Ugly babies

So, I've always said that someday I hope G and I have cute babies! There's nothing worse than an ugly baby. All of your friends and all of your family have to pretend to think it's the cutest thing ever...and deep down you know that aesthetically, it's a little off.

My point is, I came across this website today - www.morphthing.com - and you can upload pictures of your face and your significant other's face and then it will morph them and show you what your future child will look like. All I have to say is, lets just hope this morphing thing is wrong! AHHH!

Totally off. G thinks it looks like a kid from a classical painting. The eyebrows do have a nice shape.

Long time no post.

I've/We've been busy! Since I last posted I finished up my derm meeting in May, went on vacation in Florida for a friend's wedding in July that included Universal studioes, Harry Potter World, Magic Kingdom, an airboat ride in the everglades to see live gators, hung out with 7 of my closest guy friends from high school, and an awesome wedding for one of the said 7 friends from high school to an awesome lady, celebrated our first anniversary in July, spent a lot of money on our dog's issues, bought an expensive DSLR camera and am loving it, had an idea to become a professional photographer...still thinking about it, took a photography class at the Austin Museum of Art, made new friends, haven't been camping because of the HOT Austin weather, went to a professional English soccer game (Man U) - although not the team I love in the EPL (Chelsea), have decided that next Summer G, Charlie and I are doing a roadtrip up to Michigan, found out that one of my closest friends is pregnant with her first baby and is due in February, hung out with said friend more in the past couple of weeks than have in the past 10 months and have really enjoyed it, gotten closer with a couple of co-workers and have absolutely loved it, started to seriously think about first time home buying, applied to be on HGTV's show "My First Place" yesterday and hoping to get chosen like we did a year ago for "Property Virgins" before backing out, watched plenty of reality TV and am shamefully looking forward to the "Bachelor Pad" that starts on Monday, discovered Charlie's ability to really swim well in the lake, also discovered Charlie's love for rolling on dead frogs in the middle of the road after a rainstorm, cooked some delicious meals for G and myself, have also not been doing as well in the past month with staying home and eating..., started reading more and more books and have loved it every evening and on the weekends, had my laptop died a couple of months ago which = part of the reason why I haven't been posting, etc. etc. etc.

There is so much more to say and so many more things to tell but this is a good start since I haven't updated in so long. I will upload some recent pics of myself, G, Charlie and our trips and will upload them soon!

On a side note: Have you seen this commercial? I love it - makes me happy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8F_G2zp-opg

Red Bud and Palmettoooooooo

So the first set of pictures are from Red Bud Park, where I took Charlie this past Tuesday. It was just the 2 of us at the park and and an 8 month old puppy can really wear you out! Anyways, it was beautiful out there and Charlie really loved swimming around in the water and doing laps in the open areas. I think in 2 weeks we're going to head out to inks lake to camp with the usual group and possibly Michael and we're going to try to get Charlie to head into deeper water! I'm thinking that if we send G out to the middle of the lake calling Charlie, he might go!

Of COURSE Charlie had to find the biggest stick he possibly could to run around with and gnaw on!

He really enjoyed running under this branch over and over again.

Palmetto State Park was exactly as I remembered it from when I was little. Kelsey, her family and I used to go out to Palmetto quite often in the Spring and Summer when we were in Elementary school and Middle school. It's located in Gonzalez which was only about 40 minutes from our place. They don't have a lot of water access, as the current was really strong but Charlie and Lexie loved playing on the low water crossing.

Looks like a nice hill to take the dogs down to swim!

Poor Monica fell in the mud going down the hill, dropped Lucy's leash and Lucy took off running, then ran after Lucy and sunk in the mud even more :(

However, Charlie had fun running around in the mud like a nut...check out his dirty little feet!

Completely exhausted on the way home!

The End!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Unintentional Hiatus...

I apologize for the lack of updates, as I stated in the post below. Somehow that post still has the date of April 18th on it...even though I just published it today. Huh. Lets recap the past month with a couple of highlights, shall we?

April 1:

My best friend Kelsey got MARRIED! I've known Kelsey since the 2nd grade and although she ran out of Austin right after college to go to some school called Yale and then followed the man of her dreams to some state called Arizona we have remained EXTREMELY close and I couldn't be happier for her. Well, I could - if she moved back to Austin :) Here are a couple pics of us back in our prime back in the day...

She married Chris, who is the absolute perfect guy for her. I have never seen her happier and I know that they love each other so much and are a perfect match. Here are a couple of pics of her beautiful, outdoor Spring wedding in Austin at Mercury Hall! Please take note of her hair, makeup and bouquet. I'll give you a clue who did them...me. I'm thinking about opening an all-inclusive wedding salon/planning business. Actually I'm not because I don't want to work on weekends.

So Kelsey's wedding day I thought I was pregnant....kind of. I was incredibly nauseous when I woke up the morning of and felt like I was going to throw up the entire day. I had a diet Dr. Pepper in the morning, then did Kelsey's hair, makeup and helped her get ready all day. Then during lunch I had 1/2 of a 1/2 of a hamburger bun and part of a pickle slice. Then went to the restroom and felt like puking. When I came out, my dad looked at me and said, "What? Are you pregnant or something?" So one of the only pictures I have of myself and Kels from her wedding day was after my dad asked me that while I was sitting at the lunch table. Lets just say, it's not my best photogenic face ever. When I got home after her wedding that afternoon, around 4:30 or so I laid on the couch and fell asleep. I woke up around 6ish or so because we were supposed to meet Kels and the crew on Congress for some drinks and hanging out. However, I woke up sweating and freezing with a temp of 102 and was totally bummed I couldn't go out that night with them. I fell back to sleep and woke up the next morning feeling perfectly normal. And I never was pregnant :)

April 10th

This is who Garett, Courtney, Justin and I saw:

Wow. All I can say is it was a GREAT concert. Elton (we're on a first name basis) had one of the best live voices I've ever heard. He sounded exactly like the greatest hits album that I now have in my CD player in the Focus and turn on all the time. So good.... and now I have yellow brick road stuck in my head.

April 24-25th:
G and I decided to make a last minute trip out to Palmetto State Park to camp for one night with Court, Justin, Monica, Tim and the dogs. It was last minute because I had actually gone into work the morning of the 24th for my meeting and didnt' decide until about one that afternoon that I really wanted head out there. So we did, and it was relaxing and wonderful. Spring in Austin is SO nice, I just wish it would last more than a month! Pictures of Palmetto will come in the next post....

April 25:
Saw this broadway play with G and his fam:

It was honestly one of the best musicals I've seen in a long time. It was upbeat, current and had great songs...I would highly recommend it if it comes to a city near you!

Last Weekend! I had my last meeting of Spring 2010 in Fort Worth last weekend. It was for the derm group that I manage and at the end the girl that I manage said, "Well Laura, how do you think it went." And honestly, I said, "Better than I ever expected!" It made me so happy. The members were actually really nice to me, have learned my name since our last meeting and thanked me for the job that I do. The board meeting, which always makes me nervous, went great. I was well prepared and actually had a good time at the meeting. Don't get me wrong, I'm soooo glad I don't meet with them again until October...but I don't think I'll ever dread one of their meetings again!

I do however have to go to a meeting next week in Chicago Monday-Wednesday. I was nominated by my boss to attend a "New Executives of Medicine" meeting. It'll be a short trip and I get to stay at the InterContinental right on Michigan Avenue so it should be nice! Maybe I'll try to find some time to hop down to ol Michigan and do some shopping. :)

Charlie has been GREAT lately. Yesterday was Charlie's 8 month birthday and I had off because of the meeting so I decided to sleep in, then take him to Red Bud Dog park. I've been wanting to go there forever and just haven't been able to find the time with how busy G and I have been. So we went around 1pm and it was awesome. We found parking right away (the last spot) in the tiny lot they have there. I can see how it would be a problem on the weekends! Anyways, we got there and went down the walking trail for a ways. Then we found this secluded spot right on the water. I took Charlie off of the leash and he ran right in the water and swam around. He kept looking at me like, "What are you still doing up there on land??" So I took off my flip flops and waded out to my knees in the lake with him. He had a blast swimming around, then running back to the shore and doing sprints, them coming back into the water. It was nice hanging out with him for the day and wearing him out.

Of course right in the middle of GLEE Charlie had to take a dump so he sat right in front of the TV stand and cried and cried. So I took him out to the dog hill at our complex so he could run around and then dump real quick. Little did I know this outing would turn into a 5-dog play date! It ended up being awesome. Charlie and 4 girlfriends of his ran around the hill chasing each other, fighting over sticks and having a really good time. Charlie got so tired by the end of it that he laid down in the middle of the hill and growled whenever a dog would come up to him. Apparently he didn't have a long enough nap time yesterday and was the end of his rope with playtime.

Tonight we have our trick class! We signed Charlie up a couple of weeks ago for a trick class through PetsMart. This is his 3rd training class and I think he really likes it. It is so much fun for G, Charlie and me to go to each week. It gets us out of the house and also gets Charlie out and around other dogs all while learning some awesome tricks!

Anyways. I'll try to be better about updating the blog now that I'll have more free time. I'll also post some pics of Palmetto State Park and also some pics from Red Bud in my next post!

PS. Charlie is up to 38 lbs now! He's a big, growing boy...makes me sad :)

Charlie Charlie Bang Bang!

So Charlie has learned a new trick, and it's awesome if I do say so myself. He knows "bang bang" and I don't know HOW he learned it as well as he did, we worked on it for about 30 minutes one night and somehow he got it down. I think the only explanation is that he's a genius. Anyways, he lays completely motionless until I say "OK" so the below picture was snapped of him playing dead before I said OK. Cracks me up...he does this weird thing with his "arms" where he bends them in....

Anyways, so I wrote this post a longgggg time ago and just now went back into my account realized that I had never published it - I only saved it. So anyways, after a long hiatus on my account I'm hoping to be able to update more often than once every 3 weeks.

Sunglasses Update!

As you may have read in a previous post, I've been in dire need of updating my vintage 2006 Anne Klein sunglasses. They were broken in, had some puppy teeth marks in them and sat beautifully on my head just how I wanted them with the correct amount of pressure behind the ears to stay on even on a windy day. However - after looking at pictures of myself wearing them I figured that they weren't the most flattering item I owned. Therefore, I recently took a trip to my nearest (from work) Marshall's where I found an awesome pair of $15 Calvin Klein (it was that or a $40 pair of Armani) sunglasses!

Head down to your nearest Marshall's ASAP - seriously. They have CUTE tops, shoes, sunglasses and purses for super cheap...I don't know why this was only the 2nd time I'd ever been in one. Anyways, I know you've all been worried about my horrible fashion faux pas so I thought you'd enjoy that update!

TICK tock on the clock...

This nasty thing is what we found on our sweet little Charlie a couple of weeks ago after taking a trip with Courtney and Justin to McKinney Falls to hike. Here's the story:

G's been working non-stop on a project that had an April 1 deadline, no joke. That was the same day that my best friend Kelsey was getting married, not kidding. So a couple weeks ago (I know it's been a while since an update) Court, Justin and I went to McKinney Falls to hike. One, I never knew how close it was to our house and two, it was beautiful and I can't believe it's located on the east side of 35....

Anyways, we had a great time hiking and Charlie just absolutely loves it. He loves being in the lead and actually pulls on the leash non-stop and cries his little heart out if he's not the one leading the entire pack while hiking. I'll post some pictures later but my laptop monitor has a short in it I think so the light doesn't work which means I can't see the screen...point being, it's beautiful out there.

These pictures are from good ol' google images, but I thought I'd give you an idea of where we went. So we decided to go off the beaten path while hiking because we're pretty hardcore and we went through this field area that had REALLY tall grass and a tiny, narrow trail going through it. There were some bluebonnets here and there too which I'm loving right now in Austin! Anyways, this is where I KNOW Charlie got his Lone Star Tick - see the above picture. So, Saturday we had gone hiking. Sunday nigth around 7pm I got a text from Courtney letting me know that she had just pulled a TICK off of her HEAD. At first I wanted to puke, and then I proceeded to start feelign every inch of my head as I sat in the living room. Thank GOD I didn't find anything on me. However, Garett remembered that he'd felt a weird little bump on Charlie in the car the evening before and thought it had just been a scab. Sick. We all know where this story is going - turns out that "scab" was a nasty tick that was sucking the blood out of my sweet Charlie :( Living in Texas and being outside all the time, I have actually never seen a tick so it disgusted me....I quickly googled how to get a tick off and read that you're not supposed to use vaseline or a hot match or needle anymore. Instead you're supposed to get a good pair of tweezers, grab the tick down by the skin so that you get as close to it's head/pinchers as possible and pull it out in the same motion and direction that it attached itself to the dog/person/whatever you're pulling it out of. This tick was wiggling it's little back legs as I latched onto it with the tweezers. I got a good grip and pulled really hard and it popped out of Charlie and continued to wiggle while I held it in the tweezer grip...SICK. Since it was still alive and I'd never experienced a tick before and I was standing there imagining me loosening my grip and having the damn thing fly or sprint at me and start sucking my blood I did the most reasonable thing I could think of and grabbed a lighter and killed it with the flame while still holding it with my favorite pair or tweezers....

Horrible experience but I'm so glad we got it off of Charlie as early as we did. Point is, we had booked a campsite to go back to McKinney in May because the sites were secluded and beautiful...but I quickly called Inks Lake and changed our reservation for there :) That and Lexie (Court's dog) was super sick after hiking and we think it was water-related.

The End!

Garner Pics!

Our campsite!

The dogs chasing sticks in the water behind our campsite.

Charlie swimming! Doesn't quite have the doggie paddle down yet, more of a flailing motion :)

Charlie hiked all the way to the top of the "mountain" with G and Me.

The hiking trails...

Family pic halfway up. Someone needs to invest in "hipper" sunglasses....and it's not G.

Pretty Frio river. It was FREEZING though!

Handsome boy.

Charlie loved looking our the tent in the mornings.

Proud little longhorn stole my chair!

Charlie in between rainstorms...he figured out where the tent would zip :)

Finally out of the rain and in our new sleeping situation due to the leakage!

Camp Anawanna...we hold you in our hearts....

Garner was so awesome! It was so relaxing, a perfect 3 night, 4 day break from work, Austin, etc. It was gorgeous the entire time we were there, minus the last night. It poured. I'm talking torential downpour, worried about flooding pour. Ok, maybe not the flooding part but you get my drift. We got there on Saturday, set up our tents (after not getting our spot due to a meth addict that was "camping" in her truck and had lost her cat - thats' another story) went driving around to see the entire place, and relaxed. Monica and Tim got there later that evening and we cooked dinner and just sat around the bon fire. Sunday we got up and hiked, took the dogs to the water, played plenty of cornhole and hung out. Monday we did about the same, with a little more hiking down by our own campsite where the river was more shallow and the dogs could run around easier. Charlie actually swam in the Frio! I was so proud of him, we bought him a $15 water toy and thought maybe he'd chase that into the river. Nope, he wanted sticks more than anything and actually went into water over his head and had to swim out several times.

Like I mentioned before, Monday night it POURED. We knew there was a chance of rain so we picked up everything off of our picnic table that shouldn't get wet and waiting out teh first little bit of rain. Once that ended we all though, "Hey, that wasn't so bad" and continued cooking dinner and drinking and having a great time. Little did we know that was the least of it. We had just finished dinner and the skies literally opened up and poured on us. The ground had water standing all over it, there was mud everywhere and we learned that the zipper door on our tent leaks! Charlie was already zipped in the tent when the rain started and had to wait out the storm by himself in there while G, Tim, Justin and I huddled under the canopy above the picnic table. Hindsight, standing under a canopy with metal legs probably wasn't the smartest thing to do in a lightning storm. Courtney and Lexie ran to her car and Monica and Lucy went into their car. (Lexie and Lucy are dogs...)

Anyways, the rain finally let up, I use that term lightly, around 9pm and we all made mad dashes to the rest room adn into our tents for an early, wet night :(

Back to the leak: Our tent leaks around the zipper in the door. I got into the tent first, made sure Charlie was OK adn then realized that there was water around the opening. Ugh. So I took ALL of our dirty clothes, towels, a sheet and then some clean towels and made a dam in front of the door. Then G and I turned our sleeping bags horizontally so that we would be further away from the door and slept with Charlie's little head between us. It was horrible, but was definitely an experience which I hope we don't have to go through again! Everything was fine, I was just upset because it was our last night camping, we were all having a great time and had a goal of getting rid of our beer...which didnt' happen. Just means that we'll have to take it camping again soon and finish it off then!

March...thus far

So, apparently I started this blog to post about my puppy but haven't been very good about doing so lately. Charlie has been great, wonderful, etc! He's just so much fun and makes us laugh a ton every day. I LOVE him and am so happy we have him in our lives. Here are a couple of pics from March, just random and not all too exciting :)

Just thought Charlie looked sweet in this picture :)

Sleeping puppy - looks like he's smiling while he dreams :)

And apparently the flash wakes him up!

Charlie and his best bud Bailey!

Poor giraffe doesn't have any fluff in him anymore...he's flat as a board!

Found the fluff!

Guilty little face...

Smiling for his peanut butter!

Mmmm! Had to give this to Charlie when I left for work this morning. G was on a conference call and I didn't want Charlie to cry!