Yesterday – March 24, 2006 – was Scott and my fifth year wedding anniversary. It went by fast! We are pretty darn happy together – and then adding Sammy to the mix made it that much better!

We went to visit our little puppy – Baxter – yesterday, before dinner. He’s gotten so big – and we just saw him on Monday! It was a nice visit – although something tragic had happened this past week to one of the puppies. Where the puppies are at is a kennel/day care for doggies – and I don’t know how, but one of the kenneled/day care dogs got a hold of one of the puppies – and killed it… I know, it broke my heart too. I just wanted to hold Baxter tight and bring the little fella home – where I can trust he’ll be safe. There was another puppy adoptee there and she was concerned about her puppy as well. But, we talked out our fears and figured that it was a freak accident and they (the owners) will be a lot more careful with the puppies (we have our fingers crossed). We were more concerned that the two litters equaled 12 and now there are only 10 – one was killed and what happened to the other one? The owner said the other puppy went home – the only reason this brings up a question is that we were told that we couldn’t bring our puppies home until they were 8 weeks old – at least. I just hope that other puppy is safe…

After we were finished freaking out – we sat down on the cold, dirty cement floor and played with the 10 puppies. They were all over us, biting us and just being the cutest little puppies ever! There are still puppies that need homes (hint, hint)! The other lady and I came up with a great idea – we are going to crate train our pups, so we are going to bring in the puppy stuff in Monday.

This way our little puppies can have a safe haven and be able to eat their food inside their crate – not having to fight 8 other puppies for a bite of food. The other puppy owner and I have the smallest, thinnest puppies out of the litters – they are also the calmest puppies and don’t really want to fight for food. So, we are going up Monday to see our little Baxter again! YAY!

After visiting our little Baxter – we went to the best grocery store ever, Trader Joe’s! I cannot say exactly why it’s the greatest – but it is full of fresh and organic foods. They also carry a lot of foods from around the world. They are a little expensive – but it’s well worth it. Scott is the kind of person that’ll go to five different stores just to get the best deals – and he has no problem shopping at Trader Joe’s and spending the extra cash for the better quality foods. (Hey – Mr. Naughty Pants – where were you? I bought some more burritos – yummmm!)

Then we went across the street to Macaroni Grill for our 6:30 reservation. My mother met us there – we had picked up my niece from school and took her with us to see the puppies (where she had a blast running around in circles as the puppies ran after her!). We got to the Macaroni Grill a few minutes early and when we checked in they gave me a buzzer and asked me to wait! They have a card that says, “RESERVATIONS – no wait, your table is ready, relax.” Yeah, I had to wait with Sammy who was all over the place – there was no seating because the restaurant was full, so I was standing and I was really tired – we were not relaxed! When my mother and Scott asked why we were waiting when we had a reservation – they said they were waiting for the people to leave (at the table they wanted to seat us). Well, I like to linger sometimes after I have finished eating – so I couldn’t get mad. They sat us and the evening went really well. We got good food – had a nice conversation and the evening ended with the hostess singing opera (something about an anniversary – I didn’t hear what it was about, because I was too busy trying to get the camera ready to record her beautiful voice.) They brought us a chocolate cake (oh my god – it was so good!) – it was a nice dinner.

Then – we went over to PetCo and bought Baxter a bunch of stuff! A pad for his little kennel – a yummy little bed – a few toys – a couple feeding dishes and a collar. Sammy picked out the collar and one of the toys – but when we got home we realized the toy Sammy picked out never made it to the check out – he probably threw it out of the cart. So, we have an excuse to go back and get the toy that was lost and a name tag for our little Baxter’s collar. It’s going to be hard to wait another 4 weeks to bring Baxter home – but it’ll go by quickly.

We have had a good five years thus far – and I expect another awesome five years (plus sixty). I know we have had stress on our marriage – but we have never once thought of ending what we have. The stress has never been us – but outside stress (such as insurance not wanting to cover me because I was married… yeah, stupid). We were able to work past that hell and I know we’ll be able to conquer anything that comes at us. We love each other – have an awesome little boy – life is good…