Updates and a debate

I've been a little busy to blog lately, but I thought this was the cutest picture. Bunny helping herself to the laundry pile the other night. I don't know how she climbed all the way up there without flattening all the blankets out! She seemed very proud of herself.

We are moving either the 6th or the 13th. It is all up in the air right now. The people buying my house are crazy. I decided to just put all of my stuff in a storage POD next week and have it shipped whenever the house closes. All I will have to do that way is get in my car and leave whenever we close. Bud is going to have to fly out ahead of us. I checked the Houston weather tonight and he could go this weekend, which is too soon, but next weekend is looking a bit dicey as it is up in the 80s and as we all know the airlines won't fly a dog if the temp in either city is above 80. The forecast doesn't extend out to the following weekend yet. I was really trying to avoid the airline game, but there is just no room in the car for 2 large dogs and the Corgis. Lily, Cosmo and Bunny will be car riders. That's a lot of dogs in one car, but the Corgis are easy.

Ok, the Corgis are easy until you try to pose them for pictures. How do you guys do it?! Especially Traci, with her perfectly posed dogs. Beth was over last weekend taking pics. She got some great ones, but it was not without effort. They just refused to do that cute little together Corgi thing, even though when we are not trying to get pictures they are permanently joined at the hip. I think at one point they actually tried to herd us. Ok, at several points. Little brats. I ended up being in a couple pics and Cosmo sat in front of me while Bunny perched in my lap. It was the only way the monkeys would sit still at the same time!

The tension in the house is thick over Lucy. That is all I will say. Very frustrating. I checked in via email with my new, down to earth vet like he asked... his response was "You have been very patient and tried all you can. Her life is not even close to adequate. Dr. So and So near you makes house calls. I am sorry for your loss." Um, as Mandy says, at least he is honest. A bit blunt, perhaps.

I am curious, as this was a huge debate tonight, who thinks it is safe for a dog to ride crated (crate tied down on all 4 corners) in the back of a truck (no canopy, just a pickup) for about 30 miles on the freeway? I am violently opposed. Am I being irrational? Bud needs to get from the airport in Houston to the dog boarder in Katy, and we are limited on transportation options as he is a car puker. I was going to rent him an SUV so he could ride in his crate and be on the inside of a vehicle. Silly? Let the comments flow!

Lucy, again.

Well Lucy went from 1 and 1/2 prednisone per day back up to 2 again. She is also losing weight in her neck and face area. Her eyes are kind of bloodshot. I'm really wondering if it's a tumor in her back.

I have a very sick teenager on the couch who has slept pretty much all day.

I have an almost house in Houston that passed the termite inspection. Woohoo!

I also have an almost house in Houston that is able to close earlier than expected, thus leaving me homeless for a shorter period of time. Double woohoo!

I am, at this moment, incredibly scared to be moving away from my wonderful friends and family who love me unconditionally no matter what. Jeff is amazing and that is what stops me every time I want to botch my house sale and stay put.

I have decided, after looking at pictures, that lime green is indeed a fabulous color for table cloths at my wedding.

I have also decided that earth tones are a nice compliment to lime green, and that the centerpieces should be orchids with sticks and river rocks with sticks, all in tall glass vases. Not sure what the sticks are called, but you know... the tall ones that they sell at the florist.

I have decided that Cosmo, in particular, would look smashing in a black bow tie and should be allowed to participate in some fashion at my wedding... even though he would most definitely bark at all the guests.

I have decided that I cannot please everyone, so I have to be true to myself. I always come out fine in the end.

House news

For those of you who didn't know, Jeff did go ahead and pick a house. The inspection was last Thursday, and there was nothing really major that came up. A couple missing window screens, bolt the toilets down better... not bad at all compared to the last nightmare! We asked for them to do a couple things, but mostly stuff that we can (and Jeff would like) to do ourselves. It still has to pass the termite inspection, but short of finding bugs that are chewing down the house, this is where we will live:

http://search.har.com/engine/dispSearch.cfm?mlnum=8568764&backButton=Y

I really shouldn't have made that bugs chewing down the house comment, should I?

Messy Madness and Baby's First Bath

This morning I woke up (ok, this afternoon I woke up, which is why I had problems) and not only had Lucy peed on the floor, but Lily had peed in her crate. As soon as I opened the crate I realized Lily had pee all over her, even up to her head, and she shook off, and sprayed me with pee, then ran a beeline to the door tracking pee puddle footprints all through the house. WOW.

And then comes bath time... I got Lily into the tub and was quickly reminded that this was puppy's first bath. Uh oh! This summer we just sprayed her with the hose and called it good, because she was excited about playing in the water anyway. She thrashed and kicked and slid and jumped and acted a fool... until Bunny came in. I wish I understood even an ounce of what goes on in dog language. We were having a downright wrestling match in the bathroom, and then the old lady quietly slipped into the room. She stood in front of the tub very calmly and just looked at Lily, and Lily became a respectable dog INSTANTLY. I am dead serious, no exaggeration. My good old girl stood by the tub through the entire bath. Lily was calm and nice about it (even though she shook and was obviously afraid). I could not believe it. Anyone want to interpret? Needless to say, I love my Bunny and she gets a chewy treat for being so wonderful.

Now Lily smells like vanilla and I smell like dog pee, so off to the showers for me.

Well, I thought I'd blog a bit as I sit at the orthodontist waiting for Quinn... to get his braces off! He's getting a lot of perks from this moving thing, and one of them was his orthodontist deciding his teeth would be fine if his braces came off early.

It's snowing here again today. I don't think I've seen it snow this much here as long as I've been alive! I've definitely learned more about how to drive in it, since with this kind of winter, staying home every day it snows isn't really an option. Even the kids have been going to school in it.

Lucy has a vet appt today. I cut her back from 2 prednisone each day to 1, partly because she was running out and I wanted to see how she'd cope without it, and partly because she can't hold her pee until I wake up so I was hoping that we'd be able to back off the steroids a bit. So we'll see what happens at the vet. She's not doing well at all, though. She actually seemed a bit scared when I tried to pet her today, like I might hurt her.

Jeff found a house, and I am tempted to not say a word until the inspections come through. I really hope this one works. Not only because I don't want to be homeless sleeping at my neighbor's house for any longer than I already will be, but because it will be an awesome house. I'm over my anti-ranch sentiments and just decided to be happy that it's a huge house on a quarter acre lot for the pooches, has a lot of privacy, and feeds to one of the best high schools in the entire Houston metro area. I had originally put this high school at the top of my list, but quickly determined that we couldn't afford any of the neighborhoods that fed to it. Somehow this house popped up at just the right time, though, and is very nice AND in a comfortable price range. Quinn's been working really hard at school again, and his high school now has talked about switching him to some accelerated classes. He is in that mode where he doesn't want to be doing a bunch of AP classes again and working his butt off... but in regular classes he finishes his homework during class and a lot of it is review. I guess what I'm saying is I hope that the regular classes at this new high school, which is academically recognized for being above average, wil be the right fit so that he is challenged, but doesn't have to do AP where they like to give the kids 3 and 4 hours of homework each night.

Alright, signing off now to see Quinn's purdy new teeth!

Fun Times at the Urgent Care

I am sure everyone has noticed that if a kid is going to get hurt, it will happen on either a major holiday or a weekend. My mom used to joke on holiday mornings that nobody should get hurt, because I was a holiday injury kid. My brother happens to be a weekend evening injury kid. I should say a weekend evening finger injury kid. It's always a finger with him. If he'd let me, I'd post a picture of his hands with all the crookend fingers. He killed his 5th tonight. He tripped over Cosmo and fell knuckle first into a wall.

He ended up having a bad sprain, and is now wearing a splint. While we waited for him to go in, though, we saw a lady OD in the parking lot about 10 feet away from us. She was rolling around on the sidewalk screaming, and then passed out. Urgent Care couldn't deal with her so they sent security out on the sidewalk with her and called 911. I don't have a ton of sympathy for someone who ODs but I figured they could have done slightly more than they did. The lady who brought her there had bags of stuff and said that was what the OD person had been carrying around! The other crazy thing we saw was a guy who had his ear bit off by a dog. He was holding a towel to his head and brought his ear with him in a bag.

Quinn can't get hurt during the day when the respectable suburban urgent care clinics are open. Nooooooooo, we have to go to downtown Vancouver at 10pm. At least it was an entertaining 2 hour wait for us.

I really need to suck it up

I haven't been this much of a baby in a really long time. I think I am overly stressed by my move (which entails packing as well as lots of legalities in terms of my brother's guardianship) and my slightly crippled dog who is currently growling at the dog food bag. So I had a bit of a meltdown today. I also have a sty in my eye, which happens when I get too stressed.

Jeff picked another house. It's actually a pretty cool house, now that our realtor calmed me down and talked me through the floor plan. Jeff tried to calm me down, but this was beyond his abilities... I needed a professional calmer-downer. It's a one story ranch, which is the one and only thing I absolutely did not want. In fact, I had crossed it off the list to see, but Jeff accidentally grabbed my before list instead of my revised list, ended up seeing it and fell in love.

It does feed to a terrific high school, is pretty well updated, is in great shape, and even has a huge dog run (more like a whole fenced in yard for the dogs seperate from the rest of the back yard) in the back which will come in handy when we need to seperate Lucky and his precious testicles from my respectable fixed dogs. It is an 11,000 square foot lot, which is awesome. There is a laundry closet (arg) instead of a laundry room. However, it has several living spaces, including a living room and a seperate giant den. So it's really a good house, and once Barbrena did her realtor thing I stopped crying. Hey, I am in sales and understand that purchasing can be emotional, and I am not too proud to let my realtor do her job and see me through a crisis, because I really wanted the big 2 story house that they couldn't get in to see, that had gorgeous french doors leading out of the kitchen to the covered patio. I am ok, though.

That is, I WAS ok, until I found out that if they accept our offer (which is pretty darned good so I don't see why they woudn't) they are unable to close until 2-3 weeks after my house in Washington closes. Que blubbering. I am being a baby. My neighbor is wonderful and said she would take us in for 2 weeks so Quinn can go to school, and she is even willing to let Marcy stay with us. My Aunty Gail is taking Cosmo for 2 weeks. So I really just have to find a place to board Lily and Buuuuuud, and of course Lucy is still up in the air growling at her dog food bag (actually, I moved the dog food bag out into the garage she she would stop fussing over it). I will have to sit here and watch icky people move into my house, though. I am very unhappy about this. Plus I will essentially be HOMELESS for 2 weeks. 3 weeks, really, but I won't count travel time.

Vacation Pics

Finally some pictures from our vacation. Quinn, Jeff and I went to Forks and La Push, WA over my birthday weekend and had so much fun. Quinn even said he had a really good time, which was unbelievable! I am still waiting for Jeff to post his pictures from the digital camera (hint, hint... in the middle of failed inspections and starting over with house hunting, you really need to find time to get on that, haha).

I am not too terribly sad to be leaving La Center, though I have some good friends and good memories and there are definitely things I will miss. However, my sadness is lessened by my new goal, which is to live inexpensively in Houston so that I can save up enough money to buy some land on the outskirts of Forks and build a little cabin there to retreat to. There are very few pristine areas of the pacific northwest left, so please don't spread this around. This area of Washington is absolute heaven. I imagine that is because there are no jobs there, so people aren't moving in at the rapid rate that they are moving into our other cities and ruining them. Plus the cities are very po-dunk logging towns so I imagine that actually living in them would wear on many of us after a while.

Not to make this a rant, though. Just check out the absolutely gorgeous pictures. I realize I haven't seen much of the world, but if I were going to die tomorrow I could happily do it while wrapped up in a blanket on this beautiful beach, below.

2nd beach, La Push, WA
Another view

The river running in front of our cabin

Doggy Bloggy...

Haven't done a dog blog in a while.

Current frustration is that I switched the kids to Nutro, which is apparently a much better quality food than what I had been feeding, but both Marcy and Cosmo are beefing up rapidly. The answer is obviously to feed less, but it is no small feat to get weight OFF a Corgi, as we all well know. I wish those recommended portions on the side of the bag could be trusted.

I won't annoy everyone with too much Lucy information because I know half my dear readers want to smack me upside the head for continuously letting vets talk me out of putting her to sleep. I have gone 2ce now with the best intentions of doing the right thing, and instead ended up with a purse full of steroids. I had a good talk with Lucy last night and told her to let me know when she is done. Her eyes are a little more dull today and I can tell it is a bad day for pain. She has some very good days, too, so I am waiting to see when her bad is too much. She is out of prednisone in 2 days. She has been on a 2 week cycle. I missed a pill yesterday and she was VERY down. Even on her good days she has to be in a seperate room, and grumbles a lot. She just always has kisses and tail wags for me, though, and she is so young. Anyway...

I've worked it out so nobody has to fly. I don't know where we will stay on the way to Texas with 4 dogs, haha! I really wanted to avoid flights, though, so we have Marcy and Cosmo in the Uhaul with me and Bud and Lily in the car. Lily in the car is such a horrible idea. She gets mad if you leave her in the car, and pees. Oh, and Bud pukes in the car. No travel plans yet for Lucy. If she makes it another 3 weeks Ican get her a flight... or better yet get Lily a flight. Lucy doesn't dare to cross Bud, so she could ride with him. Thankfully, every single one of my dogs has a crate. Amazing.

Since you've all been asking...

Links to the houses Jeff will be seeing tomorrow. He narrowed it down to these after preliminary neighborhood drive-by's today. Guys, one of these HAS to work. No pressure on Jeff or anything, but I leave Washington is 22 days. Fortunately I have some visiting to do along the way, so the trip can be extended to about a week giving extra time for closing if we need it. Also fortunate is that I've been informed of several couches I can sleep on if I get to Texas and am homeless for a week!

http://search.har.com/engine/dispSearch.cfm?mlnum=7643084 http://search.har.com/engine/dispSearch.cfm?mlnum=5297292 http://search.har.com/engine/dispSearch.cfm?mlnum=9195740
http://search.har.com/engine/dispSearch.cfm?mlnum=8568764

And the search begins again...

Remember the house we all thought was so cute? Yeah. Inspection came back with a bad foundation- needs 15 supports and has apparently had foundation work done in the past, and some of the doors upstairs are not even square and won't shut! The roof was a mess, which nobody could see from the ground. There were big gaps where the shingles did not meet the roofline, and rats were crawling into the attic. The clever inspector even got a picture of one of the rats in transit! Or it was dead, which is even more gross. The house had so many shoddy do-it-yourself repairs that it would need an entire new roof! There was also water damage, and a plethora of other issues. So, with my move in 22 days, Jeff is headed out with the realtor this weekend to find another house. Lesson learned... make sure all doors open and shut properly, and take a ladder to go on the roof :) Just kidding, Inspections are well worth it. Let's hope the next house is a winner.