Meet and Greet season starts

After a few months of free weekends, VAGA's meet and Greets have started again! It is such a great opportunity to let people see the greys! Fredericksburg has a new Petsmart, so VAGA set up a monthly MG. There were about 20 greyhounds at the event on Saturday! it was really neat.
Of course, Stella had on a hat...she loves her hat! Almost as much as she loves her brother lucas . They always make a great team at MG's!

We are watching Lulu this weekend..she is ultra sweet! We fostered her a few months ago. She is very happy in her new home..she went with us to the MG this weekend.

People often ask how feeding time is with all these dogs...well..this picture pretty much sums it up! And this is pre-prepped..greyhounds don't eat dry kibble..;-) Of course, Lulu gets green beans and canned food in her food..her new parents are much cooler than we are and they only have one dog!
and of course, my blog wouldn't be complete without action shots of the kids in the yard. Hank is still here and made a spot in the house. They love to play..I liked this picture b/c they were all in the 'ready to rumble' stance.

I get my new laptop on Wednesday! Very excited..it will make all sorts of things faster and more fun. Kristen and gyeong are coming down next weekend. The Super Bowl will be on Sunday and of course, the 'surprise' I have promised will be unveiled after next weekend. ;-)

SNOW..well sorta..

So this weekend we are watching Ana for our friends while they are out of town. She doesn't have a fence at home, so she really loves to play with my kids. And of course, we still have Hank..

And today it snowed..well for Richmond this is considered a snow. It is now turned to the typical sleet and freezing rain. Which does make it interesting to watch the dogs 'tip toe' across the icy deck. But they got all dressed up this afternoon to run and play. Hank and Ana were playing chase...

Now..before the complaints come in...Dana is not wearing a coat b/c she doesn't like it and she is a princess. She had a coat on (Ana is wearing Dana's new blue coat), but she didn't like it and stood in the middle of the yard whining. Until Daddy swooped in and took it off...THEN she took off running in the snow. Most people who meet Dana-roo freely admit she is the fuzziest greyhound ever so she wasn't cold.

Shiloh loves to play and is usually right in the middle of the fun. She can't keep up but she finds it condusive to cut through the middle occasionally to catch the faster ones.
And since I usually take pictures of the very photogenic greyhounds, I felt it necessary to catch Shiloh in a pose. You will notice one of my children is missing from these pictures..Dante has NOTHING to do with the outdoors period..it is a potty only..and he certainly doesn't PLAY in the snow it is WAY too cold and he will get dirty. But he did go out with his Harley Davidson sweater on..but it hardly got wet before he was on the couch and under a blanket.

A haul of new dogs also stopped by my house today. I am very close to the highway, so my yard makes a good pit stop and car transfer location for dog hauls. So today, the Alfano's came with 3 girls and the Longfellow's took them up to the vet. On board were a brindle spotted female, Jazzy, a blue female (the star of the show), and Fast Lori, one of Debbie's grand-pups. Here Hank, Ana and Jassy chasing the blue (un-named at this point).
The blue has a gorgeous face. The Aflano's are going to try her out and hope she works well with Jo and Tristen. It will be cool to have a blue involved in Richmond events.
And of course, Lori...one of Aly's pups..she was very cute and sweet just like her momma!

And of course, I am going to upload some of these pics and more to my photo album..so visit that over the next few days for more photos!

And the excitement of the weekend is that I ordered a new laptop..my mother wanted one so I talked her in to taking mine so I would therefore have an excuse to buy a new one. I need faster, more powerful and smaller. She doesn't. ;-) i should have it after Super Bowl weekend....I will also acquire something else Super Bowl weekend but ..my faithful greyhound friends..will be a surprise. You will appreciate it..no worries!

Redoing the bathroom

Well, it was an exciting weekend of painting..which is something Jason and I have mastered at this point. As of this weekend, we have officially painted every square inch of this house..all 2000 square feet. We had one room left untouched (we painted the entire house the week we bought it..it was that bad!) which was the downstairs half bathroom. It was peach before (the before picture was taken at inspection one year ago..I didn't like the color enough to put up cutsy pictures!)We revamped it to match our 'wine'

themed house. We think painting everything in wine colors and decorating with wine things..makes us sommeliers! ;-) But after a whole weekend a lot of work we are very happy with our results. We did a sponge off technique..which was a big more time consuming than I was prepared for. But oh well!
Before on the left, After on the right!

But anyway...that was the excitement. On the greyhound front, we still have Hanka-Stanka (term of endearment derived from the fact that he is a bit gaseous!). Although with my new camera, i have been practicing action shots using burst mode and all the cool features I am not used too nor good with. But I did catch Hank in a neat running position.. (oh and figured out that whole hyperlink thing...will start using that to show you their pedigrees) It isn't centered or up to some people's standards (genjip..talking to you!) But I was proud of my first attempt.

But he is still doing well. He is a true attention hog which makes petting 4 dogs with 2 hands a difficult feat..but being that Hank is a big boy..he tends to win.

Thursday I am heading to Fredericksburg to go to a wine tasting event with Kristen, Gyeong and Aubry. It should be fun! I have tomorrow off...must clean up after the bathroom explosion that occurred while painting. ;-)

A lot to catch up on...

Ok..I suck. I have not blogged in a long time and it wasn't 100% my fault. My idiocy is not necessarily something I can control. I had a temporary brain fart and couldn't remember how to long in to my new blog. So I spent a week annoying the eblog help desk until finally I figured out I am stupid and have killed way too many braincells. BUT I am back and ready to roll. This will be a long blog so be prepared. Let's start from where we last left off, shall we?

Christmas..what a whirlwind! First, Hank did not go to his intended family. He simply didn't fit them even though he is quite a sweetie. So we still have him. More on him later. So we sent Hank to a dog sitter and packed everyone else in the wagon and off we went to see Santa claus. We went to Roanoke for my parents' Christmas celebrations..where my mom found elf ears and thought they would be cute....This is Truflz (groan..) the incredible spoiled Shih-Tzu and Dana..the incredible spoiled but still looks like an actual dog greyhound. ;-)

Then we loaded everything back up (including a new camera-Canon S3 and a food saver among other gifts) and went to Charlotte for Jason's family fun.

They had bought a new puppy...a miniature version of Dante. And it was cute..a weasel but cute.

Her name is Baby (groan) and we hope she works out well with Jason's parents...they have a habit of allowing the cuteness to wear off way too early when it comes to pets.

We finally left for home (with a 19 inch Dell computer monitor and automatic grinder/coffee maker in tow..among other things) and started prepping for a New Year's party. Kristen, gyeong and Aubry came down with their load of greyhounds and we had an additional 10 or so friends stop by. We had a wine tasting party..which basically meant we acted like adults for about 1hour and pretended to know something about wine and then proceeded to kill a few more of those aforementioned brain cells by swilling way too much wine. But we made some neat appetizers and had a lot of fun. Stella always manages to find her way on the couch..no matter how many times we tell her it is for human use only. She is funny....but we love her!

But we all got together and made it to New years! With a pop of two corks (notice I caught one in mid-air!!!) it was 2o07....my how time flys. But a new year brings more fun and more fosters!

Now..Hank. He is such a sweetie but a big goofy boy. He is VERY active and loves to play a lot.

He also loves his toys..his favorite game is wait until mommy puts all the toys away and then grab one at a time and carry them in to another room. Repeat this process until the toy box is empty..pass out from exhaustion.

We are still looking for the right home for him. But I think it will come along in no time. He roos with Dana which is quite hysterical. He has a really low bass-like voice and Dana has a high pitched alto-like voice..which makes for an interesting song. ;-) He and Dana play really well. He is absolutely the craziest greyhound we have had...I seriously think he has a screw loose.

(disclaimer: Dana had JUST had a bath that day and we had not put her collar back on..but she was NOT left unattended outside and it was only for a few minutes)

At this point, we are hoping to do a home visit in Hampton sometime soon..and this applicant might work for Hank.

I have put a bunch of new photos in My family folder and a few new ones of hank (click on the yahoo photos link on the right and pick a folder!)

And I promise not to wait this long again to post..this has taken me forever to get caught up! Enjoy the pics!