Safety first.

Today's post is my public service safety advice.  I thought this was something that everyone (especially us safety concious women) would know, but it amazes me how many people still do this.


Photo found here

GPS.  We all have one (well, except my mom, who still prints out Google Maps), especially up here in the DC area.  Whether it's integrated in your car, you have a portable Garmin or TomTom, or use your iPhone/Droid, most of us use our GPS system around town.  And most of us have a "HOME" address saved.

You should NEVER use your actual address as the "HOME" saved location.  If a thief steals your keys, and jumps in the car, turns the GPS on and pushes home, it'll take him straight to your HOUSE!  And, most likely your car key and house key are on the same keychain, so now he's sitting at your door, with your house keys, and knows you're not home. 

I have my "home" address set as a major intersection just down the street from my neighborhood.  I usually only use the home button when I'm downtown anyway, just to get me going towards northern Virginia, then I know the rest of the way - so there's no need to have my exact address programed in. 

Please - today - change your "home" address in your car, your husband's car, your parents' cars - to a public place or major intersection.  You don't want to give a bad guy turn by turn directions to your house!

California wine country

In less than a month, husband and I will be flying to SFO and making the hour trip north to California wine country to celebrate his 30th birthday.  We have a huge number of American Airlines miles, so our flights cost only $10 each.  Seriously, $10.  That's like free.  We couldn't NOT go.

Have you been to wine country before?

 We love it.  Love. It.  This will be our 5th trip to Sonoma/Napa.

There's something about driving north out of San Francisco, and as you crest over the hill out of Marin Country...the everyday life stresses just drift away.

We have plans to do Sonoma, Anderson Valley, Bodega Bay, and Napa.  We are taking a cooking class at the Culinary Institue of America (CIA).  We are having brunch at Ad Hoc with great family friends who live in Sausalito.  We will have dinner at Redd, Petit Sirah, and Rosso Pizzeria.

We are visiting lots of new wineries that we haven't been to before...

As well as revisiting some of our very favorite places.

We have our habits down - buy wine shippers early, stop at Costco and the Bottle Barn to stock up on wines we can't buy on the east coast, and take shipping tape with us.  Go to the store for bottles of water and some snacks for the week when we first get to town.  Share tastings so we can taste more wines and go to more places in a day.  Drink beer (or water?) at night so we aren't completely sick of wine by the end of the trip.

Have you been to California wine country?  What are some of your favorite places?

Thank goodness for doggy daycare webcams

It's been over 3 years since we brought home our furry little bundle of puppy joy...she was 8lbs and 9 weeks old.

And since then, we've definitely had an adventure.  She's a trip - she's so smart and really has a great personality and is definitely crazy.  We have loved having her, as do her Grandparents and Cousin Pearly. 

For a while we were taking her to dog daycare about once every 2 weeks or so...and she'd sleep for a couple of days afterwards.  We really like Dogtopia, and it's great exercise, fun playtime, and good socialization for her.  But over the last 6-9 months, we just haven't been as diligent about taking her.  Husband's office moved, and there really isn't a convenient one for us. 

Cady's been getting a little growly lately with some of the neighborhood dogs, growling and getting fussy with them when we're out on walks.  We decided it was time to start taking her back to daycare regularly again, for so many reasons. 

Since she's been a little aggressive lately, we wanted to do a re-evaluation instead of just dropping her off and acting as if nothing was wrong.  And it's a good thing we did...

Cause she failed.  After about 20 minutes and time with 4-5 different dogs, they brought her back out to us.  The woman working with her said Cady was very scared, and was using the growling as defense against the dogs.  She was doing ok with one for a little while, but when the dog came up behind her, it really scared her. 

Luckily, they did say she's fixable!  Just not on a Saturday.  Since the place was packed with pups for the day and weekend, we looked at the calendar and picked another day that wouldn't be nearly as busy - so we went back on a Tuesday. 

I was a little nervous at first, being that overprotective mother.  But, everyone working there knew her story and were waiting for her when we dropped her off.  Also, having the webcams was definitely comforting - I was able to check in on her throughout the day to make sure she was still playing in the room.  They had her in the Lounge with all of the big dogs - this picture doesn't even show half of the number of dogs that were in there today!  So much for a slow Tuesday.

We picked up our exhausted puppy dog that evening, and she was asleep before we even got out of the shopping center.  She's not cured, but I definitely feel more comfortable walking her around the neighborhood after her day of playing.  And we have promised each other to keep working on this - we're going to take her regularly to daycare to both keep her socialized and let her have a fun day out of the house! 

Also, the girl who saw her on Saturday gave us the name of the trainer that they work closely with, suggesting we have some sessions with her so we are better equiped to help Cady get back to not being so scared.  I don't want to have the dog in the neighborhood that no one wants to say hi to, or have her be scared of other dogs all the time.  There are easily 5 or 6 dogs on our street alone, so she needs to be friendly with all of them. 

We've also decided that we need to invest in a new collar, so she stands out among all of the other black dogs at daycare!  I had a bit of a headache from staring at the webcam all day...what about this one?


Photo from Amazon

 

Too much?

Girls night in!

Every few weeks/once a month, a group of my girlfriends in the area try to get together at someone's house.  It's a great, easy, relaxing, inexpensive and comfortable way for us to see each other and catch up.  Everyone brings something to eat and drink and we gab and laugh and tell stories and laugh and catch up and laugh for several hours.  This spring has been crazy full of weddings (May 21 and July 9), showers, birthdays, baptisms and bachelorette parties, so we haven't had our 'traditional' low-key girls nights in a while.  I offered to host our most recent one last week, and it was (as always) great fun.

 

You can tell it's summer with all of the Pinot Grigios that the girls brought

So many yummy dips!

I made a delicious bruschetta with crispy ciabatta bread - I can't seem to get enough of the wonderful ripe tomatoes lately! 

New this time, I had all of the girls bring books that they've recently read to share.  While I found that some girls don't actually read books, others do - and we had a great collection to trade!

Also, as our group continues to grow, we have a new squirmy addition to the evenings!  Friend Hillary brought adorable 11mo old Chase with her.  He was so cute in his pjs, snuggling here with Auntie Kristin.

As always, so looking forward to our next girls night.  It's a great time for us to recap what's going on in each others lives, fun summer trips we're taking, who's dating what new boy, what funny things has the baby done, and just be girls together.

What do you do with your girlfriends when you get together?

Put me in Coach!

Our alumni chapter has had a softball team for the last few years, and I've been dubbed the head cheerleader.  I'm just not the softball type.  I go to several games a year, I cheer, I take pictures, and I hang out at the bar afterwards, but I don't play.

Until now.

I have always told the coaches that I'd come and play an inning if they needed me to - the rules of the league we're in require a certain number of girls playing at all times or you take a forfeit.  Well, being a team player and not wanting that to happen, the time finally came after 4 years of cheering the team on to suit up.  Once arriving, I got a couple of quick lessons on batting, catching, and what happens if I get on base.  When I say I've never played softball before, I wasn't kidding.

So I played catcher...and even caught a foul ball for an out!

I batted...and got on base twice because I was walked...and swung and missed a few times, too...and entertained the team with my golf swing-esc attempts...

And overall had a great time!  After each game, the Coach and Captain award the MVP of the game.  They present an Elon baseball batting helmet to the MVP, who autographs it and then is required to wear it to the bar for (most of) the rest of the night.  Yep.  You guessed it...

My friends awarded the MVP of that night's game to me...for my softball debut.

I proudly wore my helmet for (most of) the rest of the night, and answered all of the stupid comments from players on the other teams who also go to the bar afterwards.

Coach and MVP

It was great fun to 'suit up' and play with the team.  At least I can say that I played softball in DC in the summer on the grounds of the Washington Monument.  But, I do think I'm better suited to be the Head Cheerleader.  I'll be resuming my role next weekend at the 15th annual Capital Alumni Network Softball Tournament.