Hamburg(er), PA

Heather and I went out to Hamburg, PA on Friday to be bridesmaids in Rachael and Chris's Vow Renewal Ceremony.


We left Philly at 3:30PM and arrived in Hamburg about 3 hours later. It's supposed to be a 1.5 hour drive, but we got stuck in downtown Friday afternoon traffic. That is one thing I DO NOT miss about California.


Don't we look lovely? We clean up perty well, if I do say so myself.

I have no idea what's going on here. All I know is that my head hurt this morning. A lot.

Penny

Apparently we aren't done fostering after all. This little princess made her way to our house yesterday.

Our neighbor's coworker found her over the weekend running in the streets. They fell in love with her, but their two Jack Russell terriers wouldn't let her stay. They took her to their vet and she's not microchipped and it looks like she's littered recently. They mentioned it to our neighbor, who knows that we do pit bull rescue... and one thing led to another.

We're calling her Penny. Joe seemed to think she was pretty great, but of course, that could be because she isn't spayed. We'll be getting that taken care of next Tuesday (thank you Spay Neuter Services of Indianapolis!).

I guess she felt pretty comfortable at our house. She climbed on the couch and fell asleep next to Aaron. What a sweetie.

Woah

It's been almost a month since I updated last, and that was a pathetic attempt at best.

So, here's our summer, in pictures.

Insanity

I've been meaning to post about the gazillion things going on in our lives, but... there's a gazillion things going on in our lives.

Quick recap of the last 6 weeks-ish:

• Nichole helped rescue a dog from a high kill shelter. His name is Carter and he's hanging out at HSI until he gets adopted. BEEN ADOPTED!
• Our foster dog tried to eat Joe. Joe is okay, but we've decided not to foster any longer.
• We did a Community Pet Day where Aaron talked to people about neutering their dogs and Nichole gave vaccinations.
• Nichole turned 30!
• Nichole fell in love with Pilates
• We went to New Orleans for the second time
• Aaron volunteered to help organize our church's Habitat for Humanity home build

I'm sure there's other stuff I'm forgetting. I'm exhausted just thinking about it. Pictures when I get home... in 1.5 weeks.

Happy Birthday United States... and Aaron!

On July 4, we celebrated the birthday of our great nation. We also celebrated the birthday of my great husband.


Our friends, Ryan and Danielle, and I had been planning a surprise party for about a month. The plan was for Ryan to take Aaron golfing that morning, and when they got back there would be a bunch of people ready to cookout and eat cake with Aaron to celebrate.


Of course, someone *ahem* had to go and get knee surgery, so golfing was out. Never fear, Ryan is a great liar! He told Aaron they were going out of town for the 4th and would we be able to come check on the dogs around 2pm?

They did a great job surprising him. The house was quiet, the dogs ran up to greet us at the door. Everyone was in the kitchen. As we approached the kitchen Aaron could see Danielle, but she just stood there until he walked forward a bit and everyone could yell "SURPRISE!".


It's not often that I get to surprise Aaron, because I'm a terrible liar and he usually needles me until I give in and spill the beans. I was super happy that he had no idea!

A bittersweet day

I spent a couple of hours at Humane Society of Indianapolis today. I love hanging out with the doggies.

I spent a lot of time with a good looking pibble named Rocky. Rocky was in the shelter about a month ago when I went to pick up Dex. He could be Dex's twin brother, but with a bigger head. Rocky was adopted a few weeks ago, but was returned on Tuesday because he "knocked over" the adopter's small child. An energetic, 60lb pit bull? Of course he knocked him down. Did he bite him? Did he growl? No. Annoying.

As I was leaving, I stopped in the Intake area to find out when Dex would be ready to come home. He went up to HSI yesterday to have another heartworm treatment and they kept him overnight to give him another shot today.

There was a family in intake that was bringing their old, sick lab in to be euthanized. The whole family was in tears as the vet tech took the doggie. I cried on my way to the car. The old boy was obviously well loved. My prayers are with that family tonight.

I had to run back to HSI around 4 to get Dex. As I parked out front, I recognized Rocky in the greet area with a big family. I just had to stop and talk to them. I chatted with them for about 20 minutes, and they decided to put an adoption hold on him. The gal who was adopting him is about 23, and was IN LOVE with the big lug. She will be moving tomorrow to a farm outside the city where she'll be training horses. I talked to her a lot about pit bulls, and it turns out she'd done a report on them in school. I couldn't have asked for a better life for this guy. He's a great dog with a lot of energy and love to give. He'll get to live on a big ol' farm with horses, pot bellied pigs, and a female dog to keep him company.

So tears of sadness, and joy.

Look who came to visit!

It's Kennie Rosebud Duck!

Kenya's family went on a much coveted vacation (they went west to Vegas and to volunteer at Best Friends - sooo jealous) so she came to stay with us for a few days.

She misses her family, I'm sure, but fell back into the rhythm of our house with no problems. She's such a sweet, sweet girl. Her family LOVES her, they've been emailing me updates on their trip and asking for updates on her. What a lucky girl.


Dex is going for his first heartworm treatment tomorrow, so he may be leaving us soon. I love the booger, but he needs a family who can keep him and love him and take the abuse on THEIR doors, windows and carpet. He's a bit of a wild one.

Other than feeling like we're running a dog boarding facility, things are good. The weather is decent, we're pretty happy, Aaron's knee is getting better. Can't complain :)