to hang out with, and I still had to get some work done, and in the midst of all of that I forgot to post.  Yesterday was Flower's 11th birthday, so she was going to be what I was grateful for.  Of course, I'm thankful for her everyday, and today we had her family party (last night she had a couple of friends over after school and Holy Giggling, Batman!), so I figured she can still be my grateful inspiration for tonight.  Since I was last home her favorite color has switched from purple to blue (be still my heart), so tonight's post is 11 pairs of blue flowered shoes in honor of Flower:

Flower has the best giggle.  Sometimes it will just burst out of her and it makes me smile every time.  I'm an awfully lucky auntie to get to have her for a niece.

Today was awesome because I got to see Mom, Dad, the brother, Double A, The Bean, and the auntie.  I've spent the last 2 nights at the seester's, so now Mom and Dad brought me to their house after the party.  It was also just a little bit of a rough day because when the whole family is together I realize more tangibly just how much I miss out on by not living closer.  So I get homesick even though I'm home.  And I miss the hubby.  I have issues.