COCO Bean

We call COCO our little "COCO Bean" ...she is such a sweet little puppy. Housebreaking is a "work in progress." We keep in in the laundry room and she has a potty pad in there that she will use, which is good. I would rather her go outside all of the time but, if she is going to go in the house, I am glad she atleast "gets" that she needs to go on the pad. We do have some accidents but we are getting less and less. We re-invested in a new Bissel green machine which is awesome! ( I highly recommend this investment for anyone with pets or children!) We had one from years ago that no longer would squirt out the water so we got a new one since we are using it so much with COCO. At least I know we will be getting new carpet once she is fully housebroken! :-) She is also a bit spoiled already and would rather go potty on the deck instead of going out into the cold grass....so we have some work a head of us this spring! The kids LOVE her and she loves to lay on your lap when you are watching tv, I just LOVE that! She likes to chew on everything but all puppies do, so we have to be careful when she runs off with one of the kids toys instead of her own!

After this task....we will be working on potty training Ava!!!!!! Lord help me!

Jurrasic Adventure

Last Saturday we took the kids to the Jurassic Adventure Exhibit at the Ohio Expo Center. There were tons of replicas of dinosaurs for them to look and and touch. It was extremely busy and the line to get in was a mile long but....we waited and made the best of it! It wasn't the Smithsonian by any means but, we are in Ohio! After so many cold winter weekends you look for anything fun to do until spring!

Will you be my V-A-L-E-N-T-I-N-E?

Here is little Ms. Ava enjoying her snack at her first official Valentine's Day party at daycare! She received a ton of fun valentine's and treats from her friends, as did Aiden!

Overall it was a very nice Valentine's day. I told Chris I didn't want a card or really anything as we just got the puppy and I would rather spend money on doing something fun with each other. Of course he had to do something so he got our Wedding & Reception video transferred from VHS to DVD. It was a wonderful and thoughtful gift! It's been years since I have seen it since we haven't had a VHS player in years! We watched the ceremony on Valentine's night and Aiden also watched, he laughed a lot watching then once again, covered my eyes when it came to the kissing part of the ceremony! LOL, he is so silly!

This has been a busy week! Well, every week is busy but this one seems extra busy...we had our parent teacher conference with Aiden's teacher on Monday and he is doing very well at school. I am so proud of him. He is a very smart kid. We do have some attention/impulsitivity issues at times, so we hope to work on those however, overall he is doing great. I still cannot believe he is 7 years old. He have his 7 year check up scheduled for this Friday at the doctor. His student teacher from his 1st grade room came to see him play basketball this past weekend and it was such a sweet surprise! He was very excited! (so was his Dad since she is a cutie, but that's another story ;-)) We also signed him up for spring flag football that will start in April.

Then Monday afternoon, we had a follow up ENT appt with Ava. She still has an infection in her throat so he put her on another 10 days of a stronger antibiotic. She will more than likely need to get her tonsils out but he is not ready to do it and I am not ready for her to go through that just yet either. She is still just a little peanut. We are hoping this medicine clears everything up and with the weather changing hopefully we can keep her healthy for a while! I am starting to get all her plans together for her 2nd Birthday. We are having a small party at my parents house this year for her.

CoCo is doing great. She is super sweet. Her first vet appointment went well and she weighed in at 9 lbs 10 ounces. We are still working on potty training but she will get there...I had a few moments last week where I wasn't sure I could handle her but, we are adjusting. Casey is enjoying her company and they are really starting to play with one another. It's fun to watch! I think we might give her a bath tonight for the first time! This will be interesting!

This weekend Chris and I are going out on Saturday night and I am very much looking forward to it! We also took Monday off of work thinking we could spend the day all together but Aiden wants to go to daycare since they are going ice skating so I guess I will get some things done around the house and maybe catch an early afternoon movie or something! :-)

The weather is finally starting to warm up a little, I will take anything I can get at this point! I will be happy when I can finally vacuum out my car and get the garage cleaned out. Hopefully once the puppy is fully training we can get moving on some things I want done around the house like new paint and carpet! One day at a time I guess....

Our little CoCo puff!

We have officially lost our minds!!!!!

Last Saturday, Aiden had a basketball game at 8:20 AM. After the game we decided to go grab some brunch. We went to a place that just to happens to be in the same plaza as the petstore. We told the kids if they were good and ate well we would go see the puppies.

I have been discussing with Chris the reasons that I think now would be a good time to get a new puppy. Although it was not in the plans for this Saturday's pet store visit! Our Casey is now 13 years old and she is noticibly aging. My Mom told me the best thing she did was get her second dog when the first one was starting to get older. I also plan on re carpeting the house, so why not get the potty training done on the old carpet....these were a few of my selling points to Chris who was not going for it.....(at all may I add!)

Sooooo, we go see the puppies and the store just opened so the sales person asks if we went to play with any of them she will take one out. We pick out a cute little Lhasa Apso brown ball of fur, and her little roomate, a jack russel. The jack russel was a wild little thing and they were playing and acting crazy. The sales person mentioned that the little brown puff normally isn't wild, the jack russel is the one that is hyper so we take him away to play with just her....and a connection started. She also mentioned that she won't shed which was like the angels singing after dealing with Husky fur for 13 years! The kids enjoyed her, I enjoyed her and I think Chris even enjoyed her....so I gave Chris "the look" and he said "NO." I said well maybe we can talk about it. We left and I kept thinking about her and was trying to decide if I wanted to take on a puppy right now.

Chris and Aiden went to run errands later that day and Ava and I took a nap. When I got up, Aiden came walking in holding the dog!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was super surprised! Chris caved and went to get her. Apparently it was Aiden's idea to surprise me with her. He said we had 48 hours as we wanted to make sure that she and Casey were going to get a long. So far they are getting along just fine. Actaully, I think they are enjoying each other.

We named our puppy CoCo, she was born on Oct 2, 2009 so she is about 4 months old. We keep her in her kennel at night and she sleeps all night (something our kids still can't do for us!) and I decided to keep her in the laundry room while we are at work so she has a little more room to move around. So far she has been doing great. I just need to get over my guilt of leaving her during the day. I want to keep her out as much as possible to run around the house but until she is house broken I need to stick to keeping her in the laundry room unless she goes potty and I feel confident that she isn't going to go in the house. It's pretty cold right now so that part sucks! Although, I do like that the snow lets me know if she went or not because she is so small I can't tell if she is squatting or sitting! LOL!

The kids and I are taking her on her first vet visit tonight. :-)

Ice Ice Baby

Well, the past two days have been a bit of a challenge! We had a ice storm hit on Tuesday, which caused schools to close and then we lost power on Tuesday night. We woke up Wednesday and it was really cold in the house. School was cancelled again and I thought they would shut down daycare however they had power and were still open! So, I took the kids there for the day so they could be warm and I figured I should go to work anyway since I stayed home with them on Tuesday. It's still a skating rink in some areas, especially parking lots but the worst is now over! Our power did come back on yesterday afternoon so last night we were all able to rest much easier than the prior night!

Ava has had a cough for a few days now. I took her to the Dr. first thing this morning and they gave her a breathing treatment. Per the Dr. it seemed to help so he recommended that we continue 3-4 times a day as needed. This is going to be fun! She isn't at the age yet where she will really sit and watch tv or anything so I need to find something that will grab her attention for a few minutes while she sits with the little mask over her mouth. :-( I just hope it doesn't get any worse for her. I think I caught it before it got too bad so hoping for the best!

Aiden is back at school today, although he really is getting excited about having snow days. He has been playing basketball every Sat morning and seems to be really enjoying it this year. I finally see the competitiveness coming out, and it's not too aggressive but enough that he wants to do well and is trying more than he was last year! I want him to enjoy what ever he decides to play. I think he is going to play flag football again this spring. His current league goes to tackle at 7 but I am not comfortable with that yet so we might change leagues.

Work has been going well, so far I still have a job which is good. (we were purchased and are in the process of merging companies) My managers still have jobs so I assume I am safe however, you never know, I don't assume anything anymore! I started working out a few times a week and am trying to eat better. We also started attending church last week and one of my new years resolutions was to start going on a more regular basis. We were invited by a friend to a local church and I think Chris and I really enjoyed it. They have some wonderful programs and the facility is amazing! It's huge and the kids areas are all beautiful! Aiden loved it and even told me he needs a Bible because all the kids bring theirs. I thought that was really cute :-) Ava fussed a little but I think she just hasn't been feeling all that great and it was a new place for her so hopefully she will start doing better in the weeks to come.

Chris is currently working a ton, but keeping his options open to new opportunities. He just feels the company he is with doesn't provide him with a sense of security so, hopefully some thing will be coming his way that is more stable and hopefully more family friendly. The company he is with now doesn't really seem to understand or support a family life balance and with two young children, that is important.

All in all, we are doing well! We have some fun things planned for most every weekend this month and are just trying to make it through the rest of the winter season! Spring can't come soon enough!

Aiden's 7th

Aiden is officially a 7 year old! He had a wonderful birthday. His party was a lot of fun and almost every one of his friends came to celebrate with him! The party was a roller skating party with a Star Wars theme. I had a special guest come to visit him. My boss is a huge star wars fan so he came and dressed up in his storm trooper costume. Aiden was surprised and I tried to get all the kids pictures taken with him. Everyone seemed to enjoy the day even a lot of the adults that didn't plan on participating had skates on at the end. I look back at the past seven years and although I can't really remember life with out him, it seems like he was born just yesterday...such a strange feeling. I am so blessed to have such a wonderful son!