Brazos Bend (gator park)

Me and Jeff, and I am wearing Jeff's awesome hat

Brazos Bend (gator park)

I am a dork and put Jeff's hat on top of mine

Garett, Holland and Haven with Uncle Jeff in the background

A very big bird

Holland (right) and Haven with a baby alligator in the visitor center with Brent looking on

A gator in the water. I am pretty sure that while this picture was being snapped the entire family was standing in a fire ant nest getting eaten alive.

Random stuff from this week...

Pedicures feel really, really good! Cheska took me to get a pedi on the day of the wedding, because I had a HUGE fire ant bite on my foot that was swollen and purple... the scalding hot jetted water bath is seriously the best thing I've ever felt in my life.

Ants bite in Texas. Trey says "Fire Ants. The name makes them sound like they come straight from hell." My purple foot says they do.

We had a dog fight during the BBQ the night before our wedding. Very embarrassing. Me=stupid. Large group, lots of noise= dogs should be crated. They weren't unattended because we were all outside with them, and it was VERY hot so crates seemed mean. My vet says she needs to send a memo to all her clients telling them that they need to crate their dogs during parties, because the majority of her same family dog fights happen during large gatherings. Yes, it entailed a vet visit. Lucky got Bud, now they have to be separated because they have not gotten over it. Fortunately we have 2 yards in our back yard so this is easy, albeit a pain. I feel like a very bad dog owner, in spite of trying harder than I ever have in my life to learn doggy dynamics and be a good dog owner. I just can't seem to get away from dog fights. It really threw me, and made me re-live a lot of Lucy stuff that I didn't want to think about. I had Bud and Lucky pegged as two who would not get along, but they have had zero problems since Lucky moved in a month ago, so I figured I was just wrong. Apparently I was right, and the s### hit the fan. The kids got to witness Uncle Jeff separating 2 huge male dogs with a shovel. I felt very white trash fabulous.

We have food for a week, and 2 full cheesecakes in our fridge. I don't think I even want to try to eat this much cheesecake.

The H word is weird, but it is pretty darned fun to sit and chill with Jeff. He's doing his thing on his laptop about 5 feet away from me while I blog. The corgis are in their normal position, as close to my feet as they can get. I am loving life right now!

We went to Brazos Bend, the alligator park. We didn't see as many gators as usual- I think they were in the water with the heat. Holland got bit by a fire ant, which has to be traumatic when you're 7 and from Utah where the ants aren't from hell. Howard also got bit, but he is used to Texas hell ants, and resisted crying in public :)

Jeff just said hi to me from 5 feet across the room. And waved. This is fun. Cosmo barks every time he hears the word "Hi" because generally it means someone is here. I have never had a dog make that connection before, usually they bark at knocking or the doorbell. Cosmo barks at "Hi."

When going to get our marriage license, the lady behind the counter looked at my age on my ID, laughed, said she refused to believe it, but that we better get to work on kids really soon. I wasn't sure whether to be offended or crack up! I kinda cracked up.

Wedding Pics!

Me with Cheska, my fabulous friend and the best maid of honor ever, getting ready in the bathroom. The men's bathroom, to be exact. We didn't realize that while we were in there primping and taking pics there were guys outside crossing their legs and looking for bushes. Oops.

Me with Rachell

Me with Nam

Me with R-Jay

More Wedding Pics

Me with my good friend R-Jay. R-Jay is actually the person who introduced me to Jeff. He invited me shooting one day, and brought Jeff along. The rest is history far too long to blog, at least tonight :)

Quinn, feeling camera shy. When we get our official pics back from the photographer, he is in some of those.

I like my very "determined" cake cutting expression here.

More Wedding Pics

Cutting the cake. We're using the cake knife that Howard and Diane got for their wedding, and apparently all their kids have used it at their weddings. I married into a family with some awesome traditions. Diane put a chocolate and lime bow on the end, which was a really cool surprise. It was pretty!

Our beautiful cakes! These cakes have a funny story. The week leading up to the wedding there was a 24 hour stomach flu going around Jeff's family, and we all kept hoping Diane wouldn't catch it. Sure enough, the night before cheesecake making day (Jeff's one request was Mom's cheesecake for our wedding) Diane caught the bug! The bad part is that she was stuck in bed all day feeling absolutely rotten. It did turn into a nice bonding opportunity for those of us healthy enough to make cheesecake, though. Jeff, his sister Andrea and I made 6 cheesecakes (2 mascarpone, 2 chocolate truffle, and 2 brownie) with the help of Andrea's girls, Holland and Haven. Jeff worked the Bosche, Andrea and I threw together ingredients, and the girls crushed cookie crumbs and cracked eggs, then we took the crusts up to Diane who use hand sanitizer and gloves to shape the crust because the rest of us aren't very good at that part. It was a lot of fun. The day of the wedding Diane was feeling better, and decorated the cakes with ribbons and fresh flowers! Group effort, and it turned out beautifully.

My cousin Brent, sitting next to Cheska, my very great friend and Maid of Honor

Me and Jeff talking to his friend Leo

Wedding Pics!

Wing, Nam, Elizabeth, R-Jay and Lexie

Quinn and Rachell

Me and Jeff, just married!

Me and Jeff with Bishop Peterson, getting married. Bishop P was reading his remarks off his blackberry, which is soooooo like him. It was perfect.

Wedding Pics!

My favorite couple, Nam and Rachell. Nam is wicked gangsta in his black suite. He even had sunglasses and wore a lime tie to match our colors.

Cutting our beautiful cakes while Garett looks on.

I am so glad Rachell caught this on camera. Jeff had just handed me (yes, in my hand) a giant slice of fudge truffle cheesecake to put up to his mouth, and when I set it down I was like "What do I do with all this chocolate on my hands?!" Haven to the rescue! Love this girl!

Eating cake. Not sure about the feeding of the cake ritual.

Eating cheesecake

Eating cheesecake while Haven watches

Jeff and our friend Rachell

This is their classic pose together

Loving Jeff's hair in this one!

More Wedding Pics!

Jeff cutting cheesecake while evil Tavia makes Garrett cry by telling him he cannot wield the sharp knife on top of the glass table that he can barely see over to help "Uncu Jeff" cut cake. Poor kiddo was trying to be so helpful!

The best flower girls ever, Holland (right) and Haven (left). These are the cutest, sweetest girls in the world- I totally loved spending time and getting to know them. I think I get to claim them as nieces now that I married their uncle, right?

Holland

Haven

The big chandelier

Wedding Pics!!

Random pic showing the venue, and the awesome tables with the bright green napkins. I'm loving it!!! Jeff's mom helped me pick the table cloths and napkins, and I made my own centerpieces.

My cousin, Brent with my good friend, Rachell

Brent has a cute baby face, but don't tell him I said it.

Nails

I just flipped a Corgi and did my very first ever Dremel job on Marcy's nails! Just like "Grandma Carolyn" does at the dog shoes for her. So easy!!! Yay!!! It was the most drama free nail job ever. Woohoo!

Lucy

A very special day approximately 6 years ago- May 12, 2009

Rest well, my sweet girl.

May you run and play, with no more pain and no more fear, have endless happiness, and be there to greet me when I get to the other side someday. You'll be missed.

I am so frustrated that blogger won't let me put text above my first picture anymore. It's being glitchy lately! Anyway...

We've had a busy week!

Before I get into the week, this is our new dog food (pictured above). Does anyone know anything negative about this brand? The kiddos seem to be doing incredibly well on it. It's turkey with fruits and veggies mixed in, totally organic. It doesn't have any of the nasty fillers, it doesn't give Cosmo any troubles, and I have noticed a huge reduction in poop making, poop eating, grass eating, and all bad digestive things in general. Everyone loves it except for Lucky (introduction to Lucky, below), because he is still mourning the fact that he no longer receives table scraps with his food... and if he does, they aren't nearly the quality that he was getting before. Sorry, Lucky. Gone are the days of leftover rosemary chicken and potatoes, filet, and the like.


Welcome to the crew, Lucky!! This is Lucky, riding in the back of my car on his journey home. We've had an interesting couple of days! The most important part is that Lucky gets along with all the other dogs. Well, almost all the other dogs. Cosmo silently hates and resents him, and has been pouting in the corner all weekend, and asking me for lots of extra attention and reassurance. Not only is he disturbed, but Lucky has stolen his best friend, Lily, so Cos no longer has a playmate. Oh, and Lily likes Lucky a little bit too much. She keeps trying to, um, entice him. Eh. I have started letting them out in shifts because this really bothers me. Does anyone know, will this behavior die down, or is there a way to curb it? They are both fixed!

Lucky came home on Friday night and met everyone, then promptly went to the vet for his neuter appointment Saturday morning. I had to take Lucky by myself, and when we got to the vet he started commando crawling at the front door. He crawled on his belly all the way into the back room. Poor dawg! He doesn't get out much, so he was awfully scared. Jeff and I went to pick up our stoned dog later in the afternoon (so out of it he walked into a glass door) and Lucky decided not to speak to me (or walk with me, or come to me, or acknowledge my presence) for about a day and a half.

We've had a drama filled couple of days with him, including lots of marking on Friday night. The darned dog marked my dining room table!!! I beat him and screamed in his face, then he turned around and marked the kitchen cabinets right in front of me! Poor Jeff had to watch me beat the H.E. double hockey sticks out of his dog, and I think Lucky and I have come to an understanding of just whose house it is, because he now marks outside only (and I am buying ammonia tonight and will be "marking" over him out there, too, thank you very much). Now with Jeff at work today, Lucky is acting very gentlemanly and following me around. He doesn't jump on me or nip at me anymore. Did my butt whooping earn me alpha status, perhaps? Or at least "higher on the food chain than Lucky" status? Cool!


Also on Friday, Jeff's mom and I made a lot of cheesecake. We're having cheesecake as our wedding cake, so we practiced decorating them and putting them on the stands. I think it's going to be pretty easy, and Diane has lots of cool ideas for decoration, and never ending patience for making the perfect cheesecake.

Dog tags arrived, so everyone is loved and tagged. I can't imagine what these people thought as they were stuffing 6 tags into the envelope.

And, you know, I have to end my blog with the token adorable Corgi pic.

The end.