Super Bo(red)wl

Last night I ate so much Cowboy Caviar. Too much. Probably thousands of calories.

Don't forget the Parmesan Baked Potato Halves with sour cream.

Or the classy cracker tray with cheeses and hummus.

Or the burgers grilled to perfection by our handome husbands.

Or E's muddy buddies that we ate by the fistful. Yikes.

That's how the Holdaways and the Findeis' do the Super Bowl.

B and the Beard shouted and analyzed, but me and E spent our time more wisely with Pinterest and Forever21.com. (These photos courtesy of E's Instagram.)

Glen Coco was LOVING the Puppy Bowl. He sat in front of the TV, even standing up to get closer to his little canine friends.

See that banner above the TV? Made it. That's right. Don't die of shock. I crafted something.

Don't be that impressed either. The hearts were from the dollar bins at Target....

Baby steps you guys.

6 Months for you, Glen Coco! You Go Glen Coco!

Sunday was Glen Coco's 6 month birthday!!!! Yeah. I'm one of those people. But, no, I didn't make him a pup-cake. It's real.

**To read our post when we first got Glen check here**

I can't believe he used to look like this.

But now he looks like this! (Notice the sock he's {unsuccessfully} trying to bury)

Man we love this little guy. Our little family just revolves around him. He's getting all puppy pad trained, not biting and slowly cutting down on the crazy barking. He's extra cuddly and he's learning tricks!

He even made it onto Dogshaming in his first 6 months. Pretty accomplished. Even if it was post-scary-haircut.

Not to mention I love that the Beard loves him. We got him knowing he'd be for me, and the Beard was reluctant to even have one. But fellow Beards bonded and now they are fast friends. :)

 

Two bearded goofballs in a pod. 

Try to tell me this isn't the best picture you've ever seen. 

Likes

• Stealing & hiding socks (see above)
• Sticking his butt in your face
• Eating leaves, paper, anything
• Playing fetch
• Our big blue blanket aka Glen's nap spot
• Humping his panda pillow pet (sorry?)

Dislikes

• Cold snow on his sensitive little paws
• His Darth Vader Halloween costume. It was a little too big and scared him so bad. So it'll have to wait until next year. :(
• Baths
• Waking up
• Lettuce
• Milo (the upstairs neighbor's Bernese Mountain dog. Same age as Glen, 50x the size and very VERY friendly)
• Vacuums & Washing Machines

Hilarious things he does:

When I'm asleep or reading or otherwise occupied, he gets his toy and drops it right on my face.

 Wake up Mom!

When I do yoga he attacks my ponytail and jumps on my back. Challenge Level: 10. I'm going to try to get some video because it's comedic slapstick gold.

When I'm asleep he sleeps above/against the top of my head on my pillow, and gets pissed if I have to change position.

When he knows he's in trouble he looks up at us with sad eyes and tries to nuzzle. It works.

When he jumps off the couch he leaps like he's trying to fly.

When I hide under a blanket and "cry" for him he wails and whines until he can find a way under the blanket. 

When we are eating he tries to catch the food between our plates and our mouths.

Boy, is he perfect. 

Meet our Fuzzy Little Boy....

Hi! My name is.....

GLEN COCO!!!!!

At 0 lbs. 14 oz., 5 inches tall and cuddly as a puppy ever was... He's perfect! We got him one week ago and he was just over 4 weeks, which is pretty early. We're lucky.

I'm borrowing this likes/dislikes thing from Katie, who does this for her baby... is that wrong? He's sort of OUR baby. We send pictures of him back and forth and just gush about how cute he is all the time. So yeah. We're THOSE kind of parents. 

Likes

• Pooping on the sidewalk, not the grass
• Jumping on mom's face (hence the scratches, if anyone's seen me in person lately)
• Chewing on dad's Sperry's 
• Hanging his feet out the side of his kennel

Favorite food - Danica's hair

Favorite napping place - deep within the cushions of our couch

Dislikes

• Being left alone when he knows Mom & Dad are in the other room
• Loud noises like doors slamming, diesel trucks and loud music
• Chewing on a chew toy when there are fun things like shoes and Dad's ears to chew on instead

Come visit him! You'll be as smitten as we are. :)

Puppy Time!

It's finally happening! After all of these years! I'm going to have a little shih-tzu of my own. Don't worry. No one could ever replace my Blade. I'll love him forever and ever. He was my first, as they say. Still, I've wanted one that's all mine. Well, and The Beard's.

I've been looking more seriously in the past week or so and called on a few KSL ads, but nothing really came up. I just had the feeling that it would just HAPPEN. Like a stork dropping one off on my doorstep.

On Friday, The Beard and I were pulling into the mall when we saw a lady on the corner with a "Puppy for Sale!" sign and a cute little puppy guy running around with her kids. We whipped around to talk to her, and as we were stuck at the light we watched some JERK in an Isuzu pull up and buy the puppy. The lady pries the puppy out of her emotionally compromised 5 year old's arms, and hands him through the window of the Isuzu, and SHIZ HIT THE FAN.

The little girl became completely hysterical. We're talking gnashing and wailing, sackcloth and ashes, drama. She's punching her mom, screaming and thrashing while her mom tries to calm her down. It was traumatizing and hilarious.

Later we had a few hours to kill before meeting up with the Porter's for date night. We pulled into PetSmart because I was getting puppy hungry, but it just made me sad to not have my own. We took a random back road to Target because, well, it's Target. As we're driving down this random back road, we see a sign that says "4 Small Dogs 4 Sale." We pulled over. Obvs.

The house looked less than perfect suburbian material. Still, we navigated the debris in the front yard to the door. When we asked about the sign, the wife looked surprised.

"Wow! Yeah we have some puppies. They're only 4 weeks and we usually don't put the sign out until they are ready, but my husband said 'Hey, let's put the sign out early!' so it's funny that you came by."

Prayer WORKS you guys. 

They had 5 little shih-tzus, 4 that we got to play with. I melted completely at the sight of baby shih-tzus (see crazy blonde in the photo below), but the big surprise was The Beard. He instantly went for "Tank," the chubby little black puppy (the puppy Ryan is holding on the left, two below). I really liked the brown little girl puppy but he crushed on Tank hard and fast. And you can't say no to true love, people. He is the cutest little (fat) puppy and we did want a boy. Perfect match.

We're total goners for this little guy. Now, we can't go get him until he's eating on his own, in about 2 weeks (fingers crossed for less!). Did we go straight to Target and buy puppy stuff including but not limited to a dish, bed, leash and collar?

We're not CRAZY. (We are.)

Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes!

After Jeanette tweeted obscurely about new life changes, Katie and I got on her case about writing a blog post to update us all on her exciting summer plans. At school and following graduation, I've been getting a lot of questions as well. Our lives have changed dramatically in the past month, so I suppose an update is in order.

I have been interning at Mapleton Junior High as a 9th grade World Civ/Geography teacher for this entire school year. For those of you who aren't familiar with the Education program, basically this means I'm a slave. I have my own room and teach my own stuff  (read: not a student teacher), have to attend a million more meetings and work on two different portfolios, all while getting paid half salary. And the sickest thing about it? I still loved it. :) However, what is less than lovable is that I am not guaranteed a job. Our school lost 3 FTEs and a Geography teacher from another school in the district put in to transfer here. They couldn't hire me. It's been a pretty stressful few months looking for jobs and really just grasping at straws. I used up the remainder of my few personal days to drive all over the state for interviews, checked websites constantly, pulled my hair out....

Finally, I was offered a job at Sunset Ridge Middle School! They are a pretty new school, and they are doing some amazing things. They are a National School-to-Watch, which I think is super cool. I'm really excited to be a part of it. I'll be teaching half 9th Grade Geography and half 8th Grade US History.

In case you haven't already googled it, Sunset Ridge is in West Jordan. Clear the freak out in West Jordan. Like against the copper mine. Like the edge of civilization. It's 70 minutes from where we live right now - hence we have started looking for housing in the Salt Lake Valley!

Conveniently, although scary at the time, The Beard's branch of Online Image in Orem shut down the day after we heard about my new job. They offered him a job at their Murray branch once they move into a new office building with enough space in June. He decided he didn't want to wait around for that job, so he started applying for other jobs. He was offered several and finally settled on Larry H. Miller Dodge/Lincoln in Provo! We're pretty excited about him as a car salesman, especially because he doesn't have to be obnoxious or pushy or deal with the finances at all. He just gets to ride around with people in new cars and make friends. Any of you who know The Beard know how great he'll be at that. :) Also, we're both in the market for new cars... so it couldn't come at a better time!

So my school year ends on Friday, we'll move up to Salt Lake somewhere (any ideas people? We're already liking Daybreak a lot) and The Beard will be able to transfer to one of the 40+ dealerships up north. I'm hopefully going to get a puppy next week when I'm officially free. How cute is that little guy? To think I could have my own... I get to excited just thinking about it. It's working out pretty well.

It will be weird to leave the Valley. It will be sad that I can't just drop in after school to visit my Blade. And family... I guess. :) It will be weird to move somewhere and know no one in the neighborhood. It's weird that  we're actual adults and our lives are changing. This could be a permanent Salt Lake life for us.

But we're so excited! The crazy and rapid turn of events actually relieved us because we can see the Lord's hand in all of it. We're so grateful to still be within an hour of our families, have good jobs and of course, each other! As long as I have The Beard... life is wonderful!