Weekend nesting

Ahh, such a relaxing and productive weekend!  Our first winter nor'easter storm arrived today.   Cold, windy, rain and then snow that is sticking.  Not enough  to shovel, just enough to blanket the ground.   Loving that new fireplace today!  It was just enough to get me blasting the Christmas music and dragging out the decorations

The stocking are hung a little early but I just felt like getting the house holiday-ready.   (Note to me: I need to remember to hide the extension cords before I take pictures).  And I even got my tree up

Abby is being fairly well behaved with it so far, except  for the gold flowers on the bottom.  She really wants to have them.  We are working on it.   The rest of the weekend consisted of binge watching Gilmore Girls.  

Oh, it was worth the wait of all those years waiting for that final season.  I so missed Luke and Lorelau.  I even managed to resist watching the last 5 minutes first so I could finally discover those famous "last 4 words".    WOW, I think we need another season to explore THAT cliffhanger.   Hope you all had a great weekend and my American friends are still enjoying thanksgiving leftovers.  

Abby and the renovation

I'm happy to report Miss Abby is acting more like her frisky self today.  She was much more playful, although playtime is shorter she still brought me a toy to throw many times today. 

You know she's serious when she delivers the toy butt-first.  Poor rabbit.  Lol.  I'm so relieved she is getting better.  And special thanks to a sweet reader Carolyn who emailed me Saturday morning with her experience with this and poodles.  Seems HGE is most common in miniature poodles.  (Of course). It helped a lot and I'm so grateful she took the time to reach out.     Now, the renovation of the living room is as done as it's going to get before Christmas.   This was my best friend - the rented steamer

It helped a lot with getting that gawd-awful wallpaper off of the wood panelling.

I think I'll be finding little scraps of wallpaper for months.   What a flipping mess!

Then it was time to fix a few spots with drywall compound, sand and then time to prime.

The task of filling in all those lines with primer was sooooooo tedious and the first coat just got sucked into that old wood so it needed a second coat of primer.  I should add here that my attention span for projects is about 3 days.  This took 6 days!  Ugh, and then painting out the woodwork was worse but I kept going. Finally the color was applied, furniture moved back and then the fireplace arrived!   I assembled it this morning.   

And after 2 years of living here I finally hung my funky martini painting.  There is still trim that need another coat of white but that will wait.  Now I'll just kick back and enjoy the room as it is for awhile. Now all I need to do is find a spot for the Christmas tree.   Maybe next weekend it will go up.  

Sick baby

I had planned on updated you on the progress of the renovation but that will wait.  Poor little Miss Abby is sick.   I came home Wednesday from work and the den(her room) was covered in a mess, bloody diarrhea and then there was another pool of just blood on the other side.   I freaked out.  It was a significant amount of blood.  I thought she was dying!  I grabbed her and we raced to the Vet Clinic.  After a series of tests everything was fine except she had a fever.  We worried there might be an obstruction inside but X-rays were clear.  Thank God!  It seems it is some kind of gastrointestinal infection.  We came home with 3 prescriptions and some special canned food.  

I put one of my old flannel sheets in the dryer to warm it up and she curled up.  Yes, I know......spoiled.  She seemed better yesterday but then it happened again this morning and at noon, but less blood (but still a lot). The Vet told me to give the meds another day and just feed her a minimal amount for a bit.  But if she gets worse to bring her back.   So far tonight she's OK, just sookie and clingy.

She scared me to death!   I know some of you saw this on Facebook so I thought I'd do a quick update.  Thanks for your concern. 

About the girl

A dear follower Kelley brought something terrible to my attention.....I finally blogged after a long absence and completely ignored Miss Abby.   I'm a bad mother.     Well, Miss Abby is certainly happy to have me home more.  "Please throw the toy a thousand times Mom"

 And she feels since I've been gone, I should be extra generous with treats and bones.  Clearly one bone at a time is unacceptable.  She needs two at a time

Lots of extra walks are also important lately.  She's even pulling less on the leash (but she still attempts to eat anything she finds on these walks).  But she just so darn cute

Just back from the groomers and another walk and it's time for a little nap.  "Don't forget to fluff my pillows Mom"

Hyperactive

So it seems I have having some difficulty winding down since my extra work is done.  I thought I would just relax and veg out for a few weeks.   It's been the opposite.  I have been just going nuts with project after project.   I cleaned the siding on the house, painted window frames, dug out all the flower beds and added new topsoil, purged and organized the garage and basement, reorganized the closets and drawers, rearranged my bedroom.........you get the picture.   Ugh!!   I'm definitely in winter nesting mode.  I've been watching all those home improvement shows and getting the urge to do something to the house again.  One room I haven't really done anything to is the living room, where I spend most of my time.  So I used some of my extra pay to buy a new small electric fireplace for this room.   I think it will make it cozier.  Here's a pic, it should arrive in a week or two

I mentioned to a friend that I was contemplating re- doing the living room.  They convinced me to wait until after the holidays.  I didn't need another big project right now.    Well......I don't know what happened  this afternoon. I just lost my mind and started ripping off wallpaper.

So there is no turning back now!    So I have to ask you......what kind of IDIOT tears apart their only entertaining room a mere few weeks before the holidays??  Honestly I don't know what I was thinking.  Perhaps I was thinking I'm sick of looking at this drywall patch for the last 2 years

Yes, I said 2 years........sigh This wallpaper is a pain in the ass to even get the top paper layer off.  It won't come off in nice big strips, just little scraps.  I'll borrow my neighbors steamer on the weekend and finish.  Then I know I'll have to fix lots of sections of the walls before I can even apply the primer.    This was a really stupid idea.