Since when did our home turn into a destruction zone?!

Seriously.  I sort of need to vent a little.  As y'all know we got Callie the middle of December and have now had her 5 weeks.  And we still love her and she is super cute and adorable! -MOST of the time lol. I'm posting a lot of pictures with this... not all of them relate at all to what I'll be venting about! I just wanted to share some cute pics of her so you know we still love her in spite of everything!

We do still love her!  She's adorable. I like this photo of Cody with Callie from Christmas.

The first week she was calm and gentle and mellow... it was great!  The second through third week she realllly started to adjust and become herself.  And it turns out that 'herself' is very different than how she was the first week.  And that's okay, just she has turned out to be QUITE the handful.  Let me tell you...  I was telling my mom on the phone today, I now often feel frustrated and stressed with her/because of her, and it takes 3-4 times longer to do almost anything that it did before.  She isn't a huge dog, but she definitely isn't a tiny dog either, yet she thinks it's perfectly fine to crawl (or jump) up into our laps when we're at the computer. And well, here are all the reasons it is NOT FINE with me:  1)  it HURTS my legs! -Especially my still sore and bruised area. It really hurts. 2) I can't reach the mouse or keyboard. 3) I can't see the computer screen.  So basically whatever I was doing on the computer, I can no longer do.  And she doesn't even just sit or lay in my lap... she tries to climb onto the computer desk or the end table we have by the futon.  I think you get the idea.  Cody thinks it is super cute how she does it though, and it is while she's crawling up... but once she gets up, it's no longer cute. It hurts!  But so she will come up to you on the computer chair, first put her cute face in your lap, then nudge you, and then proceed to slowly inch by inch crawl her body up on top of your lap. I guess I'll say that whenever it's Cody at the computer and she slow crawls into his lap, it is cute and also funny. When it's me... not so much lol.

Out and about on a walk through our apartment complex.

Also, whenever I need to shower, she isn't trustworthy enough yet to let her run around the apartment, so I have to lock her in the bathroom with me.  Well, at first this was no big deal at all.  However, it did not take long for her to figure out how to push the shower curtain back... and well that creates a huge mess as water sprays out and she often tries to jump in.  So now as I shower, I have to watch her constantly and whenever she makes a move toward either end of the shower curtain, I have to step on it and pull it tight so she can't move it, and then wait for her to give up and lay back down so I can finish in the shower.  It makes me feel like I am trying to juggle or something when all I needed to do was wash my hair.

She looooves the tennis balls!

And of course we still have the potty issue.  Fortunately she has gotten much better in some aspects of it.  She now consistently goes when we take her outside (yay!) and she has not gone inside lately when we're home at all.  The problem comes when we're not home. It doesn't matter whether we're gone for 30 minutes or 4 hours... even for just fairly quick trips out, she goes to the bathroom inside while we're gone.  We think it's from separation anxiety and that stress, but we don't really know what to do about it!  Any tips anyone??  We did buy the potty pad things... and now leave those out with her whenever we leave.  She uses them ... about 60% of the time.  So I guess that's better than never.  Actually, normally she somehow half uses them... so we have a partial mess on the very-convenient-and-easy-to-clean-up pads, and still half the mess on the carpet.  Again, any tips anyone??? Please do share!

At the dog park!  She loves to run around and play with all the other dogs!

And yes if you didn't notice... one of the first times we took her it was already almost 6 and therefore quickly got dark and we were soon by ourselves.  We still had fun.

Lastly I'll talk about the general destruction zone that has overtake our apartment.  Somehow slowly things have gotten out of hand in the general tidiness of our home since we've gotten Callie.  Of course there are the little things to be expected... her hair having shed everywhere, her toys now always spread out on the floor... what we weren't expecting as much as just how everything now is always disheveled.  For starters Callie LOVES and has practically claimed the living room papasan chair.  She loves to jump up and sit in it with a toy, loves to jump in and out of it when she's super energetic (which is almost always), and well, it's a papasan... not super steady.  So it is never upright and how it should be any longer. It is constantly toppled over and covering the entire living room area and often blocking the area where we would walk into the kitchen.  You would think... it's like a 3 piece set... so pick it up, no problem. You're right... we can easily put it back together and back in place -except then she immediately (and I mean IMMEDIATELY) jumps back into it, knocking it over AGAIN. We have left it to it's new home toppled over on the floor for the last week.  But that added to knocked over bar stools (knocked over from the papasan hitting it), her toys and balls, random food pieces, the pillows knocked to the floor, blanket pushed off the couch... well it's hit a point where I wish we could get our apartment back! -And have it back for more than... 5 minutes, if we're lucky.

She is cute and can be super sweet. I do still love her in spite of how she is now such a handful!

Anyways.  Enough venting.  I'm done for now at least.  Don't get me wrong, we do love her to death and she is super cute and adorable.  She is very loyal and sweet (when she wants to be lol).  She's ours now and there is nothing else to it... I guess I just need to adjust to a disheveled home!