Meet Stella!

Well, the day finally came....two days early!  We got our puppy!  As we figured, Fizziwig is going into the world of showdogs, as is Ebinezer, Belle, and Marley.  Belinda got snatched up (she wasn't our top pick anyways) so Caroline and Cratchit were the ones left.  We had met them a few weeks ago, and Caroline was one of the top ones on our list.  She's super adorable, she's pretty low-key but likes to play, and she's a snuggler.  Her sister, Belle, although super cute as well, was kind of CRAZY, so it ended up working out perfectly. :)

Her first night home went pretty well.  We played with her when we got home, and then put her in her crate for bedtime.  She only cried a little bit and then went to sleep.  She actually slept for 3 and a half hours straight!  Tyler took her out 3 or 4 times total.  One big accident in her crate this morning, but she's new to this housetraining stuff....she's still a baby!

In the meantime, I have seem to come down with quite the illness. I was feeling rought last night - body aches, sinus pressure, slight sore throat.  I took my temperature and it was 99.5.  I'm always convinced that I have a fever, but I never do.  But low and behold, this is the first fever I've had in literally 5 years. And of course it comes not even a week after I'm unemployed with no health insurance, and the first night we get our puppy.  I woke up this morning, and it was 101 F, so Tyler gave me some fever reducer, and I've just been playing with the puppy all day. Luckily Tyler had a light case load today, so he came home to take over puppy duty, since I'm struggling in the health department.  Here are some things we've done today:

Played with monkey

Played with ducky

Did some modeling

Showed off her two different colored eyes

Went for her puppy wellness exam

Played fetch

Overall, she has a clean bill of health, which is great!  She has a little heart murmur - on a scale of 1-6, the vet rated it a 0.5.  She thinks its just a puppy murmur, which is common, but the vet wants to watch it just in case.  Stella got lots of "oohs" and "aahs" and cuddles at the vet.  She was so sweet!

Homeownership project #3: Installing wood floors

One thing we really liked about this house was that there were wood floors throughout the main living areas.  We LOVED our wood floors in the townhome - it looks really nice and its easy to clean.  I'm not really a huge carpet fan, but I'm okay with it in bedrooms.  This house had carpet in the bedrooms that looked to be in decent shape, but once they sellers moved out, we saw that the carpet in the master bedroom had a distinct traffic pattern to it. While we could have just gotten it professionally cleaned, we decided we would rather just rip it all out and put down new floors.

Ripping up the carpet was Tyler's job. So while Jamie and I (re)painted the front room, Tyler went back into the master, shut the door, blared some music and got to ripping away.  We had, of course, done some Google searches on what to do. Collin let us borrow a crow bar, and then I stopped at Home Depot to get Tyler some leather gloves, twine, and a dust mask.  He cut small strips at a time and then ripped it up and rolled each section.  Here's the final result:

Might I add that we also saved ourselves about $400 in labor costs.  So, next we picked out our flooring.  We had heard that it was really easy to install, but eh, we're taking our DIY skills one at a time, so we decided to have the professionals do it for us.  Tyler said it literally took them two hours to do it all.  Here's the final result:

And here's the "Before" for your reference:

5 million times better.  And that's without furniture.  So glad we made the decision to get rid of the carpet!

Commute

Sorry for the lack in postings.  I've been so crazy lately.  We moved on the 26th, and then since then I've been trying to finish up some final things at the condo to get it ready for our tenant, who moved in on the 1st, all while working full time and commuting from Fort Worth to Dallas.  I leave at 6:45am and don't get home until 8pm-ish, and then all I want to do is lay my butt on the couch with Max.  Here's my morning and evening, every.single.day. :

Yes, I know Tyler commuted for 2 and a half years.  BUT, I'm convinced his commute was way easier than mine.  Here's a few reasons why:

1. He was driving in the opposite direction (to Fort Worth) of where the traffic is.
2. He didn't have to get on Woodall Rodgers - sitting in that canyon trying to get to 75 every morning is what Hell must be like. It takes me about 40 minutes to get from Fort Worth to Dallas, and then about 40 minutes to get from downtown Dallas to The Richards Group. And its about 1/8 of the distance, if not less.  Just ridiculous.
3. He didn't have to go as far.  I have to go from west Fort Worth to north Dallas, whereas he had to go from downtown Dallas to downtown Fort Worth.
4. He always got home in the evenings before I did.

Okay - now I'm getting off my soapbox.  At least I have had one and a half weeks (two more days!) to hang out with my work buds that I love and finish up some projects that I've enjoyed working on. But I'm not going to lie....I sure am looking forward to sleeping in next Monday morning!  I promise to update the blog more regularly after I'm unemployed. :)