A warm afternoon....

... after a frigid night.

It was so warm this afternoon that JS and I went out walking.... the whole walk, up to the main highway and back. Haven't done that in ages because it has either been too wet and rainy, or too darn cold and windy.

J's little dog Bella came along for the girl-time.  J had her dressed up in the cutest little doggie-Christmas outfit.... red velvet with white fur around the little ruffle, plus she had a silver necklace of Mardi Gras beads to complete the blinged-out look.  Just too cute for words... and did I mention that Bella's little toe-nails were painted red to match her outfit?  Never let it be said that country-puppies don't know how to dress up.

Surely does make me want another dog again, but let's not get started with that......

This week is like the calm after the storm...... we had our big Christmas party on Saturday night.  Almost all of our friends and neighbors were here, along with a couple of friends from our old neighborhood in Clear Lake.  I think this year's Christmas party was the best we've had in this house.... the energy and enthusiasm was just off the charts this time, and I don't know exactly why, but it was sure nice to see everyone having such a great evening.

In the midst of the other night's frigid weather, I found a huge scorpion in the garage when I went in there to feed Mickey. I nearly stepped on the darn thing because I wasn't looking down. Thankfully, my foot missed it, but I smashed it flat with the container of weed-killer.  I'm still not at the point where I can just step on a scorpion to kill it........ not these feet, no matter what shoes or boots I'm wearing.

And everyone says that the cold weather kills all the crawling critters on the property here. Bah-humbug to that...... I guess the scorpions don't know all the rules.