December 26, 2008:  We hope you all had a Merry Christmas, ours was great, nothing special but great.  The rest of last week and beginning of this week was really just more of the same with the snow and insane traffic every where we went.  Overall we got near two feet of snow at our house over a little more than a week, from what the weather guy on the news says, this is the most snow we've had at this time of year since 1861, figures because we moved here to get away from the snow!  I shoveled the driveway and walk and part of the sidewalk a few times over the last few days and was really one of the only people in the neighborhood to do even bother.  The funny part is that we have no trouble getting in and out of our driveway both on foot and in the cars when everyone else is still struggling to come and go.  They complain that shoveling it hard and it's too cold but honestly I enjoy it, fresh clean air and a little exercise during the time of year that I get very little.  It's supposed to start raining tonight and be in the mid to high 40's all weekend so now flooding is a concern, I need to get out front and clean out the storm drain before everything starts to back up.  Our street hasn't been plowed and probably has six to ten inches of packed snow and ice on it which is going to be a huge mess when it starts to melt.  Other than the weather nonsense not much else is new.  We made a nice Christmas dinner with ham and all kinds of yummy side dishes, that was fun because we never really cook.  Stella is doing well, she's getting the cabin fever as well but should be able to go to the park again real soon.  I found a few pictures that we took but never uploaded and put them on her page, check them out if you're bored.  Enjoy the weekend and we'll hook up next week. 

December 18, 2008:  Well it's been forever as always, same old deal around here.  The riding season officially ended for us when the temperature fell below freezing and has stayed there for the last week or so.  Stella went to another show and did better, she still needs some practice but hopefully she's show material.  She'll have a couple more chances in January at the Portland show.  Work has been insane for me, I've been working more hours than I have been able to keep track of.  We've been trying to perform the one of the largest network changes the company has ever had to see and we've had nothing but trouble with everything from the hardware to the weather.  Lisa has been working and will likely be filling in for some of her coworkers that are taking extra time off for the holidays.  Stella has been in season for the last two weeks so that has been a new challenge for us and her as well.  She has no idea what's happening to herself and she hasn't really been able to go out and exercise much.  Hopefully it's starting to wind down so she should be back to normal soon and be able to go to the park to burn off some energy.  We have a holiday party at a friend's house this Saturday night but other than that we have the weekend off to hang out and relax.  All areas around Seattle have gotten quite a bit of snow this week along with the temperatures in the low 20's but we have somehow got nothing until last night and today.  Our expectations of how everyone would deal with the snow were right on, a complete disaster.  We had to cancel our night work because the two people doing it, my boss and myself, were unable to get out of their neighborhoods.  Eric had to park his car almost 3 miles from his house last night and walk the rest of the way home and the highway I need to take to get to the city was closed most of the day thus gridlocking most of the eastside.  Lisa was able to get to work without too much trouble and will be coming home when they close the store early in a couple hours.  I've shoveled the deck and driveway a couple times but I think it may be still snowing a bit, too dark to see from here.  Other than all that fun, not much is new.  We hope you are all having a good pre-holiday season, we'll talk again soon.