Like the saying goes "When it rains... it pours"

I feel like since we got back from vacation last Saturday we have been flooded with unexpected problems. Really, it has only been 2 problems but still it's been a long and stressful week.



Rillz and I got back into town on Saturday and went to pick up our dogs from Kristis. Kristi and Jeff were kind enough to doggie sit while we were gone. We knew Kristi and Jeff were going out of town Thursday afternoon until Sunday. We were totally fine with our dogs being there with Diesel and no humans. They all get along really well. And Ren was going Friday to check on them anyways and give them food/water. Rillz got a text Friday saying Malu had lost 5 lbs. and looked really depressed. Not a huge shock to us because Malu is a very sensitive dog and always gets depressed so maybe she wasn't eating. Kristi said she was eating fine and hadn't noticed her losing any weight. Anyways, we go and check on them Saturday afternoon. Rillz and I walk in their backyard and are greeted to the excitement of Diesel and Simon. No Malu. We called for her and then thought she must have escaped some how. Soon after Malu came slowely out of the bushes and looked like just skin and bones.

She barely had any emotions and something was definitely wrong. Rillz and I took her to my parents and tried to feed her. She would not eat. We sat around for a couple hours to see if she would spring up a little. Eventually she started vomiting water and Rillz and I realized she needed to go to the vet. We took her right away and was told she has Parvo. She had lost 16 lbs. in 1 1/2 days. She was taken back into the hospital area and we were sent home. Malu stayed in there for 4 days. The whole time she barely ate one meatball. The Dr.s were worried to let her come home but thought she may do better at home because she is so sensitive. Plus, our bill was really starting to get expensive already. Rillz and I picked her up on Wednesday afternoon. She was feeling much better because her personality was back. She has eatin everything I have given her which has to be VERY bland foods. I have to give her pills every 8 hours and we even had to inject water into her... that part freaked me out a bit. Still looks like we haven't fed her in weeks but oh-well. I learned my lesson the expensive way. DOGGIE VACCINES ARE VERY IMPORTANT!!! This parvo virus is found EVERYWHERE! It can be tracked in your yard from anything and stay for years. So if you don't want to spend thousands on your dog make sure they are up to date on shots and get their boosters too.

Next thing, something is flooding parts of our front yard. It has been a slow flood though. On Monday I thought we had just over watered our lawn. Rillz turned the sprinkler system off on Tuesday and our lawn still had major puddles. Oh great. At our request our water is completely shut off. We think the sprinkler valve is broken. But, really we don't know. Ren has generously offered his time to come look at it today. In the mean time I have to use the bathroom but have to hold it until I go back to work in 1 1/2 hours. We really didn't need this issue after Malu's issues this week. At least I will work out tonight because we are planning on taking showers at the gym. Great idea huh!

This picture doesn't look that bad. Some water has been pumped out from the top and the sun has dryed it up too.

Luckely, Rillz and I are in good health and have food and a roof over our heads. I hope everyone else's week has gone better than ours :)

Thank goodness it's Friday!!

The kitchen

So the kitchen is pretty much finished. At least all the really hard and big stuff. So, finally, here are before and after pictures of whats completed.


Here is the before and after of the kitchen/living room wall. We opened up the doorway and made the fridge cave.

Before...

Before... but room cleared out.

The before picture of the outside of the fridge area...
The before doorway...



Finished product...

Before picture of where the fridge and microwave had to go. Took up a lot of room.

The fridge/microwave stand moved out...
After...

Looks and feels much more open.

The before fridge cave... no cave there
After picture... Look at that sexy fridge cave. Oh... and notice the cabinet paint change. We also put wood molding in instead of that hideous rubber stuff.
The floor before... It was lenoleum. It wasn't the worst thing in the kitchen but looks so much nicer with the tile

After... the new floor. We slaved over this dumb floor and it was the hardest and longest part of the kitchen. This picture isn't the best. But o-well... deal.
Our old oven... it was apartment size and very tiny and the oven temp was wrong so I always burned EVERYTHING.

Our new oven! We got it off craigslist for a great deal. Ignore the silver patch behind the oven. That is a work in progress. We eventually will put stainless steal sheets behind the oven and the backsplash. I spray painted a spot to see what it would look like.

For whatever reason I can't find a before picture of this shot. But I painted the cabinets and Rillz and Ren cut out that dishwasher space. The green cabinets are much calmer than the red. The red was just to in your face.

Old dishwasher... again, apartment size. I sold this little one for more than I paid for our new one.


The dishwasher... we got it off craigslist too.

The dishwasher was white with black trim and paneling. All our other appliances were completely black. So I spray painted the white parts with black appliance paint. Turned out great!

We bought this tool bench from Costco before we even started any renovation. We new it would be a perfect fit against this wall. The tool bench has a big butcher block on top too... perfect for prepping dinners on. It gives us more counter space and storage. All our utensils, pots, pans, bowls, knives, measuring spoons/cups, spices, foil and plastic wraps are stored in this tool bench.
People always ask if its a tool bench or if it really was made to go in a kitchen! Either way, we LOVE it in our kitchen. It's perfect.

This is the "backsplash" behind the countertops. We have not bought and put up the stainless steal yet. That is pretty much all we have left to do though. Oh, we bought kitchen things from Ikea that I can't wait to put up too!

Finally my kitchen is pretty much complete and my house isn't one big dust ball. Since our kitchen has been put back together we have NOT wanted to eat out. We were so sick of fast food and take out and restaurants. Rillz and I just get so excited to cook now. It doesn't feel as stressful as it used to in the old cramped kitchen. I know my kitchen is small but now it feels more efficiant and easier to move around in.

A new addition

We have a new baby in our family! Rillz's sister had a sweet little girl on Wednesday September 15. Her name is Gracey Milan Kealani Noone. Girlie and David didn't want to find out what it was. I immediately guessed a girl. I guess the majority of people said boy. Well, it's a girl and she is so adorable! Her hair is black, thick, and curly. We just love her already. She had a fever coming out but baby and mom are doing really well! Rillz's sister and brother-in-law live in Florida and Rillz and I were lucky to see her when she was less then a day old. Girlie came home tonight (Friday) and Gracey gets to come home tomorrow morning. I was told that Girlie was laughing and texting on her phone during labor. Crazy girl!

Gracey is 7 lbs. 10 oz. and 20 in. long.

We are all so happy for David and Girlie. It is the first baby on Rillz's side of the family. I will have to take pictures this week of David and Girlie with their baby. We just adore her and love her so much!

Welcome to the family sweet Gracey!

I made stuff for the baby. Not knowing what the gender was made it diffuct too. Here is a blanket I sewed. Let me tell you... such a pain! I had to learn a lot about my sewing machine and how to use different foots for it just to do this quilt. Took hours and lots of frustration to do! But, it's pretty cute.

Kristi also helped me make an awesome Baby ABC scrapbook. We both worked on it 7 hours straight. Kristi is SO creative and talented when it comes to crafty stuff. We couldn't make it boyish or girlish. Oops, pictures are sideways. Sorry.

Alright, got a lot of eating to do now. Peace out!

Hot air balloons

Growing up Boise always had an event called Boise River Festival. It was awesome! Always the highlight of summer in my youth. In 2003 the city ended it due to funding. Part of the festival was always hot air balloons. My dad would always wake up at 6 a.m. and wake up whoever wanted to go to. The balloons typically take off every morning for 3 days. And on the last day they did a night light balloon show. Well, like I said that all ended 7 years ago. This year Boise decided to do the hot air balloon part again. I was SO excited! I asked Rillz if we could invite my siblings over for a bbq then all go down together since my house is only 5 minutes away from the park. Rillz of course was on board. I called Kristi, Heidi, and Brent and come to find out they were all planning to go too. My mom and dad were both out of town so they missed the get together. I was excited to show off my kitchen (which I will post about soon). Last week Rillz and I worked our butts off to get the house ready for everyone. Lots of dusting! Anyways, we had a great meal and great company. We even skyped my dad (who is in Germany right now) so every one could say hi to him.

What is Brent doing? A little meditation doesn't hurt I guess.

After eating we headed to Ann Morrison Park for the Night Light hot air balloons. We all enjoyed it but everyone was saying it wasn't as magnificant as we remembered. Not as much balloon participation. But we hope if they continue to do this every year more balloons will get involved and the event will only get bigger. The balloons that were there were pretty when lit up.

I was able to take a picture of every couple/family:
Heidi, Ren and Camden (the lump of course)

Kristi, Jeff, Gunnar, and Brecken. Gunnar was trying to make a funny face but I took the picture sooner than he thought. That is why he looks SUPER happy in this picture

Brent, Noelle, and Hazel

Me and Rillz. Man, I look so white next to him. (ok I know I am white but you know, this is REALLY white looking)

There were so many people!

After the balloons we went back to my house and had rootbeer floats and celebrated Brents 26th birthday.

Thanks family for making this get together great!

Couponing deal

So I haven't blogged about a coupon deal for a while. I am still getting PLENTY of items for super cheap with coupons/deals. But I have been so busy with the kitchen to want to write about any of them. Here is my purchase from last night at Albertsons...

9- boxes of Pringles Stix

2- bags chocolate chex mix (yummy chocolate mix but the preztles kinda ruin it)

6- 4 packs of sparkling juicy juice (surprisingly still 70% juice. The apple flavor kinda tastes like red bull)

1- dozen eggs (the only thing I really needed from the store)

5- kids colgate toothpaste (I donate it to the homeless shelter)

3- 3 packs of ivory soap

4- container pringles

All this for $6.23. Plus I got a $2 survey to use on my next shopping trip.

These are things I normally wouldn't get or need but since they were pretty much free they are great things to have around or donate.

5 weeks in

So it has now been 5 weeks. We are VERY close to being done. I am not going to show pictures until the Kitchen is complete. But, it is coming along. Lets just say our fridge is officially in the cave. The baseboards are in and painted. Thanks to craigslist we upgraded our apartment sized appliances with a normal sized stove and dishwasher. Oh I LOVE craigslist! I buy so many things off there now and sell plenty too. There are still things to do in the kitchen but the thing to do now is go to bed.
Peace and love everyone

Feeling itchy

Exactly a week ago Simon and Malu went to play at Kristi's house with Diesel. When Rillz and I went to pick them up Malu had raised hair bumps all over her back and a couple on her head. My instinct was immediatly to take her to the 24 hour vet on our way home. It was midnight and we new it would be spendier than if it were with her normal vet. We decided to forgo the vet and go home. Malu still seemed her normal self and wasn't itching or anything. We put both of them to bed and hoped for the best (which would be Malu still alive and well in the morning). The next morning they were gone. We figured she rolled in a bee farm or something goofy like that. Well tonight I left the dogs outside for maybe 2 hours and once again Malu has those bumps on her back. I started researching the internet for answers. "Boxer has raised bumps on her back". Plenty forums popped up. It is most likely hives or allergies. I am thinking maybe mosquitos because it seems to be darker at night when she gets these bumps. I don't know but I guess its not uncommon for boxer dogs to get these problems. Crazy dog.


Notice the bumps on her back? Tonights isn't as bad as last week.




Harder to notice in this picture. You can see the patch of 4 bumps down by her booty.

Those just look gross. Makes me itchy just looking at her.

Of course Simon wanted his picture taken too. He is getting quite hairy and needs to visit the doggie barber. Not sure if he can even see through his bangs anymore.
I love my dogs but choose not to freak out about things like this.