Find Sam a Home

One recent afternoon, the whole family was chillin' in the living room when Miguel noticed a person approaching our door.  He quickly asked me to remove the dogs from the room as to avoid the excessive barking that typically follows a knock on our door.  Our female, Delilah went into the bedroom without a fuss but our male, Samson wasn’t so quick to move from his position on the couch.  After persistent commands were given without response, I approached the dog to shoo him off the couch and into the other room. As I got within a foot of him, he turned and snipped at me aggressively.  I jumped back and Miguel was shocked! Now, I wasn’t quite as taken back by his behavior as this was Samson’s third time exhibiting this action towards me in recent history.

Now that Miguel has witnessed the dog almost bite me, he realizes I wasn’t over exaggerating when I told him about the previous snipping incidents.  I know that I was partially to blame for his angry responses towards me, however, in this house and around my children, snipping is not allowed for any reason; especially one as trivial as me wanting a trained dog to listen to me and get off the couch when instructed to do so.  This left us with a big family dilemma: what do we do with Samson? Do we just keep going on trusting that he will simply keep warning us but never actually bite? Or do we recognize that he is a dog and you can’t really ever trust them? 

Miguel and I agonized over what to do for about a week when I brought the subject up to my parents (which I knew better than to do).  I was immediately chastised for not getting Samson out of our house the second he acted aggressively.  My father said something along the lines of, “I don’t know why you’re even giving it a second thought” and “you know the right thing to do”, which implied that we should send Sam to his resting place.  I tried to explain that we didn’t believe that was the right option for our family and we were trying to find an alternative that is best for everyone. 

That evening I cried and cried as Miguel and I continued our discussion.  I was so sad and angry that our sweet dog was getting grumpy and we had to decide whether or not he could spend the rest of his life with our family.  He has shown zero signs of a health problem being the root cause for his actions or any pain/discomfort of any kind.  He is a healthy and spry guy at his estimated 10 years of age. In the past five years since Miguel and I rescued him, he hasn’t so much as growled at either of us until about two months ago.  It was the same scenario as this last time, I went to shoo him off the couch and he went to bite my hand.  Since this has happened three times, I can conclude that the dog doesn’t like to be booted of the couch.  What if Salem went to move Samson instead of me? Or if Piper surprised him while he’s napping on the couch?  Can we, as responsible parents and guardians of our children, keep a dog that now has a history of shady behavior under the same roof? 

Ultimately, we decided that we would rather be safe than sorry and Samson was taken to the kennel while we search for a new home for him.  My dad suggested we take Sam to his place in order to give us a chance to talk and think without having to look our dear dog in the eyes.  He has been gone since Sunday and the house feels quieter.  Salem asked for him once on Sunday but hasn’t since then, which is both nice and sad.  Although I love Samson and have for nearly five years, I believe in my heart that it’s best for all involved if we try to find him a new home.  I can’t trust him anymore and I wish more than anything that I could so we wouldn’t be dealing with his fate this way. 

And we thought he was the nice one!

Walking Jordan Pond in Acadia National Park in Maine

Walking on the lakeshore in West Virginia

Merrier times!

Sam with Piper and Sara on Saturday, his last day at home with us.

I’m putting together an ad for craigslist and I will be getting a hold of the Springer Rescue to see if they can help.  This decision was one of the heaviest I have had to deal with in my adult life and I find myself struck with sadness at random times.  If you know of anyone who needs a companion and likes semi-grumpy older male springer spaniels, let me know!  He really is a sweet dog and I sincerely doubt he would ever actually get to the biting point, but you can never really know that for sure.  What would you do if you found yourself in this position?

New Year, New Me

I suppose the New Year has something to do with the recent fire under my butt. Perhaps it’s more of a combination of factors at play; Miguel is working two jobs so he’s home less, my kids are growing crazy fast and I want to document more, I miss having a social connection with the outside world on a regular basis, I have finally/recently come to terms with me and I want to hold myself accountable.

Recently, I discovered ME; as in me, I, yo.  For as long as I can remember I have been living in a conflicted state of being.  I have always felt the need to create, to work with my hands and my heart but I have pushed myself towards trying to find a more lucrative career.  I have trouble finding satisfaction in ordinary jobs and therefore have had LOTS of them.  With every new step I take towards something I believe would fulfill me, I run away with my tail between my legs.  My fear of failure has kept me from succeeding yet I also fail because of my fear of success. See the conflict?

So I came to these conclusions:

1)      I am a dreamer.  I am ‘that’ friend.  You know, the one who always has some hair brained idea that she shares with passion yet she never follows through.  The friend who means well but just can’t seem to get her shit together career wise.

2)      There is absolutely nothing wrong with being a dreamer and I should keep my mind open.

3)      This year, I resolve to live my life for me and to follow my heart.  To no longer allow outside voices to dictate what is appropriate for me or my family.

4)      Time to use my creativity for a bigger purpose and to allow that side of me to flourish.

5)      I shall embrace my differences and count them as strengths rather than weaknesses.

As you may be able to gather, until now I made a lot of excuses and refused to take full responsibility for myself and my downfalls.  As my children grow, I realize that I may be setting them up for failure to, unless I change my ways.  I’m a firm believer in leading (parenting) by example, so if I want to raise holistically successful children, I had better start living by the same expectations.  Really, who doesn’t want to be fulfilled in all areas of their lives?

Return

Last time I posted anything, I was just a few months pregnant and now here I am with a 3-month old baby! Crazy how fast time can fly. In recent days/weeks I have had the pleasure of being introduced to some new blogs and it kinda got me in the mood to start writing again. Although the life of a stay-at-home mother is far from glamorous, I do find that perhaps I have a few things to share with the world. So, even though I'm sure I won't have the ability to post daily and perhaps not even weekly, I am determined to start trying! That's right internet.... I'm baaaaack! And here is a picture of where most of my energy goes:

Ideas

Since we have been back in CO life has absolutely flown by and I am really questioning the purpose of it all. Miguel and I have been slaving almost every moment of every day, never really getting a day off. I can say with absolute honesty and a bit of desperation that we HAVE to find a better way. This is not how I imagined my pregnancy or journey into marriage and motherhood.

So, I have ideas. Good ideas. I just need to be smart about how I take those ideas and formulate a plan. So be prepared to have your mind blown, because soon, very soon, things are going to change for good!

The Scariest Halloween Ever!

Miguel and I spent Halloween Eve in Salem, MA, which I have always wanted to do. We were at the very beginning of what was planned to be a year-long honeymoon filled with travels of the U.S.

However, on October 31, 2009 we discovered that only four weeks after our wedding, I was pregnant. This day will go down in our history not only as our 4-week anniversary, but as our scariest Halloween EVER! I'm still flabbergasted as to how this happened (not the birds and bees part, but the timing and all). How is it I went from a carefree, traveling newlywed to a mother-to-be in just a month's time? Needless to say our trip had to take a serious turn. We went from the northeast to the northwest (by southern route) in about two weeks and ended up back in Colorado.
Currently, we are struggling to find employment, living in my parents' basement and simply trying to hold on. Thank goodness we have each other for I don't know what I would do without my Miggy. So here I am, a thirty year old wife and soon-to-be parent asking myself, "what happened?" Talk about expecting the unexpected and being forced to be flexible.

Failed Dreams-Just Another Stepping Stone?

My whole life I have felt as though I was failing at something. Then last year, I decided to snap out of that mindset and make a conscious decision to chase my dreams and stop worrying about failure. Although 2008 was filled with complete insanity, I was able to gain valuable experience as a baker and feel a sense of true accomplishment. Oh how quickly we can be knocked off our cloud!

Yesterday I was unfortunately slapped in the face with a serious dose of reality (for me anyway). Since early November two colleagues and I have been pursuing a dream of opening our own wholesale bakery which was to use natural and local products. Everything seemed to be going great, we had prospective clients (some really big awesome ones), we catered a gig or two, we had our name out there, a website ready to go, business cards printed, etc. However, I was struggling with some of the financial aspects of the business plan so I sought outside expertise and attended a meeting with said professional yesterday.

Now I know everyone has made some mistakes in their life, especially in their 20's. However, I made mistakes so often it was almost my form of art! I filed bankruptcy at the tender age of 24 and since moving back to Denver, I have attended two schools and switched jobs almost every six months. I think its safe to say here that I do not look so fantastic on paper and sadly, this is America where we are viewed as a number.

That being said, my informational meeting centered around the financial aspects of opening a business. I wanted the cold, hard truth and I got it. My counselor was a super sweet older and very wise man, who actually had a ton of faith in us and our concept. When I left the meeting I was flooded with an immediate sense of failure. It became apparent that if my name were to be on any of our documents, finding funding now or in the future would be next to impossible. Now to add to my financial misery, Miguel has been working two jobs for sometime now and has been supporting me as I chased my dreams. The poor man is exhausted and its my fault.

I called the Fiancee and we discussed the situation and the truth of the situation is, I am in NO position financially to start a business. I owe $50,000 in student loans and I am currently working under 20 hours a week for $9.50/hour. Not exactly paying any bills with that. So we came to the decision that I need to work full-time and hopefully I can save up some money and try this whole bakery idea again when I get my shit together.

The worst part of all of this was calling my partners and crushing their dream along with mine. I felt/feel like a total asshole and couldn't apologize enough. But, what is done is done and now I have to hit the pavement and find a job (along with the 40,000 other people in CO). Ugh!!!!!

To those of you who had your heart set on Butter Baking Collective, I will still be doing the small gigs on the side as I have been doing for the last 3 years. But, unless some super charitable millionaire out there wants to throw some cash my way, now isn't the time. BOO!!!!