Birthdays and milestones!

My little 11/11/11 baby is officially 2 months old!

And has officially learned both 'sit' and 'stay'!! Hooray Penny!!

Puppy update!

We taught Penny a trick!

Puppies, panic attacks and motherhood.

This morning I woke up to Penny crying very loud and very panicked. I bolted out of bed like you do when you wake up an hour late for work or a test and felt a small pang in my chest as though I had had a small heart attack. I scrambled out of bed and ran downstairs so fast that I'm amazed I didn't break my neck (is a sudden increase in coordination part of the Mother-Bear adrenaline rush?).

Somewhere within the 45 second time frame, she had stopped crying and the sudden silence was even more terrifying than the jut wrenching cries. I dropped to my knees and yanked open her crate, half expecting to see a freshly dead puppy and what did I see?

She was perfectly fine. Wagged her little tail and wobbled out of her crate and over to her food bowl.

I sat on the floor dumb-founded for a few seconds, trying to put my heart back in my chest. Then realized what had happened. She had taught herself that when she cried, I came running. Thus, when she wanted to get out of her crate at 5 AM, she needed to cry like a dog shaped banshee. I had inadvertently trained my dog to give me heart attacks.

It was in this moment I realized I am 100% not ready for children. And I have a deep admiration for every single mother out there. Seriously. I don't know how you do it. I think I would have a panic attack every time they scraped their knee and God forbid there were ever any broken bones. I feel the need to call my own mother and apologize for being such a sickly and accident prone child myself.

Lucky for me, I was snapped back out of my thought bubble by her peeing on the carpet right in front of me. So we went for a walk around the neighborhood while it was not only raining, but still dark. Potty training is going well. Thanks for asking.

The good, the not-so-good and the adorable

Well, finals week is finally over. I passed everything with flying colors, scored my first 4.0 since high school and got into that class I need for next semester! That means about 5 months from now, get ready for some cap and gown pictures you guys cause I'm graduating!!!

One degree down. Two to go.

So after the torture of finals week, no time to even sleep none the less blog, I treated myself to a few days of fun that included more than my fair share of beer, a mini vacation and making time for the friends I haven't seen in almost a month.

There was also cake and perfect Florida weather involved.

But over the weekend before finals hell week, I actually had a few interesting experiences and marked multiple things off my 30 before 30. Some of these things were just as awesome as I expected them to be but some of them made me realize that out of 30 new goals... some of them are bound to be not what I was expecting them to be.

The bad: volunteering at a museum. Well.. I shouldn't say bad. Just, not what I was expecting. Had I been given a job that consisted of more than being a "greeter" I probably would have liked it more. But I wasn't, so I didn't.

I wish I had been back here.

But instead, I was here. Passing out brochures.

Luckily, that weekend I got to do something super awesome! I saw my favorite band again! I maybe more than a little obsessed with them... This makes the 5th time I've seen them in concert and I've loved life every time.

It also happened to be my first out-door music festival! he day was long, fun, perfect temperature and wonderful!!

And last night, my best friend made Penny a a Christmas scarf. You can tell by the look on her face that she loved it. (sarcasm...)

If I only had the time...

I've been such a bad blogger the past few days guys... Forgive me? But between finals, fighting a seemingly loosing battle to still graduate next semester (Surprise! You need one more class! Second surprise! It's not offered again till Fall 2012!) and wrangling a puppy has me at my wits ends and I just can't wait for this week to be over. I should have thought about this ahead of time and did a call for guest posters. We'll just file that idea away in the For-Next-Semester category for now!

So tonight I'm taking a break, blogging, having a glass of wine and making baked mac and cheese. More studying can wait until tomorrow, my sanity however, cannot. I didn't have the free time to pull together a true top ten Tuesday so how about this time we go for a few less links and a few more puppy pictures?

• I want to be friends with the blog lady over at Vintch just in hopes that hear heart is as lovely as her writing.

• Danfredo's trash the dress!! Need I say more?

• Jackie Magpie makes me long for my month of freedom from classes even more. If that's even possible!

• Mastodon bones found in my home town? Neat!

• The first man functionally cured of HIV.

Why studying has become an exercise in patience.

And the only time I actually get any of said studying done.

Penny!

I had a full on post planned for today but then this morning, something magical happened.

Penny's breeder called and asked it we wanted to take her home early!!!

So instead of a post, here's a breakdown of Penny Lane's (our new Pembrooke Welsh Corgi) first day home!

The ride home

Driving lesson!

Meeting her big sister

Post-first bath time

Passed out after being coddled by everyone in Pet Supermarket

On naming our new family member.

Guess what!?

We have a new family member on the way! A furry family member that is. She's a 2 week old show quality Welsh Corgi! Her parents owners have fallen on hard times and decided to give this litter of pups away fro free rather than getting papers for all of them. I have always wanted a Corgi. Always. And Nick's amazing co-workers not only told him about this little darling but then convinced him that she would make the perfect Christmas present.

I say Christmas because she is too young to actually come live with us at this point. But that will not stop me from picking out names, buying toys and cute collars and essentially spoil her before she even knows my face.

So excited!

So the first order of business was of course a name. Now I don't know if you ever tried to name something but everyone and their mother has an opinion on what it should be.

My friend Dana wanted to name her Dana.

Nick wanted to name her Guinni supposedly for Guinness but I'm pretty sure it's due to her strong resemblance to a guinea pig in the only picture we have of her so far.

Don't worry, by the time we get her she will look more like this:

Her name was Pippa, Cuppy and Agnes. She was named after food, drink and English Queens. I thought about waiting to see what her personality was like. Then I got too excited and started making up names again. We thought about going with what the owners of the parents had named her…

I took pointers from Jenna Marbles.

Something that can be shortened into an EEEEEE sound. Got it.

And then my friend Katelyn suggested Penelope. Penny for short. 

And it stuck.

So check back next month for the first of many adorable picture posts of baby Penny experiencing so much for the first time! A new house and a big sister and cats! Oh my!!