Bearish Birthday

Last weekend our good friend Ryan Marchbanks entered what we've coined "the Jesus years".  That means the old biological clock checked out of the 20's and into the 30's.  The rationalization is that Jesus really came into His own once He hit His thirties but really it's just a way to cope with leaving the twenties behind.

Stacie became good friends with Hilary and Ryan while attending Baylor University.  When we moved to Austin we unwittingly rented a house roughly five minutes from the Marchbanks home...a brilliant stroke of luck!  To help Ryan ring in 'the Jesus years' we were invited to cheer on Baylor in an upset bid of Texas A&M.

Here's a shot of the action

Hillary & Ryan

Sic'm Bears

We drove down to Waco last night and cheered the Bears on to victory over A&M.  We even joined in and sang 'The Old Baylor Line' as they celebrated the big win.  Somehow we ended-up sitting in one of the two A&M sections (worthy of it's own blog post) and yet we had a great time.  Happy birthday Ryan and thanks for letting us celebrate with you!

-Kyle

Too Close for Comfort

For all of our faithful blog followers I'm sure it's no secret that Austin Texas experienced a sad and eventful day.  In case you missed the days' events, check this link here:  LINK

Long story short; a guy gets into it with his wife, she takes the daughter to a hotel, he busts out an anti-government manifesto and posts it on-line, burns the house down and crashes his plane into an office park housing the IRS.

Here's where it gets a bit personal.  Take a look at the map below.  Pin D is our house and Pin A is the charcoaled remains of the perpetrators home.  Notice that D covers A because we're freakin neighbors!  We walk our innocent puppies by that house every day (okay, they're not so innocent but you get the idea).

Map of Destruction

Now, deploy your mapography skills on points C and B.  Point C is the new home of eFueling Technologies, LLC where I toil daily.  Point B is the office building slash make-shift landing strip.  My office is about 7 minutes away from the crash site.  It's wild to think I was so close to the start and finish of this domestic meltdown.

Neighbors Burning House

Post Fire Snapshot

Office Park Ablaze

I guess it just goes to show that we never know what's going on inside people.  As we walked the pups by that house every day we never could have imagined the intense emotional storm brewing inside.  I'm still contemplating exactly what to take away from today's events but I've definitely got some food for thought.

-Kyle

The 9 lives of Mercedes...

Most dogs like to eat dog food and especially people food.  Any kind of meat, ice cream, popcorn- all of it.  But some dogs, very special dogs (i.e.- shorter than normal bus dogs), like to eat other things- like sheets, rugs or cardboard.  Our lovely Mercedes is one such dog.  

This past week while Kyle & I were at work, Mercedes decided that the sheet we had put in her doggie crate to keep her warm looked oh so edible and delicious.  When we came home from work, we saw that she had eaten part of the sheet. So we did what we usually do and scolded her and then went about our day. This is normal, she tends to get into things and eat them and things tend to be fine.  But this time that lovely sheet got stuck in her intestines.  After 4 days of no eating and lots of vomiting, I took her to the vet on Friday morning.  After a few x-rays, it was confirmed that Mercedes had a "foreign object" blocking her intestines (yeah, I told them, I already knew that!). The options were surgery or dead puppy.  Nice options.  So, being the Jesus lovers that we are we choose life for our little dog.  Or as I like to refer to her as our very stupid dog.  

Doesn't she look pathetic?

That's a lot of staples! 

I'd like to say that this is the first time that Mercedes has had such a surgery, but that would be a lie.  About a year ago, she had to have surgery to remove another "foreign object" in her intestines.  You would think that she would have learned- but dog brains don't work like people brains, that much I have learned. The vet gave us a firm warning that Mercedes intestines would not fare well if a third surgery was ever required (she's missing about half a foot now).  I feel like a parent having to protect my child from themselves! 

She is resilient though.  Kyle & I lovingly refer to her as our "tough old bird".  Less than 24 hours post-op she is running around and laying all over Deacon just like before.  She's like a cat with 9 lives...maybe we are cat people after all. Who knew?

-Stacie 

Our Burns Supper

This past week Kyle & I had our first Burns Supper celebration in America.  We had taken part in a Burns Supper in Scotland last year and wanted to replicate the same tradition at our house.  Traditionally, the Burns Supper occurs on January 25 and is a celebration of Scotland's national poet, Robert Burns.  You'd probably recognize his most famous poem 'Auld lang Syne'.  The supper has agenda that is followed at all traditional Burns suppers.  First the host makes a welcoming speech, then you have the entrance of the haggis (accompanied by bagpipes of course), the reading of 'Address to a Haggis' a Robert Burns poem and after dinner a toast to the lassies (this is the equivalent to a 'roasting' as we would call it).  We didn't go through with the whole dinner schpel, we just picked and choose our favorite parts which thanks to my wonderful friend Katie did in fact include haggis!

Haggis in a can!

For those of you who don't know what haggis is, it is the equivalent to an american hotdog but made from sheep parts.  It is usually served with 'neeps and tatties' which is the Scottish way of saying 'turnips and mashed potatoes'.  I steered away from the turnips, but did serve up some mashed potatoes to accompany our haggis.  I also made some 'bangers' to go with our 'mash' (aka sausage). 

Our Scottish Feast (the bowl with brown mush is the haggis)

Our piper for the entrance of the haggis

Our good friends Hilary & Ryan came over to celebrate with us and brought the other staple of our meal- Scotch.  And to top off the meal, Kyle read 'Address to a Haggis'.  Here a snipet of the poem for your enjoyment:


But mark the Rustic, haggis fed, 
The trembling earth resounds his tread. 
Clap in his wallie nieve a blade, 
He'll mak it whistle; 
An legs an' arms, an' heads will sned, 
Like taps o' thristle. 

Ye Pow'rs wha mak mankind your care, 
And dish them out their bill o' fare,
Auld Scotland wants nae skinkin ware
That jaups in luggies;
But, if ye wish her gratefu' prayer,
Gie her a haggis!


It never ceases to amaze me how different Scottish culture is from our own and vice versa.  Cheers too our favorite country after our own!


-Stacie 

True Love

As you already know, we are dog people.  We love our dogs.  We have poured time, energy and our resources into our sweet Deacon & Mercedes.  Do they love us back? Sure. Do they love us more than anything else in their little doggie lives? Not quite.  Only one holds the key to Deacon's heart. She's soft, curvy and always a good time.  She's his trusty tennis ball.

"Protection means sleeping with one eye open"

"Can you tell I'm annoyed when you touch my ball?"

"Seriously, it's mine...don't touch!"

"You want some of this craziness?"

BFF! (Best Friends Forever!)

"I poop on your stupid ball"

-Kyle & Stacie

Our weekend visitor

This past weekend my mom made her first visit to Austin.  She had been waiting for a long weekend and one finally came around.  Kyle & I love having visitors, especially family, so we excited to have her!

The majority of what we did consisted of eating and shopping- my favorite combo!  There are some amazing outlets down in San Marcos, so we spent the day there on Saturday spending all of our Christmas money.

Sunday was a beautiful day so we headed down to tan off-leash dog park downtown to enjoy the weather. If you haven't been, dog parks are actually quite entertaining.  Even if you don't have a dog.  It's just fun to watch these ecstatically happy dogs run around and play with each other. Deacon & Mercedes were definitely in the ecstatic dog category...

The park, Town Lake, is located right downtown on the Colorado river.  So, the dogs can jump in the water or they get hot.  That is an important option for our two who do not do well in the Texas heat (the short muzzle). Apparently, boxers rate a 1 out of 5 on heat tolerance.  I think summer may be a challenge! They also rate 2 out of 5 on cold tolerance- so apparently only people in San Diego should own boxers.  Interesting...

After our time at the park, we went out the dinner at a local restaurant named 'Moonshine'.  It came highly recommended to us by a few friends so we decided to check it out.  The food style was 'fancy southern'- can it get any better than deep-fried asparagus and creamy, gooey macaroni and cheese big enough to feed a family of four?

They bring popcorn to your table when they seat you...

Mason Jars for drinks

The dinner was phenomenal, although we all felt like we needed to be rolled out of there on a flatbed truck.  My mom left yesterday afternoon to head back to Virginia. It was a great trip and we miss her already! 

-Stacie 

Our newest edition- Felipe

As you may or may not know, I have a special place in my heart for all things animal.  Strangely enough, this sometimes even includes animals that are not "real".  As a child I had a collection of stuffed animals that not only had names but had life stories and personalities.  So, when the opportunity arose to add a pink yard flamingo, with seasonal appropriate outfits, to our family I jumped at the opportunity!

Meet Felipe.  This past weekend we had quite a bit of rain. So, of course Felipe had to put on his rain slicker and rain hat!

Currently, it has stopped raining and is actually kind of warm. But, in the spirit of it still being January, Texas or not, Felipe is now wearing his scarf and hat set.  

I've added a 'Flamingo Watch' on the side to keep Felipe's current attire on show. Hope you enjoy! 

-Stacie