Simple Sunday

Welcome to Simple Sunday where I link up with Rebecca from Simple as That. But before I get to my photo, I'd like to wish all Mommies and Soon-to-Be-Mommies a…

Wordless Wednesday: Muppet hands

After Jasper got a haircut, his legs look so long and skinny.

A boy and his puppy

Happy May!

When we first brought Jasper home, he was only a few months old. Our son was only a bit over 1 year old. Jasper immediately found a liking to our son since our son was small, on the ground a lot, dropped food, and had food on him at all times. Jasper loved to lick our son's face and toes. Our son didn't know what to make of him back then.

Dogs & flashes

I can't control the intensity of my SpeedLite 380EX. I bought a diffuser cap for it, but that just spreads the flash around instead of diffusing it. Ergh. I've even secured a piece of white paper over the flash. The effect was lackluster. I fiddled with the "flash exposure" on the camera, but that just dims the photo, not the flash. Ergh. Anyways, my bloggie friend Jen recently agreed that it's hard to get her dogs to stay still for a photo, but even harder because they're afraid of the flash. Luckily, our puppy, Jasper, isn't scared of anything. Not even the flash.

(REPOST) Is she talking to the puppy or the baby?

"Poll" for this post has been updated and works

We live in a townhouse and luckily only have one neighbor. They probably hear me raise my voice. I bet they play a game of "Is she talking to the puppy or the baby?" You can play along too! I wish there were some awesome prize I could give you if you get all the answers correctly. BUT if you help us reach 10,000 pageviews, we're that much closer to a gift card giveaway! Share this post via twitter, Facebook, or good ol' fashion word of mouth :). Share buttons are at the bottom of this post.

Is she talking to the puppy or the baby?

We live in a townhouse and luckily only have one neighbor. They probably hear me raise my voice. I bet they play a game of "Is she talking to the puppy or the baby?" You can play along too! I wish there were some awesome prize I could give you if you get all the answers correctly. BUT if you help us reach 10,000 pageviews, we're that much closer to a gift card giveaway! Share this post via twitter, Facebook, or good ol' fashion word of mouth :). Share buttons are at the bottom of this post.

Puppy love, literally

When we first started thinking about getting a second dog, the hubby and I first considered rescuing a young adult dog. Unfortunately, most people give up older dogs (so sad and age-ist!). Since Coco (our first dog) was only 2, and we really wanted a play companion for her, we kept looking and waiting.

We found Delaware Puppy Rescue, but unfortunately they had restrictions about families adopting a puppy when there's a child less than 7-yrs at home. They had good reason. Both child and puppy are in their early stages of development. Neither is mature enough to understand restraint. Their past experience with young families is that puppies are returned :(.

Going against DPR's valid concern, we got a puppy from a breeder anyways. We named his Jasper. Our son (J) was a little over 1-yr at the time.

Day 29: The missing puzzle piece

I bought this cool wooden puzzle from a nearby second-hand children's store, Emma's Closet. The pieces cover-up light-sensitive sensors, so that with each piece you put down, a phrase of "The Wheels on the Bus" plays. And when all the pieces are in their places, the song continues to "the driver on the bus..."

Day 28: Jasper's favorite activities

I don't talk much about the dogs on this blog, but just had to share these photos of Jasper, the 6-month-old puppy. His favorite activities are:

Getting beat up by Coco. Just kidding! They're just playing!

Day 27: Those aren't yours

Here are a few of the dogs' things that my son, J,
has just grown to love "playing" with.

The dogs' toy, the dogs' crate...

Bichons & Baby

Happy November! I received this photo as part of one of those email-forwards, and it reminded me of my family.

2 Bichons and a Baby [source unknown]

Remember, November is National Blog Posting Month. Add your blog to BlogHer.com's blogroll, blog every day in November, and be eligible to win prizes!

The terrible fours

*WARNING* Some portions of this post may be a little gross…proceed with caution.

No, J has not suddenly turned 4…

But this past weekend was certainly a group of terrible fours.

We left for Philly around 9:30 am on Saturday. I heard about a huge motorcycle ride happening in Virginia on Friday, but didn't think it'd impact us on Saturday - I was WRONG!

The annual ride, sponsored by America's 911 Foundation, honors each victim of 9/11. 1800+ bikers ride from Somerset, PA, down to the Pentagon and then back up to New York. They visit each site and honor the victims of the tragic events of 9/11.

I commend the dedicated the riders and their remembrance of that day.

But we spent about 4.5 hrs on the road with a less than happy 13-month-old, a vomiting 2-year-old Bichon, and a 11-week-old fidgety Bichon puppy. That's four terribles, right? It was NOT a good start to the weekend. I even "joked" with my husband that we should just turn around and go home.

J eventually recovered from the ride. He only napped an hour in the car but slept well that night...until 7 am on Sunday (yay!).

Poor Coco started vomiting Friday night, 3 am to be exact. We woke up on Saturday morning to find 5 dark spots on our bedroom carpet. GREAT. (The drawing below was inspired by one of the funniest parenting blogs.)

We are sleeping soundly until we are awaken by Coco vomiting all over our bedroom. Jasper is in his crate, whining, as usual. I thought sleep deprivation was over once J started sleeping through the night.

And the vomiting continued for the rest of Saturday. So we had our hands pretty full this past weekend.

J didn't want to leave my side the whole weekend. Why he suddenly so attached? I maybe got a half-hour nap on the sofa.

 J: Walk me around...everywhere!

Poor Coco (and the floor) needed to be cleaned up every hour or so - I'm so grateful my in-laws were so understanding.

We also had to keep an eye on Jasper so that he didn't (1) pee/poo in the house and (2) eat what Coco was leaving on the floor everywhere...ew.

It was like having 3 kids! I can't even imagine what it'd be like with 3 actual kids!

Anyways, our trip back to Maryland was a bit better - only 3 hours (as opposed to the GPS-reported 2.5).

Lessons: Pay attention to the news before a trip back to Philly in order to avoid a traffic jam. Don't travel with a sick dog. 

Oh, and to add to a previous post (traveling with small kids), remember to bring our E-ZPass. 

If you don't have one, get one (or similar product for your state of residence). 

It's so great NOT to have to (1) wait in long lines and (2) wake the baby by waiting in line and rolling down your window to pay like half a dozen tolls from here to PA - argh.

Puppies & babies

Before J arrived, we used to draw so many parallels between Coco and our non-existent baby. Of course, we never shared these with anyone because our friends with children (and no dogs) would be horrified that we were comparing babies to puppies. But now that we have both puppy (Coco & Jasper) and baby, I'd like to share some of the comparisons we used to make and what we know now.

Both puppies and babies get up in the middle of the night.

No sleep depravation with puppy. If any, only lasts up to 3 months.

That's because puppies can hold it for as many hours as their age plus one. A 2-month old puppy can hold it for three hours. FYI, we started with training pads before house-breaking Coco so we never had to get up in the middle of the night to take her out. But with Jasper, we house-breaking so that last night, the husband took him out at midnight and 4 am. Which of course upset Coco - where are you taking him? Can I go? I then got up at 6 am to take both dogs out. Luckily, this won't last too long.

Lots of sleep depravation with baby. Lasted 10 months for us. We could have been stricter and maybe it would have lasted only 6 months.

Babies will get up every 1-3 hours during the night, depending on the baby. Lucky for us, J was on the 3 to 4-hour schedule. But each waking was not just for feeding but for changing a diaper and repeatedly trying to get him to fall back asleep (i.e., rocking, swaddling, placing in crib, repeat until successful). In total, the whole routine could take 30-60 min, which meant little quality sleep.

Both puppies and babies need to be sleep-trained.

Puppies can adjust to sleeping by themselves within days.

Until Coco was house-broken, she spent the night alone in the kitchen at night. As soon as we went upstairs, she would yelp at the top of her lungs for 15-30 min. It was pretty heart-breaking. Oftentimes, a "quiet" from us helped ease her fears. She stopped yelping at us in a few days. With Jasper, we let him sleep in the crate and in our bedroom. It cuts down on the yelping. But when we left him in the kitchen this morning while we got ready, he yelped a lot. Hopefully, he gets used to it.

Babies need days, weeks, but for us, a month.

We eased into letting J "cry it out" around 6 months when he got his own bedroom here in Maryland. We let him "cry it out" at naptime and at bedtime. Some days were harder than others. I would say that he didn't need to rocked or checked-up on a second time at 7 months. These days, he'd rather you just put him in his crib so that he can get into his routine - remove the two toys from the crib, face the window, get on tummy.

Never give a puppy or baby playthings that you don't want them chewing/breaking/etc.

It's easy to refuse your puppy [insert plaything here].

Our trainer said never to give our puppy an old shoe or sock to play with because then she'd chew our relatively new shoes or socks. Coco was only ever allowed to play with her toys. Even now, she knows that any toys on the playmat are J's. But if they're on the hardwood floors, she'll go to town on them. It's amazing she knows the difference. We now need to teach Jasper the difference.

We'll do almost anything to distract/occupy J.

Cell-phone, ok. Even though he keeps dialing my SIL and might one day call 911 or China.

Remote control, ok. Even though he keeps changing the channel and shutting the TV off.

Bottle of lotion, ok. Even though the contents could leak out resulting in a call to the poison control hotline (I know, horrible!).

Both puppies and babies need a lot of attention.

Puppies do while they're being house-broken and during their chewing phase.

These were the two biggest challenges. I would say around 7-9 months, she was able to be left alone and have the run of the house with no incident. Besides walks 4 times a day, grooming, and training/playing, she doesn't require much else. She actually deserves more attention than we currently give her. She's so understanding. We hope she enjoys Jasper's company. I hope when I go home today the kitchen won't be completed chewed apart by Jasper.

We can't take our eyes of J for a split-second…and he isn't even walking yet!

So I have stepped out of the room here and there but was always within ear shot. And I have left him alone to eat in his high chair while I got something from the kitchen. But usually, we are stuck together like glue.

I'm glad to be parents to Jacob, Coco, and now, Jasper. They teach me many lessons in their individual ways.