Lexi's Tricks Part II

Here's a few tricks that Lexi has learned since our last video. I am especially proud of the hoop jumping. We're going to perform it in our dog obedience class on the last day--with a fun twist. Oh yes, we've got plans.

The many ears of Lexi

When we first got Lexi, her ears were perfect. "Floppy," I called them. They were like little triangles hanging down from her head. This is a picture of Lexi and her sister (we chose between those two).

A couple days later, I noticed that one of the was doing something weird. It was back further from her head and didn't "perk" like the other one. I pointed this out to Jordan, calling them the "good" ear, and the "bad" ear. When this didn't go away, I looked up information on Australian Shepherd ears and found that there are many different types of Australian ears, even though one type is preferred over the others--the button ear, what I call the "floppy" ear. (This picture is a more recent example: Lexi's left ear is button, the right is rosed)

Lexi's other ear was "rosing," apparently. Rose ears are an "acceptable" ear set--but in my opinion it was kind of weird looking. I was really upset when her other ear started to rose about a week after the first one went. I wanted floppy ears! But that's how they've been ever since.

And when they were rosed, she would put them way back on walks and her ears would do this:

I did more research and I found out online that if you really, really wanted your Aussie to have button ears, you have the option of gluing them from 3 months to 6 months. I guess when puppies are teething, their ears are pliable. I ordered the glue, and the day before it arrived, both of Lexi's ears were going button. But Jordan and I are extremely shallow, and we weren't going to take any chances.

So now Lexi's ears are glued to her head. She scratched at them for a little while but it is super de duper glue and now she doesn't really seem to mind. Anyway, I just wanted to explain why her ears will look funny in pictures for the next few months. She looks so sad because the glue presses her "eyebrows" into a funny shape. She's not actually sad!

In three months, she'll be good to go. And then her ears can do more crazy stuff like this.

Grillin' it up

We got a new toy!

Jordan and I have been thinking about getting a barbeque for a long time, and we finally did it! My dad is a barbeque master, and I want to become one, too. Besides, barbeque is so big in the south it seems like a sin to not have one.

We decided to start out easy with chesseburgers. I made up some yummy patties. Boy, were they delicious!

Lexi decided to come out onto "her" patio (she lives out there when she is being especially naughty) and see what all the fuss was all about. Boy, her ears do weird things sometimes.

We're looking forward to some yummy dinners in the future! Yay!

Doggie date night

On Thursday night, since that was our last day in Birmingham, we decided to put together a free date night. The couple of things I could come up with were a hike and a visit to the nearby greyhound racetrack.

First we went on our hike with our puppy. Birmingham is beautiful, and it was fun to take a short hike in the woods.

Here's Jordan and his puppy. It's really hard to take a not-blurry picture of her since she's always moving, but we did get a couple.

She's gotten a lot bigger since our last little "hike."

(Second day with Lexi, 7 weeks old)

(Last Thursday, 12 weeks old)

Here's me and puppy.

Taking a minute to smell the flowers.

She was really tired on the way back. Probably from all that tugging on the leash. Good thing she starts puppy class next week! Yay! Here she is under the dash in our car. We only let her sit there for very short car rides. All other times she is in her crate.

Afterwards, Jordan and I had dinner and then we headed off to the racetrack. It was a very interesting experience. I was one of two women there. There was this huge building with all these TVs showing different race from all over the US--Thorougbred racing, Standardbred racing, and greyhound racing. Everyone was placing their bets, and no one was even watching the live racing outside.

Here's the starting gate at the track.

The races ran every 12 minutes. Jordan and I would go inside and watch the TV that showed the hounds that would be racing, and then pick a winner so we could cheer and really get into it. I wanted to bet a dollar on my hound but I was too shy to go up to the ticket counter, and Jordan wouldn't enable me to break the rules. None of my dogs ever won, but one got second and one got third.

It was fun to watch them, but I was doing some research afterwards and found out that they treat the greyhounds quite terribly. Poor puppies. It was fun to watch but next time we'll have to go watch horseracing instead. Jordan has decided that he'd like to rescue a greyhound one day. Actually, today he told me he wanted to rescue a pair of them! Ha. Isn't he cute?

Here's a very, very short clip of one of the races we saw. I was selfish and watched the rest of them and didn't record. Sorry!



It was a very enjoyable night, and someday because of it, a greyhound might just find our way into our family! But not for a long time. Lexi is plenty for now. Heavens.

Too much of a good thing

This morning, as I ate my hotel breakfast, I realized that Jordan's job was taking all the fun out of staying in a hotel. It's kind of like eating too much fast food. If you eat fast food only once in a while, it's really great. But if you are eating it all the time, you start to get sick.

Anyway, I was reflecting this morning about how my family would only stay in a hotel if we were in Fort Bragg (near the ocean). We Gallachers only vacation in three places: Utah (where we stay with my grandparents), Tahoe (where we stay in the cabin), and Fort Bragg (where we stay in a Best Western hotel. Always.). Hotels were super exciting. You never knew exactly what your room was going to look like, so it was thrilling to check out the room for the first time. And to have cable television! Wow. And waffles for breakfast every morning! Amazing.

And for the last couple years, whenever Jordan and I would stay in a hotel, it was still kind of exciting (Even when we stayed at that gross casino in Winnemucca). There's something romantic about not being in your own room.

But this is my third week staying at a hotel, and Jordan's sixth, and it's kind of lost its charm. I've gotten so that I'm critical of the hotel rooms ("This one has a queen-sized bed! That's ridiculous. And how can it not have a bathtub?" I said to Jordan about this week's room.) Neither of us enjoy the hotel breakfasts like we used to...in fact, we eat cereal and bagels now instead of the eggs, bacon, sausage, and waffles.

And hotels are no longer romantic. This morning I was thinking, "Hmmm, what could we do for fun for our anniversary?" And my first thought was "Let's stay in a fancy hotel!" And my second thought was, "Ew. Not another hotel." That's just sad.

I hope someday to go back to my previous hotel belief, one of romance and wonder and yummy complimentary breakfasts. Someday.

Baby Beluga, in the deep blue sea

It's been a while since I've made cupcakes. Too long, I think. It's tough to make them with Lexi around. She loves to hang around me in the kitchen and thinks everything is fascinating...and tries to eat anything that drops on the floor. Unfortunately, this is not healthy for puppy.

But since Jordan was home and could adequetly distract Lexi, I decided to give the really cute whales in What's New, Cupcake a shot. They were as much of a pain as I thought they would be, but they did turn out pretty cute.

The first step was to build the whales out of Twinkies and cookies. Jordan shaped the fins because I kept breaking the cookies in my eagerness.

After freezing them for a couple of hours, I melted gray frosting and dipped them into it. I lost three whales who took a dive (ha ha) into the frosting...without their cupcakes. I hate that! The same thing happened when I made the ducks. And the partridge in the pear tree. *groan*

After they had dried, I swirled white, light blue, and dark blue frosting onto them to make waves. Jordan tried his hand as well. Here's his whale tail:

Here's one of my smiling whales:

Then I made the seagulls. When I looked through this cupcake book, I thought the seagulls were so incredibly cute. Jordan actually put the bodies together--these whales were a big project and I was starting to get burned out. I piped on the eyes and the beaks and the wings.

I think they turned out really cute! I definately wouldn't make them again unless my kid someday decided to do an ocean-themed birthday party, but they are darling and I was proud of myself for making them.

Oh, the cupcakes were blue velvet (red velvet, but blue instead). If anyone needs a fantastic red velvet recipe, check out this link. It's amazing! http://www.marthastewartweddings.com/recipe/red-velvet-cake

"Jordan, I'm scared."

That was the beginning of our conversation last night when I called him at 11:15 pm. Jordan is in Augusta, Georgia this week for work, and I decided to stay home because things needed to get done around here, Lexi isn't sure if she even has a permanent home, and I need to go to the doctor. Plus he is coming home Thursday, so it wasn't even long considering we spent twelve days away from each other a few weeks ago.

But I am a chicken. I have an extremely overactive imagination, and I'm a little afraid of the dark. Which is weird, because I can't fall asleep if there are lights on.

Anyway, it's scary to be in an apartment by yourself. I always imagine that someone is watching me take Lexi out to the bathroom every hour and knows that I basically live all alone. It couldn't be that hard to break into our apartment. And how would anyone know I was kidnapped? Jordan would just figure I was sleeping in or have my phone turned off. It would give the kidnappers hours to hide the evidence!

And Lexi, however great she is as a companion dog, is not a guard dog. She never barks. Ever. Which is great, but it would be nice to have a dog that barked at kidnappers instead of running up to them and licking them all over. Plus, she's in her crate at night since Jordan and I made the decision before we got a dog that she was not allowed on the bed unless dire circumstances occured (like there was a flood and we had to use the bed as a raft).

Anyway, with all these thoughts running through my head, I couldn't go to sleep. I kept hearing things and I was certain I was done for. So I called up my husband, certain he would say something like "You're fine. Go to sleep." But I wanted to talk to him anyway. You know, one last time before I got kidnapped.

But Jordan was extremely sweet about it. He listened to my garbled reasons for being scared, and he was just like "I'll stay on the phone with you. It's okay." And he told me that we'll just leave the phones connected while we slept. That's good, I thought. That way he can hear when the kidnappers come in and call 911.

But I finally fell asleep. I'm grateful for a husband who doesn't laugh at my fears. I love you, Jordan!