Wednesday HodgePodge

Wednesday HodgePodge is hosted by Joyce at From This Side of the Pond!  Come on over and have some fun!  :o)

1. Share your Christmas Eve traditions.

Honestly, we really don't have any.  Getting together with both sides of the family at Christmas has morphed into it being spread across Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, so the tradition at this point is to just spend it with someone!  Hubby and I usually do our gift exchange on Christmas Eve because going here and there for Christmas can be hectic.

2. What was the best book you read in 2010? (we're not going to include The Bible here)

I'm actually working on a list of my top 10 books of 2010, which I'll post some time next week, and there's no way I can pick just one! 

3. Do you have pets and if so do you allow them on the furniture?

We have 2 dogs--Dasher and Bella--and boy, can they be a handful!  Dasher is a male Chinese Crested Powderpuff that came to live with us July 2007.  It was really a fluke how we managed to get him, too.  See, hubby's parents also have a CCP (her name is Dancer), and she and Dasher were both part of the same litter of 8 dogs (all named after the reindeer) born December 21, 2005.  Hubby's parents have had Dancer since Christmas 2006, and by that time, the breeders had found homes for all the dogs.  So, when summertime rolls around the next year, hubby's mom gets a call asking if she knows anyone that would want one of the dogs from the same litter.  Hubby and I didn't have any pets at that time, and they were giving Dasher away, so we said we'd take him.  That dog just wormed his way right into our hearts, and he is definitely part of the family!

Bella is our other dog, and she's what we call a chug--half pug/half chihuahua.  Fall of 2008 we decided that Dasher needed a buddy, so we got in touch with one of the pet rescue organizations in our area, and she was available.  We had a trial run with her for a week, and my initial thought was that she and Dasher were never going to get along.  By the end of the week, I was honestly ready to send her back.  Dasher decided that last day that he liked her....so we kept her, too!  :o)  And no....she was not named after the Twilight movies (don't know why we get asked that all the time).

As for the rest of the question....  No, we don't let them get up on our furniture unless there's a blanket or something for them to lay on.  We got new living room furniture last year, and I'd like to keep it looking nice (and free of dog hair) for as long as possible!

4. What event from 2010 are you most thankful for?

I'm thankful that hubby made it through his appendectomy with no complications.  Neither of us has ever had any kind of major surgery, and that was an experience that I don't want to go through again any time soon!

5. What did you do in 2010 that you'd never done before.

Bought a brand new car.

6. Brussel sprouts...friend or foe?

Foe!

7. Who would you nominate for man/woman of the year?

I haven't the slightest idea.  I can think of a few people that shouldn't be nominated....does that count? 

8. Insert your own random thought here.

I'll be cooking a ham for the first time this weekend, and I pray that I don't screw it up!!  I wouldn't feel quite so stressed about it if the directions hadn't disappeared somewhere between my grocery cart and my house.  (Seriously, they were there attached to that netting stuff when I put that ham in my cart, and the netting and price tag were gone when I unloaded my groceries...how does that happen!?!?!)  I'm also cooking a turkey and a chicken, but I have experience with those, thankfully.  :o) 

If you'd like to help me out with my ham predicament, please visit this post (link).