Overdue

I realize it has been two weeks since my last post. My how time has flown. There has been so much going on around our house that I didn't realize how much time had gotten away from me. So here are a few updates of our little household.

Dogs
What do you feed two pregnant dogs who refuse to eat?

Answer: Anything they will.

But in all seriousness, I contacted a couple of breeders to ask this same question, and of course have been all over the web researching. Everyone seems to recommend adding chicken and rice to their normal diet. I am now cooking chicken breasts and rice cooked in chicken broth in bulk.

I tried adding canned food. I tried changing their food. The canned food worked for a couple of days, but both dogs turned their noses up at any type of dry dog food. Adding the chicken and rice seems to make them remember they are hungry, and so they end up eating dry food as well.

As for whether or not they are both pregnant, only time will tell. I took them to the vet a week ago and he said they were both exhibiting outward pregnancy symptoms, but would not say they were pregnant because apparently dogs have false pregnancies where they will experience every pregnancy symptom in the book including lactating, swelling bellies, and labor, but then there will be no pups. So he said all he could do was tell me to come back in 3 weeks and he would do x-rays. I think I will pass on that though. I will just wait to see who has pups and how many, since I know their respective estimated due dates.


Baby Bean
Our little family headed up to see my parents for the 4th of July weekend. We took an extra day off work to make it an even longer weekend. While there we spent some time with all of my siblings, which is a feat considering none of us live in the same states right now, and watched an awesome firework show put on and sponsored by my own little brother.

Before heading home, a few of us went to see the newly renovated zoo.

Baby Bean loved the carousel, as always. She rode a seal.
I love this picture because she still looks so much like a baby.

All of the grandkids posed for a picture on this super friendly bronze lion.

All of the dinosaurs around the zoo were pretty awesome.
They were animated and growled.

Baby Bean checking out some monkeys.

Baby Bean and her cousin sharing a double stroller.

And last, but not least, Baby Bean and her new pool. God help me, for I will and do spoil this child. I cannot help myself. The smiles these things puts on her face is worth all the money in the world to me.

A side note: this pool has 13 different sections that needed to be blown up. Each palm tree had two. It took me over an hour to blow it up with an air compressor.


The Project
A few months ago I was watching a cartoon with Baby Bean that gave me the most fantastic idea to create a quilt that I would then sew charms onto for some of the big events in her life. When I got a bonus at work a couple months ago, I used it to start buying supplies such as silver letter beads to spell out her name; numbers for her birthday; charms of a mom, dad, a little girl, and two dogs to signify her family; and so on. The idea is also to buy charms from everywhere we go on vacation or any fun places we go. When we went to Cancun in May, I bought her a dolphin and seashell charms.

It took me a couple of weeks, and an experienced eye can tell it has been a while since I've touched a sewing machine, but tonight I finally finished the quilt!

Baby Bean showing off her new quilt. She LOVES it.

The Family Square.
Dad, Baby Bean, Mom, Maggie, and Sadie.
I left room to add to the square later, if our family is added to.

TTC
I'm still on break from this game. I'm still doing acupuncture. I'm not doing anymore fertility treatments. I haven't been charting for the last two months and don't think I will until after our puppies have all been sold and are gone.

I've been exercising, but am going to start doing even more this week because one of my BFF's and I decided that instead of going out for lunch every day, we are going to brown bag it and hit our office gym. Brown bagging instantly means I eat better.

I also just had the most normal cycle I have had for the first time since last August, which gives me some hope that things are getting back on track. I have decided that if I'm not pregnant by the end of the year I am going to request a laparoscopy just to make sure there is no scar tissue preventing anything and to make sure everything else looks good. Until then though, I'm going to stay pretty zen about all of it. I don't miss stressing about every little thing in my cycle, so I am glad to have a reason to not really keep track of it (i.e., pregnant dogs/impending puppies).

That's pretty much it for now. I am way behind on my blog reading again, but will hopefully have some time to catch up a bit this week.