Meet Gerald

  Andrew and I have talked about if and when to get another dog for quite some time now.  We kind of decided to wait till the end of next year because I wouldn't have my hands so full with a new baby and rebellious toddler.  After getting here though, Andrew suggested getting a dog here because it would be easier potty training on hard floor and easier on our home back in Florida to not be peed on constantly. So my search began.
  After a week of constantly searching, I finally found an available breed we would be happy with. I called up the owner and arranged a time and place to meet. Truth or Consequences is a town 2 hours south of us that was halfway for both of us.
  We had a fun day planned at their museum but the lady bringing the puppies woke up with a fever and body aches. When she called to tell me I was bummed to have to drive further but she sounded so awful on the phone I wasn't upset at her. We ended up meeting her daughter in Las Cruces.
  They had three male puppies to choose from. Andrew's caveat with getting a puppy was that it be a male so we can name it Gerald, after the sea lion in Finding Dory.

  I thought it hilarious and readily agreed. The first two puppies out of the kennel were SO tiny I was afraid for what could happen if we took one of them home. The last puppy hiding in the back of the kennel was the size of the first two puppies combined. Thank heavens. After saving the life of the puppy Ellie was holding, twice, we gave back the tiny puppies and took the biggest one home. 

Kate and Abby were delighted to help our puppy drink and have a few bites of food.

 Daddy was happy to meet the little guy, too.

During the drive home Ellie was adorable playing peek-a-boo with me.  

   The ride home was long but uneventful. Duke was excited to meet his new baby brother but was quickly over this small, excited puppy that everyone seemed to think was the cutest thing ever. Duke has warmed up to Gerald the past 2 weeks but has growled at the little stinker a few times. I don't blame old Duke. I don't like being a chew toy either.

 Gerald still needs to be monitored around Ellie.  Neither one are gentle with the other.

 

Kate is a good helper most of the time. We are still trying to teach the girls how to discipline Gerald when he starts to bite a lot.

 He is an adorable little ball of fluff.

Out to Eat

  While we are here in Albuquerque, we want to eat out at new places at least once a week. Last weekend we went to County Line BBQ. The food was decent and we mostly enjoyed our time there. Ellie refused to sit still and eat her food so Andrew walked around the restaurant with her. There were a lot of cool items hung up on the walls that entertained them both.  Meanwhile, the girls (minus Ellie) and I had fun taking pictures.

  Once we were done and asked for the check, our waiter told us our bill had already been paid for by the couple that had been sitting across the room from us. We were totally taken aback. I couldn't tell you anything about the couple. I barely saw that there was someone sitting at that table because I was so busy looking after the girls. It was a very nice surprise and gave us a little faith in Albuquerque that there are kind people here.
 

Halloween

  My least favorite holiday has been fairly enjoyable the past few years.  Well, six years to be exact.  Cute kids and their cute costumes are what Halloween should be about.  I hate the scary, evil, gruesome stuff people feel the need to include in the holiday.  It ruins the fun.  I do not look forward to the day when my girls want to dress up as something scary.  Bleh.  No thanks. 
  This year, as in years past, we did not coordinate.  Once one child has their mind set on a costume I loose all desire to coordinate and upset said child.  I don't like Halloween enough. So this year the girls picked their own costumes from what we had and what Walmart had.
  Abby was a witch.  It's what she was last year and she was dead set on being one again this year.  Works for me.  Becca was a dalmatian just like her sisters were their first Halloween.  Kate and Ellie got their costumes from Wally World.  Kate decided to be Elena of Avalor and Ellie was Supergirl.  It worked. 
  We were able to host Jared and Kristin for dinner before going out to trick or treat.  They were on their way up to Utah and were spending the night at Flagstaff, NM.  Our home was the halfway point and timing worked perfect for them to dine with us.  Right after dinner the girls got their costumes on, we said goodbye to Uncle Jared and Aunt Kristin, and then we were off to go freeze and get some free candy. 

 Kirtland's neighborhoods are broken up into villages.  Village 1 decided to pull out a couple tables and all of the houses brought their bowl of candy to put on the table.  So the whole neighborhood at one table.  It was great. 

 We went onto Village 2.  At the first house Ellie got out of the stroller and after being given a piece of candy, waltzed right into the house.  It took almost a minute for Andrew to get her back out.  After explaining the rules to her, she didn't invite herself into anyone else's house. Hallelujah.  Happy Halloween.

 We didn't go very far but the girls were more than ready to be done.  We were all freezing.  Once home the girls dumped out their booty.  They were happy to share with everyone, which I love watching.  

 Supergirl Ellie Monster was hyped up on a ton of candy.  I asked her how much candy she had eaten and she opened her mouth for me to see for myself.

   All in all, a great evening. 

Traveling to Albuquerque

  Two days before we drove out for Albuquerque, Hurricane Michael blasted through the Florida panhandle.  We were very blessed, again, and barely missed another storm.  We got a sprinkling of rain and a nice breeze.  That was it.  After seeing the aftermath of Hurricane Michael in Panama City and at Tyndall AFB, I realized how truly blessed we were. 

  Monday was Columbus day, so no work for Andrew.  With Michael coming straight for us, work and school were cancelled for Tuesday and Wednesday.  Andrew had planned on those two days to get out-processed so he had a TON of work to do Thursday and Friday.  With no extra time, Andrew decided to pick up the U-Haul trailer Thursday evening.  We kept it in our garage until Saturday morning when Andrew pulled it out to pack it up.
  We were aiming for an 8 o'clock pull out time.  Packing up the trailer took a little longer than we thought it would so we ended up pulling out right at 9 o'clock.  I was just happy we weren't pulling out at 10 o'clock and the girls were happy to finally be on the road for our cross country adventure.

   Our first stop was a little out of the way:  Fort Polk, Louisiana.  We had never visited Jon and Noreen in their home and thought this would be a great chance to do that.  We finally arrived at their house ONE HOUR AFTER arriving at the gate google first directed us to go to.  It was closed.  So we went into town and tried another gate.  CLOSED.  We called Jon and were directed to another gate.  Google tried convincing us to drive on a narrow dirt path to get to that gate and we were all, HELL NO!!  We called Jon yet again and somehow, I don't even know how, got to a gate that was open.  That hour trying to get on post was easily the worst hour of our entire trip.
  Once we were at Jon and Noreen's, our stress went away.  It was great to be with family.  ...but that drive.  Ugggg!!!
  The girls stretched their legs and we enjoyed catching up with Noreen while waiting for Jon to get home for dinner.  We ate, hung out for a little while longer and then said our goodbyes.

 Cousins!

 Ellie loved running around and playing peek-a-boo with Aunt Noreen and Emma.

   Our next stop was San Antonio, TX.  We have no idea where we will end up in 5-7 years but New Braunfels is at the top of our list of good possibilities.  We decided to look at some land while driving through and set up an appointment for Monday morning.  We were very impressed with what we saw and might invest sometime in the future.  

   After we looked at land we went over to our friends house for lunch.  We haven't seen them since moving to Florida.  It was wonderful to see them again and meet their little bundle of joy.  While Andrew and I were trying to keep our 2-year old from destroying their beautiful new home, Kate went around the house and took pictures with my phone.  And, sadly, they are the only pictures we got of our visit.  So, here are the pictures she deemed worthy of taking.

Sebastian, their sweet handicapped dog.  He has come a long way since they adopted him.  He's mostly blind and use to have horrible seizures dozens of times a day.  Now it's only a time or two and the seizures are much less severe.  The girls loved petting him because he is so fluffy but the poor thing could handle so much of the girls, which I feel like some days too.  Eventually he just went and hid in his mom and dad's room. 

 Sweet little Lilly.  She was very patient with the girls.  Abby sat next to her for about half the time just petting her.  Abby said she was super fluffy too.  I guess when you have a dog that only has one coat of hair, everything is fluffy to you. 

 Selfie time!

After lunch we went back to the hotel to let Duke out and rest a little while.  We then headed over to the bowling alley for dinner and a family fun night.

 Kate and Abby did great with bowling.  Abby would set up the kiddie ramp all by herself.  Kate elected to bowl without it.  Both had a great time.

 Ellie did well the first half of the game.  The last half she was in destructo crazy mode.  She had to be held non-stop so she wouldn't run into the alley.  Which she did right before we made that a must.  She got away from Andrew and ran into the lane having no idea that it is super slippery.  Andrew told her to stop and, well, she is two.  Andrew ended up jumping from one lane to the next, stepping only on the gutters, to swoop up an Ellie who was still trying to escape.  Andrew got a nice little round of applause from onlookers after successfully grabbing Ellie without anyone getting hurt.  Go Dad!

I did not get a picture of the score at the end of the game but I would like to note, I got a turkey!! My first ever.  I think.  But Andrew is my witness on this one, so it happened.

 Tuesday morning we packed up and headed to Clovis, NM to visit Jared and Kristin.  Kate was a great helper holding Becca while her Daddy and I loaded up the last of our stuff into the car.  

   Forty-five minutes into our drive and we were stopped by a bunch of traffic.  We just barely missed the exit where we could have bypassed all of it but instead we added an hour onto our drive.  We weren't too sad about it because after passing the car accident that caused all the traffic, we were just happy to be alive.  It was two pickups that somehow collided.  The cab of one of the pickups was ripped off of its frame.  Like totally separated from the frame and bed of the truck.  The other pickup, the driver's side was totally caved in and had a tarp draped over it covering the body of the driver who was once alive and well just an hour before.  Very, very sad. 

  Our original plan was to go to the zoo Wednesday but because the weather was colder than we had prepared for, I took a quick trip to the BX to get some entertainment for the girls in case we decided to hang out at the house for the day.  While out and in the weather, I realized it wasn't all that bad.  We decided go check out the zoo despite the cooler weather so Andrew went out to unhook the trailer from the escalade.  While doing this he looked at the tires and was shocked at how bad they were.  They had cracks all over them.  It was a miracle that we hadn't had a blowout.  Andrew called around in town and found one place that had our tire size.  He was there and back with new tires on two hours later and a sizable chunk taken out of our banking account.  

  I'm glad that I made the trip to the BX because we did end up hanging out at the house for the day.  The girls loved the game that I picked out, Trouble, and played it all afternoon. 

 Kristin planned ahead for the girls and baked sugar cookies for them to decorate.  They had a wonderful time and didn't get too messy.  

 Once Uncle Jared got home from work the girls played a couple games of Trouble with him.

 We left Thursday morning for Albuquerque.  Just a little ways from Clovis was a HUGE pumpkin patch.  It was the most pumpkins in one spot that I had ever seen. 

 The girls were so ready to be done with driving and were happy for a short days drive.  Once the U-haul was unloaded and returned, we started settling in for the next four months.