Cone of Shame

I know that having Allie spayed is in her best interest, but I feel terrible putting her through it.

We all had a rough night after she came home from the vet.  Thankfully, she's been doing a lot of sleeping so far this morning, but she just looks so pathetic.

We hope that she'll start feeling better soon and that tonight is better for her (and us) than last night.

House Crashing

I love looking at other houses to get ideas and inspiration.

My favorite blog, Young House Love, goes "House Crashing" periodically.  And now they've compiled photos of all the houses they've visited onto one page - AWESOME!

http://www.younghouselove.com/photo-gallery-2/lets-go-house-crashing/

I think my favorite house so far is "Chic & Timeless."

Enjoy some snooping around!

Boot Camp

Compared to puppy kindergarten, Allie's new training class is like boot camp.

In puppy class, the dogs always get some kind of free play where they can wrestle and run around with each other.  For Allie, this meant wrestling with her boyfriend Hector.  They were like peas and carrots.

Unfortunately, the new class doesn't allow the dogs to interact, much less play.  Allie hasn't figured that out yet - she continually tries to make friends with the other dogs (even though many of them are twice her size).

She's been doing well with her new commands at home, but once she's around all the other dogs she focuses on them instead of us.  One of the instructors said that at 5.5 months (and the youngest dog in the class) she still has "puppy brain."

I guess she's still just a baby - a big one!  28 pounds of puppy.

Patio Table

Now isn't the best time to use a patio table, but it's a great time to buy one!  We got an awesome deal on an expandable teak outdoor table which we'll put to good use once the weather warms up.

Not an ideal grilling situation!

J finished assembling the table in the garage after the delivery guys were too stupid lazy unmotivated to finish.  But it's okay because after calling the company to complain about the lack of service we received, we have a complimentary gift card on the way.

Here's the table fully extended.

And here it is with the leaf removed (it folds down into the table and the two ends fit together over it).

We're ready for summer (please come soon)!

Snow Day Snuggles

When it looks like this outside...

... it's the perfect day to snuggle inside.

Puppy snuggles are the best.

Bird Problem

I admit it.  I have a bird problem.

It started last fall when I got four birds at our church's thrift sale.  They were the perfect addition to our master bathroom.

Then, I got even more birds at the same sale for my beach-themed home office.

And just the other day, after I thought I had figured out how I wanted to arrange our curio cabinets, I found more birds.  Really cute birds.  Really cute birds in colors that matched our kitchen.  I couldn't help myself.

Blue birds for our cabinet with blue accented china and green birds for our cabinet with green accented china.

But I couldn't stop there.  We also had a set of shadow boxes that I hadn't figured out what to do with yet.  They are still laying on the floor waiting to be hung, but now they have something inside of them!

Like I said, I have a bird problem.

Photopalooza

We've been doing a lot of photo hanging lately.  It started with our hall wall and has continued into our living room.

We already had several wedding photos in the living room but decided to relocate another so the entire wall is dedicated to wedding stuff.

Sounds pretty straightforward, but we made it much more complicated than it needed to be.  I give you... our array of options.

Option 1: We should have stopped here because
this is the arrangement we chose.

Option 2

Option 3: I had to take a photo at arm's length since
each of us needed to hold frames at opposite ends.
J's smarty pants comment after seeing the photo was,
"good thing I straightened mine out."

Option 4

This is an awesome cross-stitch that we hung in the hallway.
This photo is unrelated to the post but I thought it was cute.

Perhaps we over-analyzed photo hanging, but patching holes if you change your mind later is annoying.

We also hung the canvas prints in our bedroom, but I'm waiting to take photos until we figure out what to do with the rest of the walls.

Girl Got Her Hair Did

There are many things that Allie enjoys, such as playing fetch, chewing on her antler, and snuggling with Daddy while he reads.  

"Leave us alone- we're very busy"

One activity that definitely doesn't fit into the 'enjoyment' category is being groomed.

Allie had her first grooming experience a little over a month ago.  She got a puppy bath, had her nails clipped, and got her paws and eyebrows trimmed up.  And she hated it.  I felt so sorry for the woman at PetSmart who had to deal with her.

As it turns out, Allie is a drama queen.  She convinces herself that whatever is being done to her is going to hurt and she prematurely lets out a piercing yelp!

"Halp me!"

Yesterday was her second grooming experience, this time in a much more fun setting - at her brother's house!  Not only did Allie get to see her brother Barney for the first time since they were 9 weeks old, she also got to see her sister Julie and her brother Jack.  It was a puppy reunion!  (Unfortunately, I was mesmerized by the overload of cuteness and didn't take pictures).

However, 'us humans' were party poopers when we insisted on grooming the pups instead of just letting them play all day.  Allie's first turn on the grooming table brought out her inner drama queen.  She didn't want to have anything to do with the clippers or scissors.  But she did let us brush out her undercoat, which was a huge accomplishment.

Later on her second try she was a little better.  She got her ears, paws, bottom, and legs trimmed.  She also got more brushing on her coat and legs.

Before

After

It's not a huge change, but you can see that her legs are less shaggy and her coat looks smoother and silkier.

Hopefully as she has more grooming she'll be better about it.  My fingers are crossed.

Yoga Dog

The many yoga poses of Allie (these were all taken within a couple of hours):

Tree

Child

Side plank

Reclining hero

Corpse

Goddess

We need to get Allie added as an official Yoga Dog!

Contacts

After much eye poking and way more time than it should have taken, I'm wearing contacts for the first time (other than after my fitting at the optometrist).

Here's hoping for a steep learning curve.

Fashion Statement

Our friend Colleen gave Allie the cutest doggie accessory.  It has a slot sewn on the top so it can slide on her collar to stay in place - what a great idea.

J would never want me to buy something like this for Allie (the same goes for dog sweaters and hair bows), but since it was a gift she gets to wear it - and I'm loving it!

Hall Wall

We've finally figured out what do to with our hallway!

J had a great idea to display a photo we've taken during each season.  So we scoured our photo archives to find the perfect photos - and we realized that we don't have the perfect photos - yet.

For now, we've used what we have and we're okay with it.  But we have an idea of the types of photo opportunities we need to look for throughout the year.

So here's what the hallway and photos currently look like:

Winter
Taken by A behind our old condo
January 2012

Spring
Taken by J in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
September 2010

Summer
Taken by A at Bluemont Vineyard
August 2012

Fall
Taken by A in our old neighborhood
October 2011

Our next project: hanging canvas prints in our bedroom!

Secretary

I'm at the kitchen table while working from home and my secretary is next to me...

sleeping on the job!

It's so hard to find good help these days.

Tinkering

Finding the perfect pieces to put in our new cabinets and shelf has proven to be more difficult that I thought.  So I've been tinkering.

My original plan was to only use things we already had and not buy anything else - "re-purposing" as my mom likes to call it.  However, I ended up buying three small white vases just to round things out, (I got the trio on sale for only $15) so I still consider this a successful re-purposing.

First off, here's a shelf that I bought at an estate sale.  This is in our living room next to our pub table.

Only the small white vase on the left was bought specifically for the shelf.

Next, here's our large curio cabinet hanging on the back wall of the kitchen.

For this I used two different Pfaltzgraff patterns that I had a few pieces of.  On the left is the Napoli pattern and on the right is the Merlot pattern.  There are also a few battery-powered candles that come on in the evening to add some light.

Finally, here is the small curio cabinet, also in our kitchen.

I decided to use a blue and white color scheme when I recently found an upacked box in the garage that contained our set of blue and white teacups with lids - hooray!  The white vases on the top shelf were bought so we would have some light pieces that would stand out in the darker top shelf.  There are also a couple of battery-powered candles that come on in the evening.

I can't promise that I won't continue to tinker and move things around, but I'm pretty happy with the arrangement for now.