Christmas Photos

For our Christmas card this year we had some professional photos taken. It is something that I hope we can do yearly because as a person who loves having photos all over my wall, these make me happy. We had them taken by Meghan Doll Photography and she finally sent us the low resolution photos of the ones we ordered prints of so I thought I would share:

Our Arty boy:

This next one was not one that we needed for the house ( I had places for all of the others) but it was such a great picture of their relationship that we had to get it. Dart being king, Arty just hanging out:

Our little D'artagnan . . . such a cutie

And finally the one we ordered a huge print of to put on the wall . . . I love it, it captures our little family so well:

My sister-in-law, she rocks!

Why my sister-in-law is awesome

yes, that's right. 2 days after I posted my blog she had already "whipped up" another one for me. Is this girl amazing or what? I can't imagine how long that would have taken me!

The Things that Arty Ate Week 2

Come Friday night of last week I was thinking about this post. I thought about how good Arty had been all week and how he hadn't eaten any of our things. I was so proud of him (or us for watching him . . .). I thought I would focus this post on some of the things that Arty had eaten in the past, to catch everyone up to speed. But Arty had other ideas . . .

Come Saturday morning I was sitting with Chris on the couch when all of the sudden I saw this:

yes friends, that is our couch. You would probably think that I gasped in horror and anger. But no. I have long learned to not become attached to our things.

You see, this couch of ours has been through a lot. Our cat used to pee on it and leave us little presents (think small animal organs) atop of it. Despite getting it professionally cleaned we had long given up on taking this couch with us when we make our big move to Texas (14 months and counting . . .).

So I was only mildly annoyed when I came upon Arty's first couch handy work:

Thankfully, Chris made it look a little more presentable by stitching it up:

So when I found his saturday morning present for us (it had probably happened earlier in the week and I just hadn't noticed) I just had to laugh it off.

My sister recently told me that Chris and I needed a nice comforter for our bed, rather than the cheap one from TJ Max that we currently have. I laughed when she told me this and replied, "we can't have nice things right now."

This is the nature of having puppies (3 in 3 years my friends) . . . rugs, comforters, couches, every thing is up for grabs with teething puppies (but they are SOOO worth it!). One day when the puppies are grown then I think we can invest in some nice furniture (leather furniture that can withstand child and dog accidents) and nice rugs and a nice comforter. But for now I am happy with my "Arty proof" (or should I say "sanity proof" because technically Arty can chew through it, it just doesn't make me mad . . .) things!

he looks so innocent here, happily chewing his bone!

The Things that Arty Ate

I've decided to start a new weekly feature, let's see how long I can keep it up :)

As you can see from the title, I'm going take pictures of all of the things Arty ate in the past week. You see, Arty fancies himself a billy goat. And despite me telling him how bad this is for his stomach, he doesn't seem to listen :) So this will be a way for me to chronicle and remember all of the things that Arty eats over the next year, and for you to see it too!

Let this be a warning to you: if you get a puppy, he better be really cute, or else he couldn't possibly get away with all of these shenanigans.

Warning 2: If you tell your wife that you want a wild and crazy dog and that you will always take care of his things, be ready for a lot of sewing!

Alright, let's get started.

First a preview of what most of our blankets look like:

We call these the cookie bites. When Arty wakes up early on the weekend, to eat and go out, we let him on our bed so that we can sleep for a little longer. If he feels like chewing then the culprit is usually our blankets and sheets. This means that quite a few of our things have cookie bites. When it comes to the comforter, Chris has to sew it back so I can wash it.

This week he decided to move onto the corners:

Next we have the worst victim of the week. I would be lying if I said that this one didn't make me really angry. I locked myself in my office after this one so that I wouldn't yell at Chris or Arty :) My sister-in-law made me an awesome rice bag for my neck for my birthday. This thing has been an awesome life-saver since I have been having a lot of neck pain this semester. I use it every night and I love it!

And then this:

Chris has a lot of sewing in his future!

Speaking of Chris, he was laying in the bed when I took the comforter pictures today. He asked what I was doing and I told him about this post. Here's how it went down:

C: "did you get the sweatshirt?"

L: "what sweatshirt?"

C (with a really guilty look on his face): "oh, well you were really stressed this week and I wanted to wait until you weren't to tell you, but Arty put a hole in one of your sweatshirts."

:)

I just had to laugh it off :

So there you have it. This week was a doozy, hopefully next week will be better!

Why he can get away with it:

Feeding a Starving Weimaraner

Feeding your dog, as simple as buying food and putting it in their bowl right? Well not when you have a STARVING Weim. You see Weimaraners are at risk for something called bloat. If they eat too fast and exercise afterwards then something crazy (that I will not try to explain) happens with their stomach. It can be fatal, and if not that, then it will probably cost you about $2000 in emergency vet surgery bills. So it is something that we want to try and avoid.

What can we do to help? Well step one would be to keep Arty from eating so fast and step two would be to keep him from exercising after he eats. Since two is mostly out of the question (he's a 10 month old weim, which means boundless energy ALL THE TIME!), we have tried our hand at getting him to eat slowly. But with Arty, not only does he eat, he inhales. 2.5 cups of food gone in literally 30 seconds. So we came up with some solutions:

1) The Target Tug-a-jug:

The concept is that you put the food in the jug and then the dog has to pull it out. This worked all fine and great, for about a week. Then it slowly became this:

Yes, he slowly ate the plastic rope (or I threw the little bits away). So we went to plan B:

2. The rope tug-a-jug:

It has a nice sturdy rope that cannot be eaten, and look, this cute little puppy is showing you how to use it:

But alas, this one lasted for about 2 weeks and then this:

yeah, he broke it. And what happened to the rope you ask? Well here you go:

It got Arty shredded! (this picture is also for a future post about finding Weimaraner proof toys, hence the other Arty shredded rope) So now we are on to plan C.

3. The Kong Wobbler:

The bottom unscrews and you can put the food inside. It is bottom heavy so it wobbles around as Arty paws at it and rolls it around so the food will come out. There is nothing for him to grab or shred so we are hoping this one will last us for some time. I'll keep you posted on if that happens or not. Note: His first time using it today he somehow got the bottom unscrewed, I am hoping I just forgot to tighten it all the way, or else we could be in for some trouble!

Well there you have it folks. A lesson on how to feed a starving weim, and a reminder not to get a dog that is possibly smarter than you unless you are up for the challenge!

Settlers Weekend

want to read about our awesome weekend away? If so, click here.

Thanks Jill for being in charge of the pictures!

my week

If you ever wonder why you don't hear from me:

and the night time:

At least I have a massage on Friday (during a make-up class that just got scheduled today, I decided to still go and show up to class late, I need that massage!)

Three interviews this week :

Phone interview with a federal judge in Texas!

On campus interview with Hennepin County Attorney's Office

Law Review Interview to be on the Board next year

fun stuff!