Category Archives: Family

Family

2011 Christmas Cards

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It’s coming up on that time of the year again to start preparing for Christmas.  This year will be especially busy as we will be going to China again.  It has been nearly three years since we’ve gone back and seen Justin’s family.  There is a lot of preparation work that goes into a trip of this scale along with time and money.

It’s good then that Shutterfly is making other parts of Christmas preparation easy for me.  I will be using them again this year for our yearly Christmas cards.  The first year we had used Kodak but used Shutterfly last year which I think was a better experience.  Last year we went with the design on the left.  While I was happy with the design, etc I was highly disappointed in how the pictures of Justin and I turned out but it’s my fault, not Shutterfly’s.  We had very bad lighting conditions and I hope that this year’s card is of a higher quality.  A few things helping in that area are that we know more now about how to use our Canon camera but also we now have a nice flash for it that should help.

Shutterfly has an almost overwhelming number of possible designs and layouts available, from their holiday cards to Christmas cards to standard photo Christmas cards.  While there is a very large number of cards available, it is quite nice to have such a range of choices and not have to do the same thing every year.

Last year Shutterfly sponsored my cards and supplied them for free which was quite nice.  This year they have taken it to the next step and supplied me with an extra promotional code for 25 free cards for my readers.  Post in the comments below what your favorite holiday memory is to win.  I’ll pick a winner at random on November 19 and contact you via email.

*Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by an offer from Shutterfly for 50 free holiday cards for bloggers.
*Contest Rules: Contest is open from October 25 2011 – November 18 2011 11:59PM.  One winner will be picked at random and will receive a coupon code for 25 free cards from Shutterfly.  Shipping/tax charges may apply.

Chick-Fil-A

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After work today, Justin and I went to the College of Engineering 2011 Graduate Dinner.  I (of course) went as Justin’s spouse and you had your choice of either Chick-Fil-A or Jimmy Johns.  Why would I possibly pick Jimmy Johns when I could have me some delicious Chick-Fil-A?!

After eating we snagged ourselves a picture with the coolest cow in the land!

 

Molly, The Queen

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Molly proves almost every day that she’s the queen and last week I was able to capture it in a small photo shoot.  I came home last week and found Molly sitting in the middle of a blanket which was in a ball in the middle of the bed – like she was on her throne.

Sparky: A Week Later

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It’s been one week since Sparky’s biopsy and it’s been quite the week, sadly not for the best reasons.

Late Monday we got a call from Dr. Corriveau of the Purdue Small Animal Hospital with the results of his biopsy.  Unfortunately Sparky was diagnosed with squamous-cell carcinoma.  While the best course of action is to get into surgery to remove it, this requires very expensive imaging to determine if the cancer has spread and to determine the margin of the cancer.  After that would be the surgery which would be even more expensive.  It would most likely require removing a few teeth as well.  Taking into consideration the huge cost which isn’t feasible at this time along with how we feel his quality-of-life would be degraded, we opted for the next-best possibility.  We started Sparky on chemotherapy.

Yesterday was his first dose of Piroxicam.  It’s typically used for somewhat different areas of cancer but is promising.  The best we can hope for is that it will maintain the current cancer and not allow it to grow.  In a few weeks we will go back for another check-up.

Here’s hoping that our good boy, Sparky, gets through this successfully.  He’s a great dog and it’s hard to even think about him having cancer.

Sparky’s First Procedure

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Tomorrow, Sparky goes in for his first procedure.

This past weekend we noticed that he had a growth on the roof of his mouth by his teeth.  The vet isn’t sure what it is with their initial sample so tomorrow they’re going to sedate him and get a biopsy for a much more thorough analysis.

Hopefully the results come back benign!

Sparky Lounging

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Recently Sparky has decided that he doesn’t really want to come in after we take him out sometimes.  So, what’s the easiest way to rebel against your parents?  By not doing anything of course!

Sparky now tends to just go outside like normal and do his ‘business’ but will occasionally just lay down in the front yard and stare at you as if saying ‘What, you want me to go inside?’

I did what any responsible dog owner would do.  I let him off of his leash, went inside and grabbed my camera and had a mini photo session.  The pic to the right along with the one above are the best although there were about 20 more pictures taken.

He’s quite the photogenic dog, Sparky is.

Independence Day, 2011

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© Flickr user Cynthia.Lou

© Flickr user Cynthia.Lou

This year marks the first 4th of July for Sparky with us.  The past few years we would go watch fireworks either by Purdue West or drive to the top of one of the campus parking garages.  This year however we decided to just stay at home.  If we wanted to watch the fireworks, we could easily just look out our backdoor and probably see more than enough.

On Sunday night we started to notice a problem though.  When we were outside walking Sparky, he suddenly heard a firework and got very scared.  He tried to get back to the house as quickly as possible and I had to run after him to keep up.

Last night this got much worse once the fireworks started.  From about 6pm on he refused to ‘do’ anything when we did get him outside.  At one point, I had to pick him up and carry him outside at which point he just would get as close to me as possible while shaking uncontrollably.

This morning he was leery to go outside, but was OK once I started walking him.  Needless to say, fireworks are not something that Sparky is fond of.

Molly & Sparky

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We have now had Sparky since early September, 2010 and although Sparky and Molly aren’t “best buddies”, they are getting along better.  Some items which have helped this be easier for both of them are:

  • Sparky-gates have been put up to the kitchen, laundry room and master bedroom creating “safe” areas for Molly.
  • Periodically, we get Molly and Sparky together in one area so they can… work through their differences.  (See the image above)
  • Molly gets the entire bedroom to herself and sleeps by my head at night while Sparky sleeps in his cage nightly.
  • Sparky is finally growing out of his puppy stage and although still very hyper and full of energy, he’s learned to sit, shake, lay down and roll over.
  • Sparky doesn’t try to smell Molly as often anymore and mostly will just ignore her.

While we’ve got a long way to go until they’re bestest friends, they’re certainly much better than when Sparky first came home with us.

Sparky Ate My Aveeno

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20110623-115335.jpg

Tonight Justin and I just weren’t wanting to be productive so we went in the living room and played Little Big Planet on the PS3. After a while Sparky went into his cage and looked like he was chewing on a rawhide. After we were done I looked again and he actually had a sample of Aveeno from my dermatologist and a half eaten Halls. The above is what the bottle should look like versus what Sparky did to it. He also ate three Halls cough drops.

My dermatologist probably thought I was joking when I asked for more samples because Sparky had eaten the previous ones but alas I was not.