The Gang Made a Baby!

Well, it has been nine months since our last post and I promise we haven't been slacking off the entire time.  Look!  We made this!

Needless to say, we've had a bunch of stuff going on.  What a better time to get back into (trying) to update the blog than three weeks into the third trimester?...

It wasn't really until the beginning of my third trimester when the nesting feelings and such kicked in, so over the past few weeks, we've been trying to play some catch-up.  I had mostly been in the "way too tired/gross feeling to actually do anything, so I'll just look around online for ideas" phase.  After a bunch of searching around on Etsy, I came across this seller and her adorable handmade mobiles.  I noticed she offered custom mobiles and thought, what would be more perfect than a custom mobile honoring our sweet and wonderful petsons?  I exchanged some messages with her and a month or so later, it finally arrived.

Here is little Chewie...

Elliot...

Kiefer...

Sweet Dexter...

And finally, our dearly departed hamson, Owen, may he rest in peace.

I think it's pretty great and really special.  Little Baby Bedtelyon can go to bed each night with all of her big brothers looking down on her.

Extreme Makeover: Entryway Edition

As I mentioned in my last post, we recently acquired a new bench for our entryway which set off a whole explosion of new ideas for a makeover.  Our bench is so large (I can comfortably lie down on it), it made the hanging shelf thing look so pathetic and measly in comparison and we knew a complete overhaul was necessary.  Going off some inspiration photos found on Pinterest, we decided to install some beadboard and build a wall mounted coat rack/shelf.

First step: hanging shelf thing gets the heave-ho.  More like gets the heck sawed out of it until John was able to rip it off the wall.  A stripped screw forced desperate measures.  As you can see below, John had to take the Dremel Multi-Max to it to first try to cut the head off the screw, and when that didn't work, he just cut the hole to bits until we could pop the shelf off.

Next step: building the wall mounted coat rack/shelf.  We're not carpenters or furniture designers, so it took me a couple months of poking around on the internet before I could find a plan of exactly what I had in mind.  In a stroke of luck, I came across this tutorial through a photo pinned on Pinterest (of course).  Going completely off of that tutorial, we picked up all our supplies at Home Depot and headed home to make our cuts.  Cutting the wood itself was easy peasy, but the crown molding was another story.  John had some difficulties getting the correct angles and our first attempt took approximately four hours... even though our Turkish neighbor's father (who speaks no English) came out to help... Once that first piece of molding had given all it could give, John headed back to Home Depot, found a piece of double-sided crown molding, made the cut, it fit perfectly, and it was all over in a matter of minutes.  I should mention this all happened the weekend before last when it was about 35 degrees and we were all bundled up in our winter coats, hats, and gloves.  After the cuts were made, we nailed on the trim, filled the holes, did some caulking along the seams, and took it downstairs for priming.

My lovely priming/painting station.

My lovely assistant.  He has a weird thing for plastic.

While the shelf was drying, we started in on the beadboard paneling.  Our first step on that was to install a thin piece of stop trim along the right side of the wall as a finishing piece for the paneling (so there wasn't just a weird raw panel edge).  After that was up, we cut the paneling to length (they come in 8' sheets and we decided to go with height of 5') and trimmed the bottom to fit over the baseboard molding.  We then did a dry fitting and used some old lipstick of mine (gotta love the Clinique free samples) to mark the register and outlet holes that would need to be cut out.

Step 1: Apply lipstick!

Step 2: Smoosh board on wall to create an outline!

John used his Dremel Trio to cut out the holes and the panels were ready to be installed.  John first used  paneling adhesive and 16 gauge finishing nails, but discovered the nails went all the way through the panel without securing it.  So, he switched to 18 gauge brad nails and that worked perfectly.  I was at work for the installation, but luckily, our neighbor was able to step in and help.

The paneling goes up!

We then installed a piece of chair rail molding along the top of the beadboard to cap that off.  John used some adhesive and brad nails to hang that, followed by some caulking to hide the seams.

The trim!

After everything was nailed into place, I filled all the holes with some Elmer's Carpenter's Wood Filler (in a little tub, not the squeezy tube which is awful and I would never, ever recommend unless you have a vice-like grip), waited for that to dry overnight, John sanded it down, and then it was time to paint.  Our first attempt went horribly, horribly wrong with the roller leaving a gross speckled/raised texture that was just nasty, so we gave up for the night and decided to take another crack in the morning.  So, I went to town sanding down the first attempt (which probably took an hour) and then painstakingly painted the entire thing with my trusty 1.5" Shur-line paint brush.  Luckily, it only took two coats and the beadboard was done.

In the meantime, I painted the shelf a nice light gray (Bedford Gray by Martha Stewart color matched to Glidden paint so we could just buy a little tester tub).  We had originally planned on painting the shelf white, too, but then realized we'd go from a blob of black to a giant blob of white.  Still wanting to keep it light and airy, we settled on a soft, kitteny gray.  When the shelf was dry, John drilled pilot holes and then counter sink holes so once it was installed, the screws would hide beneath the surface and we could patch over them.  John installed the shelf, patched the holes, and repainted and we were close to done!

Pre-hole filling, but it's getting there!  We picked up that giant cast iron "B" on sale at Restoration Hardware.  woop!

We had a slight delay in obtaining the hooks we had chosen to finish off the project.  Our Old Town Alexandria Restoration Hardware is sadly closing (boo), but we did score that giant "B" for 60% off.  The Tysons Corner Restoration Hardware was doing inventory the day I went in and wouldn't sell me the hooks (still don't understand that), so we had to order them and wait patiently for 4.5 days until they arrived this afternoon!  On the upside, they were on sale, so we saved about $36.  In case you're curious, we went with the Vintage Hooks.  After powering up with some Panda Express tonight, we came home and screwed those puppies in.

There's a tiny photo-taking John in the hook!

Bam!  It's done!

Don't you think the scale looks so much better?  And it's so much brighter!  Here's a side shot for you...

But how will it look all full o' coats and such??  Have a look!

We're still working on the shelf decor, so we just threw some stuff up there for photos.  Doesn't look half bad, though.  So, all in all, it took us about a week and half, with a lot of time spent on the crown molding and waiting for caulk/wood filler/primer/paint to dry.  I'd like to get a new appropriately sized rug for the entry way, add some pillows to the bench, and find some more or less permanent junk for the top of the shelf.  For now, though, we're happy... that it looks good and it's done.

Just another picture of Elliot because he's so darn cute.

Battle of the Weed Forest: Part 2

In the continuing battle against our wild, unkept yard, last weekend we reclaimed another patch of land from the vines and pricker bushes.  Located in the back left corner of our fence, the vines and such created a decent looking patch of greenery in the warmer months.

See the patch of green in the back corner?  Past the azaleas.

However, once fall came and the leaves died, it was obvious all we really had was a nasty patch of pricker bushes.  Our plan is to one day landscape all along the fence line with little beds in each corner, so to start that, the strange pricker triangle had to go.

How it looked last weekend.

Strange vine growing up a tree.  And a board.  Not sure where that came from.

We raked and raked... and raked up all the leaves and then went to town hacking down the vines, cutting down some spindly trees, throwing large branches over the fence, and digging up stumps.  Once it had been cleared, we found a bunch of odd things like a mound of cement and random clumps of cement, a few old bricks, and a whole line of cinder blocks.  I'm pretty certain there are bodies buried in our yard.

The line of cinder blocks and some bricks.

Why are there so many cinder blocks in our yard??

After just a few hours, we were left with this... barren patch.  Mostly barren, I should say.  We're still working on the leaf removal.

I guess it doesn't look like much of an improvement right now, but it does make our fenced in space look so much larger.  In spring, we're hoping to plant a little shade garden with some hostas, lilies, ferns, etc.

Oh, and a special shout-out to our best little helper, Chewie.  He was extremely helpful in digging up roots and carrying away little stumps once I had ripped them from the earth.  Of course, they're now scattered throughout the backyard...

Look at those little dogs!

More End Table Madness!

Just when you thought the topic of end tables couldn't get any more exciting!  Late last night, I provided an update on our new end tables we scored from Craigslist.  Well, our weekend has just been chock full o' end table delight.  Remember way back in the beginning of March, I painted and decoupaged an old end table my parents were so kind to give us?  Then I sewed a little hexagon-shaped cushion to fit inside of it with the hopes one day a pet would venture in and use it as a little bed?  Well, I am elated to report that day has finally come... four months later.

John and I were sitting in our living room on Saturday discussing our (spoiler alert!) living room built-in project, when out of nowhere, Elliot came strolling by, poked his head into the table/hopeful pet bed, and promptly ventured in, did a spin, and laid right down!  To add to this Saturday miracle, he actually stayed there long enough for John to grab the camera and snap some evidence for us to share.  Here is my glorious catson chilling in the bed and filling his mommy's heart with joy and pride.

And just for fun, here he is earlier that day sleeping in the cat tree with his poor (and extremely tolerant) brother, Kiefer.  Aren't they the cutest things?

If we ever have human kids, we'll totally be the creepy parents taking hundreds of photos of our children sleeping.  :)

Baking: Human and Dog Treats!

In my last post, I mentioned I baked dog treats for Dexter's birthday party.  I love to bake and I love my dogs, so it's a win-win situation for me (and the dogs).  I figured maybe someone out there might be a little weird like me and enjoy baking for pets, so here's my recipe for beef and cheddar biscuits:

Ingredients!
1 cup rolled oats
1/3 cup margarine
3/4 cup cornmeal
2 tsp white sugar
2 tsp beef bouillon granules
1/2 cup milk
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 egg
3 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup boiling water

1) Preheat your oven to 325.  Combine the oats, margarine, and boiling water.  Let this butter oatmeal stand for about 10 minutes and either grease your cookie sheets or line them with parchment paper.  I went with the parchment paper route because clean up is way easier.

2) Mix in the other ingredients and then add the flour one cup at a time until a stiff dough is formed.

3) Knead the dough, pat it out to about half an inch or so, and cut it up into whatever cute shapes you want.  I still don't have a bone-shaped cutter, so I used a Michigan-shaped cutter John's mom gave me (just the LP, sorry Yoopers).  Place your biscuits about an inch apart and bake 'em for about 35-45 minutes, or until golden brown.

This made quite a few Michigan-shaped biscuits, so you can throw them in a Ziploc and you're set with homemade treats for a while (depending on the piggyness of your dog).  They're Dexter and Chewie tested and approved for taste and Amanda approved for super baking easiness.  I also made some peanut butter based treats, but wasn't very happy with how dry the dough was and not easy to spread out and cut, so I won't bother passing on that recipe and will continue on my search for a second dog biscuit recipe.

Say Yes to Michigan-shaped dog treats!

Since I couldn't let the dogs have all the fun, I also made some human treats: smores bars!  I love smores and so far haven't been allowed to build fires in the yard due to fear of lighting our trees on fire and ending up burning down the neighborhood.  So, I had to settle and make some bars, which I'm happy to say, were a huge hit and whet my smore appetite (OK, I lie... such a thing is not possible).  For those of you out there who can't have a fire or don't want to deal with a fire or just want to make a bunch of smores to have on hand for smores attacks, here's the recipe:

Ingredients!

7 graham crackers, broken into one-inch pieces
6 tbsp unsalted butter, melted and cooled
3 tbsp light brown sugar
2 tbsp all-purpose flour
1/8 tsp salt
1.5 cups milk chocolate chips
2 cups mini marshmallows

1) First of all, melt the butter and set it aside to cool.  I always forget to do that and panic when I have hot butter.  So do that now!!  Then adjust an oven rack to the middle position and heat your oven to 325 and grease (or do a foil-sling (see below) and grease that) an 8" baking dish.

2) Process the graham crackers in a food processor to fine, even crumbs.  Maybe about 30 seconds.  Toss in the sugar, flour, salt, and pour in the butter.  Pulse all this until it's nice and combined.  Sprinkle it into your dish, flatten it down into a crust, and bake it for about 12-15 minutes, or until it's starting to brown.

3) Straight from the oven, sprinkle the chips over top of the crust and let them sit and get all soft and squishy for about 5 minutes.  Spread your melty chips over the crust and go ahead and lick the spatula if you're done with it.  Who can resist a chocolate-covered spatula?  I cannot.  Spread the marshmallows on top of that and stick it in the fridge until the chocolate is set (about an hour).

4) Now adjust an oven rack to about 10 inches from the broiler element and heat the broiler.  I have two settings - "Lo" and "Hi".  "Lo" worked fine for me.  Broil the bars until the tops of your marshmallows have slightly browned.  I made two batches and the first took about two minutes.  The second took about six.  Just watch them like a smore hawk and it'll be OK.

5) Let your bars cool (you might have to stick them back in the fridge depending on how warm it is in your kitchen) and then chop them up (see handy Pam knife tip below).  You can make 16 nice-sized bars, 8 big bars, 4 greedy-sized bars, or maybe one you-have-a-problem-sized bar.  Make sure to test at least one... you know, for quality control.  :)

My smore bars straight from the oven, still chillin' in their foil sling.  I've got to learn to take better photos...

Now, for some tips my "The America's Test Kitchen Family Baking Book" (best baking book ever... or at least that I've discovered in my few years of baking...) (also, if you're going to buy it, buy it on Amazon unless you have an awesome coupon from Border's... sorry Border's, but if you don't want to have to close all your stores, how can you charge full price always and never have anything in stock?).

Tip Number One: Foil Sling.  Get your pan.  Get your foil.  Tear off a foil sheet and lay it in the pan horizontally, with enough extra to stick up over the sides.  Tear off another foil sheet and lay it vertically, again with enough extra to stick up over the sides.  Make sure it's all snug in the pan, like a nice foil liner.  Now spritz it with your Pam.  When your bars (of any kind, it doesn't just have to be smores!) are done, you can pop up the sling, gently pull down the sides, and bam!  There's your whatever lying there all ready to be cut up.  No digging it out of a pan!  No bottoms permanently seared to the pan and your treat horribly disfigured!  Plus, the pan is probably clean enough that you can easily use it for batch number two or just toss it back into the cupboard.  *rejoice!*

Vertical foil (please excuse my weird half picture, half Paint creation)

Horizontal foil

Tip Number Two: Spray your knife with Pam!  Especially with the melty little marshmallows, you don't want gross goo all over your knife, gumming up the works and desecrating your bars.  So, spray your knife with Pam and it'll glide right through them.  Seriously.  I didn't have one marshmallow string connected to my knife.  Easy peasy!

Doesn't stuff like that make you hate yourself?  Like, why didn't I think of that?  It's so simple!  It's stuff that helps me and hopefully it'll help someone else.  With all the time you save not having to dig out bars, crying into messed up bars, cleaning up pans and sticky, gross knives, think of all the time you can spend eating!  *cabbage patch victory dance*

So, those are my two recipes.  A hit by dogs and humans alike.  Some humans tasted the dog treats and said they were "bland".  No dogs tasted the human treats, as chocolate is not good for our buddies, but of course, mommy snuck them a few bits of graham crackers and marshmallows.  Good times all around.

Dexter's Second Birthday Party

About a month ago, I talked about Dexter's first birthday party and plans for his second.  I can hardly believe it has already been a month, let alone another year has gone by.  Saturday was the big day and boy were we busy the last few days leading up to the party.  In our typical fashion, we waited until the last minutes to take care of everything, but luckily, I'd say it all went off without a hitch.  We did our shopping and cleaning over the long Memorial Day weekend, John called on Tuesday and got our food ordered from Rockland's, a few tables and some chairs reserved, and made an appointment for Dexter to get his birthday haircut.  Then Saturday morning, we were up bright and early to do our last second cleaning, setting up and decorating.  I had the crazy idea I might fit in a quick nap before 5:00, but no luck for me.  Fortunately, we did manage to pull everything together and the weather miraculously cooperated without any of the sweltering heat of last year.

Now for the details and I'll start off with something random... the "Windex Outdoor All-in-One Glass Cleaning Tool" is amazing.  After a ton of deliberation, we finally cracked and bought one.  The biggest hold-up was its price at about $14.99 at Target.  However, our windows were so nasty (mostly due to our MDF project back in January that resulted in mountains of dust on the ground and a disgusting layer all over the siding and windows), we had to do something.  The kit comes with a Swiffer-like apparatus (a pole that you stick a cleaning pad on) that's easy to assemble.  Then you just squirt down the pad with a hose, spray your window, scoot the pad around, and spray it clean.  That's it.  No wiping or anything.  We worked together with John manning the hose and me scooting the pad and in no time we were done.  Just like it promised, we were left with a streak-free shine on our windows... and I even did my back windshield.  The kit only comes with one pad and the refills are a little pricey, too, but if we keep up with our window cleaning frequency of once every eight months, I think we can foot the $10 or so.  :)

Look how happy you can be to wash your windows!  yay!

OK, back on track, with the outside all clean, we were free to do our thing inside.  I had grand plans in the beginning of DIYing some decorations and all that, but I had to take a step back and remind myself it's a dog birthday party and we can't afford to go nuts and don't want to end up as new subject matter for TLC to feature along with Hoarders, Extreme Couponers, and Crazy Eating Habits people.  So, we made our first trip to Party Depot.  It was kind of a weird store with a weird vibe, but lucky for us, we found some inexpensive decorations to spice up our place... just a few cute fan decorations (decorations shaped like fans, not decorations for fans like some may have thought...), a package of paper lanterns, and some streamers.  I think it may have cost a whopping total of $10.  Here's our set up.  Once people arrived, our photo taking kind of fell off, so boo to that.  Oh, and check out our awesomely painted kitchen.  Yeah, we finally finished painting the rest of our main floor, but our place has been so much of a mess since then, it hasn't been appropriate for photos...

That's not a creepy stalker in the doorway, that's just our friend Paul.

And because every kid who goes to a party likes to take home a little goody bag, I prepared doggy bags for our canine guests.  I baked two kinds of dog biscuits, a peanut butter based treat and a beef and cheddar (gotta have your sweet and savory), and threw in a squeaky Kong tennis ball.  Maybe that was too much...

Here are our guests, human and canine, (hopefully) enjoying themselves.  Our boys had a great time meeting and playing with other dogs.  It was incredibly nice having the fence up to keep everyone safe.  Chewie had an amazing time playing with our friend Keith's dog, Bailey.  I guess he has a thing for older women.  Apparently she did, too, as Keith said she was asleep in the car before they turned onto the first street from our house.  We were thrilled to have our friends over and catch up.  Now that we have our house and yard, I think we'll have to schedule more (smaller) parties here and there because it's just too much fun eating, drinking, and laughing all evening.  We're so lucky to have such amazing sons and friends.  :)

Jasmine making sure she's protected from mosquito bites.

Jet doing a jig... or something.

And then acting as dog whisperer.

The guys hogging the comfy chairs.  Typical.

06-03, A Birthday Party for D!

If you've read any of our posts or know us at all, you know our sweet Dexter is the light of our life.  He's so smart, kind, and loving.  Looking into his big, round eyes and his happy, smiling face, our hearts just melt.

It's pretty sad how many life decisions we've made based on him and his happiness.  For instance, buying a house with as big of a lot as possible for optimum puppy play space, installing a fence for optimum puppy safety, and adopting another dogson so he would have his own playmate and friend.  We can't help it.  We're just crazy dog/cat people and proud of it.  Last year, we decided to throw the little guy a birthday party (which we tell people we mostly did as an excuse to have a get-together with our friends and neighbors... it's a lie, we did it for him).

All the party people at Overlook.

The birthday boy, obviously passed out from excitement and gratitude...

Here we are, less than a month from his second birthday.  Our little baby has grown up so fast.  Of course, his second birthday party is in the works.  Like last year, I had invitations printed from Tiny Prints.  They have adorable stationery, but they always seem to screw up my order in one way or another.  At least I had a 20% off and free shipping coupon codes.  I think maybe next year I'll DIY something.  Either way, here is this year's invitation:

Disgustingly precious, no?  I tell you, our human children will have a lot to live up to one day.  They'll probably end up resenting Dexter.  Also like last year, we're having Rockland's cater so John won't have to man the grill and can enjoy the party.  For our non-DC friends, Rockland's is a great local barbecue place and was a hit last year.  So, between now and June 4th, we just have to get a fence installed, finish a variety of indoor projects (mostly painting...), do more clean-up work in the yard, possibly build an outdoor table, and plan the rest of D's party details.  Are we going overboard for our baby bichon?  Possibly.  Is he worth it?  Definitely.  It really is a great way to get people together for a fun early summer party.  And don't worry, we're already planning Chewie's first birthday party, but since that won't be until November, we have plenty of time.  :)

The Gang Gets a New Member

John and I are proud to announce a new addition to our Gang: little Chewie Bedtelyon.  We have dreamt of adopting another dog son since adopting Dexter and finally took the plunge last Saturday.  Our final push came from the desire to provide a friend for Dexter, as he so enjoys playing and rough-housing with the cats.  Kiefer and Elliot are extremely tolerant of his antics, but can only take so much.  They are just cats.  After seeing how excited and happy Dexter gets to play with his next door neighbor, Wesley, we knew he needed his own buddy.

Baby D on his first day as a Bedtelyon.

A-tisket, a-tasket, a boring cat in a basket...

For months, I have scoured Petfinder.com searching for available dogs in our area and discovered a local organization called Dog World Rescue.  Friday night, John and I were looking over some dogs and realized the following day DWR was holding an adoption event at our local Petsmart.  So, after filling up on some chocolate chip pancakes Saturday morning, we headed down to check out the dogs, never really thinking we'd be proud parents once again by the day's end.  Of course there were plenty of adorable boys and girls there, but we knew we wanted a puppy and they had three chow/shepherd/lab mix siblings and one little black and white schnauzer/dachshund/terrier/border collie... thing named Rascal.

Elf, one of the other puppies we considered.

While John has always wanted a larger, "manly" dog, we decided in the end, the best fit for our family would be another little guy.  I'll admit submitting an application for Rascal was a little nerve-wracking, thinking about the efforts of training another dog and the added financial commitment, but in the end, we knew we were ready for a new son.  DWR was able to conduct the home visit that evening and by 10:00 Saturday night, we had our boy.

Chewie during our home visit.

Not a fan of typical pet names, we brainstormed forever trying to think of the perfect name for Rascal.  Our other sons' names come from TV shows (Kiefer... Kiefer Sutherland, Elliot... Elliot Stabler from Law & Order: SVU, and Dexter... from the show Dexter), but unfortunately, nothing we could come up with really seemed to fit our guy.  We branched out to movies and naturally came to Star Wars and Chewie just seemed to be a natural fit.  While he's really nothing like his namesake (not a Wookiee, cannot operate a crossbow nor co-pilot the Millennium Falcon... at least not to our knowledge) we think it's a fun, cute name.  We're not sure what breed(s) he is, but he sure is cute and we're excited to see what he grows up to be.

Look at that sweet face.

He's so small!

One thing is for sure, little Chewie is extremely intelligent, loving, and playful and has been a wonderful addition to our family thus far.  Elliot, surprisingly, took an almost immediate interest in him and has been having a great time dashing around with him and Dexter.  Dexter was at first a little hesitant and confused, but now they spend their days playing tug-of-war, chewing bones, and biting each other's faces and their nights cuddling in bed with us.  Kiefer in his usually suspicious and stand-offish ways is still just watching from afar, but has been showing progress.  We're sure in no time, we'll have four BFFs on our hands.

Two peas in a pod already. :)

Curious boys checking out the camera.