These types of things only happen to us...

So Duff came home yesterday with a story. Here is the preface: after I had come home from work, Duff went to the college to do some work. Upon his return, he finds me and the puppy in the backyard and says to me, "you will never believe what just happened..."

Apparently, when Duff was walking from his office to the car, he saw a giant turtle lying on its back on the pathway next to the pond (we're talking over a foot long, here). He thought, poor turtle. I should turn you over and send you back to freedom. So, after inspecting the turtle for a good grab point, Duff reached down and grabbed what he thought was the space between the rear leg and the tail. Instead, it turned out to be the front leg and the head. As soon as Duff touched the turtle, the little sucker's head whipped out and latched onto Duff's hand, in the tender spot between your thumb and forefinger. In shock, Duff pulled his hand away, only to have over 25 pounds of turtle come with it.

So there was Duff, standing with arm outstretched and a 25 pound turtle hanging from his hand. Luckily, after a few seconds, the turtle lost its grip and fell. It landed right side up and safe, at which point Duff made a run for his car. And he turns up at home looking like this:


If you click on the image to enlarge it, you can get a better idea of the extent of damage a turtle bite can do.

Anyway, the moral of this story is...beware of turtles--they are out to get us. ;)

We're back!

We had so much fun on vacation, that we didn't take any pictures! :0 Well, that is besides this one...

How could we not take a picture of that sign?! We could hardly believe it when we saw it with our own eyes! It was on the pathway leading to the pool of our condo complex. That pond you see in the background is also the pond that our patio overlooked (and we were on the first floor). Crazy, huh? So that is our one, lone picture from 6 days in rainy Hilton Head.

How is this comfortable?

Riley sleeping.

I've been a very bad blogger and haven't updated the blog in awhile. But that was only because we have been so busy and hard at work. The most obvious illustration of our efforts is the backyard. It has made a drastic change from overgrown and slightly jungle-y to sleek and clean. Ok, maybe not that sleek and clean yet (because all the cutting and trimming left a lot of newly exposed brown spots) but it will be once all our efforts reach fruition. Unfortunately, I don't have good comparison before pictures, but here are some pictures that might give you an idea of our progress.

Our backyard before purchase of the house:


A mid-way picture from the early spring with some cleanup.


And now...
Did you notice the sudden lack of gigantic bushes between the trees? How about the fact that our yard now looks twice as big?

We also did some trimming up around the house.

No more tree branches growing in front of the guest bedroom windows. And no more 6 foot high bush with razor sharp leaves. We, of course, plan to plant new, better plant life around the patio. But for now, I'm just enjoying the pristine lack of overgrown plant life.

Oh, yeah. And here is Riley helping us with yard work.

She is very adept at helping us clean up the empty bags of top soil.


Well, I hope you enjoyed this update. I'll try to do better this coming holiday weekend.

Riley's maid service

While Duff is out rapidly mowing the lawn before the impending thunderstorm (he just got home from working all day, poor boy), I thought I would take the opportunity to post an update on what we've been up to. Well, we've been chasing after a puppy 24/7 and trying to save a few key pieces of furniture from bite marks. And that's about it...

Ok, so we're not very exciting. But Riley is. So I'll tell you all about her big day today. After having a normal morning of waking at 6 (its Saturday, Riley, don't you sleep in?) and going for a nice walk in the warm and not-rainy weather (finally, its her first non-rainy day since she's been here!), she had her usual morning nap time in her crate while Duff went to work and I ran some errands.

Then at noon, I came home and it was pretty clear that Riley was very excited to see me. A little confused (why are you not my dog walker...what did you do with my dog walker...), but very excited. She was even more excited when she learned that we were cleaning the house today (yay?).

It turns out that Riley is a fantastic cleaner. Here is Riley helping me vaccuum:


Here is Riley helping me make the beds:


And here is Riley helping me mop the kitchen floor:


Unlike most dogs (or at least my parents' dogs), Riley had no interest in chasing the vaccuum cleaner. I was a little disapointed. But all that faded away once I got out the Swiffer. Now there is an instrument of torture that deserves a full out front-paws-down-back-legs-arched pounce as well as a few puppy barks and growls. Unfortunately, by the time we were moping the floor, we were two hours into cleaning the house and Riley was getting a wee bit tired. So she decided to stop pouncing on the Swiffer and take a break under the kitchen table (hence, the above picture).

But in all seriousness, Riley did really well today. The entire time we were cleaning, I had a pouch of treats at my waist and the clicker around my wrist. It turns out that cleaning was a great time to teach Riley to "leave it." There are just so many tasty things around the house that she noticed while we were up and about. So after only one day, I'm pretty sure she understands "leave it." Whether she decides to listen in any given situation is another story (kind of like her temporary amnesia sometimes when we call her name). That makes four tricks up Riley's training sleeve: her name, sit, down and leave it. I am also working on teaching her to touch her nose to my pointed finger. That will make it easier when we do more complex training later on. All in all, she's a pretty well-behaved and smart 11 week old puppy. Except when she tries to jump over the couch to get to the front door, instead of running around it. Yeah, she can be a little ditsy like that.

Turn your volume up for this one

Our little girl has the snoring ability of a grown, 400 pound man. Its hard to believe...so we got proof.



Who would have thought that this little face could make such a loud noise?

Riley, day 2

No explanation necessary.

Multimedia puppy

I hope this works...

The New Addition

This weekend is the big weekend in which we picked up the puppy. Our road trip across Pennsylvania began with a stop for lunch at Primo's Hoagies (delicious) after a half day of work on Friday. Then we headed out across the state. Our first stop was at our alma mater, Grove City College.

We then proceeded on to dinner with some friends from college. I'm pretty sure we would have shut down Rachel's without even noticing the time, if not for some of our more responsible fellow Grovers.

After a short night's sleep, we headed off to pick up our puppy. You know you're in Ohio/Western PA when you see:

But we made it to Barb's (the breeder's) just fine and got to meet our beautiful little girl. After some tearful goodbyes, we headed for home. Riley slept on our laps the entire way home, looking something like this:


We have no idea how she finds that comfortable but whatever works...Once we got home, she was just as mischievous. She loves all her new toys and thinks her toy box is also a bed.


And she's just darn cute, don't you think?

As you can see, she's about the size of Duff's foot.

And now it is 11 o'clock at night and we have discovered that Riley is an interior decorator. Unlike most puppies that cry for hours on their first night in their crate, Riley only cried for about 5 minutes. And now, she is loudly and meticulously rearranging the pad on the bottom of her crate every 10 seconds. I guess its not quite feng shui yet. Hopefully, at some point soon she'll get it just right and we can all go to sleep. Good night, everyone!