An Update....

Well, week 3 is upon us and I haven't posted since my last frustrating rant...

Myko is doing great! We are really starting to get the hang of things! Mark even said tonight that he is starting to like him more, and the biting is getting fewer and further between. I think it is all the episodes of Dog Whisperer that we have been watching, but Mark keeps reminding me to be the "pack leader" and stand up when I talk to him so that I seem bigger to him. He says that when I play with Myko on the floor, I am like a "big dog" to him. I guess I shouldn't take it personally that my husband called me a big dog. :)

We also keep calling Myko random nick names out of nowhere. Here are a few that seem to keep popping up!

1. Myks (pronounced: meeks) We use this one the most!
2. Mykster (pronounced: meeks-ter)
3. Myky (pronounced: meek-y)

I'll post a video and more pictures later! But for now--- everything is going great with our little puppy and our sanity!

P.S. He is still 100% sleeping through the night! No whines, no barks, no potty! Perfect!

Week One with Myko...Survival and Patience

Well, it's been one week exactly since we went to get our puppy from Bonham, and he has gotten quite comfortable in the McSpadden household. Okay, so don't get me wrong... I LOVE our dog, Myko. He has the cutest face in the whole world, it takes him about 5 minutes and all his strength and energy to bark, and he loves running back and forth. When I let him out of his crate, his excitement to see me is priceless!

With that being said, I have to ask my good friends, why they didn't warn me that I would want to pull my hair out on a consistent basis? Seriously, today,  had to have a "come to Jesus" meeting with our dog because of the intense biting and growling... he doesn't do it to Mark, but he does it to me. I LOVE snuggling with him and throwing a ball for him to retrieve, but seriously, the biting!!! Granted, it's only been about 3 days of biting and growling, so maybe I should give it longer, but we'll see. Here are some things we've tried:

1. Holding his mouth and saying, "no bite"

2. Barely popping his mouth and saying "no bite" (see the trend here)

3. Saying no bite, holding his mouth, and then putting him in the laundry room for 30 sec (time out)

4. Screaming "ouch" and walking away (trying to ignore him, but he follows me and jumps at me)

.....and then there's the growling. He looks like a gremlin mixed with the personality of Old Yeller when Yeller gets rabies. I keep asking Mark, "Does our dog have rabies?" He laughs it off and says, "No," but I am still suspicious. I may ask for a rabies test when I take him to the vet this week. :)

ON A POSITIVE NOTE: Myko has slept through the night every night except for the 2nd night we had him, and even then, he only needed to go potty at 2am. I guess God knows I couldn't handle losing sleep AND having my flesh ripped from my skin at the same time. :)

In order to provide a visual to how my week started and ended with Myko. The picture at the beginning of this post was taken the day we got him, and the picture below is one of me right after I put Myko to bed this evening. Can you sense my frustration!

 May I have patience with this pup, so that I can enjoy my summer and our dog! Any advice? Any anti-biting strategies? Help! At least pray for me to have patience with this dog. Babies are easier than dogs, right? :)

Myko: Our First Puppy

Wanted to just let everyone know that tonight, we went and picked up the greatest puppy ever, Myko.

Myko (Me-Co) is a 7 week old Miniature Schnauzer, and he was the first one of the pups to walk up to Shevawn when we went to pick one out. He loved her at first sight, and any dog that does that is one worth taking home!

Here are some photos!

Hello Myko!

Our First House

Today we became homeowners! We are super excited about our new house. It's not too far from where we live now, but we are definitely "moving up!" 

We both took the day off to take care of last minute details, bank trips, and sign all of our documents. We started off the day by shooting a video of our current apartment in all of its glory. It was a great way to finish off our time in this apartment. We shared funny stories and realized how blessed we were in our first home, as we move on to this new house.

Then, we had lunch at Chick-Fil-A, ran a million errands and went to the title company to sign the very, very large stack of paper work. I even asked the lady in charge of our paper work if I could take a picture for my scrapbook. She laughed, and as you can see, we had to sign a lot of papers! I told Mark that it was kind of crazy that we had to sign more papers for this, than when we got married! What are we getting ourselves into?? :)

Since our closing was at 2:00, and the sellers couldn't close until 4:00 (grrrr, but okay) we had some time to kill, so we turned on the water at the house, ran a few errands, and since were were STILL waiting, we went to Dairy Queen and waited patiently with our ice cream cones for the title company to call. Mark and I played thumb war, and I said, "If I win, then the phone will ring..." Well, I kid you not, I won, and the phone rang! We were off! We picked up the keys and headed to our new house!

We decided to order a pizza when we got there and eat on the living room floor. While we were waiting for the pizza, we decided to check out some of the projects ahead of us. Mark tried to clean off the back patio with a garden hose, I checked out some of the appliances, and we really just marveled in the fact that this all really just happened. 

When the pizza arrived (don't worry, I got a photo of our first visitor) we were so excited to have our first meal in our first home! Right when we sat down, we noticed that the agents for the sellers were there to take the sign out of the yard. Since we didn't have a picture in front of the house yet, we asked them to take it. They were so excited because they just celebrated with the sellers, and they said it was really emotional. They said that what helped the couple to feel "okay" with selling was knowing that we were so excited. They raised their kids in that home, so it was hard to say goodbye. They said that the lady told them at the title company  how I took a picture of the paperwork, and how excited we were, and that gave them a peace about us taking the house. So all around, we feel like God really blessed this house, this purchase: everything.

We still have some time before we move in, and Mark is a little bummed about it. He seemed to sulk a little coming up the stairs to the apartment, but I know that it will be worth the wait! We are so blessed to be homeowners! 

One of my favorite DFW holidays!

It's not on any calendar, but about once a year it snows in this part of Texas, and it sure feels like a full fledged holiday. I love seeing everything covered in white and listening to weather men frantically interrupt commercials with "Winter storm warnings" and the like. (They've learned not to break into real shows.)

Even though I'm normally pretty diligent while working at home, today I couldn't help but take longer than usual breaks to stare out at the white goodness. I guess that's the benefit of not worrying about commuting in this weather.

If you live in a different part of the metroplex that missed out on the snow, (we here mesquite and sunnyvale got no snow, only rain) pictures will have to do. :)




(This post also ends the long famed Mark absense from the blog!)

Amarillo by Mornin'

Well, since Mark has officially "abandoned" our blog (ha ha) I will update the world on what has been happening in the McSpadden household. Well, we are working, working, working, and in the meantime, we are looking for a house. My aunt is helping us look for a place, and we are really excited about extending our space a bit! More news on that in the coming weeks.

This past weekend, Mark and I got to take a pleasant, yet strenuous drive to Amarillo, Texas for the wedding of one of our favorite friends: Katherine. It got off to a slow start, as we were supposed to leave Friday night, and I caught the "crud" (from one of my germ-filled sixth graders, I'm sure!). So, by Sat. morning, I was feeling much better... that's right- Amarillo by morning!

Let me just say, a 6 hour car ride is such an amazing way to spend quality time talking with your spouse. I am really serious on this... no exaggerating or sarcasm! We really got to talk it up, it was great!

The wedding was beautiful, the flowers, the cake, all of it was lovely. However, in all my listening to George Strait's song, and hearing people talk about "A" town, I have never heard how awful this place smells. Mark and I were immediately surprised by the pungent aroma of the nearby dairy farms. Wouldn't you know that a dairy farm or 2 were placed right by our hotel! We screamed, "hurry up, get in the hotel room, so the smell will go away!" But, nope. That smell followed us back to room 120. Wonderful. Luckily, I was still halfway recovering from "the crud" so my nostrils were lucky to be somewhat on vacation.

Anyhow, we loved getting to be a part of Katherine and Billy's special day (she was also one of the Aggies on the trip we took to Thailand, back in 2004), and we even got to grow in our marriage by spending over 12 hours in the car! It may have been smelly in Amarillo, but coming home to a rekindled marriage smells pretty nice to me! :) Congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. Parks!

* On a side note- the picture on the right, below with the bride (Katherine), the groom (Billy), Mark, and I, has a lady in it. She was a relative of Katherine's, who jumped in the picture. Funny, huh? We thought it was hilarious and didn't have the heart to bump her from our photo!