We took our pup to the vet... plus baby updates

Our homemade poncho for the one day it
truly rained :)

Roxy needed to go into the vet for her 6 month shots and also for a check up so we could get her heart worm and flea medication renewed for January.

$172.50 later... we will still be paying another $120 for her medication next month but she's a healthy little girl, just slightly over weight since we haven't been walking her as much and hubby has been over treating her to make up for the lack of walks... so she needs to loose 2 lbs or so...Hopefully cutting back on treats and walking her more will do the trick since I don't want to cut her kibble because we already don't give her very much of that anyway.

She also needs to get her teeth cleaned, but they want to charge us $500 to knock her out to do it... so we will be looking around a price checking that one...My friend works at a vet so she's going to send me their price list so I can compare it because she's local.

But Roxy is her normal happy go-lucky self... Especially since we have been giving her more attention these last couple weeks. She had a small destructive streak going earlier in December between Christmas concerts, events, church stuff and a few early month gatherings that kept her at home alone more than we normally do... She got into South County Boys work bag and shredded some of his oatmeal packets... and my holiday headband bit the dust because she decided that it too needed to be shredded to make a point that we had, had too many things going on in a single week and she missed us too much.

After those incidents, we started leaving things out she could shred that wouldn't piss us off as much (tp rolls and empty soap boxes since she likes those... but she had made her point and we gave her the love she needed so those have remained on the bathroom floor just in case..) 

I also had to drink the orange bottle for my sugar test... It wasn't bad on the way down like everyone says, but waiting for my blood work to be drawn totally sucked because I started getting a little dizzy and light headed since I normally don't eat a whole lot of sugar at once... and it made me dehydrated...

But I passed... normal range is 70-129 and I got a 58 so I was well below...

Unfortunately the scale hasn't been my friend this pregnancy and i'm starting to measure 2 weeks early growth wise and because we are worried about a large baby because of my husband's stature and my weight gain, my doctor has asked me to try and keep an 1800 calorie diet until my next appointment so we can hopefully get me caught up where I need to be... So I'm cutting out treats this holiday season to make sure little Eli is getting the nutrition he needs and I don't gain anymore holiday extra.

Monday was my first day watching, and I started going back to counting calories on Tuesday and its really making me more mindful of what I'm eating and how many veggies I've been eating as well.  I'm still getting my 10,000 steps a day most days and I've worked myself up to a doing a cardio strength training program 3 days a week with my doctors approval and I've already seen myself get stronger as I've added more reps or time to the different activities so that makes me feel better knowing I am doing what I can to keep this little man happy.

A post entirely about my dog... just because

Aww, hug time!

I swear, we have the worlds perfect dog.

She came to us well behaved, trained, and with enough personality that she's a cute character that doesn't annoy us at all.

I honestly believe that she's ruining us for being future parents later in life since the acquisition of a dog is supposed to help train you to be responsible and all. But she doesn't require much from us at all.

Roxy dances with us in the house... cuddles with my shoes... and stays beside me like "man's best friend" when i'm home all day.

She even knows when I'm done petting her and when she needs to go lay down and leave me alone so I can blog.

When we take her down to the park she becomes the adorable pup that everyone wants to meet... literally the iconic "look mommy, there's a doggie" type of dog.

(Mind you she won't play fetch and she has to stop barking like a crazy dog first before people can see her cuteness... so she's generally more adorable by lap 2 in the park when she's more comfortable and has confirmed that no one will in fact eat her... but in my mind she's perfect).

(Yup, I'm "That" proud dog owner... but what can I say... Rescues make the best pets!)

Anyways, everyone down at the park always asks us how we keep her so "white" and "fluffy" and "soft" which naturally leads to the question of how frequently we take her to the groomers...

But we don't take her to the groomers. For the most part she just stays that way - Soft and Fluffy - But about every other month or so she starts to smell a little more like dog then we prefer.


Since Roxy really likes us... she often visits us when we are in the bathroom. It doesn't matter if its toilet time or a relaxing bath, she comes right on in and wags her little nub of a tail and demands affection and attention.

She'll even put her paws up on the side of the tub and reach in as far as she can so lick our faces when she's gotten all the water off our arm that she can reach... so in those moments we just pick her up and drop her in the tub with us.

Yup. It's that simple for us.

We just pick her up and place her in the nice warm water.

Now she won't climb in on her own mind you... but she doesn't try to jump out and run away from us either. She just stands there and takes it. If the water level is low enough, she'll sit down and wait until we tell her she can get out and get her towel rub down... and then she just walks over to me and lets me towel dry her off.

So like I said, WORLD'S BEST BEHAVED DOG!

Locked out of the house

Yup. Locked myself out of the house... again.

It was my day off I had just made myself a smoothie and was in my PJ's still as I had been cleaning the house most of the morning and had made some real progress.

All I wanted to do was take the trash out. Since Roxy was keeping me company as my cleaning buddy, she followed behind me when I grabbed the kitchen trash bin and some random costco boxes and headed out the front door. I didn't have my house keys with me since I was just going to the dumpster...  but I forgot something important.

Our new door locks can turn from the inside like they are unlocked, but be locked on the outside...

and I normally check before I close the door behind me that the door is in fact unlocked... and this time I guess I forgot to check as Roxy headed down the stairs to go woof at a neighbor and roll in the grass.

We dropped off the trash and headed back to the house. Roxy didn't have her collar on because she had gotten a bath the day before and we forgot to put in on her... and we normally keep a spare set of keys with her leash so we don't have to worry about getting locked out... So yes, she wasn't on a leash when I took the trash out because she didn't have her collar on....

When we got back to the door and I found it was locked I knew we were in a pickle. My car wasn't in the lot because SCB had taken it to work since his was in the shop... and even if I had my car, I didn't have keys...

My phone was inside... & did I mention my cute dog didn't have a leash or a collar on... ????

So I did what any sane pj wearing gal would do. I walked up to a stranger who *thankfully* was on their balcony watering some plants and asked to borrow her phone while Roxy woofed at her in the grass behind me.  Thankfully she was more than happy to let me call the only phone number that I have memorized... My mom's house number... and by the grace of all things awesome, she picked up.

We sat on the stairs of my place and waited for our ride. I figured if I could get a hold of SCB he could bring me keys or we could go with my mom and steal his... so we waited.

Roxy was thrilled to get so much petting and attention from me while we waited for my mom to come over and rescue us.... and the neighbor was playing so nice music and I got to watch a woodpecker go at a tree and a few birds hung out to keep us company so it wasn't that bad. 15 minuets later my mom showed up and took us over to her house so I could use her internet to look up SCB's work number. I gave him a call and we arranged for my mom, Roxy and I to drive over to take his keys from him...

Why didn't I call a friend... or get a spare from my mom? Because it was 11am on a Monday morning and since we got our new house keys, we haven't given copies to our friends and people yet.... because we are slackers...

So we drove down to San Clemente, in my PJ's I walked into his work and got his keys... Roxy got a dog treat from his co-worker and we were off on our merry way.

We also stopped by the Rainbow Sandal Outlet store and in my PJ's I picked up a pair for both SCB and I for our birthdays from my mom who stayed in the car with Roxy and the AC. (I'm glad my PJ's consisted of some long pants and a tee the night before since they were on display to the world.)

Keys and new shoes in hand, my mom dropped us off at our place and I went in and put our trash can away... my smoothie was still good so I finished that up and got on with my day.

After work we joked about adding a key to Roxy's collar but after 2 minutes it was clear she didn't like it... so we called our friends from church that live about 10-15 minutes away on foot and asked if we could hide our house keys in their backyard in case it happens again and they agreed. So next time I lock myself out, I just have to go across the park to the next neighborhood over and get my house keys.

Dogs, Cat, and more Dog sitting

SCB and I just spent the weekend Dog sitting at the McMansion again...  and earned a nice $70 for the 2 night stay!

I'm so glad that we can continue to Dog sit now that we have our roxy! This will give us some nice spending cash for the concert this weekend.

Speaking of this weekend, we also start house and cat sitting for my mom... who's going on a trip with my sister and her fiance and friends again... So we are watching her cat and house for her while she's away out of the goodness of our hearts.

Then as soon as we finish that up, we are back at the McMansion for a whole week!

We actually had to pass on an opportunity for another weekend at the McMansion because it coincided with watching my mom's cat and the back track from my mom's place to their place would have been insane and with $4.00+ gas, we would have lost money instead of gaining from the trip.

So here's to a little extra green in our wallets... which will come in handy nicely with all the stuff we have planned for August.

Adventures in Dog Food

My husband and i were talking with some people from our doggie circle (aka- the neighborhood pets from all the condos that gather in the park after work to play and visit) ... about pet food.

We know that MEAT should be the first ingredient in a "quality" dog food and when we first got Roxy, we didn't have all the time in the world to compare every bag of food in the store since she was so scared at first. We just took some advice from the people in the store and grabbed a small bag from the "Better" section (At pet smart they segregate their dog food by aisle. Good dog food, better dog food, and Best dog food). We picked up a small bag to make sure she liked it and we figured it would give us some time to test the waters.

We paid around $12 for the 4.5 lb bag.

My husband and I want to be good to our little love bug and feed her quality... but we also wanted to be practical about it. SCB said he was okay with us continuing to get the "better" type foods from pet smart since she seemed to eat it fine-- but only if we took the effort to shop around first and try to compare the labels since the pet store was probably the pricier option.

A lot of time its hard to compare brands together because they are often are not sold in the same stores... or in the same packaging. But the key to comparison is the ingredient list (and if your dog will eat it).

Since we are almost through the bag (1/3 left), we decided now would be the time to hunt around. If we decided to buy something new, we would still have enough of her old food left to slowly mix into the new food so there would be less chance of anything not agreeing with her ... or we would have enough food if she didn't like anything new we tried.

So we started at Walmart. I couldn't remember what the ingredients were in ours from home and I didn't have a list on me, but since pet smart is next door to Walmart, we decided to just take a look and snap photos of any of the brands that listed Meat as the first ingredient.

We turned every bag over and they only had one brand in which meat was the first ingredient in the whole store... and get this... they wanted less than $7 for the small bag (which was a full 5 lbs instead of 4.5 lbs...)

So, we snapped the picture and went next door to Pet Smart so we could look at what we had been buying... and we were a little floored. Meat wasn't the first ingredient...

It was Chicken meal... I turned over the bag in my hands for a bit and kept comparing it to my phone picture. When I looked deep in thought, one of the store clerks (who happened to be the manager) came over to see if I needed any help. I fibbed and told her my "friend" sent me a picture of what she feeds her dog and I wanted to know which one was better... what we were buying currently or the brand from my phone.

The lady looked at my phone and then at me and said hands down, the black bag on your phone,

"Your friend probably bought that at some high end dog boutique..."

It listed both chicken and then chicken meal as the top 2 ingredients... and she pointed out that you could pronounce more of the ingredients in the pure balance mix than you could in the natures recipe so that made it also better. Being the good sales lady she was, she steered us down the isle where the BEST dog food is and told me that the brands on that isle would be more similar to what was pictured on my phone... and of course they wanted WAY more for those then Walmart wanted for the Pure Balance... even their store version was way more.

So we thanked her, left... and went next door... back to walmart and picked up the Pure Balance for $7...

The next day when I fed roxy we mixed in 1/4 cup of the new stuff with 3/4 of the old... Guess what she picked out first, nugget by nugget? The Pure Balance.

Look who's happy! She so belongs to us!

In case you were all wondering.... this is not a sponsored post and i'm not getting anything out of sharing this little story with you all. :)

In celebration of Friday... Photos

When i'm not home... she takes my shoes into her bed...
she doesn't eat them... she just wants to be with them.

nap time while I read....

Doggie Checkup

So Roxy and I went to the neighborhood vet for her free check-up... which ended up costing me $215.54 in the end. While the check up was free, the tests were not.

They wanted to test her poop for any "worms" and pests ($49.75) since she came from a shelter that's kind of got a wrap for being over loaded and they sometimes put more than one dog in each pen... and in order to put her on a once a month flee and heart-worm preventative medication, we would have to have her checked out for heart-worm too ($43.75).

Those two weren't so bad... and I knew we would have to spend some kind of money there for tests (my two friends that work at places like that told me so).-- They also agreed to come over to teach me how to brush her teeth and clip her nails so we won't have to pay grooming costs if we don't want to.

The $122.04 was for 6 month supply of a flee/heart-worm pills. Apparently flees are becoming immune to the droplet "Advantix" flee killer and its generics (plus apparently you can't wash your dog before and after applying it for a week to make sure there are enough natural oils to make it work so that means at best you can only wash your dog every 2 weeks). Normally Heart-worm wouldn't be an issue in my area, but after Hurricane Katrina, about 800 animals came into our area when they were sent all over the states to find new homes for them, and heart-worm is now becoming an issue again. It's apparently way easy to prevent and a heck of a lot of money to treat. So since we were going to go with the once a month pill for the flees, for a few dollars more they could give us the combo pill that included both flee and heart-worm so we are going to try that.

My poor little love bug was really freaked out by the doggie nurses (she liked the doctor fine) that when the nurses took her in the back for her "poop" sample, Roxy nipped one of them.

But other than that, she's been an angel and she's learning really well and I can't imagine life without her anymore...

and if you haven't guessed, she's more like my dog that SCB's. She likes me better since i feed her, brush her, and take her for walks. He's jealous that she follows me around and when given a choice, chooses me over him.

:)

Welcome Roxy

Me listening intensely about
dog food in pet smart...

For the past few months SCB and I have been thinking about getting a dog... and since we don't have to worry about paying the mortgage this month... I started hitting up the local shelters...

and then we went looking together...

and then we met Roxy...

and then Roxy came home with us...

and we have been happier ever since!

She is our new almost 3 year old Australian Shepard mix (mixed with what we don't know), but she's about 20 lbs and slightly over weight for her size. We are hoping regular walks will help slim her down to her healthier weight... but oh man is she a love bug.













She just wants to be petted 24-7 and loves to just hang out with us on the couch. We haven't gotten her to play with any toys yet, but she's great on a leash so far and has been a welcome addition to our little family.

Welcome Home Roxy!

Since this is a personal finance blog, here's the details on Roxy.

She was originally adopted from a shelter when she was 6 months old... but 18 months later, they brought her back because their kids had severe allergic reactions they couldn't live with any longer. She's house trained, smart, does well on a leash, and seems to like people and kids. She's a little shy but she warmed up to SCB and wags her tail at him all the time.

To take Roxy from the shelter: $165.95

• Adoption Fee: $88
• Lica: $24
• Micro-Chip re-set: $3.50
• Shots and medical terminology (Dhpp-bord, Advantix, Drabies, Drontal): $10.00, 11.25, 9.00, 17.50
• and a really cheap rope leash: $2.50
• tax: $0.20

Then we went to Pet Smart for essentials and spent $102.86 on

• Bone tag id, Harness, Collar, Milk Bones, 3 Dog toys, Water Bowl/Dish, Leash, Small bag of Dog Food, and a good dog brush.

We probably could have gotten a few things cheaper else where... but the perks of Pet Smart is you can take your pet in there and let them smell things.

The next day we went to walmart and got her a pop up kennel and a bed liner for her ($36.43). We have our house sitting this weekend and next week (we talked with them about bringing Roxy since she was a last minute addition and they are fine with it) so we wanted her to have a travel bed/place that feels hers regardless of where she's at.

All in all, Roxy cost us $305.24 in about 24 hours. She gets a free vet visit-- we just need to book an appointment at one of the places on their list.