Ladies Night

Tonight I went to a Ladies Night at one of my friends house. This is something that a group of us like to do about once a month at different houses. Usually we all bring some food and just get together and visit and chat about life. This time was no exception.. we had a good Mexican meal including margaritas and some great chats.

Something new we did this time was incorporate a jewelry show into the festivities. My friend invited her friend to show us this very nice jewlery she was selling as a side business. At first I was pretty skeptical, because I just never like buying things in this sort of fashion, with shows and what not. But I did have a good time, although I resisted buying anything. There was a pretty good sale going on, where most of the prices were 1/2 off, so it made the jewlery a lot more affordable.

One thing that did suprise me though was how many people actually bought jewlery! Of the 8 of us there, probably 5 people bought jewlery, and each purchase was over 50 dollars.

Eve the Guide Dog Puppy

Eve's family information, as found out from Guide Dog's webiste:

2/13/2009 LAB
Sire Russo Color Black
Dam Dia Color Yellow
Elena F Black
Ellison M Black
Eve F Yellow

Where are you oh littermates?

Little Miracle

I'm in a recreational softball league with work. Tonight we had a game after work -- typically we play on Tues/Wed but since today was Thursday, we were down a few players and only had enough to make an entire team with no subs. I brought Eve to the game anyways, because it was better than sitting in her kennel. I tied her up to the bench where she couldn't get into any trouble.

Typically I like playing 1st base, but tonight we all played different positions. So I initially went to third. 3rd was on the opposite side of the field from our dugout. During the first few innings, Eve was great -- she just sat there and watched all of us. But then in the third inning, I moved to right field. During this inning Eve went to the end of her leash and started licking/eating things off the ground. I had checked the ground earlier, so I knew there was nothing bad around, but I suspected she was just eating the gravel, which is not good anyways. But I figured it would be too distracting if I yelled all the way from the outfield. So I thought of sending Eve telepathic thoughts, but to no luck. And then I thought, "Well God could help me!". So, not really thinking too much about it, I casually asked God to make Eve stop eating whatever she was munching on. And about 10 seconds later, this little girl comes wandering over to our dugout (which Eve was at all alone), and walks straight over to Eve to pet her. Of course as soon as Eve sees the girl walking toward her, she stops licking/eating the ground and goes to see the girl.

Think what you may, but God works in mysterious ways! Even in little miracles...

Photography

So today I was looking at my friends photo's of the triathalon, found on SmugMug. This led me to look at the photos of the day:

http://www.smugmug.com/popular/today#604980150_Pwkbz

Wow, was I ever impressed! Ok, so some of them maybe I could do, but a few really caught my attention. I do love taking pictures of flowers, so I clicked on some pictures of flowers, and low and behold one of them was taken at the Gardens at Spring Creek, which Rob and I had been to the other week. At first I thought it must be some other gardens, because there is no way I could take a picture like that... but lo and behold, this guy was from Colorado! Fort Collins to be exact. If you want to see some great photograpy, look at Steve Barge's photos on SmugMug, http://sbarge.smugmug.com/

I think I 'want' 3 things right now:
1) Photography class
2) Photoshop skills
3) A better camera

I'll have to work on these....

Eve at the Salon

So tonight I decided to cut Eve's nails. Cutting her nails is one thing I definitely do not enjoy -- I am very scared that I will accidentally cut too far and it will start to bleed... worse, it would hurt her. So I think I always cut the nail and leave plenty of margin. If I had it my way, I probably wouldn't ever cut her nails.

This is a picture of me cutting her nails when she was just a baby :) She even held her foot up for me to cut her nails. At first I was only cutting her nails when she was in a deep sleep, but now I noticed that she doesn't seem to mind, so I can cut them when she is awake. I just use the standard clipper:

Millers Forge Big Dog Nail Clipper, with a bright orange handle. They sell these at Pets Mart online, and it got good reviews, so that is a good sign. But I still don't like the entire process....

When we took Eve to a puppy sitter, she introduced us to the idea of a dremel to file their nails down. It is similar to the PediPaws kit (www.pedipaws.com). Only a dremel has more purposes
than just filing nails. Overall this seems like a winning solution... maybe I'll start online shopping for a dremel.

Tired Eve

So after playing very hard for about 2 hours, Eve was completely worn out... poor Eve! But at least she had fun! Who even knew her tongue to get so big! I'm surprised it fits in her mouth!

Eve says she just wants to go to sleep:

Eve gives it her all....

So Eve was a little sad after Gromit didn't want to play with her this morning. But luckily, we had the Guide Dog Annual Picnic this afternoon, where Eve got to play and play and play. I think she was the only dog that didn't get tired -- she just cycled through the dogs playing tug and chase with them. I think this is Eve and Dickens... Dickens is the same age as Eve.

Eve and Tim duke it out -- Tim is 13 months old, but they are about the same size

The two little puppies, Betsy and Anthony decide to try to play with the big dogs. It looks like so much fun!

Run Eve, Run!

A new tug toy -- who is winning?

Eve practicing her olympic jumping skills :)

Sunday Part 1: Visit with Gromit

Today was a busy day for Rob and I and Eve. The day started with a brunch with our friends Sarah and Dave. They brought over a keish (mmm, delicious), and we made blueberry pancakes (also delicious). They also brought over their dog, Gromit. Eve was so excited to have a playmate, but unfortunately Gromit wasn't into playing as much as Eve was. Eve's favorite game is tug, and so she kept bringing her rope toy over for Gromit to play with, but he just stared at her, as if saying, "What do you want me to do with that?" She'd hold it in front of his face, and then run away with it, trying to get him interested in the toy. But she was unsuccessful. Oh well Eve, good try...

Sprint Triathlon

Well, I did it! I just finished my first sprint triathalon!!! It's been a busy day since yesterday, and I'm a bit tired, but overall I feel good! In fact, I did the triathlon much faster than I even thought I would. My biggest accomplishment came in the run -- I am NOT a runner, and so my plan was to run the first half and then walk and run the second half. Well, I ended up running the ENTIRE 3.5 miles plus the additional distance to the finish, probably totaling 3.75 miles! And, it was even faster than I had run in my training at the gym -- my total time for the 3.5 miles was 35 minutes, which means I was running about 6 miles/hr which is fast for me! So I was super proud of myself, and Rob is also super proud of me too! Of course I am super proud of him too!

We started off the morning at 5 am, in order to get to the reservoir by 6:30. Rob and I went with a group of friends from work. We got all set up in the transition area, which is just a big space with lots of small bike racks. We laid out our bikes, helmets, shoes, camelbacks, etc. Then we got into our wetsuits becaseu the swim portion of the race was first. We all were given white swim caps to go on as well -- boy do we look HOT!


All of us decided to do the 'official' triathalon order of swim-bike-run, so all 7 of us got ready for the swim. The race started in two heats -- all the men followed 7 minutes later by all the women.

The Pre-Race photo!

The Post-Race Photo!

I'll try to post some more pictures as I get more, but for now this will have to do! My overall results were pretty good for me!

SWIM-BIKE-RUN
750M swim: 16:38
1st transition time: 3:52 (yes, I was taking my time :))
14M bike: 1:01:33 (this was a very hilly course --- probably 5 miles of just uphill)
2nd transition time: 2:05
3.5M run time: 35:37
Final run to finish: 1:39
Total time! : 2:01:21


So you know what's crazy? There were 70% women at the race. Now why would that be? Further, the top three women times for swim,bike, and run were by women ages 36, 46, and 48 for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd! Wow! Maybe I can get there when I am that old! That's pretty amazing though! What's also crazy is that I beat about 50 people doing the same event as me! I was shocked!

The day before

Well, tomorrow I am off to my very first triathlon. I am feeling a range of emotions right now, but overall, I'm trying to keep excited about just finishing. My goal is to just finish with a smile on my face (or at least just finish). There are 7 of us from work going to try it tomorrow - only one person has ever done one before. Thank goodness this is a sprint triathalon, which means it might be possible for me :) The bike portion is 14 miles, and when we went to practice last weekend, it looked really steep, but maybe tomorrow it won't seem so bad. Time will tell... regardless of what happens, I will make a new personal record, so hooray!

1000 Questions

So having the only dog in the office gets me a lot of attention. And I mean a LOT of attention. Since Eve is so adorable (if I do say so myself :) ), I think everyone on my aisle has stopped by my cube to at least say hello and meet the dog. And of course, I probably get 2 people each day who just stop by to see how the dog is doing. Good thing I don't have a problem with jealousy, or I'd be in real trouble! No one ever stops to say hi to me (except a handful of my friends and of course my husband)

Well the other day I was walking back to my desk and this white-haired guy comes up to me and we have the following conversation:

OldGuy: I was going to tell you your dog looked depressed earlier - while you were having a conversation, she was laying on the ground.
Me: Oh, ok. I think she is pretty happy. But maybe today she isn't feeling well.
OldGuy: Wasn't she sick last time I talked to you?
Me: Well, she was sick about a month ago.. puppies like to eat things they aren't supposed to.
OldGuy: Isn't she too skinny? She should be bigger than that for being a lab....
Me: She will be a small puppy I think... some labs grow to be 100 lbs, but she will probably only be around 50-60 lbs.

---by this time we are back at my cube and Eve has walked into her cage in my cube and is playing with a toy laying down. Conversation continues...

OldGuy: Looks like you'll have to get her a new kennel soon, that one is getting small...
Me: (trying not to roll my eyes, since that is an adult sized kennel and will be fine for her whole life)....Maybe I will. Have a good day, I have to get back to work.

---and now I sit down at my desk and he leaves. Thank goodness! That guy was just grillilng me on this and that about Eve! I guess it comes with the territory! And to think that I don't even know this guy's name, and I'm sure he doesn't know mine either. Oh well....

In addition

I forgot to add that the lady said, "Thank you for raising a puppy!"

Boy, did that bring a smile to my face!

Motivation

So tonight I was shopping at Lowe's, picking up some items for the house... I was standing there thinking of what to buy when low and behold, a woman and man came around the corner. But this was not an ordinary couple -- alongside the woman was a guide dog, AND, the dog was part of Guide Dogs for the Blind! I was flabbergasted as I have never seen a working guide dog before in Fort Collins! And of course I had Eve by my side, which made for 2 guide dogs in Lowe's at the same time.

I was proud of Eve -- she just sat there while I talked with this nice couple. (When I say that she sat there, she sat there for a few minutes and then started creeping slowly on her stomach towards the other dog, which was laying on the ground facing Eve) :) But for being only 6 months old, she did great! I thought it was really motivating to be able to talk to this woman who is using a guide dog -- it was her 2nd guide dog and it was named Dexter I think. I hope Eve can grow up and be a guide dog, but if she doesn't make it, we'll love her anyways!