When in doubt, smile.

Our neighbor decided to take Dipstick and one of their friends decided they wanted Newton today So both our puppies have new homes with lots of kids to chase around!

Here are a few more pictures of the finished paint …

Inside the dining room looking out, see the neat curved edge

Door to our bedroom and our hole in the wall

From inside the library (or arcade room)

From the front door

Looking into our bathroom from the bedroom

Even the ‘water closet’ has new paint

Its a very strange feeling to have your house full of strangers for 3 days straight .. especially when its sooo quiet around here normally. the first day the painter showed up with 4 guys, all mine and sean’s age, the last 2 days he added his 2 nieces for help. So today there are 7 people painting our walls in our living room, kitchen and hallways .. its pretty overwhelming .. but it looks like it will all be finished today!

Here are some sneak peek pictures .. Master Bedroom:Master Bath:Dining room from kitchen, the white walls haven’t been painted yet. This same color is also in the front room (the library)

Apparently it grows without much attention from me I’ve been watching my lettuce and cilantro grow to over 3 feet tall over the past few weeks, we havent eaten a thing from my garden since I planted everything. Today I’m going to trim everything back and hope it keeps growing. At least we finally have a few tomatoes on their way!

In puppy news we’re still looking for homes for our 2 little boys .. keep spreading the word for us They’re sweeties, and we just want them to have good homes where they get all the attention they deserve

After puppy training Wed. we decided to make a puppy schedule. Since we separated them into their own crates, they were having frantic nights, especially Big Boy. He cried all night for 3 nights straight! Sean and I even moved into the guest room last friday night. I dont know if its because he was so worn out from training or what, but big boy slept through the night with very little crying on Wednesday! So we decided to have them spend more time in their crates, they were used to eating and going to bed in them, but now we decided they should nap there too. We figured normal puppy parents have to go to work for several hours, so our puppies should be able to hang out in their crates for at least 2 hours if we need to run errands. Yesterday we started the new schedule, with most of their naps in the crate, and today we had somewhat of a breakthrough. Almost every time naptime came around, we told them “naptime”, and they’d all run into the bedroom to their crates. We’d have to show them which one they each belonged in and drop a few treats in, but they went in with no fuss and there was hardly any crying when we left. Then, for dinner, we said “time for dinner” and they all ran to the crates, and all 4 actually beat Sean in the room and were waiting in their respective crates!!! They learned so quickly!

Another positive thing about more time to themselves is that Sean and I had more time to ourselves! We actually left the house together to pick up pizza for dinner That was the first time in 2.5 weeks we have been out with each other!

Monday we’re getting the inside of our house painted (the common areas and master bed/bath). I cant wait, although I still haven’t picked out colors. I’m meeting with our designer tomorrow to figure that last part out I’ll take lots of pictures when its finished!

Who knew there was such a thing, but we sure are glad it exists We signed 2 of our pups up for it, and the first class is on Wednesday. Im really looking forward to it.

In other puppy news, we realized with the help of our vet, trainer, and researching the internet on ‘raising littermates’ that raising 2 puppies together is pretty bad, not to mention 4. So we’re doing everything we can find that people suggested, separating them as much as possible, but its not easy. We’ve come to a decision that if we can find good homes, we’re giving 2 pups up for adoption. If you know anybody who might like a super sweet mini dachshund, dont hesitate to have them email me

Today my parents had to put my 17 year, 11 month old cat to sleep. Now he can hang out with Jeff and Bunny at the Rainbow Bridge.

Here are a few pictures of the pups from the weekend [click here]

We were just visited by 2 Sandhill Cranes .. they were literally less then 10 feet from us, and then started squawking .. they freaking sounded like dinosaurs and it was sooooo loud. Here are a few pictures and a video.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/CaXDgbnnA3c" height="300" width="400" /]

Yep, after a couple months of searching for 1 little red male smooth coated mini dachshund, we ended up finding 4 (well one’s a girl), not being able to really choose a favorite, we made the bold decision to add them all into the family. Yes, we’re crazy.

They were 8 weeks on Tuesday when we brought them home, and they’re very quickly learning their routine, hopefully with alot of time and effort we’ll have some very well trained puppies in no time (keep your fingers crossed!)

Here are some pictures of their first few days with us [click here]