Quick Snap Sunday

Stuck In Pink

This is what happens when a pug needs to get a good nap but all the beds are taken. Once again a cat-sister doesn't know her colors or decided she wanted to lay in his bed instead. She doesn't know her colors, yes, but she does know where her bed is placed. Apparently there was a change up, she went to his bed and he was stuck in her pink bed. Sometimes it happens that way. He also had to make do with the fact that she left her "toy" paper towel roll behind for him to contend with.

He doesn't care just give him a bed and make sure it doesn't have rocks in it. It's all good in his opinion. However, knowing Simmie like I know my little Simmie, he would figure it out and deal with it even if the bed did have rocks in it. That's the kind of easy-going our Simmie is!

Football and Movies

So close yet so far! My Cardinals are down in Houston and will take on the Texans tomorrow afternoon. Now this is great news because I actually get to watch it! If they were here in Dallas I would have tried my hardest to convince my husband to go to the game. Oh wait, I did that anyway for the Texans game. I wasn't completely serious. I wasn't totally into a trip to Houston to watch a pre-season game this weekend....or was I? Forever a mystery! ;)

We were considering going to a movie this afternoon. We were focused on seeing Pete's Dragon, until I looked up the show times. Apparently, it's getting ready to leave theaters in our area soon because the showings have greatly diminished already. Has it been out that long? We are so into procrastinating when it comes to going to movies. I can't believe my husband has never seen Pete's Dragon. He's never seen so many classics it's a wonder to me! I wonder as to what he did during his childhood? When I've jokingly inquired as to the reason he's missed out on so many classics his response is, "I was playing football". Well, it is Texas and that is a big part of Texas so I suppose it makes sense.

Perhaps it's an at-home movie night for us, can you say Redbox? Then again there's football on. Do we have time for a movie? :)  Must say I'm not completely accustom to seeing the abbreviation "LAR" yet. That's going to take some getting used to. Not sure why the abbreviation decided on for the Los Angeles Rams is LAR but whatever! I'm not fond of the fact that L.A. now has a team or once again has a team. That gives the state of California 4 NFL franchises. That's borderline ridiculous! Just my opinion, folks!!! I don't need my email blowing up with people from Cali defending their right to have 4 franchises! I'm a Zonie originally, there's a bit of a rivalry between Californians and Zonies, so understand my position. No matter what I will FOREVER side with AZ! Never CA! I've explained this several times to my husband, growing up in AZ there's a fair amount of young Zonies that are extremely fascinated with the Cali lifestyle and desire to move there as soon as they get of age. Then there's the rest of the young Zonies that grow up despising anything and everything California has to offer other than Disneyland. I fit into the second group. I got so sick of hearing how great California was as a young one I wanted to gag! Have my thoughts and feelings changed much since then....ask my husband! It's definitely different here, people in Texas don't seem to have a rivalry with the surrounding states, like I feel exists between CA and AZ. I'm going to stop right there before I get too many complaints from this post in my email! Once again let me politely reiterate it's just my opinion!

Setting The Record Straight!

For some strange reason I feel the need to set the record straight regarding a little something! During dinner Saturday night with my nephews, one of them revealed there's a little rumor/story he keeps hearing circulating in the family about Brad and I. The story? I know you are all on the edge of your seat for this one. Rumor has it Brad's wife serves him the same thing to eat depending on the day of week it is, week after week. Yes, each night of the week is reserved for a different entrée. According to what my nephew has heard we never have variety from week to week. The same 5 meals served on weeknights keep repeating week after week.  Insert laugh here!

Come on, seriously? Spend 10 minutes with me! I beg you! Spend 10 minutes with me, and you will quickly discover I love to cook. I love to reinvent! I love to experiment in the kitchen!

If anything, my poor husband is not subjected to eating the same thing as much as he'd like. I'm sure he'd love for tacos and spaghetti to pop up in the rotation more frequently. They pop up about once a month. Why? Because I'm always trying new things. For me to have a schedule and always make the same exact thing each Monday, each Tuesday and so on....sorry folks, not my style. I'm all about variety. I'm all about trying something new. 

Are there themed dinner nights in our household? Yes, some weeks, but not all weeks. Sometimes it might work out that I choose to serve up meatballs on a Monday and therefore I'll term it "Meatball Monday", but it doesn't mean we have meatballs every Monday of the year. Sometimes Mondays are termed "meatless Mondays" when I want to try a vegetarian dish out. From time to time we may consistently enjoy meatless dishes on Mondays but it's not the same dish being served each Monday.

So please understand my husband is not suffering through endless nights of the same thing being served to him each week. I'm not that boring in the meal prep area! Feel free to ask him!

On a complete side note I used to do a workout program designed that way. There was a certain
"Monday" workout, "Tuesday" workout, and so on thru the week. Week after week it was the same order. That lasted close to 6 months for me before I was ready for something different. Now that's exercise, eating is very different to me. I would get bored of a dinnertime schedule much quicker than 6 months, simply because I need to invent and experiment. That's just how I am!  

Quick Snap Sunday

The Test Waffle

Well as it turns out it was a waffle kind of a morning around here and not a pancake morning with the nephews. I have been perfecting my waffle recipe in recent months. So I decided to seize the opportunity to have two more opinions on the waffles! :) Now similar to pancakes, the first one in the pan is always a test 'cake for me. Same goes for waffles! I usually don't make a complete waffle the first time as I want to first make sure the temp is right as well as the texture my waffle batter is providing.

What happens when I turn my back? Apparently waffles are tossed to the cat to be tested not only for texture and doneness but also as a super-sized brunch time cat treat! Guess who tossed my lovely waffle to the floor for the young Pipe? Her daddy! When I gave him a stare after seeing the waffle out of the corner of my eye being thrown to her, he shrugged his shoulders and with a coy grin said, "What? I want to see what she'll do with it." Oh my!

She did nothing with it. Her pug brothers were thankfully busy in the other room, otherwise Simon would have shown her what to do with it. She sniffed it then walked away. Cats may meow like crazy to try something you have but rarely take it when it's given to them. Unless of course you are offering tuna or a dairy product. :)

Nephews Weekend

It's a nephews weekend for us. Both of our nephews have come to spend so time with us this weekend. Now that they are older it's a bit hard to get schedules to line up, but we made it work for this weekend.

So when the nephews are here there's three, no wait, make that four things you can count on: 

-Big gaming action! From board games to Xbox games! They, along with their Uncle Brad will be up until crazy late playing games.

-Nephews time equals brownies time! Brownies are for sure when Wes and Dylan arrive. At some point I even sneak back in the kitchen to make cookies so they have something to take home with them.

-Pancakes please!!  My kitchen will be pancake central come Sunday morning. Dylan requests pancakes every time he's here. He always has a special request usually for the type of pancakes, hopefully Wes agrees come morning!

-Pet me NOW!  Cody is in heaven having extra people to dole on him. He's super friendly as everyone knows. When company arrives he's super happy to welcome them.

So that's some for sure things happening with our weekend!

I'll close with a little story. Soon after Brad and I got married we decided it would be nice to make a point to have Dylan come over to spend a weekend at least once a month. Now he's a bit older so we've gotten away from that. It's not as frequent, understandably though, he has other commitments. Anyway back to my story, it was the first time he had come over to our place for the weekend. I put the boys and Storm(yes, Storm was still with us) to bed in the usual pet sleeping quarters. When I got up the next morning to get all pets up for the day, Cody was missing. I figured what had taken place, as I quietly looked in the spare room where Dylan was to spot Cody curled up next to the bed. He had begged Dylan until Dylan let him in. I knew it! Yet another thing that can be counted on this weekend...Cody will try his hardest to sleep in the same room as Dylan.

Should be fun!

Quick Snap Sunday

Recognize!

Hello to all! For it is I, Cody W. Vaughn. I'm happy to report this weekend the temperature outside took a dip. A very pleasant dip! I'm anxious to enjoy this week's worth of temperatures that will hover in the high 80's. It's like May has returned in mid-August. I can admit I'm rarely happy with the weather. If it isn't absolutely PERFECT outside then it's not for me. This has been one hot muggy summer here in Dallas. It's the mugginess that gets to you my friends. I walk outside and within 90 seconds my coat is drenched. I'm not going to stretch the truth I have un-politely at times dealt with these muggy-hot summer temps. I barely get inside our front door before plopping down and demanding my bowl of water. And you know what?...I get my bowl of water promptly delivered to me each day. That morning walk my human mommie takes me on is LONG, I need a good LONG drink when I get home.

Now when the temps cool down and summer is a distant memory will I still get such good service....I BETTER. I have one word: RECOGNIZE! People in this household need to continue to recognize just how important I am! Who doesn't agree with my lofty importance? I don't see Simon getting this kind of treatment each morning. Nope his pug feet carry him to a bowl of water after I'm done. Take it from a 14 year old pug, training these human parents is not easy. It's taken me 14 years to get this mommie of mine to bring me a bowl of fresh water each morning. After finishing half the bowl I hang out in the entryway making my human daddy walk around me every day to get out the door. I move in my own time, as it should be at my advanced age. Recognize!

You know what? I should write a book folks, it could be called "How To Train Your Human Parent In 14 Quick Years". Oh it would be a best seller for sure. All the dogs and even cats would flock to bookstores to get it. I'm old, I've collected a lot of great tips to get these humans to "bow down" to me. The world of pets needs to know what tricks I have up my paw! 

Well my peeps, it's time for me to end this post. It's Sunday, I have a big day of NOTHING planned. Getting enough naps as well as watching people at the pool from our balcony are top on my "to do" list today and everyday. It's quite the pug life!

Pug Speak!

Things that make me pause when I'm working out:
-Building fire alarm sounds for a reasonable amount of time. I don't leave on short sounding ones, ask my husband! He's had to convince me on a few occasions to leave when fire alarm blares.

-The building implodes.

-There's a threat of blood being shed by a fur-baby, at the "paws" of another fur-baby(meaning a fight breaks out).


So there I am working out yesterday morning. I was doing my warm up when out of nowhere, one pug moves too close to the other pug, World War 3 erupts a mere 5 feet from me. Piper hit the road fast. My resistance band went flying as I jumped in between two pugs. Cody was letting Simon have it verbally, as he tried going at him too. Simon was giving it right back to him. Simmie is passive and gives in to his siblings all the time. But if you are trying to pull his head off he's going to fight back! He's going to be a little Rottweiler if he needs to be. Typically though he saves his protective Rottweiler ways for the great outdoors when he's leashed up. While I tried to separate two fast moving pug bodies, as they spewed their pug "venom" at one another, I imagined what words they could be shouting angrily? Perhaps, the argument in full pug dialect translated to this:

Cody:  I'm the king, and you looked at me. Off with your head!

Simon:  You certainly are no king. You aren't even a prince. You just have some weird hierarchy beliefs that don't exist in this house.

Cody:  Oh I'm royalty all right. Look at the way I strut my stuff. You need to recognize little bro. You are so beneath me it's pathetic!

Simon: (laughs)...You are just a cranky old dude.

Cody:  I'm not cranky, I just demand respect. More respect than I get around here.

Simon:  Please!!! Are you listening to yourself right now? How much more respect should you get? Don't you listen to mommie? We are all equals.

Cody:  (scoffs) Recognize! I was on this planet first! I'm the king.

Simon:  (spoke with total frustration)YOU ARE NOT A KING. I might concede you are possibly a prince. The prince of crankiness! But not a king of anything! Wouldn't the big guy of the house be the king if there was one in our household?

Cody:  Fine, daddy's the king and I'm the prince. And you are the pauper. You along with Piper are my paupers. Now, go fetch me my slippers and a bone. Then leave me alone and don't look in my direction or I'll tear your head off.

Simon: Tear my head off? Seriously? You must be kidding? It's been more than 14 years that we have existed as brothers and you have yet to win one of these battles. Have you ever heard this, "don't mess with Texas"? It applies to me as well. Don't mess with me!  Recognize!

Cody:  Whatever! No matter what, I'm the oldest and I get the most respect!

Simon: Can you say delusional? (scoffs as he walks away)


That conversation seems completely plausible! LOL! I still have no likely clue as to what set Cody off this time. It was all Cody though. In 14 years of brotherhood, Simon has NEVER started an argument. He's defended himself, for sure. But starting a rumble is not Simon. Cody is such a loving little guy but he has a demanding/difficult side to him. He's a mystery wrapped in a riddle!

Piper Simona Vaughn

I jumped out of bed in a bit of a panic as I realized I accidentally overslept. During the warm weather months when I accidentally sleep too long it means I'm speeding around the house as if someone hit the fast-forward button. I'm trying to get pet chores done, pets fed, and two of the three pets out the door before the sun rises too high and doesn't give us enough shady areas to walk thru on the long morning route.

Now when the fast-forward button needs to be hit, so to speak, I never ever worry about Simon not being able to keep up. The "kid" was born ready. Born ready for anything! Piper is more like Simon than Cody in that area as well. She can adjust, she knows how to hustle. Then there's Cody! What to say about Cody? Oh dear! Oh how I love my Cody-man! However, I do not want to begin to estimate how many minutes of my life I have wasted away waiting for Cody to move a muscle. He was born in slow motion. There I was this morning hustling around to get things done. Simon finished eating rapidly as always. Piper was done. Cody was?....you guessed it....not done! We needed to get going. He seemed to realize the world(our household) was waiting on him. As he looked up after each nibble, he soon stopped. Perhaps he felt the pressure of 6 eyes staring at him? I grabbed Cody's bowl of food which was only half eaten, then set it up on the counter. There's been other mornings Cody has eaten only half of his breakfast too, he eats the other half after we get back in from walking. No biggie. Leashes were soon clipped on and out the door we raced.

It was mere minutes after getting home from the walk before I was saying bye to Brad as he walked out the door to head to work. Once he left I went into our bedroom to make the bed for the day and grab my workout shoes to go workout in. While in our bedroom, I remembered Cody needed to be given the rest of his bowl of food. Upon returning to the living room, I glanced at Simon. He appeared guilty. Between his two front paws laid a rawhide. I instantly asked him, "where did you get that?" As he was tilting his head to the right his expression began to read, "Rawhide? What rawhide?". Meanwhile, I'm thinking to myself, 'I left that rawhide on the counter in the kitchen last night. How did he get up there?' Next I walked into the kitchen, quickly noticed an empty bowl of food. Cody's bowl of food I was about to give him again had been cleaned out. Alright, what is going on here? Cody's food bowl is empty and Simon has a rawhide that I did not get for him. Light bulb moment!!!! PIPER! There she sat near Simon. Eyes fully focused on her youngest brother, she wasn't about to look in my direction. That is until I started interrogating the youngest of the trio. No jury needed, she was clearly guilty! Guilty on all counts. She accumulated quite the rap sheet in a very short amount of time this morning. Simon looked guilty because he knew he got something as a result of her crime spree. She had snatched his rawhide for him after cleaning out Cody's bowl of food. What a sneak!

Just call her Piper Simona Vaughn! Congratulations Simon, you have created a monster! Your little sister is becoming more and more like you as the days and weeks progress! Look out world we've got two Simmie's. Simon and Simona!

Here's the worst part about having more than one pet. Although for the record I'd never have it any other way, a trio is perfect for us! And that previous line is stated with HEAVY emphasis! But I'm simply saying when you increase the numbers the more likely they are to work in tandem. How many times have two of our three been up to no good at the same time? Too many to count. How many times does one pet begin the dirty work while another quickly joins in to finish up? Too many to count. How many times have I arrived to pick up the boys from doggie day camp on Fridays and they are both sitting in time-out after they decided to tag-team a dachshund? Too many to count! Believe me, that one is truly too many to count. No clue what their issue is with dachshunds. They have a cousin that's a dachshund and they accept her just fine. My oh my, isn't it fun having fur-babies! Yes! Yes, it is! Wouldn't trade it for anything!:)

Quick Snap Sunday

It's A Cat Thing!

Oh yes, it's a cat thing! This is the cutest "bag-Pipe" ever!  Get it?..."bag-Pipe"? LOL!

Bags(paper or plastic), empty paper towel rolls, empty toilet paper rolls, bottle caps, and boxes, are all among Piper's fave things to play with. We recently moved our bookcase which occupied a prime spot in our living room to make room for the new fish tank, in the process we discovered 3 empty toilet paper rolls Piper had chased, then lost underneath the bookcase. She's very low maintenance! No fancy-shmancy toys needed. Don't worry folks, plastic bags only stick around as long as one of us is able to monitor the situation, no suffocation risk to be concerned about. Paper bags from Braum's however, stick around for weeks. As a human parent to a cat-daughter, one has to adjust to an empty box or a Braum's paper bag hanging out in the living room to help entertain the cat. Yet another difference between cats and dogs. Dogs are much more about "real" toys. Some puppies are briefly entertained with an empty water bottle or some other household item but that stage is short(or at least it was with mine). Only Simon was into empty water bottles. Cody was way too evolved to be into a household item instead of "REAL" dog toys. As with cats they seem to be forever entertained with the simplest household things.



Side note: For those unfamiliar, Braum's is similar to Dairy Queen. With the added appeal of a small Farmer's Market inside each location as well. Braum's, it's a Texas thing.

Ready For Olympics

Ready for some games? I mean, Olympic games? Oh yeah, bring on the Olympic coverage! I'm ready. I love sports as most people understand about me. I mean seriously, spend 10 minutes with me and some form of sports is going to come up in conversation. My mom raised me to be an avid Olympics watcher. I try my best to get in as much Olympic coverage as possible. So for the next 2 weeks every single night NBC will be exactly what our TV is set to.                                               

The only sad thing to me are the issues the Rio Olympics have faced already. Zika, crime, unfinished hotels for guest, fecal matter in the waters...pick a negative headline at random! Geesh! Furthermore, some athletes have refused to go to Rio. I'm hoping that all the negativity can be pushed aside and a great Olympic games can be played.  Then again, I have a strange feeling this Olympic games will be like no other...hopefully it's for good reasons and not bad ones. After all, Rio has seemed to be a desirable tourist place before Zika entered their world.

I most look forward to swimming. Come on, Phelps! As well as diving. I'm a huge gymnastics fan too. Come on Aly! Honestly I'm not picky with the sport, I love it all!

Go Team USA!

The Prank

One can only pop out of nowhere to scare her husband so many times before a new, more evolved prank is needed. Although earlier this week popping out to scare Brad worked like a charm! He might not agree! But he did laugh!

Well make way for a new little prank. Yesterday, early in the evening I noticed Brad's ring was sitting on the nightstand. Hmm, he's been out all day and no ring. It's very uncommon for him to forget to wear his ring. At first I casually noticed the ring and moved on with what I was doing. A few minutes later I had an idea....hide it! Yes, that's the type of naughtiness that runs through me. Hiding a ring, type of naughtiness. I hid it in a safe place. I was quite curious how this would play out? How long would it take for him to miss it? How long would he look for it before asking if I had seen his ring? Would he even ask me, maybe he would just look on his own?

Fast forward quite a few hours, Brad arrives home. He instantly made the rounds to greet as well as say goodnight to our fur-baby trio that were all tucked into their beds. Meanwhile I realize it's getting late, and time for bed. I'm sitting in our bedroom as Brad walks in going right for his nightstand. I instantly could tell he was starting his search for his ring. Next up, he hustled into the closet to look thru his tennis bag. Within a few minutes he returned to the bedroom and stood in front of his nightstand again, he appeared to be deep in thought. Perhaps, trying to remember where he last saw his ring. He then looked in the drawer. As he was shutting the drawer he asked me if I had seen his ring. I busted out laughing! I couldn't hold it in. Gig was up! Once I started laughing he instantly began questioning me. Which made me laugh even more for some reason. The ring was soon found after he followed my vague directions to the whereabouts of his ring. We both laughed quite a bit over my little prank.

It's likely not funny to most people but we enjoy silly/harmless pranks. Tricking each other every once in awhile is rather fun...believe me. Some of those silly ridiculous moments is exactly what we all need every now and then. Those moments help lighten the mood of a hard work week! Also helps us truly enjoy a simple laugh with one another.