Pupdate

 

Nia Thundersnow is fitting in very well here, we are quite attached to her already.  She's smart and sweet and very lovey, wants to snuggle and play, then falls asleep almost instantly.  The house training is going very well, much much better than I expected and every day I wonder if it really CAN be this fast and easy.   Her only accident in the past week was totally our fault for not responding to her signals.  

We have a foster dog this weekend, which has become a bit of a fiasco since he's unhappy here and does not seem to be feeling well.  I called the local person over his case, as his foster family is in south Alabama all weekend, and he agreed he needs to go to the vet Monday and get checked out.  While we are dealing with him, she's getting a little left out.  Hence the potty accident.

There's a new dog park in town, we have taken her a couple of times.  She mainly wants to sniff and bark and jump around, yesterday she did a couple of obstacles because we bribed her with chicken balls set all around the course!  There were 4 big dogs in the pen next to us and she wanted badly to be in there with them.  When the foster dog showed up to actually come home with us, she wanted nothing to do with him.

Here are my sock monkey slippers, look what she did to the eye!  Rotten puppy! 

This has been the sole (ha!) damage so far, though she has gotten a couple stuffed toys out of Chan's room and chewed them until they were soaked and gross.  She's attempted to eat a power cord once and of course, hands and wrists are puppy gourmet and she never passes up a chance to have a sample.  We keep a toy on us at all times, those baby teeth are SHARP.  She's better every day.

She's on a once-a-night potty schedule already, helped by the fact that Matt wakes at 4:30, so somewhere around 1 or 2 I get up and make her go, I think she would sleep all night, but she's not yet even 4 months old, that seems too hard on her little puppy system when all it takes is a 2 minute round trip, she goes the second her back feet are on grass, hops right back in bed, eats a cookie and passes back out.  Never a peep all night, she's amazingly easy to deal with.

Anyway, we are feeling quite happy with our new family member, she's a love bug for sure.  We said Zeppie was a mop-headed Jack weasel, we call Nia a coyote pig-pug.  I hope she gets 10 pounds bigger and stops growing, so she will still fit everywhere.

I am going Monday to look at a dog at the pound that MIGHT be her brother, if that's the case, I will snap that pup up!   We could name him Ian!  LOL!

Last of January

And so the new year goes, I am still not 100% on the whole '2013' issue, as I seem to have only recently caught up to 2011, which is why when we cleaned out the pantry last week, Chandler was in charge of expired items, I probably would have killed us all with botulism. 'October 2012, that's MONTHS AWAY!'

I have been in a bit of a fugue, not a funk, just feeling a little removed from it all.  It could be any number of things-allergies from the early blooming flowers, the weather being all over the place, the new puppy needing to go potty at all hours, Matt being out of town, meeting new people and doing new things.  I tend to back away from myself and observe at times, particularly when I feel overwhelmed.

Puppy update-it's been 6 days since she's peed inside, she goes right out and to the same spot.  Since her vet visit last Friday, I have been scooping poop and putting it in the trash can, because the vet wormed her again, though she's still as pot-bellied as ever.

When she got to the pound on the 4th, she was 11 pounds.  The vet said she was under 10 when they did her spay on the 17th and this past Friday she was 14 pounds.  They were a little freaked that she had gained 4 pounds in 8 days.  I am not surprised at all, pound puppies are the worst for gobbling because they have had to fight for all their food their whole lives.  It takes a little while to realize there will be more food and until she's sure of that, she will fatten herself up.  Now that her stitches are gone and that belly is really healing, her energy levels are increasing daily.  She will burn it off.  Though I have had to expand her collar twice because her neck is so fat.  eep!

I did our taxes and THAT was awful.  I did them 4 times to be sure, but the days of a fat refund are over, it will be exactly enough to cover half of Ben's braces down payment.  I had planned several upcoming expenses like new tires on the front of the van to be covered by the refund as well as a little boost to the savings account.  So, I had to go back and spend a couple of hours re-working the budget for the year, which stinks.  I am not sure we will be able to get to Disney this fall as planned, but I am sure going to try.  We will still be out of debt-other than Ben's braces-by the end of April, so that will help.  It's just that the house needs some repairs-mainly its needed a new roof for a while.  And only the porch is painted.  I stopped painting when it was apparent we had to replace the fascia boards all the way around and now that's done and they are all painted, so I need to get back on my house painting plan.  At least I picked a good color, we all still like it. 

We came through the weather just fine.  I, of course, had to fret about it.  I had the kids wear socks to bed and keep their shoes and flashlights (with new batteries) right by the bed and pack a change of clothes and their favorite items, I got our toiletries and important papers packed, Matt's glasses and mine, the external hard drive, my Nook, a pair of good tweezers because they really are hard to find.  Then I looked around.  There wasn't anything else I wanted to save.  I am not sure what that means, I guess that everything can be replaced and photos re-printed.  It's just stuff.  I did kind of wish a tree would fall in such a way as to need new roofing without damaging anything else so insurance would help out on the cost.  I guess that was too much to hope for, though the wind managed to take a few more shingles.  I am going with metal roofs from here on out, I am tired of playing shingle shuffle.  Ooo, or a flat roof.  So useful!   Live in a big cube...our underground. 


Today is the end of the month, Ben goes for his final fitting before getting his braces in 2 weeks, it's my half-birthday, I am directly between 38 and 39.  I have decided that for my 50th birthday, I don't want to have a huge travel vacation or the usual.  I just want to not have any cats.  Between the near-constant yowls, the DAYS of work each time getting foster dogs to not chase them, the piles of dead thing guts in the yard, the piles of dead-thing pukes on the steps and welcome mat if they can't actually make to to one of the beds to throw up, the waft of loose hairs that get on EVERYTHING, the peeing in the sink and bathtub, the way they run JUST ahead and then LAY DOWN IN THE PATH while you try to walk, the way they follow us and cry and cry as we walk or bike on the driveway, the way I have to drive AROUND them or stop and wait as they dust bathe in the road, how when I bend over to pick something up, they leap on my shoulders and dig in.  I am just...done with cats.  I won't get rid of the 4 we have, I just don't want to replace them, either.  We will be a dog family.  Of course in 10.5 years, the kids will be well into their 20's and likely we will just be a dog couple.  *sigh*  Good thing I am still crazy about Matt, he's not going anywhere.

I can never see a chickadee without hearing Ben's little voice saying, "Mommy!  Tickadees!"
I still think of them as such.

Fosters Return!

Famous and Shelley are with us for the week!

Fes and Kuma

I have a fondness for a dog with an underbite!

 

SO SCARY!

Jess and Kuma heading over to break it up!

This week, we have Famous Festus and Shelley, 2 mutt mixes from Fairy Dog Mother.  We have played 'what are they' and come up with they are both Australian sheep dog mixes.  Him, possibly with a Papillion ancestor and her with a spaniel of some type.  She has the sweetest face, but is SO shy. 

I have enjoyed these two more than I did Kira and Fes just because they are so animated and playful, Kira was a calm soul and Festus is a red-headed freckled kid with impish sparkle eyes who loves to play and play, Shelley is much more reserved, but totally willing to wrestle and play.

Thursday of Not Much

Today we slept in until 10:30, had potato chips and diet soda for breakfast and then watched an episode Jim Henson's The Storyteller. Perfect morning! : D 

Then we had some raw veggies and actual food, did a few chores around the house and the kids worked on Alice for an hour or so. Since then, I have felt like I am here alone, I think the heat has us all moving as little as possible. 

 Fairy Dogmother contacted me to say Famous has been VERY sad since we left him.
Kira has been adopted, so we took them both back at the same time.

Intruders Beware!

This afternoon we are finally making Matt's birthday cake and I have made fresh noodles, asparagus, black-eyed peas and have some really good tuna for dinner.