House improvements

So the hubs and I have lived here for a little over 8 months now and have done a little remodeling. I figured I would post some before and after pictures of our work!

This was our backyard before and after. We took out 13 trees, about 8 inches of dirt/roots, and added an extended patio.

This was our fireplace before, it went all the way to the ceiling. Below is our living room after, still waiting for the Hubs to build me a mantel though!This is our front yard the day we moved in, and then our front yard for Christmas time.

Notice our newest Christmas decoration, the hunting Snowman? He was a must have!

On a side note, I am home sick today but one thing that makes it better is having the fire going and hearing the crackling of the burning wood.

Pizza muffins

Tonight the hubs is working late so I was on my own for dinner. I decided I would make one of my all time favorites pizza muffins. First I put biscuits into a greased cupcake pan.

Then I add in whatever toppings I want. Tonight it's pineapple, pepperoni, and red peppers.

Then add in whatever pizza sauce you prefer, I used Boboli.

Cook the muffins for about 5 minutes longer than what the biscuit recipe calls for and POOF! Pizza muffins!

I will be enjoying these with my Dixie tonight, doesn't she look comfy?

Doggy Pills

So since my last post alot has happened with our Jewls. I hated keeping her in a crate, especially a small one since she chewed through the door on her large one and we had to start putting her in a smaller one. So I tried to leave her loose in our guest room. First few days everything was great! There was still alot of drool by the door, so I figured she spent most of her time there but no damage, until day 4. I noticed the blinds were a little chewed up, but it wasn't a big deal and we were getting rid of them anyways. Then on day 5 the blinds were demolished. Day 6 was the worst.... She ripped up about 5 sq ft of carpet from the door! So that room is completely shut off from the world until we replace the carpet. We had to go extreme with our dog and make her an outside dog. The only option we had was to buy a large 10x10x6 dog pin. So Michael went out and paid alot of money for a pin and we put Jewl's dog crate without a door in there and toys and water and thought that this was a pretty nice set up for her. So we left her alone one day and a couple of hours later we got a call from our neighbor that apparently Jewls had chewed through the chain link fence! We knew something was seriously wrong so we called the vet and they said that Jewls had SEVERE SEPARATION ANXIETY! So now she is on Xanax, and seems to be doing ok. We are able to leave her loose in the house and so far she hasn't done any damage!

Doggy Troubles

So my husband and I have 2 adorable dogs. We have a 2 year old mini daschaund (Dixie) and a 1 year old black lab (Jewls). When we got Dixie we started leaving her in a crate while we were at work to avoid any potty accidents while we were gone. Then when we knew she was potty trained we tried letting her roam the house when we were gone, hoping that she would just sleep all day. That didn't work, she pulled up carpet 2 times and that was the end of that. Back to the crate she went. Then we when we got Jewls a year later we still had Dixie in the crate, so without a thought we put Jewls in a crate. Once Jewls was potty trained we had a doggie door installed and tried leaving them alone in the house. That worked really well for about 6 months! Then about 2 months ago when my husband and I were on our honeymoon she ate 2 couch pillows, just the zippers. Then nothing happened for about another 6 weeks, and in the last 2 weeks she has eaten 2 more pillows again the zippers, chewed up some carpet and chewed the zipper on a couch cushion!! We don't know what to do with her. We know that the couch cushion was her because it is the kind that is attached to the couch and was flipped over the couch and Dixie can't reach up there. So we know it's Jewls! We don't want to have to start putting her in the crate again, so I tried this morning taking her for a walk/run we we woke up to see if she just has pent up energy throughout the day. Hopefully this works....

Why is it a NO???

Hello all, I am coming on here to vent for a moment. So I've been recently trying to see how my husband and I can improve our home enough so qualify for a larger refinancing loan and I had the thought of updating our cabinets. They are almost 30 years old, and while their quality is still good, they are just and old style. (I will post pictures later). So I brought up painting them, and immediately my husband shuts my idea down saying he will never have painted cabinets. He would rather pay alot of extra money to get a full set of new cabinets! I am not ready for a remodel like that, but I'm not sure how we can update those cabinets otherwise.

Until next time,

Ashley

Wedding thanks you's done: 0 :(

Working Out

So today is my first day writing on my new blog, and it came about when I was looking up information of others getting fit for their wedding days. I wanted to find a place where someone else was going through what I was going through. When I didn't find that, I decided to create one myself. So today is Day 1! So today I was able to stick with my 6 small meals starting with oatmeal and a banana for breakfast, 1/4 blueberry bagel with 1 tbsp of cream cheese for snack (probably not a great meal, darn work meetings!), tomato soup with 10 whole wheat crackers for lunch. Worked out: ran 1 mile at 6mph, walked for 25 minutes at 3.5, 10 minute at a a high incline. Then did strength training for 30 minutes (mostly arms for that strapless!). Came home and ate a yogurt and string cheese. For dinner had 4 oz. of pork chops, but they were breaded and fried :(. Also had a 1/2 cup of broccoli with cheese sauce. For dessert I met a friend at Baskin Robbins for the 1$ scoop night! I only had the kid size though! My weight this morning was 137.4, which is higher than it has been the last couple of days. But I'm still hopeful. 124 days until "I Do", so I still have time to get in shape.