Finally! A place to put all of my jewelry!

Ok, I just had to share something I am super excited about! I don't know about you, but I had the hardest time finding a place to fit all of my jewelry. Especially now that all of my necklaces are long. Not only did they not fit, but they would get tangled, earrings would get misplaced, and then I forgot what I had because I couldn't see everything. They just didn't fit! So I was surfing the web for some ideas to help me organize my jewelry. And I came across something fantastic! So I had to buy it :) It just arrived the other day and I had to put it together all by myself because Greg was gone on one of his trips. So here it is! My jewelry organizer...

                              What? A mirror?

You might just think this is just some ordinary mirror, but wait until you see what is inside :)

                                    Tada!

This is my new jewelry organizer! I was so surprised how much  jewelry I actually had once I could see it all together. If you look to the right of the organizer you can see my old jewelry case. I can't believe it all use to fit in there (actually it didn't really fit, it was more crammed than anything).
Maybe I need to get more jewelry just to fill in the extra spaces ;)

Fostering

Greg and I have been foster parents for dogs since April of this year through the Collin County Humane Society. We absolutely love it, but it has been some of the most challenging and heart wrenching thing we have done so far.  The dogs we take home with us each have a story of their own. The first two puppies we fostered were called Lily and Rocky. They were 6 week old Australian Cattle Dogs that were surrendered by their owner to the animal shelter.

                                                                              Lily

                                                                        Rocky

These 2 were such sweet puppies! Now, when dogs and puppies are surrendered to the shelter they are automatically put on the list to be euthanized very soon. The sad part, is that the owners are told this and they give them up anyway. That is when emails are sent out with pictures of all the dogs about to be euthanized and different rescue groups step up and take these dogs into their homes and help them find a permanent home with a GOOD family.
These 2 puppies were so sweet but a LOT of work! When someone was interested in them it was a bittersweet moment when we gave them up. But we were happy that they got adopted together.

The second dog we took in not too long after Rocky and Lily were adopted was a shar-pei lab mix we named Toby.

                                                                          Toby

Now when we got Toby he was a skinny, scared, and unsure little dog. We could tell this would be different from cute playful puppies. We knew Toby had been through a lot in his young life. It took a long time for Toby to finally warm up to us. He got sick a lot when we first got him and I think that helped him see we were nice people and were here to help him. We didn't think we would have Toby for very long, because the puppies got adopted within a week of us getting them. But the days with Toby turned into weeks and weeks into months. We have now had Toby for 4 months now. It is amazing how much a sweet little dog can grow on you when you have had him for so long. Not only were we able to get him over being sick, but he went from a dog who didn't trust anybody to a wonderful happy dog. I like to call him our blissfully happy dog because I think he truly knows how lucky he is.
While we still had Toby, we decided to add another foster to our crazy animal house. So we took in a CUTE hound/lab puppy named Jack.

                                                                            Jack
He was such a cute and fun little puppy. He had tons of energy and loved to play. But he was also one of the most calm puppies I have ever seen! He would love to just lay in your lap and take a nap. He recently got adopted to a great family!
So we still had Toby. And by this time we were really considering adopting Toby because we had just fallen in love with him. So one night I was really thinking that Toby would be here forever, then I wake up the next morning to an email with an application for him. And to be honest my heart just sank. I was not ready to see him go. But tonight, Thursday, I took him to meet this family that is interested in him. And wouldn't you know that are the nicest family? They were so great with him even when he was acting so scared. So I told them I would send in my thoughts and they should hear back from me soon. I think I cried almost the whole way home. I knew when we went into fostering that it would be so easy to get attached to dogs. Especially ones like Toby where you see them grow so much! But I never knew it would be this hard to give them up.
But we keep on fostering. We just took in a beatiful chocolate lab named Allie. She has only been here 2 days and already has 2 applications from families interested in her. So I won't get to know her too well, but maybe that will be for the best!

                                                                            Allie
                                                    (Sorry this is obviously from my phone!)

I still love fostering and it is such a rewarding experience. I just wish it weren't so hard!
Of course, I should probably mention our own crazy dog, Charley. I think he has loved having dogs in our house more than us. If you haven't met Charley, he is a VERY social dog and LOVES everyone and everything he meets. He has been great through all the changes and has made lots of new friends I am sure :)
I'll leave this with a photo of our sweet puppy who is not much of a puppy anymore :)

                                                                         Charley








                                                                     

House Projects

It has been busy over at the Parks' house! A good busy, though.
I am on summer vacation from school now and I love having this time off to get things done that I am too tired or don't have enough time to do during the school year.
Greg and I moved into our house in February of 2010. We love the house, but had some "upgrades" we wanted to have done to it. So this was the summer to do that.
The first of the "upgrades" we had done was in the back 2 bedrooms we had these horrible lights (without a fan) that gave off no light whatsoever. So, the first thing we wanted to do was add a fan with a light that actually gave off light (what a concept!). And anyone who is from Texas knows that a fan is a MUST in the summer months. So here is our new (bright) fan. We can finally see how nice the room looks. :)

 The next thing we had done was our under cabinet lighting. I am sooo excited about this one! I never knew I would be so happy about lights, but I love them!
This is just a sampling of the lights, but they are oh so pretty :)

 And because I am in the kitchen on our "tour" here is some decoration that we have recently added to the top of the cabinets (All from Hobby Lobby-my favorite store!)

And now, for the final touch. We have saved and wanted this for quite a while now. Our new stone landscape in our front yard. The benefit of having a small yard (beside the fact that it takes all of 15 minutes to mow) is it wasn't too big of a hit in the wallet to have all the stone work done. Next week we are having some up lights put in. This was all done by The Patient Gardener. They really did a great job!

The Beginning

Hey all! I am just starting out on this blog adventure :)
So come along with me as we take a walk in the park!