Mini vacation!

On Friday morning we embarked on a great journey to the Northwest--Detroit Lakes, to be exact. We headed up to Louis' grandparent's cabin for a long weekend of relaxation and fun.

Though it was mostly a rainy, cool weekend, more of Lilly's firsts gave us lots to look forward to.

First boat ride. Everyone needs a "dog driving the boat" photo.

Tail between the legs. :)

Skinny puppy+wet floor=cold Lilly.

The sun shined long enough to hit opening day of the Shady Hollow Flea Market! Best part: Lilly could come shopping, too! (Just when you thought I'd write about something non-dog related...) We browsed around, found a few interesting things, but nothing we wanted to actually bring in our home.

But it's always fun to look. This vendor was our window hook-up last year.

We walked away empty-handed...

On day one. A simple dog walk turned into a walk through the flea market on day two.

And I remembered this tray I had spied the day before. For $6.50 it was mine!

We also took a few hikes. Lilly got to explore sans-leash and at one point got a little excited, went off the trail, and found herself in a bog! She was a little shaken up at first.

So when we returned to the lake we thought we'd see if she were a swimmer...

She's crazy for fetching, but couldn't be convinced to get the sticks out of the water (just yet).

I'll just get a drink of water instead.

So...no swim in the lake, but still messy from the bog-fall, and finally healed from surgery gave way for...

FIRST BATH! (Okay, technically it was a shower--an outdoor shower). Aww, Lilly. :)

All in all, it was a good weekend away. Lilly sure had a good vacation and so did her humans. This about sums it all up:

Passed out nearly the whole ride home!

One of these days I'll get back to blogging about things around the house...my garden still unplanted, porch floor I still want to paint, clothesline that needs to be constructed. Some day...



Life with Lilly.

Life with Lilly is fantastic. Louis and I are still feeling surreal about this whole thing. Our little pup has been a wonderful addition to our family! We also received her health history from the Animal Humane Society and learned that Lilly's exact birthday is December 14th (we were close with our guess of the 19th).

The first six days of having her home have been all about getting to know each other. We've noticed that Lilly is one smart pooch. She's picking up on lots of things--improving each day on her walks and heeling, going outside (no accidents to report so far!), and sitting to get her leash on and sitting when she wants us to pet her (she does jump every so often).

See? I'm very good at sitting. No big deal!

All in the past few days, Lilly has:

-Had not one, but TWO play dates with Basil. They had fun fetching tennis balls together in our backyard.

-Met our friends, Derek and Leona.

-Taken her first trip to PetCo (and first car ride not in the crate) to pick up a new ball and get an ID tag.

-Went to the vet for her first check-up (and got to see Louis' uncle for her appointment). All is well; she's a healthy puppy!

-Taken countless trips to the park, explored her new neighborhood, and met some of the neighbors. Tonight the neighbor boys tossed the ball around for her. Lilly can be a little timid at first, but loves everyone she meets!

-And she's been so good, we let her sleep out of the crate after two nights. Aside from coughing up a stick she ate earlier (still working on sticks=not food concept) in the middle of the night, she's had three good nights sleeping in our room. She's a good little alarm clock, too; we were both out of bed an hour earlier than usual today (she must know this means more playtime for her).

Lilly's only real challenge so far: how to fit two balls in her mouth at once. She's determined to do it. I'll have to get video of this as it's pretty funny to watch.

Surveying backyard activities.

And making sure things are all clear out front.

Today I was at the eye doctor, so I missed coming home for lunch with Lilly. On a very sunny day with very dilated eyes, this photo Louis texted me summed up perfectly how I was feeling! Lilly could relate.

"Hey dad, I can't see!"

I love the tail-wagging action and her shadow.



We're not sure how we ended up so lucky. We're just happy to provide Lilly with a nice home and to have her love and bonding in return. Tomorrow is another first for Lilly--her first vacation! We're headed up to Detroit Lakes with Louis' family. Lilly will get to meet some more family and dog friends. And I get to check out the opening weekend of the Shady Hollow Flea Market. For the win!



And Lilly makes three!

Well, we did it. We  got over our fears (okay, fine, MY fears), took the plunge, and no more than 18 hours after first stepping in to the Animal Humane Society, we found ourselves in love with a furry, rambunctious, lovable pup!

Meet Lilly!

Now let's trace back to how she got here...I asked Louis over lunch on Friday if we might still get a dog. Sure, we were nervous about the responsibility, but we kept coming back to wanting a pet. I deemed it a "now or never" situation, then Louis sent me photos of adoptable dogs from the Humane Society website. I was in cute overload, and we set out to the St. Paul shelter after work.

There we met the as-of-then-named Lucy. We took her outside for a walk, deliberated in the parking lot, went back in with our questions, and put her on hold!

Here's her stats:

-She came from Oklahoma where, sadly, there is an overpopulation of shelter dogs, to MN, where we don't have that problem. Because of this, there aren't too many details on where she came from.

-She's a mix of Labrador, terrier, and pit bull. But don't let the pit bull part fool you, she is as sweet as can be (and likely has very little pb in her).

-She's 5 months old. We're going to give her a b-day of December 19th (also our 1/2 year wedding anniversary) because we can.

-She weighs 30 pounds and could get to 55-60, and should be pretty muscular.

-She has a LOT of puppy energy in her, but is surprising us with how well she is already responding to commands. She sits and waits to get her leash on.

-She has tons of love to give! She runs off to play, but comes right back to us ("checking in" with mom and dad...we'll see how long this lasts). She really loves when we get down on the floor with her so she can give lots of kisses and see how far she can go towards getting directly in our laps.

But enough of the facts and details...enjoy her cuteness for yourself.

On the way home! She loved looking out the windows (even if it meant getting jostled around in the crate).

"Hey, what's goin' on here?"

"What'chu lookin' at?"

And our first family photo. :)

So, Lilly Vanilli...Silly Lilly...welcome home! (And if you could try really hard not to pee inside, we'll get along even better! I have this thing about keeping things clean. You understand, right?)

Olivia the pig.

And I still have an hour+ to go before my two flights home, and I've left my dutiful blog readers in the dark for a few weeks, but I have been crafting something the last few weeks, so without further ado...

If you don't know who Olivia the pig is, I'd recommend checking her out. When my sister (who will be a teenager this week!) was little, she had these books and I enjoyed them as much, if not more than her.

I mean, a pig in a sailor collar "who is good at many things" (singing loudly happens to be one of them). I love her!

Last year I gave my friend's daughter the book for her first birthday, and with her second birthday approaching, and after spying this dress-up kit, I was inspired.

But to be quite honest, I thought the kit was a little lame and all of the reviewers confirmed that. So I set out to create my own--with a few caveats: 1. If I really knew how to sew, I might have attempted the red dress, 2. black and white striped tights/leggings/sock are hard to come by, and 3. my own procrastination got in the way.

So tutu it was (because Olivia is also a dancer)! I followed this tutorial and it was a really simple process (even though I bought tulle by the yard instead of on a roll as per the instructions).

She would also need some pig ears to complete the porcine ensemble. :) These I just sort of winged from looking at some google images. They are a combo of pink fleece, white felt (for the inner ear), pipe cleaners to help them keep their shape, and a headband.

And lastly, little miss Mari was going to need the sailor collar!

I followed this tutorial and cut stars out of adhesive black felt, and tailored the tie part of the collar and sewed in black ribbon to make it more authentic and Olivia-like.

I hope she likes it!

Happy 2nd, Mari!

Success!

Hellooo from Sea-Tac! I'm currently sitting in the airport awaiting my flight home...and figured what better way to use my time than a little update I call Operation Tulips.

You will recall I was nervous about my green thumb when everyone else talked about their tulips popping up and mine were not.

But the sunshine last week was finally enough to send them springing from the ground, and I crossed my fingers they would bloom before I left for Seattle.

Winning (the purple ones that is...it was a mixed bag of bulbs).

With a lone red one.

It's weird that I'm looking forward to getting home to check on my tulips, right? 

Candy wrappers, bubbles, a piece of a kite, and several bricks

These are the things we'll be growing in the garden this summer. Kidding. These are the things I unearthed in the garden this past weekend.

From 40 degrees at the beginning of the week to the first few days of 70s for the year, it was time to get outside and get to work on our yard!

So I pulled out the rakes and got to work. I forgot to take a before picture, so here's the work in progress. Lots of dried-up plants from last year.

I don't remember what was growing here when we moved in last August, but I'm thinking this concrete-blocked mini garden behind the garage could be good for some herbs.

And clear! Now the weeds can grow up. Check out that massive rhubarb!

Sigh. No tulips yet, but they're trying. They don't get as much sun due to the fence.

But my hyacinths have triumphed!

We also put together our rain barrel. And I convinced Louis to take this shot:

Here's the Systern all cozied up to the house. Glad we got it in place because we're in for a lot of rain the next few days it seems.

We picked up a few plants over the weekend, but we're still deciding what to put in the garden. I also dug up at least 10 plant tags--not sure what is actually still growing back in the garden, but I'm nervous to start digging too much to disturb perennials and Native plants.

Today we hit 80. As predicted, spring was skipped. Here's hoping for some more near-normal temperatures. I'm off to Seattle for the weekend anyhow.

Reaping what we did not sow.

Oh hey, Happy May Day! We reached a high of 39 degrees today (whatever!). But the cold, rainy spring still has brought forth rhubarb in the garden.

A few years ago my roommates and I discovered what we referred to as "alley rhubarb" growing in the alley behind our volunteer house. It was also at that time I declared not liking rhubarb and them calling me out on it. Had I ever had it? Well, no, but I knew I didn't like it. Thanks, roommates, for not letting me act like a four year-old.

It's nice that Louis always has his iphone to snap pictures since I leave the Canon inside. Yup, that's a knife in my hand. I really can't wait to start digging around in this garden...must weed, remove rogue bricks, and figure out where we can plant some additional items in here.

And here's what I've learned about rhubarb: while it is a perennial, it takes 3-4 years to really start up, so thanks, sellers for letting us reap what you sowed.

Today's harvest turned into rhubarb strawberry crisp. Technically it's to take to dinner at a friend's tomorrow night, but we firmly believe in Quality Control at our house. Had to test it to make sure it was okay first!

I love the idea of walking in to the backyard to collect food for the night. We've been told there is some type of potato as well as Minnesota melon in our garden. I wish we had grandiose ideas for growing lots more out back, but, um, I don't think we have that kind of time. And at the rate we're going, I don't have a lot of trust in this weather.