Merry Christmas Everyone!

This was a wonderful Christmas season for the Baden Rolts.

It started at the beginning of December with a Meyer family Christmas at the Recreation centre in Milverton. Tony, Lisa and the kiddies made it out and it was a fun gathering of the Meyer family...unfortunately no one brought appetizers so we all were salivating as the main courses cooked away in the kitchen! Next year, everyone will make up for that with too many appetizers an the cycle will start again!


The next Christmas event was with our friends Carey and Chris and their kiddies Mya and Cora. For a few years we have been talking about trying to start a Christmas tradition and we finally got it going this year. We went to their house and ordered in Ben Than (big surprise - one of our favorites) and played trivial pursuit (girls had a huge come-from-behind victory...we really should have lost this one!) Really fun night. My favorite part was Violet's gift, a homemade SOCK MONKEY! I totally love it...I mean, violet, violet loves it, yeah, that's what I mean. It is so cute. She smiles at it all the time. Violet also got a Dr. Seuss book, she loves to look at the pages of the book, so much fun!


























On the 21st in the morning we met an old friend for breakfast. The three of us got together with Jude at Benny's for breakfast. It was Jude's first meeting with Violet. She was all smiles for Jude. It was great to see her but as usual, too short.

That evening we went to Andrew's Dad's for the family Christmas. It was a fun night with lots of potatoes and ham! Dinner was great, all kiddies were good and visiting with the family is always a great night. Unfortunately Barb had to work until 7 so it was a short visit with her. It is so wonderful to see how much a baby can light up the faces of everyone. Violet was great for the evening, smiles all around (ok, ok a few cries too).


























Christmas eve was a visit to Nance and Drew's new condo. I am loving the condo, starting to look like their home now. It was a nice evening with friends and family. It was great to see Susan and Russ Rodrigo as well as some old family friends. After a scary drive home on solid ice Andrew and I spent the night belting out songs on my first Christmas present - Singstar! for PlayStation. Seriously, we were up until 2am...not smart when you are still breastfeeding a little one.
My best Christmas present came when Violet slept in until 8 AM!!! WOOHOO! Andrew and I got up and exchanged gifts and stockings and Violet smiled and giggled with us. Then, we shipped off to Nance and Drew's for Christmas day. It was a nice day, some naps, some gifts and lots of eating.




















































Next day we were off to Andrew's mom's for our final family Christmas. In an unlikely turn of events we were there first! Had a nice visit with Betty before the rest of the gang arrived. We had a super meal and then present time. It is always so much fun when to see the kiddies opening presents and then with the annual fashion show of outfits, it is fun for them to be the centre of attention. Teresa made all the kids personalized book marks, they are so cute. Violet loves her bookmark!























































Andrew is off this week, so it has been a nice time at home with the whole family. We will be sad to see him return to work next week. Fingers crossed we win the lottery!
Special thanks to Aunt Adrienne, Uncle Dennis, Madison and Parker for Violet's new track suit! She loves it!

Saved!

A little bit of Christmas Magic happened the other night. My old hard disk came back to life, and I was able to revive everything that I needed from it!!
And the next day, its replacement came. So every thing's good. I feel SO relieved. It was festering and eating away at me so much that I was pretty grumpy for the last several days. I'm off until Jan. 5 after today, so tomorrow I'll have one more look through the disk, (if it allows me) and then send it back before I'm charged for it. Yay!

Now the only thing left to do is decide on whether or not I'm going to keep Linux (currently Mandriva 2009), try a different "flavour" of Linux like Ubuntu, or go back to Windows. If I do, I'll probably dual-boot Linux with Vista. (There are some things that you just "need" Windows for - like Tax software!)
So far both Marn and I are liking Mandriva, but there are some things that are bothering me about it. I can't get my web cam working (it's pretty old, though, and sound is a little flaky). The biggest thing is decent software can be hard to find, although there are TONS of free software available in the Linux world - not all of it is great. In the Windows world, EVERYONE develops for the platform so finding software is not an issue. The Mac is getting better, but still suffers from lack of software (Apple has done a great job by including a lot of easy to use software that most people want anyway.)
With the new disk here, I'm going to trial Ubuntu which has been grabbing a lot of press lately, and has sort of stolen the limelight as the flavour of Linux to use. We'll see if that resolves some of the driver issues I'm having with Mandriva, although I really like it despite the issues.

Linux has come a LONG way in the last 3-4 years. If I had to put a number on it, I'd say it's about 90% ready for "prime time". In another 1-2 full releases (which happen yearly at a minimum for most flavours), most of the little nagging issues should be worked out, and anyone would be able to use it daily without issues. In fact, anyone really could use it right now, if all you're doing is email, web surfing, pictures... the basic stuff that 95% of computer users do. Especially if you have a more modern PC. I find it amazing that you can run a full blown operating system, with 1000's of free applications available to you, including a full-blown "office" suite comparable, or better than Microsoft Office, photo editor comparable to the very pricey Photo Shop, and other stuff all for free. The average computer user has everything they need and they don't have to spend a cent for it. You can download a CD Image, burn it, and even try it out without harming your current system. It's called a "live CD". Meaning, you boot from your CD ROM, and it runs the full system from CD without ever touching your current windows, or Mac install. Now, it will run slower because it's running from CD instead of your hard drive, but you get a nice feel for what it's all about and capable of. Most of the time, if you do install, your system will run quicker than it did with Windows.
try one here:
www.mandriva.com
www.ubuntu.com or www.kubuntu.com (same system, different "desktop"; Gnome, or KDE)
You also don't have to worry about Viruses/Trojans/Spyware/Malware and crap like that.
Ok enough about that... not like anyone reading this will try it anyway!

Did I mention that I'm off after today, and it's really slow at work right now? (like always around this time, but especially this year with the economy in the toilet) That's probably the reason for my ramblings.
We're having our staff Christmas Luncheon this afternoon where I'm sure we'll hear that we're not getting raises or bonuses this year.... but will be re-assessed in July after the first half of the year. We are getting gifts in the form of a cooler bag, shirt and maybe wall clock that looks like a tire. woohoo! lol It's actually kind of a cool clock that I designed, but there's no way in hell it'll hang in our house. It'll be nice for a games room or the office, I guess. I think I officially have more J&R Hall garb than other normal clothing now.

Anyway, I'm starting to shake the Grinch feeling I've had up until now - maybe it really was the hard drive causing me to feel down. Maybe it's a combination of my being off for a while, first Christmas with Violet, pictures, music and files all saved, snow (ok, that's not really helping - my neck and back are killing), shopping, Christmas music playing every time I come home, or not having to rush around so much between Christmases this year. I'm looking forward to it!

Computer

Last night I was REALLY mad at the computer, technology and myself.
It's bad enough that our hard drive is crashing, but I wasn't too worried because I could still read files from it while we waited for the new one to come. Well, the newly purchased one came, and the warranty replacement is in the mail. But now, I can't read anything on the old disk. It's completely failed. I was all ready last night to start making backups of my 50gb of music and 20 gb of pictures and other "personal" files like tax returns, etc, when all of the sudden the system wouldn't see it anymore. I popped it out and hooked it to a laptop I borrowed form work... no go. ^%$^!@@*&(%^@# !!!
WHY didn't I just back the crap up when it WAS working, all this and last week? Well, I'll tell you - because I was waiting for the replacement. But I COULD have done it on the spare drive I was using in the interim. It wasn't big enough for everything I wanted to save, but most of it would have fit OK.

So while I'm fiddling with this trying to get the system to read it one last time so that I can slavage my files and what happens? The monitor goes black. WTF? I thought my video card blew, but a computer will normally beep at you if no video is being pushed out when you reboot. There was no beep. Thankfully I still have "the beast" in the basement. A Samsung 19" CRT 50lbs monster that has been the best monitor I've used to date. So I lug that up and plug it in. Hey, there's the screen, no problem. The other monitor is still black... my blood is boiling at this point. To begin with, I'm really, REALLY mad at myself for not saving the files when I had the chance to, and then the monitor quits on me... F'ing great!!
To give you some background on the monitor, I bought it refurbished. It was a great monitor that was very hard to find at the time as the LCD panel in it is not used very much anymore and being phased out for cheaper tech. It produces a far superior picture than most LCD's. "I got a deal". But it's been a lemon. I should have returned it right away, 1st day. The first time I powered it on, there was a black line down the middle. After fiddling with it, it disappeared for a while then reappeared, so I called Viewsonic and had an RMA made up. No problem - I was happy with that. The replacement came, but this one had problems too. The green pixels sort of flickered, then after some time went away. I called them back and explained the problem. I said I'd monitor it for a week and see what happens. It went away and hasn't been back since. Now it's black and dead. It powers up and tells me "no signal detected". A typical message when you turn on the monitor, but not the computer... I have yet to call them, but it's almost pointless to do so since it's out of warranty. Fixing it would probably cost me the price of a new monitor anyway, but I'll wait and see what they say and what our options are.
Did I mention that I got a deal on it?

I did at least manage to save one DVD worth of recent pictures onto a USB memory key when the drive first started to crash. I should have continued and did everything when I had the chance... should have could have. A hard lesson to swallow.
Maybe we'll get lucky and the drive will power up one last time for me, but I'm not holding my breath. Once the replacement drive comes, I have 30 days to return it, or they'll charge me $150. The drive is worth $80, maybe.

Christmas!!

I can't believe that Christmas is one week away!
Even with all the snow, cold, shopping and decorations around me, I still don't feel like it's this close. I'm not sure why, but it just doesn't FEEL like Christmas this year... yet, anyway.

Last weekend we chopped down our Christmas tree, put it up and decorated it. That usually helps me get in the mood, but it didn't really this time. I don't know what's wrong with me this year? Maybe it's the economy and the poor outlook at work for the next six months to a year? The terrible RRSP "performance" from the past year or more? Maybe it's because we're not spending a lot on gifts for each other? I dunno, but it better change, and quick!

We are doing a Christmas dinner with our friends Chris and Carey this Saturday. The first of what we're hoping will turn into a little tradition between our families. Then Sunday is the first Christmas for the family at my Dad's house -- also the shortest day of the year, come on summer! :)

So if after this weekend, it STILL doesn't feel like Christmas, then maybe I have SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) and we'll need to book the next flight out of here and into the sun like a few of my siblings!! No, we're not jealous.

We never said Echo was smart...

I was up with Vi a couple of times last night so I was still in bed when Andrew left for work this morning sometime after 8. Vi started squeaking around 9. Up we went to the lazy boy chair (my preferred site for feeding as I have it set up for the TV, current book, water and the phone), when what to my wondering eyes should appear but Echo dog and many tiny pieces of something. Yes, Echo had chewed up something while I slept. I was mad. I went downstairs and as I got closer to the mess, I realised that Echo had chewed up some boxes of chocolates. Wait...Echo ate 2 boxes of Chocolate. WHAT? I freaked out, I called Andrew at work, I know that chocolate is poisonous for dogs. When I am on the phone with him I am discovering that Echo has consumed Adrienne and Dennis' Christmas present from Betty (we are sending the presents out West this week). To make matters worse, one of the packages is a dark chocolate. Enter Violet (the baby that never cries) and start the crying. So now, I have a crying hungry baby and a dog that had a nice chocolate breakfast. I quickly decided to call our vet. So I hang up on Andrew and call the vet clinic...what luck, our vet, Anne answered the phone. She asked how much chocolate Echo ate and told me to give him hydrogen peroxide. Now, if you have a 20 pound dog, they only need a little bit of peroxide to help them regurgitate, but for an Echo (170lbs) sized dog...we are looking at more than 3 tablespoons. You try making him lick it up! I grabbed the turkey baster and sat Echo down (now I am on the phone with Andrew again) and open his mouth and go to shove the baster down but then I realise I am wearing a tank top and PJ pants, how can I follow him outside in the cold to make sure he brings up the chocolate. Cursing (a lot of cursing) later I am in some sweats and force Echo to take the peroxide from my turkey baster and follow him outside. Very pleasant to observe as I am sure you can imagine. In true dog style, hey we never claimed to have a smart dog, the evidence suggested chocolate, I don't know what gave it away more...the colour or the wrappers that came up with it!
Back inside after that, call the vet again. She recommends giving him the rest of the peroxide to help clear whatever we can and then giving him pumpkin. Pumpkin? Great, that is a trip to the store....no wait. I have a can of pumpkin in the cupboard. Why, you may ask. Well, it seems when I last made a pumpkin pie from scratch Andrew gave it a 6/10 (with Betty's pumpkin pie being a 10/10 - seriously he gave me a 6 and expected more pie someday). The can has been safely in the cupboard since that rating, so yeah, I have the pumpkin. Angel baby Violet has stopped crying and is now just watching me fly around the room after Echo. The last information Anne gives me on the phone is that Echo is likely to have diarrhea. Oh great. I have a dentist appointment today. I can't leave and risk coming home to a house full of you-know-what. So now I have to arrange with Andrew to come home early to watch Vi and Echo so that I can go have my teeth scraped. All the while I still haven't fed Vi.
Good grief.

Computers

It's a love/hate relationship.

Sometimes I love them (Hey, they've provided me a half decent living thus far), and sometimes I want to throw them out the window...
This week has been the later as our Hard Drive is starting to bite the dust. It's slowly been happening over the last couple of months, where upon booting up, the system wouldn't find the drive. Power down, and back up, and it worked fine. Well earlier this week it happened again but this time it wouldn't boot back up.
I was able to boot off Linux Live CD (it's basically a full-blown operating system that runs from your CD instead of Hard Drive -- very handy for emergencies!), to see if the disk was completely pooched. Thankfully, it's not! Ironically, the SMART functionality of the disk seems to be failing. It's ironic because SMART is supposed to predict when the drive is about to fail so that you can get a backup done and prepare for it. (just 2 weeks ago, I ran utilities from the manufacturer to test these things, and everything passed....)

Anyway, I was able to save photos (of Violet - the most important data on there at the moment!) and save them as a DVD image onto a USB disk in case the disk ends up completely screwed. A mild panic set in until I found out that all was not lost! I'm thinking that the disk crashing caused some corruption in Windows that is preventing it from booting. Usually not a problem, but I haven't been able to really troubleshoot it yet as the easiest way to fix it is to plug into another Windows machine and run a repair on it -- if that doesn't work, there's either more severe damage to the file system, or more physical damage to the disk that can't be repaired. I am going to purchase another hard drive, and then save these files to it before sending it back for replacement (I'm pretty sure that it's still under warranty). Another expense we didn't count on right before Christmas (less than $200, but still....)

I think we would cry if we lost everything on that drive. Photos, MP3's, videos, email, addresses books, Tax returns, personal docs.....

So, maybe on everyone's wishlist this year, if you don't already have one, should be an external Hard Drive for backing up the files that would cause you to age and stress if you ever lost them - it WILL happen! It's a simple game of Would you rather. Would you rather loose $200 or loose everything on your computer?

ps: and before this turns into a Windows vs. Mac debate: it has nothing to do with the OS. It's a hardware failure that can happen on any computer, Windows, Mac, or Linux!

First Shots...is mommy supposed to cry more than Violet?

Yesterday I took Violet for her first set of immunizations. Dr. Pannozzo informed me she likely wouldn't cry for the first shot, but he had never met a baby that didn't cry for the second one. She had her DPTP (diptheria, pertussis, tetanus and polio), HIB (haemophilus, meningitis and epi-glottitis) and Prevnar (Pneumococcal infection)shots. She did cry for the second shot, but only for about 5 seconds. On the other hand, I welled when he was getting ready, a few tears fell on her face as I was trying to smile before the first shot. She looked right at Dr. Pannozzo and gave him a huge smile and he said "I am sure you won't be smiling at me after this"
She was such a cutie pie. After the first shot, she looked back at me, not smiling but not upset, then came the next one. No tears like she normally gets right away, just a few yelps. Then it was over.
Last night I was talking with Candace about how her kids were with the shots. Violet had an off day. She slept a lot and didn't eat too much. Every time she awoke I put her on to get some milk. She always drank but not for too long. Then she would look around a little and then back to sleep. Candace said she just watched her kiddies for fever and signs of fever after the shots. She gave them Tylenol before each shot too. Well, I didn't give Vi Tylenol because the doctor had told me she may not need it for these first shots. So now I am putting things together wondering if she might have a fever and is trying to sleep it off. Enter thermometer. Up until now, I always used the axilla for the temperature reading, but it made me nervous that I wasn't getting an accurate reading...enter first rectal thermometer reading. There is nothing nice about doing this to your pretty little baby for the first time. I was nervous it would bother her, hurt her, make her poop all over...she was totally fine. Talked to Andrew the whole time. Temperature was fine. I set my alarm for 3 hours and checked again. Fine. What a little trooper.
I suspect that is not the last time mommy will cry more than Violet about something...