He is Risen!

Happy Easter! My sister was home from Berkeley for spring break and we wanted to celebrate Easter together with the family. So Paul & I invited them over to our house for a Saturday BBQ (and to meet Dodger for the first time). We cleaned the house and tidied up for the occasion, practiced commands with Dodge, and took him out for a looong walk before. He even got a bath at daycare. Haha.

The BBQ went really well. Dodge LOVES having visitors. He can be a bit crazy for the first 5 minutes of greeting, but he eventually calms down. Our trainer told us that he can’t be allowed to “meet” people unless he is sitting quietly on his bed… but we haven’t quite gotten to that point yet. Of course he was the star of the show.  My parents kept calling him “Dodgers Stadium” in their cute Korean accents.

The food itself was delish! Dodge enjoyed hanging out and being fed dog treats and carrots… so many carrots. He’ll probably have orange poop for days. And he only tried to snag a steak once after everyone had left. Good thing I caught him red-handed!

Then, today we went to Sovereign Grace for Easter service and Paul got baptized! It’s something he’s been thinking and praying about for a while, and it was just perfect timing. It was a huge blessing to witness this.

We also had dinner with my family at Chosun Galbi on Sunday night to celebrate my cousin passing his RN test.

All in all, a great weekend filled with good food. And most importantly, remembering our Savior’s death and resurrection.

“Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died, he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives, he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.” –Romans 6:8-11

A Doggie Whirlwind

Sorry about the hiatus – This past month has been a whirlwind! Since bringing Dodger home, we’ve had to completely re-jigger our schedule and take on a few extra responsibilities

The first thing we did was enroll Dodger in doggie daycare at Canine Retreat (and The Wags Club for late days, since they’re open until 9pm). He loves it there, they love him, and it’s been great for socializing him and tiring him out! They even post fun videos on their FB page so we can watch while we’re at work.

We also started his private training sessions with Rebecca from Dog’s Best Friend, in preparation for him to take the Canine Good Citizen test. So far, so good! She uses positive reinforcement techniques, and we’re just hoping to work with him a bit more on his following commands amidst distractions, not jumping on other people, and loose leash walking. Overall, he’s a happy, friendly, loving, silly boy, and thriving fast with us at home!

The hardest part of the past month has been getting used to having a dog in the house. For those who know me, you know I am crazy OCD when it comes to being organized and keeping things clean. But with the shed fur, slobber, and dirty paw prints that come with a dog (especially a 1-year-old lab that doesn’t sit still), my standard of “clean” has diminished greatly. Plus, I’ve been traveling for work over the past few weeks, so I haven’t had any time to really clean the house in a while. But I think it’s been a good change for me. I needed to loosen up a bit and enjoy living life without worrying about the little things. Just, don’t look under the couch the next time you come over

Meet “Dodger” – Our Newest Addition

Yesterday marked a very important milestone in our lives. Paul and I adopted a dog! We had been talking about it for several months now, and we started visiting shelters a couple of weeks ago, but we just didn’t connect with any dogs we saw/met.

Until yesterday.

This is Dodger. When we saw that this pup was available for adoption at Adopt & Shop, we jumped at the chance to go meet him. A 1 year old labrador retriever mix?! We figured that he would already be taken, but HE WASN’T!

He has a bit of attention deficit disorder, and he’s VERY playful, but he’s learning pretty fast now that he’s home. He was originally called “Daryl” in the shelter, but we changed his name to “Dodger” and he’s sort of responding to that when we call him. He’s housebroken and already knows his commands (just has some trouble focusing enough to follow them through), so with some consistency and extra obedience training, hopefully he’ll pass the Canine Good Citizen test so we can start taking him to work (we both work in pet-friendly workplaces).

In the car ride home. He loved sticking his head out the window

It’s funny, I had originally wanted a smaller dog, but Paul loovees labs, and he eventually convinced me that I love labs too. So we’re both pretty excited that we found this awesome dog. He’s got kennel cough from being in the shelter, but he’s taking medication for it, so it should go away soon!

Welcome home, Dodger!

Rugs: A Unique + Modern Upgrade

We recently added a couple of things to our living room to make it feel more bright, colorful and complete.

Before:

After:

We’d been looking at rugs for a while, and everything we saw was grey or brown, boring, and drab.  But right as our cold feet started to protest, we found this Maples Medallion Collection rug at Target for $80. Yay!

And can you spot something else in the living room that wasn’t there before? Hehe. My awesome colleague, Deva, made the Labbit portrait for me using 4 separate canvases. I LOVE IT!

We also added a rug to our laundry “room” (which is technically just an open addition to the kitchen). I want to do more with this room… just not sure what yet. I do love all of these cute laundry decals on Etsy, though…

Can you tell we love color? Some people might think it’s crazy and distracting, but we like crazy and distracting

It’s a Deviled Eggs Kind of Night