Pup's Perspective "My People took me to the Beach!!"



My People took me to the beach!!!




I've never seen sand before ... but I realized pretty darn quickly it was super fun to dig in!! My people took me in the water ... dude the ocean is cold!!! So to get back at them I moved as much sand from the beach onto their blankets as possible ... I even tried to bury Rachael. We'll see if they try that funny ocean business ever again!




After some swimming and trying to chase sea gulls, digging to my hearts content ... I just lounged and caught some rays ... life is good for me ... although word to the wise... don't stick your nose in the sand and inhale, you would think someone would have thrown me a bone and given me a heads up here ... although hey ... I'm not saying I would have listened to the advice ... I like to do what I want but that's neither here nor there ... I learned the hard way.
Overall I'd give the beach a 9 out of 10 I loved the sand, sun and watching (crazy) people in the ocean... But I'm gunna have to take a point away because I would have enjoyed more freedom to run ... I SO would have caught one of the annoying sea gulls!



Pup's Perspective...

Peter was trying to build a shelf .. so I thought I'd try to help

I was really trying!

And then Peter told me I wasn't doing a very good job ...

I kept trying anyways

and trying...

and trying ...

and trying ...

And finally Peter yelled at me :(



How can you not want my help?



A Day in the Life of Elbie

Blogging about my dog? Well yes I am :) I'm not going to lie sometimes this little guys pushes our buttons like non other. There are times that I swear he does things just to see our reactions, ie the other night... I woke up in the morning to find our laundry, which had been put into the washing machine the night before, was all over our living room ... as I huffed and puffed under my breath I turned around to see Elbie sitting watching me with his head cocked to the side. Why in the middle of the night he had felt the need to get up on our washer and pull out all the clothes is beyond me! If only this dog could talk ...

One of his many favorite things, only falling behind staring at himself in the mirror and and army crawling under the bed, is laying and watching the train go by.

He is lucky he's cute ... and often makes up for his crazy behavior by sleeping on your lap like in the picture above.

Remember that time Peter didn't want Elbie allowed on the bed ... oh well this was what I witnessed this morning. I have to get up earlier than Peter in the morning, when I came back into the bedroom today Elbie had taken my spot in bed, head on my pillow, cuddled up next to Peter, happy as a clam!

Not going to lie, I'm loving my life, my messy apartment and the 2 dudes that keep it interesting, fun, and messy along side me :)

Married Musings

- When you start having convos like this "did the dog eat?" "I don't know I thought you fed him." "I didn't feed him ... " "humm... he's probably hungry" You know you have a new puppy and your life and you haven't quite figured out the schedule yet...

- You know your getting old when you do things that remind you of your parents such as: "hey hubs, I bought a cute necklace ... you can give it to me for my birthday." When did birthdays stop being surprising? Apparently when you get married.

- I have an issue with the fact that my puppy gets more money spent on him than my husband and I combined ... shots, broken teeth, swallowed bones, heart worm meds, flea and tick meds ... and he has allergies?!?! I have been told often as of late that I am now prepared for a child.

- You know that you are no longer considered newly weds when: you go to bed with very very unshaven legs and you ask for a foot massage when your feet stink to high heavens, and your not even ashamed :)

- Nothing is better than seeing the sacrifice in a relationship ... whether is be putting up with a puppy (when your not a dog person) or running a race (even though you despise running). Cleaning when you're tired, taking your down time to fix things in the house ...

- When morning hair doesn't scare him ... you know you've got him hooked!

- It's pretty great when your parents come to visit and they are impressed at your apartment, it's also pretty great when you can treat them instead of asking for money :)

- When your all of 12 pound puppy is being bad and your husband comes running from the other room to help you know he's going to make a great dad haha

- On the flip side when your puppy swallows a whole chicken bone and you and your husband sit and laugh till you cry while the DR makes him throw it up ... you start to wonder if you will be a good parent yourself...

- When you start having more friends married than not ... and half of them have children, you wonder "where did life go?!" and also many times ... "Am I old enough for this?"

- If you've even had a fight about: 1) how to paint a wall 2) the way to hang a picture 3) how to pack a car 4) where to park the car 5) how to properly wash the dishes ... or any other ridiculous fight along those lines you may realize that 2 firstborns have married each other.

- umm ... what a life so far. At times fun, frustrating, exciting, ridiculous, irritating, tiring, joyful but no matter what always full of love. I wouldn't trade it for the world.

Our kitchen is finished! (ish)

So we decided that since we were painting the rest of our apartment we were not going to paint the kitchen. The walls were dirty but with a little scrubbing they were a nice off white color... plus trying to paint around those cabinets ... no thanks. Something needed to happen in the kitchen and for a while I wasn't sure exactly what, the space was just blah. I had a bunch of decorations, but being in such a small place, there was nowhere to put them. I was a wee bit sad until I discovered how to make my kitchen look a little more alive!

I took all the vases and glass bottles, old books, some photos a small little globe and some other odds and ends and but them on top of my cabinets. I know I know its like only the oldest trick in the book. Part of me was wicked excited because I didn't spend any money, just used things I already owned. The other part of me was just plain in love with how homey it made a pretty bland small and at time frustrating space. So there ya have it! I added some dark pieces as a base and then some bright fun colors with red books, orange and blue glass bottles and a tree decoration I had found wicked on sale at Anthropologie for some texture. Also for the fridge, as we get plenty of save the dates, wedding invitations and birth announcements I found the cutest little magnets at an antique store. I love antique stores, it's kinda a problem.

So there it is in all it's glory, well at least a piece of it. I may take a picture of the full kitchen at some point in the future but lets be honest, we live here now ... and maybe it's just me but the kitchen seems to enjoy being a mess ... so sometimes I just let it be :)

Sometimes when your dryer doesn't work, it's a birdnest...

Our Post Office.  

Original Manassas Post Office. Built in 1906 by Judge C. E. Nichol, it housed the post office from 1906 to 1923. The building is an excellent example of Renaissance Revival architecture with its decorative brickwork in parapet, segmental arches with keystones over the windows, rusticated brickwork surrounding the doors and "POST OFFICE" in cement over the main entrance. The building was restored in 1983 by Gloria and Walter Delisle and now houses their Antique business.
http://www.manassasonline.com/delisleantiques/histmana.htm

So yes, the Post Office or our home. We love it despite the smallness of the section we inhabit. It is a beautiful building ... and the space we do have the privilege of living in and calling ours for the time being had a few things that needed fixing, besides the walls and need for more storage space. When we first started cleaning things up we decided that the dead mouse, who had been in his grave behind our fridge for long enough to be faceless ... needed to go. With all the cleaning we were doing we were using a lot of rags. So one day I did some laundry ... and the when I put the load into the dryer and dried it, they came out wet. So in my head I thought either 1. the dryer is broken or 2. the guy who lived here before us didn't even notice the faceless mouse behind his fridge ... it wouldn't be a far stretch to guess he hadn't cleaned out the dryer vent or hose in years. And so the honey do list grew :) Peter decided one Saturday when I was out to try and fix the dryer for me and below is the picture I received to my phone.

The message that accompanied it was something very Peter "Dryer should work better now." YA THINK?! Appearently the dryer hose, which goes straight outside to the ally behind our building was stuffed to the brim with sticks, feathers, dirt ... pretty much this bird was a pack rat. I mean really dude ... you really needed that much stuff for a nest?! Anyways for argument sake we decided he couldn't live there anymore and he was promplty asked to relocate. And now my dryer works!

A dresser make over

So as I stated in a previous post we have one closet in our entire apartment. This poses problems on many fronts ... 1. There are two of us and a dog living in this space. 2. We only have a small living room, bathroom, tiny bedroom and a even smaller kitchen. 3. We are like any normal couple ... we have clothes, books, and other things that require spaces for them to be put in! So I was on the hunt. When we first rented the apartment, I was unemployed, so although we were not yet living together we were for the 3 months before our wedding living off of one income. When you think of it that way decorating an apartment becomes a whole new ball game! After scavenging my parents house and making list of all the things my mother was giving us we were still in need of: 2 dressers, kitchen chairs, a bookshelf, coffee table, side table for the couch, and a night stand for the bedroom, shelves for the bathroom a few rugs ... yeah :)

So as I stated, I was on the hunt. I needed something that would fit with the vision I had for decorating our first place ... but also cheap. And this is what I found:





   At a second hand store down the street from us a kinda scary looking ... oddly decorated, yet in really great shape, dresser! And the best part, it was $30.00. At the time I had visions of where I would put it and how it would look when I was finished ... I had no idea how long it would take or how much work, but I knew it would be worth the money. So home the dresser came!

Luckily at this point, the apartment was still empty, as were were still painting those 15 foot walls, so I took the dresser inside. I was on a mission to get it looking at least a bit like the vision in my head before Peter got out of work ... I mean lets be honest, the metallic gold flowers and knobs, not exactly our style. So after taking the knobs off I got to work scrubbing down the gold. To my surprise it came off wicked easily! And I realized that if I just did a little extra sanding all over the dresser I wouldn't even need to apply paint. I was lucky because the paint underneath was a nice blue grey color. Perfect... seriously the vision in my head, shattered, it was better. I will admit I got a bit lucky, and had been prepared for a long road to a good looking dresser but here it is in all its glory ... although still knobless for the moment, black knobs to be added soon.