smile

Last week was a long week, culminating in a three-day fundraising dinner/national council meeting/board meeting extravaganza. And this part-time gal on a full-time schedule is tiiiiiiiired. At least the first day after a major event is slow as molasses!

 What do you mean, my lip is stuck on my tooth?

 It'd be great if you'd stop laughing at me.

 I'm telling you, there is nothing wrong with my face!

Stop giggling, or I'll stab you with my lip.

sick day

Because I spent the vast majority of yesterday in sickie mode, there's no real post for today. Instead, I'll leave you with this video, which depicts Rory's reaction to her new snowshoeing gear:





What's your favorite remedy for sick days?

pupdate: the mopey puppy

Rory and Eli on our trip to Mt. Evans in July

Rory is a year old now. In fact, she was one of those very special babies who celebrated her birthday on 10/10/10. Her actual birth date is a guess, since she's a shelter dog, but our best estimate is that she was born on or around October 10 last year.

She's grown a lot since we brought her home last November. (So has my patience.) And even though general consensus is that a puppy becomes a dog when it's a year old, actual 'youth' varies from breed to breed. And despite having completed a trip around the sun, Rory is still very much a pup.

One of her favorite games is 'tug'

One of the benefits of our new (rental) house is that it is across the street from the church where Brian works. Every morning he leaves out the front door. And every morning, Rory spends a little quality time moping by the front window.

Sooooooooo sad and lonely

Eli, on the other hand, prefers that his beauty rest go undisturbed.

Company Girl Coffee 2.19.10

 

It's Friday! Time for another Company Girl Coffee. I've got a nice mug of green/white/peach tea (it's REALLY GOOD, I promise) and there's snow on the ground and the dogs are going crazy. A proper Denver morning in February, if you ask me.

Eli says a proper morning begins at 10am, no more of this 5am business.

This has been kind of an interesting week, what with Lent beginning and all. Brian has been ordained for all of 3.5 months and on Tuesday he went and got himself his first collared clergy shirt to wear to the Ash Wednesday service. YOW. I'm still getting used to this Pastor's Wife (PW) thing, but seeing him in the same shirt the 4 (four!) pastors at my home church wore every single day was a little...odd.

I've thought more about Lent this year than I have in years past. Growing up, I went to a Lutheran church that wasn't exactly oppressive, but very steeped in doctrine and kind of strong-willed in a socially conservative way. In other words, there was a definite right and wrong way to live. And one of the right things to do was give up something - something significant - for Lent. You weren't bad if you opted out, but you were very very good if you opted in. The problem was, I don't remember receiving much info on why we were making a sacrifice. I got that Jesus fasted for 40 days (and the guy who actually fasted for Lent became a small-time celebrity of sorts) so we should give up something too, but I didn't learn much beyond that. Lent in my childhood was essentially a competition to see who could 'give up' the best.

It should be no surprise, then, to learn that when I went to college (and started going to a very different kind of church) I never really 'did' Lent. Now, at age 26, I am finally a part of a doctrine-oriented church again, and I have come back to the practice of Lent. I hope to learn more about this part of our spiritual journey - really experience it the way we are intended. If you know of any great reads on Lent, or fasting in general, I would love to hear them in the comments!

We have had an extraordinarily busy week for us, with meetings and activities every night Sunday-Thursday...and then watching the Olympics after that keeps us up even later. (We don't have a DVR.) I am tired; Brian is exhausted.

Tonight, we sleep.

Rory says sleep is for the weak and that she would much rather be chewing on this blanket here. Because that's what is supposed to be going on at 6am on a Friday.

A couple knitting updates:

I realized sometime in the past week that the fun stripey socks I'd begun required more yarn than I had for the project. So...I've finished one of those and I have found some more of the yarn second-hand (it's discontinued). I'm hoping to get that yarn before the end of Feb, so I can finish up this second sock and have some fun new foot-sweaters.

In the meantime, I decided to start a shawl I've had my eye on for many months. It's more or less a triangle shape, knitted in three 'stages' of sorts. I've finished the first stage and I'm in the transition part to the second stage. This is my first real actual lace project with real actual lace-sized yarn. I'm pretty stoked about it. I might be able to finish by the end of the month, but it might take me a little longer than that. We'll see.

Beginning stages of lace. It's much bigger now.

So tell me, what are you up to this weekend?

DOOMSDAY IS UPON US

It has happened. I knew this day was coming, but I naively hoped it was still a ways off.

Alas.

Rory has discovered how to get toilet paper off the roll.

My world (and apartment) will never be the same.

(Until the dogs move out of the guest bathroom and into the laundry room. Which is still a little ways off.)

early rising

Since the Dawn of the Puppy about 2 months ago, Brian and I have become unwilling early risers. And as it appears that waking up at 5:30 is something deeply engrained in Rory's soul, I am faced with two choices:

1. Continue to have us stumble around in the dark, trying to shush her for an hour and a half; taking her outside to potty when it's urgent which involves the putting on and taking off of many layers; and generally being cranky between the hours of 5am and 8am (at which time she has most of her just-woke-up energy burned off); OR

2. Start getting up at 5:30. Me, the night owl. Me, the girl who goes to bed early so that she has plenty of time to read under the covers...until 11 or 11:30.


I have been leaning more and more toward the getting up early part, because I think it would be better for me in that I could get some actual income-earning work done -  because, let's be honest, not much of it is getting done during daylight hours. Having that hour or two before Brian gets up and moving could make a world of difference, if only I could be disciplined enough to make it happen. And I know it could work, because when we first moved here I was up by 5 or 6 most days anyway just because of the time zone change. And it was AWESOME.

And speaking of Brian - I know it would be good for him too, to be able to sleep until the alarm sounds instead of playing the your turn, my turn, up and down game we play the first two hours of the day.

We already turn in between 9 and 10 most nights anyway, so a major evening routine change wouldn't be necessary. Except I wouldn't be able to stay up late reading, but it wouldn't be hard to read during the day instead.

On the other hand, waking up when I don't want to or plan to is HARD. And one silver lining in the whole taking turns to address the puppy plan is that Brian and I spend those hours cuddling, and I would miss that.

Have you ever tried to implement an early rise schedule? Or had one imposed on you by puppies or babies or construction next door? What are some things that work to get you awake and moving when the rest of the world is still asleep?

coffee, etc.

I have never liked coffee. I have never liked mocha, or coffee-flavored ice cream, or tiramisu. I have always, however, liked coffee shops, and hot teas, and the coffee drinkers these shops serve (Starbucks not included - I get headaches in there for some reason).

On this date two months ago, we packed up our car and our dog (we only had one dog back then) and began our cross-country journey from Richmond, VA, to Denver, CO. Brian had just finished seminary and was about to start work at a church out here. I was facing a new first for me - being a housewife. We got married while he was in school, and I worked to support us. The plan for when we got out here was for me to get everything unpacked and then start bringing in some web-based income from home quickly, as a freelance proofreader and editor (and YES, I am for hire NOW! and YES, I DO edit theses/manuscripts/articles/resumes/blog posts!). Quickly hasn't happened as quickly as I had hoped (see posts tagged Rory) but it is coming, and I imagine that once work starts rolling in, I might spend some time in coffee shops. Especially when the weather gets nice, and I can sit outside with the dogs.

I haven't found my coffee shop here in Denver yet, but that's ok. Moving was expensive, and Christmas was expensive, and Eli had to have four digits worth of dental surgery, and all three of those things happened within about 6 weeks of each other, and I am still working on amassing a winter wardrobe (it is 0 degrees outside according to my thermometer) and we just plum don't have play money right now.

I've got plenty to keep me busy, though. Designing a website, for one. Setting up our home, for another. And then there are the dogs, who need feeding, and grooming, and training (lots of training) and walks and potty breaks outside (where it is 0 degrees) every 10 minutes or so, and cuddles and pets and ice cubes.

Busy hasn't proven to be quite the wonderful thing for me, though. I am lucky if I talk to a non-family member more than once a day (I'm counting librarians and grocery checkout people in that number) and, while I am fairly introverted, I am also very lonely right now. I send lengthy responses to 'hey what's up' emails; I linger on the phone a little too long; and the mail man (whose name is Jim) might be the closest friend I've made out here so far. Don't get me wrong - I have made some wonderful friends at church and I know those relationships will grow, but we rocketed right into the holidays when we got here, and everyone was busy doing holiday things. There was lots of good cheer to go around, but a shortage of the 'let's get together this week' kind of thing. So I have found myself doing a little bit of that one thing I thought I would never do, or need to do: finding community online.

One of my very very favorite blogs is called Home Sanctuary. I can't say enough good things about it, and I imagine that a large portion of folks who are reading these words came here because of Rachel Anne and Home Sanctuary. I've only recently begun commenting and reading the blogs of other visitors to Home Sanctuary, but I am so encouraged by linking with other women like me. And, I feel a little less lonely.

WELCOME! to any visiting Company Girls. And to my friends who are reading - please leave a comment and let me know you were here. I could use a little wave, some friendly words, and maybe your best joke on hand :)

In the meantime - I have some new girlfriends to call and some little get-togethers to try to set up. I hope you have a great day today and a good weekend ahead. Happy Friday!!

a little (p)update

Rory, aka Rory-Bear, aka Miss Priss, aka Little Miss, aka Stinky Butt, aka Stinker, had a vet checkup on Monday. She passed with flying colors, and we really like the vet. She listens to us, she isn't pushy about drugs or shots, and she really loves our pups.

Back to Rory. She has doubled her weight and she's outgrowing her crate. She is extremely leggy and is more sure-footed every day.

She is also mostly housetrained, though things get a little iffy in the afternoon, when we are all tired of each other.

We have started going on long walks, which has been good for me, probably good for Eli, and of negligible impact on Rory and her wild puppy energy but she seems to like them. We've been to the library and back - about a mile each way, which will be a regular venture in the future. On days when the weather is bad we just walk a half-mile loop around the apartment complex a couple times. As soon as the weather stops threatening to dump ten tons of snow on our heads, we're going to check out a dog-friendly shop in a shopping area a little over a mile away. (This complex will probably end up a regular destination of ours - along with the dog shop, it has a Chinese place, a grocery store, an Einsteins, and a few other places that contain treats for HUMANS.) I am currently strategizing how to tie the dogs up outside while I duck into non-dog-friendly places, like the library and the grocery store. Rory would probably be ok, other than barking at everybody and begging for attention, but Eli might go berserko and hurt somebody. Maybe I need to take a sign that says 'do not pet the papillon.'

Rory's current favorite things to do include ringing the outside bell any time she wants to go outside, chewing on bottles, and going with Eli to Home Depot. She's picked up a new habit of barking at other dogs when they're at a distance, which does not thrill me, but we are working on that. She is very friendly and loves meeting new people and animals. The trips to Home Depot are especially good for Eli - he is more inclined to calm down around people there than he is outside, for some reason. When we were there on Tuesday, Eli even approached a cashier looking for pets! A first for him!! Rory has been very good for Eli, and now the big task is to prevent Eli from teaching Rory bad habits.

She is more than twice Eli's size now. Her paws are becoming massive, her muscles are developing, and her head is starting to square off and become less 'puppy with a long nose' and more 'border collie under construction.' Sometimes we think her eyes are turning green, but then they'll be blue again. Could be lighting, or could be actual changes in color. We'll know which, eventually.

And for those of you suffering from Eli withdrawal, here's a cute picture of him sleeping.

TOMORROW IS CHRISTMAS EVE!!!

Have you finished all YOUR preparations?

a post about snow

Holy white stuff, Batman!

As is to be suspected, it is snowing again here in Colorado.  Twice in 2 weeks!  My feeble southern snow-loving mind might explode.  Other pertinent details include: the forecast predicted that it would 'snow for two days.'

Did you see that?  SNOW for TWO DAYS!  Not like two hours, or two seconds like I'm used to seeing.

Eli has experienced a couple of snowfalls in his young life.  While it can't be determined whether he actually likes the stuff, he certainly tolerates it pretty well and he's been known to brave snowfall deeper than he is tall, which is pretty cute. He is not so much interested in temperatures in the teens, or lower.

Rory LOVES snow.  More specifically, she loves to eat it.  She does NOT love to potty on it, which has proven a challenge for me, the potty break enforcer.

All in all, we love snow.  Good thing, since we moved to the mountains, right?

a big announcement from the western homefront

After nearly a week of alternating between panic attacks and extreme excitement, I am ready to announce that there is a new member of the westernmost (as far as I know) contingent of the Gainer/Daoust/Shultz/Bowden families.

Her name is Aurora, but she goes by Rory.  She is a beautiful three-month-old brown package of piddle border collie and I am investing in a Bissell Spot Shot very very soon to save the carpet.  When we brought her home, she was about the same size as Eli, but a little taller and with a bigger head.  She outgrew him overnight.  She still looks like a stuffed animal, though.

Her name, Aurora, comes from a town in the Denver Metro area, where we will probably be spending a lot of our time since our Denver neighborhood shares a border with Aurora.  She is not named after Rory Gilmore.

(Brian didn't go for my suggestion that we name her Aurora Borealis and call her Rory-Bory.)   (Sometimes I call her Rory-Bory anyway.) (UPDATE: Brian came around.)