We did it!!!

We FINALLY got done painting the two bedrooms!! Who would've thunk that it would take THIS LONG to get it all done?? Stupid blue paint tape threw a monkey wrench into the mix though. Lesson learned: DON'T TRUST THE BLUE TAPE!! After putting two coats of primer and two coats of paint, we pulled the tape off to reveal that the paint had bled ALL OVER the baseboards and the chairrail. Not good. We found something called frog tape, which does the same thing as the blue paint tape, only better. So after taping off the ENTIRE ROOM again, a-painting I went. Again.

The carpets are being cleaned this morning (probably as I type this) so everything will be ready for our move this weekend!!

Here are some pictures of the after. I forgot to take pictures of the before... The colors are not true at all, but the general idea is there. The model in the pictures just adds to the effect.

The master bedroom. With the green frog tape still on the wall...


The master closet with the new wire shelving. We still have a few more shelves to install though.


The second bedroom.


And the newly painted white doors, that used to be dark brown.


We're eventually going to rip out the small, brown baseboard that's throughout the rest of the house and replace it with wide, white base. But before that, we're going to tear out the mirror in the master bathroom and replace it with something smaller and then put some sort of storage in there. I'll definitely take before and after pictures for that! Fun stuff!!

A Little Less of a Man and School Starts Tonight! and Updates

Little Hayden got his not-so-little fuzzies chopped a week ago today. I was so worried that he wouldn't do well under anesthesia because of his murmur. But the vet said that he did great and that he was such a good dog, doing everything that he was asked to do. Awwww! My little boy is so sweet!! He was sent home with some meds for pain and valium for sedation, and with instructions to keep him calm and sedated for 7-10 days. Uh, yeah, we have a problem there. Boxer pup and calm and sedated are complete oxy-morons! He was quiet for the first night and a little into the next day but he's been his normal, happy, bouncy self since then. Even with us giving him three doses of valium a day...

School is starting for the kids tonight. I'm really hopeful that they'll learn some good skills from this class. I'm taking Hayden and Grampa is taking Abbi. Thank goodness for Grampa because I would've had to leave one at home while I took the other to class, and that would not a happy boxer make! The skills learned in the class is all dependant on how "smart" the dogs are going into it so I'm hoping that there aren't too many or any "dumb" dogs there tonight because then I will get bored and feel like I spent money to teach my dogs to sit. Again. But then again, my dogs might be the dumb ones in the class and holding all of the other ones up!!!

Following tradition, I'll take first day of school pictures of them tonight. All pretty, and p-o'd, with their snoot loops and leashes on.

Josh and I haven't been doing much lately. We went to the fair last Sunday and spent ALL DAY THERE! I tell ya, if you ever want to feel pretty, go to the fair. We stayed later than we usually do because we wanted to see the demolition derby at the end of the night. Why it's fun to watch people SMASHING the heck outta perfectly good cars (most often classics, a T-Bird in this case) is beyond me. But it IS fun!!

We're still in the process of moving but should be done in a couple of weeks. Every time we go to the duplex, we bring a little more of the little stuff with us. We can't do much more than that because we're waiting to get the carpets cleaned, which is waiting on us being done painting. I. Hate. Painting. I think I've done enough painting in this last week to last me for a long, long time.... But it's looking really nice though and I can actually see the progress, so that makes me feel a little better. We did an off-white-ish color on three walls in the master bedroom and, for lack of a better description, an army green on the fourth wall. We tore out the existing closet storage and have installed wire shelving. We have a TON more storage available now! Which means more clothes! Right???? In the second bedroom, we did the same army green on the top of a white chairrail with a dark chocolate brown on the bottom. The contrast of the dark colors and the white chairrail and baseboards looks really nice! Quite the change from the wasabi green and bright raspberry pink that was in there before!! We're also painting the once dark brown doors, white. It really makes a difference in the place and lightens it up nicely. We're lucky to be living in a place that my gramma owns so she's given us the freedom to do whatever we want to it. We still have a lot to do to the place, and quite a few things to buy, but we're excited to move in there and even more excited to GET OUT of the apartment!! Abbi and Hayden have been coming along with us pretty much every time we go out to the duplex so even though they're still a little uncomfy with the place, they're getting more used to it. However, Abbi, in her princess-like self, won't go outside to potty at night by herself. Guess she doesn't like pottying in the dark. Who does though???

A broken heart...

We got some bad news in the beginning of July that little Hayden might have a heart murmur. But because of our late-night emergency vet visit the night before (he thought it would be a good idea to eat the outside of a stuffed basketball), it was possible that it was just a stress-related murmur. No such luck... We went back to the vet yesterday and he gave us the thumbs up that yes, Hayden does have a heart murmur. A low-grade one though. We have to keep him calm (yeah, right) until we get in to see the cardiologist....in about 7 weeks. We're not sure what this means as far as what his activity level can be for the rest of his life, or even how long his life will be... We just have to make sure that he knows that he is loved and let each of his days be full of fun. We felt bad for him yesterday after we left the vet, so we let Hayden go pick out a new toy at the doggy boutique a few doors down.

We're keeping our fingers crossed that it won't be too serious when we finally get in to see the cardiologist, but right now, we just don't know...


UPDATE: We've decided against taking Hayden to the cardiologist. It's a poop-load of money to get him tested and we just don't have that money to spend right now. Besides, the cardiologist already recommended keeping his activity limited and not to let him exert himself. This means no running or playing. He's such a happy boy and loves to run that by limiting him, it would make him so unhappy. We figure that we're gonna let him continue as if we didn't know that he has a murmur, and if he drops dead in the middle of a sprint across the field, then at least he died doing something that he loved. We don't want to keep him medicated for the rest of his life and keep him from doing something that he loves to do.

Hanging by a limb...

After putting the Tree of Life project down for a bit, starting again, unraveling, starting again, unraveling, you get the picture, I think I've finally gotten the hang of it. For now... I'm 23 rows in and doing well so far. Wish me luck!!

You can't give a Dementor the old one-two!

I..........CAN'T........WAIT!!!

UPDATE: Stupid Warner Brothers is deciding to hold off on releasing this movie until July 17th of NEXT YEAR! Stupid. Still can't wait though!!

Ahhh...memories!

I was organizing all of our pictures from the last couple of years and came across the ones of Abbi when she was a puppy. Like 5 weeks old puppy. I can't believe that she's grown so much in the time that we've had her!! She's such a good girl and more than I could have ever asked for in a dog. Those that know the kind of "special" relationship that Josh & I have with our dogs, can somewhat understand what I'm talking about. Then I came across pictures of little Hayden boy and my heart completely melted. I love my little babies so much, it's almost like I birthed them myself!

It's just so hard to imagine that they went from this

Abbi:

Hayden:



To this!!


We're really excited to expand our family with another little four-legged baby, but it's gonna have to wait a bit. Which is completely fine because it'll give us more time to enjoy the babies that we have now. And give us the extra money to get our new tv!! Priorities, ya know. ;)

iNsANitY!!

That's what you get when you have two wild and crazy dogs cooped up indoors for about two weeks. Since this stupid smoke is lingering, none of us have been outside for more than a potty trip, and we're all feeling it... We keep hoping that the air will clear up by the weekend, but no such luck yet. We've wanted to go camping too but haven't been able to find a site that is dog-friendly and by some body of water. You'd think that with as many people that own dogs and want to enjoy camping with them, there would be a whole lot more dog-friendly places. Or some of the ones that are dog-friendly, confine them to the campsite or only allow them to walk on the road in the campground. Lame.

So until we can get out of the house, we're carefully dodging running balls of fur that seem to be aimed for our lower extremities!

The fat lady has sung

Since Josh and I both are collectively about 65 pounds heavier than we were when we first met, we are now on a diet. I unofficially put us on Weight Watchers, since that is about the only thing that we can both realistically stick to. The food isn't bad either; we can eat pretty much whatever we want. Although, a Burger King Whopper isn't what one would call a "healthy choice"... We've been doing it for four days now and the only difference that I've noticed is Josh's mild irritation at the energy that I've aquired. Apparently, a leaping, bounding wife is not what a work-weary husband wants to be greeted with after a long day. But it's okay if the dogs come leaping and bounding to greet him....hmmm......

My goal is to feel comfortable in a bikini again. Not the kind of comfort where you quickly take off your t-shirt and shorts and all but sprint to the water and not get out until you think that nobody is looking. I know that I'll never be strut-your-stuff-on-the-beach skinny, but I'd like to at least get back to the way I was when Josh & I met. To think, to go from being able to run 10 miles with relative ease, to not being able to complete one, that's bad. As soon as all this stupid smoke clears, we're gettin' outside again!! The dogs love to be outside and it's a great time for Josh & I to talk about our days, etc.

A bit of advice...

Another dog-crazy friend of mine emailed this to me the other day and I had to sit back and think how true it actually is. Dogs live their lives so simply that if we looked at life like they do, how easy would it be???

Take some advice from your furkid....

When loved ones come home, always run to greet them.

Never pass up the opportunity to go for a joyride.

Allow the experience of fresh air and the wind in your face to be pure ecstasy.

When it's in your best interest, practice obedience.

Let others know when they've invaded your territory.

Take naps.

Stretch before rising.

Run, romp, and play daily.

Thrive on attention and let people touch you.

Avoid biting when a simple growl will do.

On warm days, stop to lie on your back on the grass.

On hot days, drink lots of water and lie under a shady tree.

When you're happy, dance around and wag your entire body.

No matter how often you're scolded, don't buy into the guilt thing and pout...run right back and make friends.

Delight in the simple joy of a long walk.

Eat with gusto and enthusiasm.

Stop when you have had enough.

Be loyal.

Never pretend to be something you're not.

If what you want lies buried, dig until you find it.

When someone is having a bad day, be silent, sit close by and nuzzle them gently.

Our babies make us laugh from deep within our bellies every day and I am so thankful that I have two wonderful, furry, stinky, wiggly bodies that great me with so much excitement every day that I get home. I could just be though that they really have to pee...

One step closer!

Moving day is gonna be here before we know it so we want to get as ready as we can now so it's not such a big ordeal when it actually comes. So Josh and I spent part of Sunday (Happy Father's Day to Josh!!) looking at paint chips at the local Sherwin Williams. Wow...is their paint expensive!!! We're planning on painting every wall and door in the place so it's gonna look quite different the next time that Dan & Tami see it. We're taking a risk because Big Gramma isn't such a fan of color. Unless it's Dusty Rose, or something like it.....

This really is a poor representation of what the colors truly look like, but I think that the general idea is there. We'll take before, during, and after pictures so the progress will be shown. We'd like to do a whole lot more stuff to the place, but we're only renting, after all. Maybe we'll be able to talk gramma into some updates soon!

On to the color parade!!
We chose, fittingly, Cargo Pants as the main color for the living area and Cocoon as an accent wall in the living room itself. Our couch is an army green-ish kind of color and we have a lot of greens running through our decor. We thought that they were really warm and inviting colors too. Aren't mental institutions painted green...???

For the master bedroom and bath, we chose Stucco for the main color with Sommelier for the accent wall. We have a black comforter and pillowcase set, with an off-white design running through it. The sheets that we're using now are a tan-ish color so all of the colors together will all look very nice together.

We're going to put our bamboo decor in the second bathroom so we want to continue with that color and are going with the color Pier for all of the walls. The ceiling is white so the green will definitely "pop" too. Wow, that color doesn't look green AT ALL.

The second bedroom is going to be our challenge: the walls are painted bright and dark colors so we're going to have to prime them pretty well before we put the new colors on. Cool thing though is that there is a chairrail already on the walls so we're going to take advantage of that and still paint the walls with two colors: French Roast on the bottom and Andiron on the top.

And for the coup de gras: we're painting the kitchen a color called Crabby Apple .

When I first mentioned going to look at colors, Josh thought that I wanted to paint the walls with bright yellows, reds, greens, etc. He was really surprised when we agreed on the colors so quickly and how "normal" they are. We're hopefully going to replace the baseboards soon with wider, white ones and we'll be painting all of the doors white as well.

I'd really like to get this rug to go in the bedroom too. It's from the new Canopy collection from Walmart. They're getting some really cute things in now and it's definitely not the Walmart of old.

We're planning on replacing our kitchen table with something more "grown up" but that won't happen for quite some time. Josh & I are having a lot of fun right now, envisioning what the duplex is going to become after we move there. But more than the excitment of getting into the duplex, we're excited to get OUT of the apartment! GOOD RIDDANCE!!!

Holy dirt, Batman!

Josh & I took the kids, and went with Josh's friends Mike & Shelly, their daughter, Emma, and their dog, Duke, up to a place called Stumpy Meadows. It's about an hour and a half up Highway 50 from Folsom, nestled back in the El Dorado National forest on Highway 193. Now, for any of you that know what a, um, priss that I am when it comes to camping and dirt and showers, the mix of the first two without the third doesn't usually equate to a good thing. So Ms. Priss had a little freak out when she discovered that when the website stated the campsite has "vault toilets", that it really meant "a fancy outhouse." Ooof.... It wasn't bad though and I definitely survived.

Josh had always talked about going to Stumpy Meadows and how much he liked it. And now I see why. This campgound probably has all of 30 campsites and the furthest one is probably less than 1,000 yards from a gorgeous reservoir with water warm enough to swim in and our site was the closest to the water. I wasn't expecting much, based off of descriptions of the place, but when we rounded one of the last curves (the road was quite curvy and had we gone a little farther, I might have needed a little, white bag...), we were met with this:



The weather was great while we were there: warm enough for t-shirts and pants during the day but as soon as the sun started to go down, we had the sweatshirts out in a hurry. One thing that we all noticed though was the ginormity of the insects there! The carpenter ants must have been on steroids, the spiders were about the size of half-dollars, and the termites were probably working out with the ants! There were a crazy amount of mosquitoes there too so we all smelled pretty sexy with our bug spray...

We all had a blast and we're hoping to get out there next month, when it's a little warmer and swimming will be a little more comfortable. Oh, and we'll make sure BEFORE we leave that our next air mattress doesn't have a hole in it. We found that out the first night that we were there.

Not there for 20 minutes and they're already filthy!


Josh got them beef femur bones to keep them occupied while we were setting up camp


They swim like rocks!


Spoiled girl!


The obligatory sleeping dogs picture


What our hands looked like before we had a chance to wash them


So we're home now, with what looks like a tan, but is really just a layer of DIRT covering our skin. The dirt there is crazy: it's so fine and it gets everywhere. And try as we might, we could not seem to ever get it out from under our nails the entire time that we were there. We had a blast though and after all of us have had a good nap, we're looking forward to going again!

Watch your step!!

Josh and I donated a bit of money on Sunday and took the kids to particpate in the 2008 Doggy Dash. The SPCA's website said that there was a record number of registrants this year: about double from last year - about 3,000. And I believe it... We did the 5K (3.something miles) walk through William Land Park. The only thing that we had to watch out for were landmines in the middle of the path that other dog owners "missed". Yeah, right. I don't want to pick up my dog's poo any more than the next person but it's just common courtesy, yo! It was a perfect day for this too. The weather was really nice, a bit chilly in the morning though. Abbi and Hayden got a little nervous in the beginning with all of the people and other dogs there but once we got walking, they really enjoyed themselves. Josh & I did too so we decided that it's something that we'll continue to do. Although, I'm not sure how we'll be able to do it next year with three...

Dillon's Beach

So on Memorial Day, Josh and I took the kids out for some much needed play time. He's been working so much and we haven't had much time for us to spend together. And the kids needed to burn off some serious energy. We found that Dillion's Beach is an off-leash beach, but were considering another beach in Bodega Bay too. So after Abbi and Hayden saying that they'd rather go to Dillon's, off we went! It was really nice because all of the traffic was going the opposite way because people were leaving as we were arriving. The weather was a little chilly (60-ish degrees) but no rain and no heavy winds. It was so nice to get my feet in some sand and ocean water again! Even though it was a bit cold...



Josh and I came back a little more relaxed, with two tired babies, and with a ton of sand in the backseat of the truck! It was so worth it to just get away with each other and to reconnect.

The Tree of Life....or of Immense Frustration!

So I decided to tackle a new knitting project, but now I feel more like Steve Young after a quarterback blitz: lying flat on my back, with the wind knocked out of me.

I thought that I had knitted enough now to be able to handle an "intermediate" project without too much swearing, eyebrow furrowing, and heavy sighing. It seems I have met a worthy adversary. Lion Brand Yarn is hosting a knit-a-long right now and this is the project that they are using: http://blog.lionbrand.com/2008/05/21/tree-of-life-knit-along-2/. I'm only 16 rows in and already the frustration is palpable.

Very cool afgan once it's complete, just getting there I think is going to be the death of me. And maybe Josh's too because the knitting needles go flying sometimes.... Ugh.

Warning....inappropriate-ness ahead!

This picture is especially for Dan, who pointed out the huevos in one of the other pictures of Hayden.

Hayden says that he can't help if he's a fine male speciman.