The Cone of Shame

Our snow melted slowly but it is all gone now except for a few tiny patches from bigger piles. I'm glad to see it go! And last Friday was the BIG day for Milo. We decided to get him fixed and originally, we thought we'd have to wait until he was 6 months old, but the vet told us in November that we could have it done any time. After his last shots in December, I scheduled him to get fixed the end of January and last Friday was the day. Just like humans before a surgery, he was not allowed to have any food past 10pm the night before but he could have water. Everything went smoothly. We dropped him off at 9am and picked him up close to 4:30pm. We also decided to have him microchipped, so if we ever lose him, then he can be scanned for our information to get him home again. He came home with "the cone of shame". We actually did not put it on him until after we got home because there wouldn't be much room in his kennel. He looked so sad and pathetic. The post-surgery instructions said that they might seem depressed and he certainly did. They also sent home 3 pain pills that he only took once a day. 

 

Charlotte was good to keep him company and helped him hold his chew bone.

"I do not like the cone of shame".  (The line from the movie "Up" from the dog named Dug)

Charlotte had also put on her own cone of shame from a game that we have (Exploding Kittens) just to help him feel better and like he wasn't the only one. Unfortunately, I was not able to get a picture of her. Alice took a turn with it also and once again, no picture. It was so cute though. It's been a little rough this week because he's not allowed to run and jump or get dirty for 10-14 days. We have to put a leash on him and take him out to go potty. I'm just glad that it's still winter and that he's not missing out on much since it's been raining. If things look good, I think we should be able to remove the cone on Monday but for now he has to wear it 24/7 because he likes to lick himself and we can't have that causing problems.

While Milo was at the vet, the boys had an early release because it was the last day of finals and the semester. Jack's friend Caleb, and his mom and brother came over after school so that we could do some party planning. Jack and Caleb share the same birthday and so we're having a combined friend's party. We originally planned to have it this coming Saturday the 3rd but then we found out that the boys and most of their friends have band stuff going on (ensemble/solo competition). They also have pep band (playing for basketball games) Friday night. The following weekend we'll be in Idaho. Fortunately, Jack had the idea to just do it on Wednesday the 7th because the boys have early release at 10:30am. Their friends will just come over right after school and hang out and play games for a few hours. We'll have the family party and opening of our gifts on Sunday the 4th, so it works out perfectly.

Here is a picture of the two hand warmers that I made as testers for our activity days activity. The yellow one was made out of felt and the other was cotton, I think. The felt was just a little too thick and you have to warm it up more to feel the heat, so we decided not to use anymore felt. But I gave it to Charlotte since it's her favorite color. The gray one I wanted to see how it would go with hand stitching it together around the outside. It took too long and I liked the look of the machine sewn better, so I let Alice keep that one. She decided to give it to a friend. These two were the original size from the pattern I found online but Sister Gale made a slightly bigger one that we did for the rest of them.

Charlotte wanted to make some for friends and so she got to do a little practicing at home before the activity. We also went to the store to pick out a color for one of her friends, Wesley, because he wanted green. She ended up picking out a dinosaur pattern because he likes dinosaurs.

Finally using her machine again!

Monday was the activity and I think it was a hit. There were 13 girls there, but we had 3 machines going. I helped with my two machines and Sister Gale had hers. She also sent the girls home with a fleece scarf that they had the option to cut the ends of it or not. She left that up to the parents to help if they did want to cut them. Sister Gale got pictures of all of the girls after they finished their hand warmers. She sent me the ones of my girls.

While we were shopping for the dinosaur fabric, Charlotte saw some wooden cutouts that you can paint and she really wanted to get a cow and paint it for her teacher because her teacher loves cows. I told her she had to promise to actually paint it and give it to her if I were to buy it. And she did!

She did a pretty good job all by herself!

I know this next picture is late, but I had Curtis send it to me since he took it on his phone. Sometimes I have a difficult time finding the pictures that people send me when I go to copy it to my computer, but I finally figured it out. This is from my birthday, but I love it and had to share.

We had our final weigh in on Sunday for our biggest loser competition. I did not make my goal but the fact that I still lost weight over the holidays and all of the birthdays is a big success. I lost about 7 lbs. It was a very close race between Curtis and his brother Ricky but Curtis came out as the winner by 0.3%. They both lost 26 lbs though, which is amazing! My mother-in-law lost enough weight to be able to stop taking insulin, so that was awesome to hear! It was a good competition and we all lost some weight (about 120 lbs combined). Unfortunately, Stillman and Michelle had to bow out early because they just had too many things going on to think about it, with their son Alex going on a mission and other stuff. We talked about taking a break and maybe doing another competition later this year. And we're going to check back in 6 weeks to see how everyone is doing. The competition ended up being between us, Ricky & Jenna, Gaya, Shauna and Aubrey. It amazed me that Ricky and Jenna could still do so well when they were busy moving from Alaska down to Boise and had to live with my in-laws for a little bit. They were both committed and both of them met their weight loss goals. Curtis and they were the only ones to reach their goals. Overall, it was a positive experience and it helped us to keep ourselves in check, especially over the holidays.