Poor Unfortunate Soul

So you know when you see something happening and you can't do anything about it, and random words come out of your mouth while watching the event?

Ray's brother and his wife and kids are visiting, and they decided to sleep in the playroom last night. And to preface, we actually have two staircases in our house (and no, we don't live in a big home, there is just a staircase at the back of the playroom that goes down as well as one in the middle, I know, kind of confusing). We always use the back staircase from the playroom because it has a door at the bottom that we keep shut so that Tootles doesn't come upstairs when we aren't home (because THIS is what she will do). The other staircase has a baby gate at the top that hasn't been removed since we moved in. It keeps Tootles from coming up, as well as keeps me sane as I fear Audrey's roaming at night would land her at the bottom of those hardwood stairs.

Instead of walking through the playroom, I decided to lift the kids and dog over the gate this morning. Dog first, which as I was doing it, I realized I should have gotten over the gate and pulled her over. I got her over the gate, and she kind of landed on her side and THEN PROCEEDED TO ROLL DOWN THE ENTIRE SET OF HARDWOOD STAIRS.

Unfortunately now I can't help but laugh as I type that.

Yes, she's fine. I just kept yelling "No, No, no, NO" as I watched her roll. But she got to the bottom and stood right up and walked away. I have no idea how she wasn't hurt, but I just called to check on her, and she's fine.

For Free

Anyone want an overweight but kid-friendly Dachshund? She goes by the name of Tootles. This is what she did to the carpet in our playroom while we were gone this weekend:

And this is how she feels about it:

Tootles - The Dog

Tootles has finally earned her very own picture-worthy post.

Basically documenting all the damage she has done in our house (forgetting the rug we discarded from our family room) (oh, and the rug we had in front of the front door).

The window ledge she chews when she is pissed we are outside and she is not.The first Christmas we had her, we had a small party, and one of the kids was scared of dogs. We locked Tootles in our bathroom, and she obviously was pretty pissed. More bathroom damage.

But she has definitely become part of the family. It's been about 1 1/2 years since we rescued her, and she is now gets really upset when she thinks someone is hurting one of the girls, especially Audrey. I had to put her in the garage last Sunday when Audrey had a playdate with one of her friends.

Let's just hope the damage remains minimal.

I have THREE children (well, really four if you count Ray in the equation...)

So yesterday I was working from home. At some point, I was upstairs doing laundry or something, and I heard our dog Tootles yelp and whine. I didn't think anything of it as she often whines when we are upstairs during the day (we only let her upstairs at night after multiple bathroom accidents on her part).

I go back downstairs, and she is laying on a pillow on the floor, which is sort of odd and she is normally a permanent fixture on the back of our couch. I go back to doing some work and think nothing of it.

And then I go to walk her. She is slow to get up, and when I try to put her harness on her, she yelps like I hurt her. Not good. She labors through the walk, not running in parts like she normally does.

I call Ray when I get back inside since I was about to leave to take Ashley to piano and he was coming home to get ready to take Ashley to Myrtle Beach. He takes one look at her and decides she needs to go to the vet. A call was made, but they couldn't see her until this morning. They gave us an emergency number to call just in case.

Ray and Ashley leave, and Tootles isn't doing much better. A friend stops by, and she whines and walks all crooked to her (Tootles is a dachshund). But after sitting in my lap for about 10 minutes, she jumps up and runs perfectly normal to her food bowl.

Well, huh. Did she pick up some drama tips from my girls or what?

I carry her upstairs at bedtime, and this morning, she promptly jumped off my bed and went down the stairs. Then she jumped on our couch, which is a pretty big feat for her as it requires her to take a big start from across the room.

I really needed to be at work this morning, so I called the vet and they said that she probably just hurt her back somehow yesterday and resting it last night helped. They said we could bring her in anytime next week to have her checked out. (Plus, I still have my head cold and sounded kind of bad on the phone with them, so I am thinking they didn't want me to come into their office and get them sick...).

So yea, dog = another child to stress about. Thankfully she seems okay, but unfortunately since we rescued Tootles, we aren't sure of her age or her history.

Nice start to a completely cold, rainy weekend. And then I let Audrey paint my fingernails last night, and forgot to take it off. I look lovely today.

Tootley Bugs

I often forget to mention we have a dog. She wasn't a puppy when we got her, so she really doesn't make that much work for us. Unless you count the time she ate the plate of cookies or when the week Ray was in Atlanta she peed on his pillow. And yes, I did toss that in the trash.

The kids love her. I mean really, truly love her. Ashley begs us to let Tootles sleep with her, but Tootles is sort of attached to sleeping in our big bed where she burrows under the covers and keeps me feet warm. We have affectionately started calling her Tootley-Bugs.

And thanks goodness Tootles is a good dog, because the way Audrey is with her sometimes is a little rough. Audrey pretty much gives her hugs that choke her, and tends to hit her instead of petting her.

Tootles has made a home on the back cushion of our chair. It's the only thing I don't like, that darn dog is ruining the cushion.
See the choke-hold Audrey has on her?

But still, Tootles was a great addition to our family. Even if she does pee on Ray's pillow.

We finally figured it out...

So Ray and I just figured out something, and I was laughing so hard I was crying...

Ray picked the kids up early from school yesterday to take advantage of the good weather and took them to a park. I got home and started dinner and decided to make a quick batch of chocolate chip cookies as a couple of neighbors were coming over to play and I have been wanting to make this particular recipe.

So everyone comes over, cookies are shared, everyone leaves, and about a dozen cookies are left on the kitchen table...

Let me just remind you we have a Wiener dog, Dachshund, small dog, that is not supposed to be able to jump much.

So I do the bedtime routine with Audrey (which I won't bore you with the details, but it took 2 hours, so much for watching TV anymore) and Ray puts Ashley to bed. Ray gets to go back downstairs and enjoy TV without me and looked for the cookies. He looked in all the cabinets thinking I had hid them as they are completely his weakness. He can't find them, so he gives up.

Flash forward to 1:00am. Tootles, the lovely dog, normally sleeps like a log at night in our bed, under the covers. Instead, last night she spent two hours pacing, breathing heavy and annoying the living crap out of us. Ray took her out once, I took her out once as well as giving her some water which she inhaled.

I look for the cookies this morning, and wonder where the hell Ray put them. I was going to take one to work.

I didn't think about them until a few minutes ago. I remembered that Ray was going to be late tonight, so I called him to see where he hid them.

He didn't. He wanted to know where I hid them.

Do you see the light bulb going off??

No wonder Tootles had issues last night, that DAMN DOG ATE MY COOKIES.

The Newest Member of Our Family

For the past few months, we have been in search of a dog. We had pretty specific wants - a small to medium dog, older (aka already house trained) and good with kids. One of Ray's clients rescues dogs, and ultimately, this is where we got Tootles...(not the best picture, Ray was taking them...)We think Tootles is a full breed Dachshund, but we aren't sure, and it doesn't really matter. She is a great dog, doesn't bark, good with Ashley and Audrey, small and doesn't really shed.

And this is Ashley's first reaction.

Ashley is used to one of our neighbors dogs who is big and jumps on her all the time. Ashley warmed up quickly though. And Audrey? Watching her with the dog is hilarious. She goes from sheer joy to excitement to terrified to mad in the matter of a few seconds. She is so excited about the dog, but then we the dog puts her paws on her, she gets a little scared. And then she wants Tootles to just sit so she can pet her, and when Tootles doesn't, she gets pissed. She spent much of the first evening with Tootles chasing her through the house yelling "DOG, DOG, WAIT". It was quite cute.

Tootles is definitely a lap dog. She wants to be on someone at all times. And we were told she likes to sleep with people. Ashley wanted Tootles to sleep with her the first night, so she made a bed out of blankets on her floor. Ray went to read Ashley books, and Tootles got a little excited and ended up peeing on Ashley's blankets. I asked Ashley if she wanted Tootles to sleep with her when Ray was done reading to her, and her answer was an emphatic no. I think she was worried Tootles would pee on her. So Tootles slept with Ray and I, or rather me, as she slept on me most of the night. Then last night she slept more with Ray, which was nice since the dog had gas...ah, to be a pet owner again...