Living Room!

The living room/dining room is finally (almost) done!  We went with a blue color on the walls, which I think turned out great!  We wanted a green color but couldn't find a green paint that didn't look like mint ice cream.

View from the dining room, the curtains were from overstock.com and two panels on each side of the massive window worked out perfectly!

Slightly different angle, I love that the Kermit lamp found a home on the bar next to the front door! 

This awesome lighting fixture was original to the house, Michael found a lamp store that restored to it's former glory!  It looks amazing over the dining room table.

View of the living room and dining room.

I'm SO happy with how this room turned out, such an improvement from when we first moved in!

Skunked!

Is anyone suprised that out of all three dogs, Toby was the first to meet up with a skunk?  He got sprayed right in the face by a skunk that was hanging out in our backyard the other evening.  This was the one time that he gladly jumped into the bathtub!
We took him to the groomer's to get a professional bath, and they had to clip off most of his cute facial hair.  At least it will grow back!  Hopefully he learned his lesson, because this was an experience I never want to repeat!

Humbled

This is not a house update, just musing on the weekend.

This past Friday, a lost dog found us.  Michael made every attempt to talk to all our neighbors to find out who this dog belonged to- no one knew but had seen it wandering around for the past month or so.  I come home from work to find a sweet, friendly, adorable fluff ball in our backyard.  Michael had somewhere to be and asked me if I could take it to a vet to see if she was chipped.

After talking to a few people, it seemed better to take her to the shelter- that way it would be easier for her family to find her is she was not chipped.  I dropped her off at the shelter, which was beyond heartbreaking in itself as this dog was amazingly sweet and well-mannered but I figured her owners were most likely frantically looking for her.  I stuck around to see if she was chipped.  She wasn't.  And the little things that I noticed about her (lump on her belly, swollen eye) caused some alarm in the shelter staff and they whisked her away to be looked at.  I gave them my number just in case they needed more information and I wanted to find out what happened to her, I assumed she would quickly be reunited with her family.

Later that afternoon the shelter called me.
She was much more sick than they had thought, likely mammary cancer which may have spread to her lungs.  An eye that had been infected in the past and never treated.  Did I want her?  Most likely her owners would not be looking for her due to her medical needs. 
The family has until Friday to claim her, after that the shelter is going to turn her over to a rescue organization to see if they can help her, but really they just aren't so sure.
The day left me shaken, and made me feel that I should have rushed right down and picked up that dog.  Let her live out her last few months in a loving home, off the streets and out of the cold shelter.  I am still feeling so guilty over the fact that this wonderful creature is alone in the shelter, sick and most likely confused.  What does one do in this kind of situation?
It also made me feel incredibly humbled.  We have been given three absolutely amazing dogs of our own, mostly by chance.  They are home with us (all snuggled up on the bed right now) because we happened to be at the shelter on a certain day and noticed these dogs (or in Toby's case- he noticed us).  It is such a huge responsibility to me to be their mother, and it makes me sad that some people do not share that same feeling of responsibility. 

I'm feeling pretty lucky to be a mom right now.

Betty White to the Rescue!

Ok, not the real Betty White- I should explain.  Our neighbor "collects" cats.  She feeds them and houses a few, so there are many cats running around our neighborhood.  One of which has stood out to us (mostly because it loves to sleep in our driveway).  Everything about this cat is crooked, she even walks a little crooked and looks like she is about 90 in cat years.  I have taken to calling her Betty White, she is a sassy old lady cat.
We were awakened one night by Toby, who was barking like crazy at something outside.  Turns out Betty White was in our trash can, digging around and making a HUGE mess all over the street at about 3:30 in the morning.  We go out to get everything cleaned up, and think that we have cleaned up all our trash.  Until the next day, when a neighbor brings over a check that has been mistakenly thrown away and brought out of the trash can by Betty White!
Michael and I have been sneaking her treats whenever we see her, I think she may be hanging outside our house for awhile and we are more than happy to have her!

I finally found my camera, so I can post a few pics!  I'm hoping to be posting some before and after pictures next week.  Michael has been working like crazy to get our yard functional- and the dogs are loving it!

Baily and Charlie are really enjoying the yard, as you can see!  See how tall the weeds are behind Baily?  They were that tall ALL over the yard, front and back!  It looks so much better now :)  There were also a few trees and things that we took out, the yard looks SO much bigger!

Baily LOVES to sunbathe!

Bees are pollentating the orange tree!  I'm hoping for some fruit this summer!

I also (finally) ordered some curtains from overstock.com, we really need them!  I got a great deal and cash back from ebates.com, excited to put them up next weekend.

Where the Wild Things Were

We finally got around to "trimming" our backyard.  In all honesty, our yard needed more than just a trim- it looked like it could double as a set for "Where the Wild Things Are" with a few Dr Seuss trees mixed in to make it more interesting.  Chopping things down was very theraputic and educational- I learned that we have 3 ficus trees and not 2 like I originally thought!
The orange tree is flourishing with all the sunlight it is getting now, hopefully we will be getting a nice crop of oranges this year!   I must admit, when we were chopping down trees I half expected a Lorax to jump out at us.  It is looking better and we are moved in with internet (yay!) so updates will finally be more frequent!
I will be posting pictures as soon as we can find the USB cable for the camera.  It has to be in one of our boxes...

Projects!

The house did finally close (YAY!) and we have been working like crazy to get it ready for us to move in!  There has been many coats of primer put on the walls, just so we can start actually painting the walls!  The man who lived there before us was a heavy smoker, and we finally have painted over the tobacco stains on the walls. 
We also took down the wallpaper in the bathroom (which was the worst project so far, I swear to never put up wallpaper of any kind!) and the bathroom looks SO much bigger and cleaner.  In fact, the whole house looks much cleaner and smells a lot better!
The next big project will be refinishing the hardwood floors, which will be happening on the 15th- very exciting!
I will be taking pictures this weekend of our progress, I think we will be itching to move in after this weekend!