A Momentous Occasion

Things have been pretty crazy lately. Gigi and Max are here for the Summer visit and like usual, we are everywhere!

They flew into Las Vegas and we drove in to pick them up and spend a couple of days there. We did tons of walking and seeing the sights. After that, we drove back home and went to the beach, Disneyland and Legoland the next few days after that. We also drove up to San Clemente to have lunch at the pier and see the sights.

Things have been so busy and I will have some pictures as soon as I can. The momentous occasion I am talking about is that at Disneyland, Keira had a dry diaper just about the entire day. That is huge for her. She was consistently going to the potty.

When we got back from the beach today, we were home for a bit before I realized that Keira was nowhere to be found. Where was she? We searched through the house and there she was...sitting on the toilet in the bathroom. She was horrified that we opened the door when she was going potty and gave us a lecture (in baby talk of course) that she needed privacy while she went to the potty! LOL Dan and I quietly backed out and I waited until she called for me to help. She went to the potty all by herself! Granted, she had peed a little in her training pants just before, but that was a huge breakthrough for her to actually go to the potty all by herself! Yay! Hopefully this is a sign of more solo potty breaks and that she is on her way to going by herself from now on! We'll see :)

Here She Is!

Well, I went to meet with Bea, the wonderful lady with the rescue that brought our dog to us! She is an amazing person and devotes her life to rescuing dogs. It takes a very special person to do that. They named her Socks at the Humane Society but she never responded to it. Bea said that we should rename her so that she can start off fresh so I decided to let Dan think of her name.

In typical Dan fashion, he came up with a very interesting one. He wanted to name her after a famous lost person since she was lost and we found her! Her new name? Amelia Earhart LOL. We just call her Amelia and she is already responding to it better than she ever responded to Socks! It's a good thing that our Amelia had a much happier ending than the real Amelia Earhart!

Keira adores her although we have really had to reinforce her giving Amelia her space. Like most toddlers, Keira isn't too great with her limits. I have really had to get on her about shoving her face in Amelia's face or screaming in her face because she's so excited. The first and second day we had Amelia, there was a little snapping incident. She didn't actually try to bite Keira, but was trying to give Keira a warning that she was invading her space. It really did concern me, but I corrected her right away (right on Cesar Milan! LOL) and there hasn't been an incident since. I actually could sense it was going to occur a split second before it did when I saw Amelia tense up when Keira was crouched by her petting her. That helped because I was able to react pretty fast in disciplining her immediately after. I've been kind of trying to let them each keep their own space until they get a little more used to each other. It's kind of hard on Keira because she wants to play and kiss Amelia, but I just do not want to take any chances of anything happening since Amelia is still stressed out getting used to her new environment.
Here are Keira and Amelia together. Hopefully they will get to be great buddies once they both learn each other's limits.

YAY! Not In Montana!

The supervisor at the Humane Society had one of her assistants call me back. This was to let me know that she was going to be out of the office until Wednesday, but when she gets in, she will call me. I was finally able to get some answers...

Apparently what happened was when we were at the counter trying to process the adoption, the lady working at the counter was new. When we needed to put a hold, she put a hold for us, but put it as just a regular note in the general comments section instead of in the HOLD section. Ugh... So apparently what happened was when they were going to be transferring dogs out to rescues, they checked the holds sections and since she didn't have a "HOLD" (at least not in the right section where they could see) they released her. ARGH... That finally makes SO much more sense!

I asked why on earth they would transfer her out to a rescue all the way in Montana and she told me not to listen to anything that anyone else says since some people there have already given me some incorret information. She also said that the Supervisor was the only person who would have any information that was correct since she processed the transfer herself.

Where did I get Montana from? One of the customer service people after much poking and prodding finally told me the name of the rescue. I looked the name of the rescue up in Google and it was located in Billings Montana.

Well, the lady from Montana called me last night. She said that they didn't have the dog and couldn't understand why they would say that they transferred her there. What a mess!!! It really sounded like we were never going to find her!

While at work today, I had a moment where I was thinking about how sad it was that we lost her. Then it hit me... what if there were a rescue closer by that had the SAME name as the rescue in Montana??? I decided to Google the name again. Still lots of hits on the rescue in Montana...then it happened. About the 3rd page..there it was! A rescue by the SAME name in Ramona! I called and left a message and received the call today on my way home from work.

I found her!!! You can only imagine how happy I was! The lady and I talked about our dog and how crazy it was that everything happened like it did...and especially how much I went through trying to track her down. I guess there wasn't much doubt that we really truly wanted to adopt her, huh? LOL She was shocked and said, "Wow! You would have driven all the way to Ramona to get her?" My response was "Are you kidding??? I was going to drive to Montana, so Ramona is WAY better!" LOL

I'm meeting with her tomorrow to bring OUR dog home! :)

Montana

MONTANA! They shipped our dog off to Montana! How on earth does that happen?!??!?! No one I have spoken to so far can explain how it happened when we had a hold on her and obviously wanted to adopt her. That was OUR dog and they shipped her off to Montana...

Heartbroken...

...I'm very sad right now.

I've been going back and forth with the idea of getting a dog for a little while now. One day a few weeks ago, I looked online and there was an absolutely adorable Cocker Spaniel that was at the local SPCA. His name was Socks and he was described as the typical adorable Cocker Spaniel and was a very sweet boy. I decided to take Keira there with me one day to meet him. She has been a little scared of dogs lately since the incident with The Tonka Truck, but when they let us in the play yard to interact with Socks, she immediately took to him. He really was a very sweet gentle guy and she would even give him treats from her hand with no fear because he was so gentle with her. I thought it was a little unusual that he squatted when he peed. Was he maybe alot younger than they thought he was? (2 years old)

I didn't want to make any decisions without Dan there, so the next day, I brought Dan with me to meet him. He was not in his Kennel so the volunteer brought him to the play yard and he was such a sweet, gentle dog. EXACTLY what we were looking for. Funny though, because when he was squatting to pee, I asked the volunteer, "Are you guys SURE that he's a boy?" He said yes. That was when Socks rolled over for me to pat his tummy. HE was a SHE!!! We played with her for a while longer when we decided to go ahead and adopt her! I was really happy and excited. We went to the desk and she started to process our paperwork. As she was doing this, a guy comes up and says, "You can't release the dog, it is sick". Sick??? What's wrong with her? Apparently the Vet was by earlier and said that she had Kennel Cough. Ok, I've had 2 dogs now that have gotten Kennel Cough before and I was really shocked when they said that Socks had this. I even said to them, "You know, I spent 30-45 minutes with her today and the same amount of time with her yesterday and she hasn't once coughed, hacked or wheezed. Are they sure that she was sick? I even offered to take her home and have her go to my Vet. They said that they would put a hold on her and for me to check on her in a few days. I called back a couple of days later and they said to call back Monday after 3. I called at 3:01..no exaggeration! I really was anxious to take her home. They said that they just put her on Antibiotics and for me to call back and check on her on Thursday after 3. What????? She's been sick for a week and they were JUST putting her on antibiotics??? I offered to take her home so that I could bring her to my vet for the medication, but they said that they couldn't release her.

Well, today is Thursday, and at 2:59, I started trying to call the SPCA to get a status on Socks. I was HOPING that the status would be that we could take her home! I got voice mail a few times and finally reached a person. She checked for a few minutes and came back to the phone reporting that Socks had been released to a Rescue. HUH?!?!?!? What??!??! How on earth did THAT happen??? Why would she be released to a Rescue if she already was on hold for a family that wanted to adopt her right away??

I was so upset and I wanted answers! What happened??? How could she be released to a shelter when we had a hold!

I asked to speak to a supervisor and they told me that the supervisor would be back at 4:30 and was transferred to voice mail. I called back at 4:30 and they transferred me to voice mail again. I was transferred 3 times and finally just put on hold before they disconnected me 5 minutes before they were closing at 5pm.

I just don't even know what to say. I hate to be a suspicious person, but there is something really weird going on. I mean, I'll be honest, I really don't think that she had Kennel Cough. Don't you usually have a COUGH when you have Kennel Cough? Also, not putting her on antibiotics until an entire week that she was being quarantined??? Then knowing that there was a hold for a family that obviously REALLY wanted to adopt her..why would she go to a Rescue???

None of this makes sense, but I do know this, I'll be calling them on Monday to have someone explain to me how all of this happens. I already felt in my heart that this was our dog. We already bonded with her and I'm so sad thinking that something weird is happening with her. I just want to know what happened to her and bring her home :(.

Baby Sings The Blues

Dan is a big fan of the blues. Whenever Keira and him are driving around, instead of playing children's songs, he plays the blues in his car. She bops along to the music and really gets into it!

He has a really funny story where many many years ago when he was just discovering the blues, he was in a bar in Maine and this amazing guy was playing on stage. After the show, the man was sitting at a table with some fellow musicians. Dan approached him to tell him how much he enjoyed the show, which the guy was very happy to hear. They chatted for a bit and Dan told him that he was amazing and he really should think about doing it full time because of how great he was. The guy laughed and thanked Dan for his kindness. It wasn't until a few years later that he realized that he was giving career advice to B.B. King. Obviously he was already doing just fine without it, huh? LOL

Dan has always wanted to play an instrument and I tried to teach him piano once. He was doing really well, but his busy schedule was keeping him from getting practice. One day, Keira and I were at the mall and I saw an instruction CD for learning to play the harmonica. I thought it would be a perfect instrument since he could mess around with it while he was working on other things since a harmonica is so compact and easy to bring with you. That was a while ago and he hasn't had the time to mess around with it.

Keira found it the other day and wanted to know what it was. I took it and blew into it for a second and that was all it took! She was having a BLAST playing it and next thing I knew, she was singing the blues. She sounded great! She would play the harmonica, then stop and sing "Mommy Mommy Mommy!" Play again, then stop and sing "Daddy Daddy Daddy!" Play again, then stop and sing "Keira Keira Keira!" We were laughing and having such a good time! She wouldn't do it on video, but she did allow me to take a picture of her doing it, so here she is! The next blues phenomenon!

More Summer Movies and Father's Day!

We've had a great start of the weekend so far! Keira and I went to UTC to go meet Uncle Rod for lunch at Red Robin. He said that he didn't even know that they existed up until a couple of years ago. I'd never even been to one all the years they have been around. I'll tell you, I've been missing out. The food was great and what is not to love about bottomless french fries, huh? WOO HOO! :D

We're celebrating an early Father's Day today since Dan has to work tomorrow. We started the day out taking Keira to see Kung Fu Panda this morning and she did GREAT! Yay us! :) There were some scenes that were a little intense for her and she started to get a little antsy the last 15 minutes or so, but all in all, she did fantastic! It was pretty early in the morning, so there weren't alot of people which was good. The people that were there all had kids, so that way if she started to get a little freaked out, it would be ok. I LOVED it. It was so well done and there was just enough funny stuff with Jack Black to keep the parents amused. I laughed out loud several times through the movie and I think that you all will love it as well.

Dan and I also snuck away to see Indiana Jones this past week as well. It was great to see Harrison Ford back as Indy again, but I have to be honest... I didn't like it as anywhere near as much as the other ones. It was good, but I think that Dan and I have gotten to analyze things and situations too much in our older age LOL. We were just too perplexed about why anyone would take the skull in the first place...but hey....that is just us :)

I WAS excited to see the Happening at first when it was announced, but it's not getting that great of reviews. That could mean nothing, since the critics seem to hate M. Night, but we'll see. I can't wait to see The Mummy 3, but that definitely is going to be one that Dan and I will have to sneak away for. No WAY Keira would be able to watch that!

A wonderful Happy Early Father's Day to all of you great Dads out there! Have fun!