I am going to be an Auntie!

My brother Kyle and his wife Drea gave me the best Christmas present this weekend....they informed me I am officially going to be an Aunt this Summer. I just can't believe the excitement that has come over me. I never thought I could be this excited about anything....so now my blog will go from me blabbing about my dogs to me ooohhhing and aaaahhhing over my little niece or nephew. Drea will kill me when she reads this, but wouldn't it be cool if I got one of each! Merry Christmas to me!

Genentech Prom 2009 "Oh what a Night"

I have not been to the Christmas Party the past 3 years and this year I was really looking forward to going. I hadn't gone the last two years because it was at the ballpark outside and I hate being cold. The year before that my Mom was in the hospital and I missed it, but this year it was back at a hotel in San Francisco. The funny thing was this year I needed to take a nap in order to make it past midnight, boy I am getting old! I just wanted to post some pictures from the night. I was wonderful to hang out with my friends and coworkers!

Catch up!

My mom has been very disappointed with me lately because I haven't been blogging. The funny part about that is she knows what is going on in my life I talk to her every day, but to make her happy (because that is what life is all about) I am going to try and start keeping up again.

It has been busy since Halloween it seems like that Holiday sets in motion for all the craziness to begin. I swear that every year I am going to slow down and enjoy the Holidays more, but that never seems to happen.

I made my first Turkey Dinner on Thanksgiving and it was wonderful. I spent the day with a friend and we had a blast cooking. I have really been into cooking a lot lately....so much that I even bought a KitchenAid on Black Friday for a steal. This last weekend I made pumpkin bread and pumpkin pie from scratch. I still need to work on the Pumpkin pie, but at least I am trying. I need something fun to do with beets so if you have a great recipe you can't help but share I would love to hear it. You can only eat so many beet brownies.

Of course the Saturday (ok I got lazy and it was the Sunday) after Thanksgiving the Tree went up.

After Thanksgiving I had a presentation at work that has been a year in the making. It has been a rather controversial project so I was a bit nervous to put it all together and present it. I had been working on it a lot the past month and it turned out to be a really good story. I still pulled a "Kyle" and didn't sleep the night before, but besides that and a minor freak out with my mother I stayed pretty calm. (I can say that now that it is over I am so my Dad's child)

Now I am just coasting until Dec 20th when I go to Arizona to spend 3 weeks with the family. It will be nice to have some time off of work, but until then I have to survive 2 more weeks of work. This will include the company Christmas party and all the activities involved in getting me and the 2 dogs ready to go south. I am sure I will have stories to tell about all of that.

Halloween!

Wow how time flies I have been wanting to post this Blog all week long and just never get around to it. For Halloween my department at work picks a theme and everyone dresses up. Last year it was the 80's I was still on crutches from my surgery, but I sported a Madonna look anyway. Since I wasn't blogging at that time I thought I would post a couple picture for old times sake. I am so happy that crutches were not involved this year!

This year we were "Heroes and Villains" which leaves the door pretty wide open for imagination and people didn't disappoint. Darth Vader even showed up to work and the only way I knew who it was was to look at my co-worker badge. It was a lot of fun. My Friend and I dressed up together I went as Glinda "the good witch" and my friend Nalene was Elphaba "the wicked witch of the West"!

For all of you that have watched Wicked the play you know that either one of us could be considered the Hero or the Villain. I think that was what made it so much fun. We got a lot of attention and had our picture taken with one of the Executive Committee members during lunch. You are going to ask me which one, but since we have become "Genentech a member of the Roche group" I have no clue who it is.
I can tell you one thing Halloween in Cali is much better then in Pierce. You can actually go outside without a winter jacket, gloves, and moon boots to go trick or treating! No need to worry about getting frost bite again. :-)

The Blog is not about my Dogs!

OH my goodness as I was looking over my Blog today I realized that it has become about my Dogs. How sad is that? Well I guess I haven't been in a place to write about much else because life pretty much consisted of Work this Summer and work isn't something I like to Blog about!

Things are turning around though I am setting boundaries and work hasn't been my priority as of lately. This has been GREAT! Since doing this it seems as if things are just falling into place. I decided not to work for the Warriors this season to give myself some extra time. I am back in a small group with my church community and it has been energizing to meet each week. I looking for great things to happen this season and look forward to planning my sabbatical.

Look forward to more posts that are actually about me doing stuff and not about the dogs :-)

PS I even cooked lasted night...I was really tired and wanted take out, but I cooked. My Mom was pleasantly surprised.

I can't believe it is OCTOBER!

Wow where does time go? As you can see the boys are keeping each other busy. It is fun to see them play together and it is so amazing how much this has helped Sly. He has always had a hard time eating, but now that he has some competition for food he is eating GREAT!!! He has never ate this well so having Nick has been a blessing! I have also started small groups again at PCC which as been so much fun. I have been so disconnected all summer long so to be back in community has been a lot of fun. I am sometime really tired from a busy week at work, but it is always refreshing to see friends every week on Tuesday night!

Work that is an entirely different issue and after a year of a lot of stress and a lot of tears I have a new boss. He has been amazing and has take a lot of the stress off of me. So all in all LIFE HAS BEEN GREAT!

This weekend the boys are going to the East Bay to meet Dali and Jean Luc and my friends Grace and Katherine will get some quality time while they play. I am so excited to go to Salt Lake City to see my brother be sworn in as a Lawyer. I am so proud of him for passing the Bar exam the first time. Also Mom and I are planning our trip in Florida to see Kyle graduate from Bomb school (I don't know what it is really called so that is what I call it) in January. I think the Fall and Winter might shape up to be even busier then my summer if that is even possible.

With all of that going on I am still trying to plan my Sabbatical which I am eligible for in December I am really trying to go on a mission trip. I really have Africa on my heart so please pray for me and the direction that all takes in the coming months!

Why another Dog?

Well a lot of craziness has happened around here this week and many of you have seen Facebook and Twitter updates saying getting a new dog, not getting a new dog, and now this morning I have a new dog. Here is the Story....

As everyone knows I have struggled with Sly's health since he was about 8 months old. He is a purebred Shih Tzu who was suppose to be 12 pounds, grew to be almost 20 pounds besides that he his health is guaranteed until he is 3. Well I wasn't going to "trade him in" for another puppy ever. Several times the vet has asked me to talk to the breeder to see if there are any know health issues with the parents or litter mates. Every time I get the same answer "all my puppies are healthy nothing wrong at all."

Last week Sly went back on antibiotics after being off them for only 2 months. After about 5 days on the medication I came home from work and fed him dinner. About 20 minutes after that he crawled on my lab and was shaking I couldn't figure out what was wrong with him until I found his dinner on my living room floor all slimy and gross. I call the emergency Vet the night and they wanted to see him that night, but without his detailed history I didn't think there was much they could do for him so I waited to talk to his vet the next morning. After telling her the story she thinks that he may now have esophageal problems from all the digestive issues. I had, had it at this point, so I wrote the breeder a not mean, but not a very kind email stating that not all of her puppies are healthy that Sly has suffered most of his life. After the same old song and dance she was like " I will just give you another puppy" I told her I didn't want a puppy Sly needed to be my first priority I wasn't looking for money, a dog, I just wanted her acknowledge that this had something to do with his breeding. This was the end of about 10 emails that had went back and forth and I was just upset so I went to hang out at a friend's house.

When I got back I had another email asking who Sly's parents were....all this time she had been telling me there was nothing wrong with the litter and she didn't even know who his parents were. I told her and reiterated again that I wasn't trying to cause trouble just needed help trying to figure out this problem. The next morning I had an email from the breed expressing how very sorry she was Sly was from a litter where she used one of her friend's studs and he came from a questionable breeder. Grant it she never use him again, but she could have told me that from the beginning. Not only that but the black female from Sly's litter was just put to sleep due to either complications with pregnancy or a brain tumor....well since they think Sly might have a mass in his stomach don't you think that information might be helpful?

She was horrified that this had happened and offered a toy 1 year old white male to me. She said she would be sad to see him go, but she felt I deserved this after all Sly and I have been through. I told here I couldn't take him from her that was cruel. After saying this throughout a few emails she told me she was going to have to get rid of him anyway eventually, so I said when she was ready I would take time. She said I could have him now if I wanted so I said that I would pick him up on Saturday. So there were a ton of emotions going on now because here I have knowledge that one of Sly's litter mates have had to be put down for a tumor related issue, I am bringing in this new dog and feeling guilty that I am trying to replace Sly....I wasn't really convinced that this was what I was suppose to do. After spending hours on the phone with my cousin Summer and friend Grace they both convinced me that I was doing the best thing for Sly and for me. After that I started getting excited that I was going to pick up this little guy in the morning.

My friend Mark and I woke up early and were trying to get everyone else around. We had kind of planned a day of it since we were driving almost 3 hours to pick him up. I had ran into some neighbors (Carol) telling them how excited I was to go and get my new boy....15 minutes before we got in the car the Breeder emailed me and told me she couldn't give him up. I lost it!!! I was in tears and I felt my heart rip out all over again....I couldn't believe this person was putting me through this. Well the great friends that Mark and Mina are they refused to let me sit around by myself all day being sad so we headed to Santana Row. As we were leaving Carol had seen my status on FB and couldn't believe it!!!

During our retail therapy (window shopping therapy for me) the breeder started emailing pictures of dogs saying that she would buy me another one and ship it to me...it was just too much for me. I told Mark he could talk to her when we got home because I couldn't. He originally wanted to just drive up there and get the dog even though she said I couldn't have it :-) Well we got home from Santana Row and I didn't want Mark to have to deal with this. I went back to my place and I was going to email the breeder, but figured I had my emotions under control enough that I could talk to her.....BOY WAS I Wrong. As soon as she answered the phone I started crying again. We had a good conversation and in the end she told me to come and get the dog I asked her when because I couldn't got through this disappointment again. She said if I could come tonight she would do it, but do it fast. Mark, Mina, and I jumped in the Car at 6pm and headed up to the foothills at 6pm last night. We picked the dog up at 8:45pm and were back in the Bay by 11:45pm. Carol called at 10:30pm and couldn't believe we had the dog....we were getting it, we weren't, then we did...IT WAS TRULY A CRAZY DAY! I wasn't even looking for another dog, but after all is said in done Sly loves him and I guess we have a good story to tell! Welcome to the family Nick!