RAIN!!!!!

This picture deserves its own post – it's raining!!  Becky and I went on a walk and went puddle splashing!  It was fun to be silly out in the rain! 

Rain people!  It’s raining!!  Okay, okay, it's not a picture of the rain.  Hopefully we'll have more rain and I'll have more entertaining pictures. 

P.S.  The shoes I'm wearing are super comfy.... if you're looking for new shoes.  They are Sketcher D'Lites.  VERY lightweight and were on my feet for 12+ hours while walking around Disneyland.  They are worth checking out!

Gassy Sunsets

I bet you thought I was going to post about farting.  NOPE!!

We had a couple beautiful sunsets over the last couple days.  Here’s the first one: 

Between the sunsets, I got gasoline for under $3!!!!!!!!!  HOLY CRAP!! 

Then we had another beautiful sunset last night:

Mizithra Cheese

I’ve ordered this pasta dish at a restaurant for years and now that I’ve made, I’ll never pay $10+ for it again!  There are only 3 ingredients!

Mizithra Browned Butter Pasta

1 pound of spaghetti

1 cup butter

3/4 pound Mizithra cheese

Directions

1. Cook pasta in large pot of salted, boiling water until al dente. Drain.

2. When pasta is almost done, start slowly melting butter over medium heat until golden. Skim butter solids off top. Toss pasta with butter. Sprinkle with cheese to taste

I’ve never browned butter before and it took longer than I expected.  I was nervous I was going to burn it, so I took it off the stove earlier than I should have.

We put marinara sauce, parmesan cheese and mozzarella cheese in cresents, wrapped them up and baked them.  They tasted like little pizzas:

 

Destruction Continues

Winnie wanted to leave her mark on the world just like Ruger did.  She smashed her face/head into the same wall.  Her damage is a little lower since she’s shorter than Ruger.  It looked like it took her a second to get her bearings back in order, but then she kept running around.  These dogs have strong heads!

The two little jerk dogs that live in our home have chewed up 2 slippers; one was Doug’s and one was mine.  Here is what was left of my slipper:

They completely destroyed Doug’s slipper; it took Doug a while to figure out what was in pieces all over the floor:

The day the chewed up my slipper, they also ripped out the piece of carpet that was lifting up: 

I stopped at the store to get some carpet tape – of course I bought the wrong kind.  I wanted the tape that gets heated/ironed and glues the carpet seams together, but I got the kind that doesn’t need heat and it’s SUPER sticky.  It was very difficult to use in the small area we were replacing, but we got it done.  The carpet looked ridiculous because the new patch piece is so clean:

but after using carpet cleaner it looks pretty good!

I’m sure it won’t look good for very long; the tape was so sticky that we couldn’t wiggle it into place and the dogs run through that area a lot.  I’m really glad we fixed it since they were destructive the next day.  I would have been so pissed off if we came home to our carpet completely ripped up.

The pups were super helpful while we were fixing the carpet - they were sleeping on the carpet I was using to make the patch:

 

Quarantine day 3:

Quarantine day 3: "These humans keep talking to me in a high pitched voice. I don't feel good, but all I hear is 'blah, blah Ruger, blah' in an annoying sound. They know I don't feel well, but they keep making me walk up and down the stairs while pointing a camera in my face. Why won't they just let me nap? I was fine until they brought this girl home they keep calling my 'sister'. This girl has done nothing but cause me problems. I haven't been this sick since I ate azalea flowers. Now these humans keep trying to hide 2 tiny, funny tasting tablets in my normal food. I lick these weird things they take from a small bottle and I spit them out, but they won't stop. They've managed to hide a few pieces in wet food. So rude. This girl keeps taking my toys, sleeping in my bed, pooping on my grass and she isn't leaving. Why won't someone come get her and take her home? I can't go to the mailbox, see my friends at the dog park, or do anything anymore. Won't someone save me?" while pointing a camera in my face. Why won't they just let me nap. I was fine until they brought this girl home they keep calling my 'sister'. This girl has done nothing but cause me problems. I haven't been this sick since I ate azalea flowers. Now these humans keep trying to hide 2 tiny, funny tasting tablets in my normal food. I lick these weird things they take from a small bottle and I spit them out, but they won't stop. They've managed to hide a few pieces in wet food. So rude. This girl keeps taking my toys, sleeping in my bed, pooping on my grass and she isn't leaving. Why won't someone come get her and take her home? I can't go to the mailbox, see my friends at the dog park, or do anything an

 

Dog Tags

I made a dog tag similar to the one I created for Ruger.  It has the logo of the gun maker they are named after and their name:

 

I copy/pasted each letter in Winnie's name from the Winchester name, so her name would be in the same font.

Almost Scammed

Bummed. I thought we finally sold our truck; I've been emailing with a buyer for a couple days now. I just got a scammer 101 email offering to send us extra money so we can help him get money to the "shipping company" that will pick up the truck since he's out on an oil rig. I mentioned my brother's experience in that field and he changed his vocation to petroleum. I doubt I'll hear back from him since I told him his email is from scamming 101 and copy/pasted almost the exact email from the internet. Unfortunately he has my name and the city I live in. I already deleted my paypal account linked to my email since that's how he was offering to pay. Ugh.

THEN, since Doug is sick and sleeping, I logged into blogger to post this and my entire reading list is naked women showing everything they've got.  WHAT THE FREAKING HECK!  I thought my account was hacked, but it turned out someone took over a blog I was following that belonged to a good friend while she was going through the adoption process.  She stopped using the blog quite a while ago....apparently it has a new user.  Good grief.

Sickos

I’m glad I made another lasagna, so Doug and I didn’t have to worry too much about dinner while dealing with our sick pups this week. 

I took a couple hours off on Tuesday to take care of the pups, Doug took Wednesday off work and he came home a little earlier on Thursday.  Unfortunately Doug is sick now, but he’s been able to be with the pups today.  Here are a few sicko-pup pictures from our week:

It was pretty scary for a couple days; Ruger was VERY ill and wouldn’t move around much, had a fever, etc.  Poor little guy.  To save myself from typing the same thing I posted on Facebook, I’m going to copy/paste it: 

Poor pups are so sick. They both are displaying symptoms of pneumonia and are on antibiotics. Ruger is really sick today - shivering (probably from a fever) and super lethargic. We're waiting to hear from the vet... Praying it won't cost us a fortune.

Both pups are being seen this afternoon and of course the insurance plan doesn't cover pneumonia. We'll see what the vet says in a couple hours.

The vet saw her on Monday and said it isn't kennel cough, but things change, so we'll see.

I'm pretty anxious for the appt. I called the shelter and they offered to do the vet appt, chest X-rays and meds for free but it's over an hour drive for us. We're going to our regular vet and the shelter is going to talk to their COO about helping us with the bill! Yay! Hopefully they'll just increase the antibiotic dosage, give something for the fever and send them home. Crossing my fingers!

Done at the vet office and Doug picked up more meds at the pharmacy. Ruger did have a fever, but they said it's not pneumonia. The vet said he's been vaccinated for Bortetella (kennel cough), but might have gotten a different strand of it. Kinda like people who get the flu shot and still end up with the flu. They want us to stop the current antibiotic and start a stronger one. Ruger has an additional med as well (a cool $100+ for the one med). They are quarantined to the house for 2 week; no walks and no one that has pets can come over. The plus is since it's diagnosed differently, I should be able to file a claim through the pet insurance for Winnie's portion of the bill.

Ruger has lost a few pounds and Winnie is down a pound also. They were eating normally and still losing weight. I had to hand feed Ruger this morning and he barely ate; luckily I had canned food - he ate about 3/4 can, teaspoon by teaspoon.

I was scared for him last night.  One of them was whining at 3am, but every time I turned the flashlight on to see which one it was, it would stop.

As of yesterday evening and today, Ruger is feeling better.  He’s still sick, but he’s mobile and wants to play a little.

Recognition

I’m really proud of the steps Doug has taken in his company lately.  He works his butt off and, as with any company, it can go unnoticed sometimes.  Back in December they asked him to go to Texas to help them get back on track.  Hundreds of people were flown out to help.  I’m pretty impressed at the amount of “Thank you” he’s received.  He’s received a corporate thank you letter, a thank you gift and the company had a recognition ceremony in another city.  They recognized his efforts, company support and gave him another present:

People at the ceremony knew who he was and/or they know his reputation in the company which was pretty impressive because there are SO many people in the company.

Farewell Jake!

Friday night was Jake’s open house to say hello and goodbye before he left on his mission on Wednesday.  Then Sunday was a family dinner to spend a last meal with him until we see him again in a couple years. 

Jake and Doug took a picture with Flat Kyle.  He’s supposed to take this picture of our other nephew with him on his mission.  Cute kid!  I like this picture of Jake and Doug: 

Karla sent me this picture as they watched Jake head up to catch his flight:

Dog Training

We started training Winnie on Sunday, but first they had a nap – these goofy dogs always seem to lie just like one another: 

We practiced a few commands to see what she knows already.  She will sit/shake all at the same time, so we need to fine tune her sit, down, shake, stay commands.  She did very well during her first lesson. 
Sit command: 

Down Command (weirdos): 

Down/Stay: 

Down/Stay with food temptation: 

After playing and some rough housing while they try to determine dominance (we don’t leave them alone right now because they get pretty mean with each other while sorting out the pack order), they took another nap – identical sleepers again: 

They even did some cuddling!: 

The shelter posted Winnie on Facebook as ADOPTED – fun!:

Birthday Fun

We went to an Italian restaurant for Breanna’s birthday dinner; they had a separate gluten menu for her.  The food wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t good either.  It was worth a shot, but when we first walked in it smelled like stale cigarettes.  They have really good reviews online, so we were pretty excited.  Oh well, we had fun anyways! 

After dinner, Ben and Breanna came over to meet Winnie and then we went to their house for Breanna’s surprise birthday party.  Her parents did a great job decorating!  My pictures didn’t come out very good though: 

We decided we are never in pictures, so we took one of ourselves:

Dog Station

Because of these two crazies

we have a dog section in our kitchen, near the sliding glass door.  The chime under the light-switch is how Ruger lets us know he needs to go outside.

Pitiful Fruit Trees

Our fruit trees froze a while back and I finally trimmed back the dead branches and leaves....

Lime Tree:

 Now:

 Mandarin Tree:

 Now:

 Lemon Tree:

 Now:

 Orange Tree:

 Now:

They're so sad!