Cats rule, dogs drool...

Our family started out with one cat...Donovan. Since then we've had a total of 6 cats and at one time, we had 4 living in our home at the same time.

When Gusto (our first Seeing Eye pup) arrived at our home, we had Donovan, Olivia, Daphne and Harrison. None of the cats liked Gusto mostly because he thought "chase the kitty" was a fun game and no matter how much we scolded him, we couldn't break him of chasing the cats. Our home became a segregated household with a series of baby gates with cats on one side and rambunctious puppy on the other.

When Harley joined our family, he and Harrison became pretty good buddies. None of the other kitties really showed any interest in him at all.

By the time Anita and Ava joined our family, we only had Olivia and Harrison. Neither Anita or Ava chased the cats and both Olivia and Harrison liked Anita and Ava.

The cats were in Maryland for most of our renovation and it wasn't until a few weeks ago that they moved back home with us. They settled in very nicely and we were so surprised to find Olivia on the bed with Harley. She actually seems to like him this time around.

They spend most afternoons napping on our bed together. It's very cute -- one day I hope to find them actually cuddling but for now, they seem content to share the bed.

Snow Day!

We were in a rush to get the POD empty the Sunday (March 1st) after we returned from Salt Lake because it was supposed to start snowing that night. The upcoming days looked like it was going to be cold enough for the snow to stick around for a little while which would have made it difficult to empty the POD.
Just like the weatherman predicted, it started snowing late Sunday night. Over the next few days, while I unpacked lots and lots of boxes, Harley and Ava got to enjoy the "frozen tundra" out back. The ground was hard enough to let them run around in the snow a lot and they had a great time playing together.

Ava even found one of her many outside toys and the two of them played tug of war in the backyard.

Images created using Creative Memories StoryBook Creator Plus software and Creative Memories Cozy Winter Digital Kit

Springtime!!!

No, it's not raining fire around our home. That's snow!!! Last Friday was the first day of spring and when I took Harley and Ava out first thing in the morning it was snowing huge snowflakes! It snowed for a good part of the morning although nothing stuck.

Harley and Ava really wanted to run around the backyard but it was too wet with the snow and we still don't have any grass out back -- just lots and lots of dirt, i.e. mud.

Images created using StoryBook Creator Plus software and Creative Memories Primary Spring Addition.

Happy St. Patty's Day!!!

Last Saturday morning we headed out to Morristown to march with Ava in the Morristown St. Patrick's Day parade. Ava wore her St. Patty's Day headband until she shook it off and gave it to me to wear.We marched with the other pups from our club, Puppy PALS, as well as lots of other Seeing Eye puppies. It was a beautiful day out -- perfect for a parade. There were bagpipes, marching bands, lots of different dogs including Irish Wolfhounds (of course) and just lots and lots of people dressed in green.

The parade goes through downtown Morristown and between all the waiting for the parade to start and the actual march, we were all nicely pooped out afterwards!

Move-in Day

We returned from a week of skiing on a Saturday night and on Sunday we had a whole "moving crew" over. There were nine of us and the POD that has sat on our lawn since October was emptied in a matter of hours with only one casualty.

Now the mess that was in the POD was now in our new/old home!

We were pooped out but after everyone left, Yvette helped me start unpacking box after box after box. We've been home for a week and a half now and there are still boxes everywhere but I am very happy that the empty box pile is much bigger than the filled box pile.

Scenes from the new house...

Two nights before we left for skiing, we spent the night in our new home! We slept on an air mattress and it was like camping out with real showers but it was fun. Earlier in the week, we ate our first dinner in our new/old home -- it was just take out but especially tasty. Some of the rooms were still being worked on but we now have an orange guest bathroom and a pink laundry room.

Our bedroom is still bright as ever and I don't know why but my bathroom shower reminds me of the Flintstones.

My favorite place to ski

I really am not that fond of skiing. I don't ski on the east coast at all since it seems more like ice skating downhill and I'm not up for that "challenge". But if I am going to ski, my favorite place is Alta. We usually try to end our Utah ski weeks at Alta since it is my favorite place and maybe Ed's too.

Ed actually ended up not skiing the entire week since he bruised his ribs with the fall he took the first day. But he felt up for a day of skiing at Alta on our last day. It was beautiful and sunny but really really cold -- that's me with the purple face mask in the above picture!

I have to admit that one of the things that makes skiing so worthwhile is the beautiful views.

Thor...

There's a new addition to the family! Thor is our newest Salt Lake nephew and he was absolutely adorable. He's a playful puppy and very very sweet. I spent a lot of time sitting on the floor with him -- we were so happy to get to meet him!

Ski Utah!

We arrived in Salt Lake on Sat Feb 21st. Our flight left Newark pretty early. Lynn and Jeff had already been in Utah for a week and they picked us up at the airport. Since Lynn had hurt her back mountain biking, she didn't ski with us on Sunday at Snowbird.

The Sunday skiers were me, Ed, Jeff (Lynn's husband) and Ed's cousin, Tiff who lives in Salt Lake. The first thing we did was go through the tunnel to Mineral Basin at Snowbird. It was so cool! We skied up to a conveyor belt that took us through the tunnel on our skis. And of course, I had to take pictures :-)

I like to take it easy when I ski and my favorite run is Easier Way :-) I decided to spend some time knitting my glove after lunch while Ed, Tiff and Jeff continued on. Unfortunately Ed took a bad fall and bruised some ribs so he ended up joining me -- we skied to the bottom and hung out while Tiff took Jeff all over Snowbird.

Pictures created using Creative Memories StoryBook Creator software and Creative Memories Pastel Winter Digital Addition.

Busy busy busy!

Wow--so much has been going on!
Over Valentine's Day weekend our wood floors were all finished. Don't they look pretty? We used to have wall-to-wall carpeting before but that was really just a huge magnet for cat and dog hair.
My favorite door is still my french door/pocket door combination and it looks so much better without the protective stuff over the glass.

After the floors were finished, I spent a week cleaning out kitchen cabinets -- the kitchen is the one room we did not clear out except for furniture. All our cabinets were filled with our dishes plus whatever else we could jam in there. Despite the plastic draping, there was dust everywhere! And it took a really long time to clean.

We actually decided to camp out in our home on Thursday February 19th. It was cold and we slept on an air mattress but it was so wonderful to be back in our home!

Final inspection was that Friday, the 20th. We had quite a few inspectors and all we need now is the actual certificate of occupancy.

I wanted to move in right away but as timing would have it, we were off to Utah for a week of skiing the next day.

After we returned from Utah we moved in and we've been living there for a week now! It's a mess of boxes and furniture in the wrong rooms but it is wonderful to be back home!!!