4 Feet off the ground

Our weekend was spent mostly with me studying and Mitch working. He was on call this weekend and I am still preparing for the CPC exam in Roanoke, VA on April 6th. It is only 2 weeks away. I am a NERVOUS wreck! But in the midst of all the insanity in my brain, I did take a few breaks on Saturday and today to enjoy the fresh spring air.

The pups are happy that spring is finally here. Me too. We will be spending way more time outside on the patio.

Oh yeah.......I also got tired of the blog name, so I changed it. I have been trying to think of something for months and finally it came to me while I was studying. Guess my brain is on overload and it is spitting out info. it does not need to retain to make room for all the info. I need to retain for the exam. ;-)

And, I think I may have found my photography muse. I took quite a handful of pictures (257) this weekend and surprisingly got some pretty decent shots. All of these are of Pippi. I will post the rest of the pups a little later in the week.

So here is miss princess Pippi looking stunning. Don't you just love those ears?

Love this next shot! I am pretty frakin proud of myself on this one.

She does not even look like a greyhound in this next picture, but she is still adorably cute!!

Here is Pippi's best impersonation of the clown face in the Saw movies.

She loves those squeaky toys.

And, she has such great determination to catch them. She could do this for hours if we let her.

Another shot that I love!

Drum roll please........I finally got two shots with all four feet off the ground!! (you have to look closely on the first one, but trust me, I zoomed in, all four are off the ground.) It only took me......2 and 1/2 years. LOL!

Now, if only I had been facing her, this picture would have been amazing.

Practice makes perfect, right? I am big believer, but I also believe a basic photography class would help me as well. Tips, advice, suggestions, pointers from the Pros out there are always welcome!! =)

Anywho, she eventually wore herself out. Sweet dreams princess Pippi.

O.T.H.W.

Happy Wednesday! This picture makes me smile because it reminds me of my honeymoon, which we spent in the Cayman Islands. =)

Fun in the Sun

First we want to say THANK YOU for all the support!!! It is very appreciated!!

Fun in the sun....ha....if you live in VA you are probably thinking when was there sun? Seeing how we have had days of rain. =) Most of you already know from reading other Virginian's blogs that the weekend after the "big snow" (for you northerners, we had a dusting!) , we had a weekend of 80 degrees and sunshine! Of course we had to take advantage of this after freezing our arse's off just the week before. The pups enjoyed the change in weather too. Although, they really did enjoy the snow as well. Mitch and I sat on the patio, enjoyed a glass or two of wine, listened to some tunes and just spent time watching our four wonderful pups enjoying the day.

Below are a few shots, in no particular order. Excuse the camera work, I swear one day I will get better at this whole photography thing. I seriously think I need to take a class. ;-) No seriously....it is on my to do list.

Pippi playing catch. She will actually bring the toy back to you and drop it, which is a nice change. Usually we have to go get the toys to continue our game of catch. Our other three are not really retrievers, they like to catch and run.
Below is Cueball swinging Garfield around. Funny thing is, they were not supposed to have this toy. This was a toy from my childhood. Yeah, yeah, I know, laugh if you must and call me a geek. I admit it! I had this stupid thing stuck to the window of my very first car. Anyways, one day Booyah got a hold of it and that was the end of that. They seem to like this toy better then any of the ones we buy them. Weird!!

Poor Garfield, he went from being chauffeured around in a car to being tossed around by pups in a yard. It's a crime I tell you! Someone should call the authorities. ;-)

The pups and Garfield pics.

Cueball caught a little tan bunny in the yard a few weeks ago. Luckily he did not do this to it. He came out of the woods with it in his mouth and started heading towards the deck. Mitch told him to drop it. It took repeating the phrase a few times, but he eventually dropped it.

He sure does have a conniving look on his face doesn't he?






The pups playing. We are thrilled that all four get along so well! We keep a careful eye on them and keep them in line when things start to get rough, but overall we are so pleased with our pack.





Look at the attentiveness. Pippi has been so easy to train. She sits for a treat without even being asked to. Good girl Pippers!!



And lastly, one final farewell to the snow. I think it is pretty safe to say we won't see it again this winter.

Have a great week everyone!! I will be busy studying my arse off for my exam on April 6th.

Doors not only close, they open too.

Local folks probably have heard that Qimonda, the company I used to work for, is closing. Back in October it wasn't so clear whether they would survive or not and in order to keep this very long story short lets just suffice it to say that instead of hoping that they might survive I decided to pursue a dream of mine.....self employment. I searched the web and found www.ibba.org (Internation Business Brokers Association). They led me to Sunbelt Business brokers, a national company with local offices. After meeting with a broker and going through some paperwork and q&a's they turned me on to some businesses that were for sale that they thought would be suitable for me. I talked with a friend of mine, another Qimonduan who has the same work ethic and principles as me, and we decided to become partners. We met with the buyer and mutually (all three) came to the conclusion that this would be mutually benefitial to all of us. Chris (my partner) and I spent the following months spending our free time with Ricky (the seller) learning the new business, which, by the way, is an HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning) and Commercial Refrigeration business. The experience, to say the least, has been very invigorating. I have been working for someone else ("the man") since I was 16. I have always received excellent performance reviews and received pretty good raises but having someone else basically in charge of my livelihood has always been something I never really cared for.
Well, today, March 11, 2009, marks the first day of the rest of my life. Today Chris and I signed the closing papers and have become co-owners of Air Repair, Inc. a locally owned HVAC and Commercial Refrigeration company. We are officially broke and extremely happy. For those local folk that require honest ethical work on their heating or air conditioning call us and we'll be happy to do whatever we have to to make sure you're comfortable. 804-559-7744. We're also in the yellow pages.

-Mitch

Panic Attack

I have been meaning to get this post on the blog for a little while, but got side tracked with the snow. Two weeks ago, I took a business trip to Charlotte, NC. When I returned Friday evening, the pups and Mitch were happy to see me and of course I was thrilled to see them and to be home. I thought everything was fine. Maggie was doing her usual follow mommy around, not letting me out of her sight, whining when I went outside to get the luggage out of my car. After a few hours, she had settled down though. We went to bed around 10:30 p.m. Suddenly in the middle of the night, Maggie woke me up. She was panting heavily and pacing around in circles. I reached my hand down off the bed to pet her to try to sooth her and suddenly she started nipping me all over my arms and on my neck. I got up out of the bed and tried to calm her down. Finally after what felt like forever, but was probably only 20 minutes. She stopped panting and layed down on a dog bed beside me. The next morning she seemed to be back to her normal self. Mitch and I discussed it and we can't figure out what happened. This is only the second time I have ever left her for a long period of time. Did she have a panic attack? Can dogs have panic attacks? Is it just separation anxiety?

Mitch told me that the last two days before I came home, she was not acting like herself. He could tell she really missed me and it was like she thought I wasn't coming back. I know, I know....I am probably putting too much human emphasis on this. She is after all, a dog. But, I am at a loss as to why she reacted this way. All the other pups were completely fine.

So I am reaching out to you. Any advice, suggestions or have you experienced anything like this before?

Over the hump Wednesday's

I thought I would try something new on the blog. Lately, I have been celebrating Wednesday's because I know once they are here, my work week is almost done. The last two months at work have been a little stressful. Don't get me wrong, I love my job and I feel very fortunate to be employed because so many are not right now. But because of the stress, Wednesday's are becoming one of my favorite days of the week. In honor of that, I thought it would be fun to post something each Wednesday of each week that I have come across during the week that made me smile or chuckle. So here goes.

I saw the following plate on my drive in to work today. It made me smile because I can completely relate.


*Note: I tried to take a picture of the plate on the vehicle while I was driving, but all I had with me was my cell phone and I could not get a clear shot, so I went online to dmv.com (for Virginia) and put in the plate info. to re-create the plate for you. Also while on the site, I could not find how to choose a blank plate, so it automatically defaulted to the cardinal plate. But, I think you get the idea!



I hope you enjoy, get a smile on your face or a chuckle. Happy rest of the week! Friday will be here before we know it! =)

7 inches of White Fluffy Bliss

We finally got a good snow in the Richmond area. It has been years since our last good snow fall. It started snowing yesterday when we were leaving the Wine Expo. Good thing Mitch was DD because I was in no shape to drive. =) It was really pretty watching the snow fall in the city and on our drive home. Kinda made miss living in Shockoe Bottom.

By the time we got home though...it was a rainy mix. After letting the pups out and then giving them a bath (they were covered in clay/mud from running in the rainy mix, with the combination of an already soaked ground from two days of rain), I layed down and took a nap. I was shocked when I got up at 8:30 p.m. and saw the ground covered in snow! When we woke up this morning the ground was a blanket of white fluffy bliss. I took a PTO day from work. Just did not want to risk driving in it (my commute is about 50 minutes).

Mitch walked down the driveway to check out what our road looked like.

While he was out there checking things out, he took some pics of the house. I think the Bradford Pear Tree looks beautiful covered with snow and ice.

The snow sure is beautiful. It continued to snow throughout the morning and stopped early in the afternoon. But, I think the snow will be around for a couple of days. The temp tonight is going to be 11 degrees. Burr..... It will make for an interesting trip to work in the morning.
Maggie, Booyah and Cueball have experienced snow before, but not quite this much snow. I think Pippi played in the snow when she was at Gyeong's. So I think it is safe to say that this is the second snow for all the pups. The pups were very frisky and played in the snow several times today. They had a blast and we were in awe just watching them! *Pippi is wearing a muzzle because we have discovered she is a poop eater. =( The muzzle seems to be working in detering her from trying to eat poo. Below is their captured play time in no particular order.


Cueball shows us his stalker stance.
Pippi enjoys doing zoomies around the yard. Maggie tries to dig up a flower pot out of the snow.

Then she pounces around the yard with glee.
More zoomies.

Pippi says "Come on Cueball, let's play!"
She gives up on Cueball and moves on to Booyah.
P: "Forget you guys, I'll have fun on my own!"
In the shot below, she is stalking Cueball.
It works! She finally got him wound up.Cueball says"okay Pippi, that's enough."


What was that?
Maggie shows us her zoomie style.


I thought these two were really cute of Maggie. She stopped to check out the snow covered branches.
Cueball discovers Garfield in the snow.
All three checking out Garfield.
Booyah takes a turn going zoom, zoom , zoom!

Pippi says "Snow dayz are da best!"Have a great week everyone!