Happy Halloween

I want to kiss a vamp...

Okay, so I am off the wedding posts again, but for those of you that know me, I know you are not surprised. I become easily distracted, and then easily obsessed.

So True Blood started on HBO a few weeks ago. John from Cincinnati was cancelled and I was truly bummed at the time so when they announced they were starting a show about vampires I was excited!

I went through a Blade phase in the late 90's. I was obsessed with every thing vampire related including the shows Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. The phase went away when Angel fell in love with Cordelia and I wanted nothing to do with it anymore.

All these years later I have still been into the world of fantasy...the movies, my fairies and dragons and of course vampires and werewolves so when True Blood started I was really looking forward to it. Then I watched the first episode....and now....my obsession begins again!

I LOVE Bill Compton....He's scary and sexy and obviously in love with Sookie...how I wish I were Sookie....

On top of Bill Compton and Sookie's love story, there's a ton of other creepy sci-fi type stuff going on here. I haven't quite figured it out, but I think Sam's a werewolf and he's the one on the killing spree.

So each week I wait patiently for the next exciting episode. And for those of you that watched last Sundays' episode...who knew sex in a cemetery could be a turn on!

So after watching the first episode of True Blood I decided it was time to finally read a series of books I have been wanting to pick up. They are the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer. I read the first two books in five days. LOVE IT!

I am on the third book and I am having a hard time deciding whether I love Edward Cullen (the sexy and protective vamp from Twlight) more, or Bill Compton (Sookie's lover in True Blood) more.....choices, choices.

Either way, I am pretty sure I want to kiss a vamp....

For Amy....

Lord, Beer me some strength.....

My inspiration

Okay, so here they are, the colors that will inspire the entire even.....Gold, Choclate Brown and Burgundy....

(this pic didn't upload so well, but I think you get the idea)

Back to the nitty, gritty....

Okay, as promised, back to wedding stuff....

Things have been crazy at work so I haven't been able to properly obsess about our impending wedding the way that I would love to. We do have an announcement though. We have a date!

October 9, 2009

Yeah! Finally! going back and forth with the the venue is exhausting but we at least have it set in stone now.

Oh and I have more wonderful news (for me anyway)....The wedding colors have been chosen. About two weeks ago I purchased an insane amount of wedding magazines. (Don't worry, I had a gift card). They are all fall/winter so I thought they would be perfect to flip through since our wedding is in October. I found lots of little inspirations, but nothing jumped out at me.

The following weekend I was at the "salon" getting my "eyebrows waxed" and flipped through a bridal magazine they had there which is the only one of the lot that I did not buy. It was Brides fall/winter magazine.

As I flipped through I turned to a page and the instant I saw the collage there I KNEW it was what I envisioned for us. Rather than rip the page out, I went to four different stores to find the right issue of Brides. I found it last night at Barnes & Noble; went home and got Kodo's Dad a little tipsy; then sprung the page on him. He agreed! He loved it as much as I did!

I am not giving away any of the colors in this post, however, tomorrow morning I will scan the page and post it here for all to view.

Twelve months away and I am already exhausted.......

My adopted animals....Chptr 2

Exciting news....We have internet at home! (despite the winds attempt to destroy our power lines)

So to continue on how we got Lola....

When we decided we wanted another dog we discussed breeds. Since we are both dog lovers, every breed came up. German Shepard: too hairy, Rottweiler: too big, Terrier: to hyper, Lab: too active, Dalmatian: way too active, another Chihuahua: Kodo's Dad put his foot down and said no!

Then we started talking about Boxers. We both had experiences with them and knew they were sweet dogs. Then we googled a little and discovered they were really good with kids. Since we have a lot of kids coming by, we thought one would be perfect. So I started my search to adopt a Boxer (I don't do puppies.)

There is a Boxer rescue in Burbank I contacted. They firmly said "NO". We live in an apartment. So I decided to search our OC Shelter. That IS where I got Kodo. I looked for weeks and no Boxer ever came around. One morning I logged onto their website and their she was. I left for an early lunch and went and visited with her. She was the only Boxer I had seen there in weeks and I had to have her. That day, I came home with a Boxer. We named her Lola...

I brought Lola home the same day I visited with her the first time. We were NOT prepared! We had nothing! They put her in my car with a rope around her neck and I was off. First stop, home...

Kodo and her took all of 1 minute to learn to love each other. I think Kodo immediately showed his dominance, even though he is 40lbs smaller than she is, and that set the tone for their entire relationship. Next stop, the pets store...

I picked up the necessities; collar, leash, bowls, food. (Kodo eats special chihuahua food). Last stop, our vet, Dr. Laura.....

This was the most interesting of all stops. Dr. Laura took a good look and Lola, ran some tests, and then the results...

Lola has what Dr. Laura refers to as a chronic bladder infection. At the time, she knew it was bad, but she didn't know it would take nearly a year and three different type of antibiotics to clear it. She also has ripped out most of the nails from her front paws scratching at the metal gates at the shelter. We had to have them cleaned and each of her paws wrapped for over a month. Imagine trying to walk a dog and not get those wraps wet. We tied grocery bags around her paws to take her out but she figured out how to pull those off real quick.

We knew that the shelter would take her back based on the medical problems she had when I picked her up. Kodos Dad and I made a quick decision, we chose to bring an adopted animal into our life, and we were committed to making sure she was healthy and happy for as long as we could. She is a good girl and one of the sweetest dogs you will ever meet.

Okay, enough about my dogs....I will begin appropriately blogging my new wedding obsessions tomorrow. I have a ton!

My adopted animals...Chptr 1

I realized I never really told the story of how we ended up with our animals....

I used to have a long-haired chihuahua named Skittles my sister gave to me. She was born April 2003. She was long-hair at birth, but lost all her hair by the time she was 1. She never weighed more than 3.5 lbs so she was a definitely a runt! We called her "monkey dog"......

When I decided to go back to school that fall, I wanted to get her a friend to keep her company. Much to Kodo's dad disapproval, I went off to the OC Shelter. That's where I found Kodo. He was covered in fleas and was found roaming with another male chi. I tried to adopt the both of them, but the other chi was too aggressive and he had to be euthanized. I brought Kodo home and he and Skittles got along great! He struggled with humans though. Kodo immediately bonded with myself and his dad, but he was really aggressive with everyone else.

In case you are wondering, the name Kodo was inspired from the movie Beastmaster. You gotta love 1982 Marc Singer. Dar had two ferret friends named Kodo & Podo. I always knew I wanted to give an animal at least one of those names.

The first year with Kodo was difficult, he growled and snapped at people a lot and never seemed comfortable in his environment. We just kept putting him in situations where he was required to deal with other animals and humans in the hopes he would just get over it. The only time that we would have to muzzle him is when kids came over. I would feel so bad about it that I stopped muzzling him and we would keep him around us until he snapped or growled and then we would punish him by putting him in "time out". Now we don't even have to muzzle him when he goes to the vet. Five years later and he is a changed dog!

Skittles passed away in April 2005. Kodo's dad and I struggled a bit with her loss, as did Kodo. He became a maniac! Spoiled and selfish, he began to do whatever, whenever, and we knew it had to stop. We decided that we would adopt another dog to help regulate his behavior.

For those of you that know me, I will take any old dog off the street and love it. Matt is a little more particular about his animals.....

Chapter 2...the story of how we adopted Lola....

Update 2...

Dr. Laura called.....No cancer on Lola! Let's celebrate!

Oh, and still no internet at home *sigh*.....

Updates...

Sorry to for the lag in blogging. Out internet has been down for over a week at home. Aaaaagghhhh! We thought it was the modem, but it's not so we are having Time Warner (booooo) look at it on Saturday. I feel bad blogging at work, but it has been so long I know I needed to update.

So this blog started as a way to share not only my lovely little wedding obsessions, but the crazy things that occur in our "house of dogs". You need not wait anymore, have I got a doozy....

Last Thursday when Kodo's dad and I got home from work, we noticed Lola had a lump in her belly. Not one of her normal lumps (i.e. hangin raisins...), one really scary looking, inside the skin, extremely red, changing diameter by the hour kind of lump.

Friday afternoon I took her to Dr. Laura (our vet) and she immediately scheduled surgery to have it removed. Fact: Boxers are prone to all types of cancer. On Friday, Dr. Laura gave me our estimate for the surgery; Kodo's Dad and I spent the weekend freaking out about it; and Tuesday morning Lola had surgery.

Dr. Laura removed the mass in her stomach, along with the several "hanging raisins" she had all over her body. She has a ton of stitches but is doing really well. As soon as our internet at home is back up I will be sure to post a pick of her and her cute pink head cone!

We had her lab work done before the surgery and discovered she has another UTI (for those of you that remember it took us almost a year to kill the last one) and she is showing signs of early kidney failure. She is currently on pain medication and antibiotics and we will be picking up her prescription food next week for her kidneys.

Dr. Laura should be calling me today with the biopsy results. We are nervous so please say a prayer for Lola!

I will update you as soon as I can.....