New Puppy!

We have been searching for the perfect dog for us for a few months now and found her!

Meet Mila!

She is a 6 week old German Shepherd puppy. She's black and silver.

The poor thing has already had a pretty awful life. The people that had her had already separated her from her mommy weeks ago. She had no litter mates left. The mom was tied up outside by a garage.

We took Mila to the vet and she had hookworms and roundworms. She was also infested with fleas. The vet gave her medicine and she is much better now.

She is getting crate trained and is doing really well with that. Just a few accidents in the house and none in her crate.

If you guys have ever had a German Shepherd you know that they are called "land sharks" when they are babies. They constantly bite and chew on everything, especially your hands and feet!

Can't wait for her to be done with that stage!

We have tried lots of different things to help with that:

• redirecting to toys
• yelping or saying ouch
• saying no
• taking her outside to play
• letting her take a nap in her crate

For her toys and going outside work the best! We are also going to get some bitter apple spray and see how she responds to that. 

How have you guys dealt with a biting puppy? Have you ever had a German Shepherd before?

Oh and Chloe just loves her and giggles when she sees her!

Our Wedding in the Mouintains!

Our pictures FINALLY came in!! It took almost 2 months instead of 2 weeks. First they were just backed up and then they accidentally sent the CD to the wrong address. But they're here now!!!

Our wedding was was such an amazing experience.

First of all, we went to Estes Park, CO and it was just the two of us. It's something I would highly recommend...at the end of the day all you need is the two of you!

The mountains were beautiful and were such a perfect backdrop for our wedding. The pictures are amazing!

Mark, our photographer, had a British accent and he did a great job capturing a lot of candid shots. I mention his accent because it was so windy up there that it was even harder to understand him. Many times Jared and I just looked at each other and smiled because we didn't hear any of his instructions.

The weather started out in the low low 70's and partly cloudy. By the end of the ceremony the wind had really picked up and it dropped about 10 degrees. I think my excitement kept me from feeling the cold air... The last 10 minutes were pretty cold, however, and it had started to rain very lightly. You can see in the pictures that my hair is flying around and my dress is all over the place.

Oh and there is elk poop everywhere! :) They are all over the place out there and get pretty close. During the ceremony a bunch of them just walked right past us.

After the ceremony we went to have a few drinks at Coopers in Estes Park. It was so much fun. It was so great to just sit and talk to each other and enjoy each other without having a million people trying to talk to us. We could actually hold a conversation with each other with only a few minor interruptions by people telling us we look awesome :)

We had dinner at the Stanley Hotel. You've probably heard of it. It's where Stephen King stayed and was inspired to write The Shining. It was also where Dumb and Dumber was filmed! It's definitely an interesting hotel. It was dark and there aren't many employees running around. When we got there we got a little lost and it was definitely creeeepy.

We did get a delicious "elk tracks" dessert complimentary since it was our wedding day.

I can't tell you how much fun we had that week. It was such an amazing experience and so much better because I spent it with the man of my dreams. Our wedding was everything I could ask for.

p.s. to the people who hacked my facebook on our wedding day...who send me anonymous emails through here...who attempted to hack me again... it's not working. We still love each other more every single day.  And I can honestly say that with every one of your attempts we grow closer to each other :) So thank you, I will always appreciate that. Oh, and please stop being obsessed with me. It's just pathetic.

My Sweet Baby

I don't think there is anything worse than having a sick baby.

The last few weeks have been rough. Chloe (8 months old now) has been crying a lot and is having such a hard time sleeping. She wakes up on average about 6-7 times a night. Each time she wakes up I have to nurse her to  calm her down and she almost always cries like she's in pain and can't go back to sleep for a while. She also does this during the day. She is playing one second, happy, giggling...then she arches her back out and cries and is sooo angry. If you try to touch her face or give her a pacifier she swats your hand away and cries harder. She seems to frustrated. It just didn't make sense to me. She's typically such a sweet and happy baby.

Earlier this week she was just having an extra rough couple of days. At one point she had huge crocodile tears running down her face. She's also teething so for a while we attributed her crankiness to that. It took forever but she finally had 2 little teeth on the front bottom pop through. I quickly figured out it wasn't her teeth since baby tylenol or baby orajel didn't seem to be bringing her any relief. I had my husband call our pediatrician and they suggested we bring her in to check for an ear infection.

At every appointment they routinely weigh the babies. Chloe was 16.4 pounds at 6 months. When I put her on the scale this time it read 16.5 pounds. She hadn't gained anything for 2 months...That's obviously a huge concern. She also only grew a 1/4 of an inch. She's always been short but she dropped from the 27th to the 17th percentile. For weight she dropped from the 57th to the 23rd percentile. It's such a huge change for a little baby. The hardest thing to believe about her lack of weight gain is how much she eats. She's still exclusively breastfed and eats at least every few hours and gets fruits, veggies, and grains on a regular basis. She's smart enough to know that when she sees us eating that it's dinner time for her too.

The doctor ordered some lab work for Chloe to see if there was anything in her blood that could tell us about her weight. Her physical exam of her was normal... no ear infection, lungs are clear, tummy sounded good, etc. Therefore it had to be something organic.

Getting Chloe's blood was awful.

They started with the heel and squeezed so hard it bruised instantly. They needed 5 vials of her blood and hadn't even filled 1 yet. They had to get another person with more experience to help since Chloe was so little. They didn't like the look of her veins so they did a finger prick. It took 45 minutes to get those 5 vials. She screamed and cried the whole time and said mama a few times. Such a sweet baby.

Since they had such a hard time getting the blood they noted in the lab results that the results might come back skewed. Her potassium levels came back weird. Her thyroid function was .34, just slightly abnormal. At this point the doctor wanted to redo the blood work but she felt the results pointed to hyperthyroidism and/or acidosis.

We got more blood drawn the next day. It didn't take as long but of course she still cried the whole time. She was happier to begin with so it wasn't as bad for her. You can just see the pain and confusion on her face.

The potassium levels came back normal this time, but the thyroid levels have gotten worse and they now point to hypothyroidism. The problem with this is that it doesn't explain Chloe's weight.

Our doctor called an endocrinologist in Iowa City and she asked for a third round of blood tests. She has been very helpful to our doctor and they have been bouncing ideas off of each other. Yesterday we took blood out of Chloe for the third time. She did so good. I got her to play a little with things like keys and a hand warmer. Not your typical baby toys but they kept her from thinking about the pain.

The rest of the results haven't come back yet. Our doctor feels it's best for us to go see that specialist. They have everything a baby would need in one place.

We will know for sure if it's a thyroid problem then. We go Tuesday.

I think the not knowing is the worst of it all. I just need to know what's going on with my little munchkin and how we can make her feel better.

We will probably need to have an MRI done as well. The poor thing will need to be sedated for that since she has to stay still for so long. With the MRI they will be looking for abnormalities like a mass.

It's been such a long week. So many things going on. My birthday is this coming Friday and we were going to have a poker party but I'm cancelling it. It just seems weird to be celebrating when I still don't know what's wrong with my baby. And honestly I'm just tired. the lack of sleep is really affecting the both of us. My husband is so sweet and helps me with Chloe at nights and then he has to work all day. We both just need lots more sleep!

Well speaking of sleep, Chloe is finally asleep in my arms and is cuddling. Such a sweetheart. We both love her so much and hope she's going to be ok.

This is the 2nd time they took blood from her. Poor baby.

She was happy and giggly right before they took blood out for the 3rd time.

As you can see she's got some healthy rolls and it's hard to believe she's not gaining weight.  

Estes Park

Wow!!

I thought that seeing the mouintains would be amazing, but I never thought it would be THIS amazing.

Since we drove through the night we got to see the sun come up over the mountains.

Jared woke me up and said "look outside!" And there they finally were! Snow covered mountains!

I couldn't stop staring for hours. I was taking a million pictures like the biggest tourist dork. I was glad people couldn't see me.

We got into town around 6:30am and thankfully were able to get a very early check in.

Jared was snoring with seconds. I guess even Estes Park can't fix that problem :)

We got up for the day and got a late breakfast at the Egg and I, it was pretty delicious.

We were only supposed to go walk around town BUT we decided to go check out Rocky Mountain National Park....

There was only one problem, I was wearing heels. Ugh!

We spent a few hours driving around and got out to take some beautiful pictures, but I have blisters from my very cute ankle booties lol.

Today we are going back and I am DEFINITELY going to be prepared this time!

After the park we walked around town and looked at all of the cute little shops.

Dinner was at Poppy's. Had really great pizza there and a local raspberry wheat beer. That was yummy!

We couldn't help but notice that everyone is so friendly here!! It makes people from Iowa look like real jerks.

I'm excited to go exploring the park some more today, in tennis shoes :)

Thanks for reading, have you ever been here?

Elvira

On the road for our 12 hour road trip!

The view from the car right as the sun was going down.

THIS is what Jared woke me up to!

This is right behind our cabin. The water is freezing!

See my pretty shoes? lol

There are elk everywhere! This one was just a few feet from the car. They don't seem to be afraid of people at all.

I was holding my breath here... It is very high up! I made Jared come back down to get me :)

I loved Jared's white shirt and blue jeans in these pictures. They just pop!

Our sweet baby... I miss her so much!!!!!!!

It's Road Trip Day!

It feels like forever ago that we decided to run away and get married in Estes Park, Colorado.

Well TODAY is the day we finally leave!

There are so many mixed emotions running through my head tho....

On one hand I'm soooo happy to marry my best friend, on the other all I can think about is leaving my baby...

Chloe. She's going to be 7 months old... on the day that we get married. I won't see her for 7 whole days. I've never been that long.... The longest has been overnight. And that was hard enough.

She's so cute!

I wonder if she knows that we are leaving because the last 2 nights she has slept like an angel!

I'm going to snuggle her a ton today :)

Estes Park is going to be amazing! I've never seen the mountains. And of course I get to marry the man of my dreams!

Have you ever left your baby for so long? I know she will be in good hands but it just breaks my heart!!!

Elvira

I'm going to be on TV!!

Yup... I'm pretty darn excited!

Last week I emailed an idea over to Paula Sands Live about having them feature my quilts. Jake, the producer, called me back in just a few minutes.

I normally don't answer unknown numbers, but I thought it was about some things I had on Craigs List so I picked up.

Nope. No weird Craigs List buyer, just the producer to Paula Sands!!!!!!!!

I was soooooooooooooooo excited!

He wanted me to email him some examples of my work and IF they liked it they would have me on the show! That was the longest hour ever! I emailed him some pictures and he called me back and said THEY LOVED IT!

wooo hooo! :) (can you tell I'm excited?)

I'm going there April 30th.... they wanted me there next week but that's way too soon for me! I'm terrified.... I've never done anything like this!

Do you know what the first thing I thought of? WHAT AM I GOING TO WEAR!?!!?

Guess I'll just have to go shopping.

I also need to SEW a ton in the next few weeks. I'm almost done with the black and pink one and I just started on a custom wedding quilt for a newlywed couple. It's going to be beautiful. It will feature their wedding colors and I will include their names, the wedding date, and a quote they love. Their colors were purples and green. So pretty!

So much to do! AND we are getting married in 19 days!!!!

April has been an amazing month so far! :)

Here are the pictures I emailed them...

101 Reasons Why I Love You

This last Christmas I wanted to give Jared another present but I was already over my budget... You know how that goes I'm sure!

Chloe was napping and I was doodling with some pretty pens I had.

I have seen other posts on lists of proclaimed love for another but I wanted to do something just a little different....and something more personal.

So I took a regular piece of paper and folded it in half (like a hot dog), and then I folded it three more times in a way that it looked like an accordion.

On the outside page I wrote "101 Reasons Why I Love You." I took six different colored pens I had and started numbering the page 1 to 101.

Then came the easy part.

Under each number I wrote a reason for my love for him. The hardest part was keeping all of the reasons in my head. They seemed to be pouring in all at once!

It took longer because I wanted to keep the pretty colors in a certain order.

When I was done I wrapped it up in some scraps of Christmas paper and put it in his stocking.

I think it was one of his favorite presents... He still reads it at least every other day. It sits in his office on his desk :)

I think you could also make this list for a child, parent, sibling, etc... Anyone you love!
If you wanted to make it more fancy you could print it or write it on pretty paper and frame it for them!

Here is what was on my list:

1. You are my soulmate.
2. You put me first. Always.
3. You think my imperfections are beautiful.
4. You can always make me laugh.
5. Your touch is magical.
6. You are even more cheesy than I am.
7. You gave us a beautiful daughter.
8. You help me pick out an outfit every day.
9. You work hard for us.
10. You love time with me.
11. Your kisses are amazing.
12. I can talk to you about anything.
13. You know all of my secrets.
14. You are always there.
15. You have a sweet smile.
16. All I think about is you when you aren't with me.
17. You love PDA.
18. Waking up to you.
19. You never give up on me.
20. Love you look in a suit.
21. How ticklish you are.
22. You are honest with me.
23. Growing old doesn't sound so bad with you.
24. How your phone sounds on the phone.
25. How open we are.
26. The way you look at me.
27. We are running away together.
28. You always have good intentions.
29. You are strong in every way.
30. You aren't always gentle.
31. How you refuse to ever completely grow up.
32. Your elf voice.
33. You aren't afraid to cry.
34. You are smart.
35. You're an amazing dad.
36. The way you walk.
37. We are often thinking the same things.
38. You aren't a bully.
39. You make me feel beautiful.
40. You are willing to forgive.
41. You are a dreamer like me.
42. The first and last person I've ever really loved.
43. You always get the door.
44. You know when I'm not OK.
45. You are charming.
46. You give the best hugs.
47. The most amazing moments have been with you.
48. We just fit together.
49. Our life.
50. The sound of your laugh.
51. The way you dress.
52. You don't ignore me during UFC or football games.
53. How jelaous you can get.
54. That we shower together.
55. How others are jealous of us.
56. How much we cuddle.
57. You would do anything for me.
58. I'm always included in your plans.
59. How you love to annoy me.
60. That we talk all day.
61. We never have enough time together.
62. You love Christmas as much as I do.
63. Having drinks together.
64. I can be silly around you.
65. Wrestling with you.
66. Getting hot chocolate.
67. You're always there when I wake up.
68. You like trying new things.
69. You love chick flicks.
70. You're never bored with me.
71. You gave me a beautiful ring.
72. Love that we have a home together.
73. You always want to know what I think.
74. You respect me.
75. You never say bad things about me to others.
76. You are nothing like the typical guy.
77. Your massages.
78. Your tattoos.
79. How we always want each other.
80. You can make me smile without even being here.
81. You are giving me your last name.
82. The highlight of my day is you coming home.
83. I look forward to retiring with you.
84. All I think about is you.
85. All I talk about is you.
86. Private.
87. That I tell you I love you when you're asleep.
88. You hold my hair when I'm sick.
89. I'd rather you take care of me than the #1 doctor.
90. How you treated me when I was pregnant.
91. If I'm not sitting by you it's a catastrophe.
92. How you make fun of me when I use big words.
93. How easy it was to write this list.
94. Your soft lips.
95. Holding hands with you.
96. You never make me feel stupid.
97. You love my cooking.
98. You are my rock. Always.
99. You never want to hurt me.
100. You are OK with making fun of me.
101. I love you for you.