Dog Days of Summer

The last few days have been full of DOGS!  This past weekend my "Sioux Falls family" went to Minneapolis and I watched the dogs while they were gone. 

For those of you who don't know, my Sioux Falls family consists of my friends (who are sisters) Brittney and Amber and their families, their parents - Dan and Diane, and also their brother Jerod (who lives in Minneapolis with his family) and their grandpa Ken.  They've accepted me as part of their family and I love them all. 

Any who, back to the dog sitting.  Amber and her family have a yellow lab, Zoey.  Dan and Diane have two dogs, Skosh and Quinn. 

*This is Skosh - she's the oldest one of the group and just barks as the three labs play.

*Zoey is in the back and Quinn is lying in the front.  Quinn is just around a year old and Zoey is about 2 years old.

So when I watch all the dogs I stay and Dan and Diane's house and have all 4 crazy dogs (including Neko) running all over the place.  By Sunday afternoon here's what all four dogs were doing.

(Zoey has crazy eyes in the background, but as you can see everyone was tuckered out.)

Neko was tuckered out and slept all day Monday to rest up from the weekend and for her big outing today!

So, what did she do today, you may be asking yourself?  Well she got to go SWIMMING today at the swimming pool!!

On the last day of certain swimming pools being open in Sioux Falls, the pools have "Dog Nite" where all dogs are allowed to come and go swimming for a couple hours.  This was Neko's first trip, but will definitely be an annual occurance!  Well Neko was slightly overwhelmed when we got there as there were TONS of dogs and people in attendance.  Here is a pic of the pool after it had cleared out some:

Neko stayed close to me until she saw the pool and off she ran and jumped right in - excpet she didn't realize it was the 5 FT end.  She couldn't figure out why she couldn't touch bottom and was floundering around.  Luckily I was able to fish her out and she figured out that she had to actually swim instead of just wading in like she does at the stock ponds at my parent's farm. 

Well over the next hour and a half we worked on jumping into the pool like the labs in contests on TV and I worked on getting a good picture of her and this is the best one we got (which I think is pretty good myself!).

Let me tell you - it was not easy to time hitting the button on my camera at the same time as flinging her ball so she would lunge off the edge of the pool!!  I have quite a few misses - like this one.

Next year I'm going to make sure to bring a change of clothes since I ended up as wet as Neko.  I had to help pull her out of the pool every time since she would swim to the edge of the pool and then try to climb out.  All around we had a "swimming" good time!! :)

Reality Check

Wednesday night I went to a funeral home to offer my condolences to a coworker who lost her son.  This has left me a little somber and saddened.  I had never met the young man, but had heard a lot about him from his mother.  He was 28 years old.  2 years older than me.  I guess it hit me how, when we're my age, we think we are invincible.  Guess what - we're not.

I think my own mortality isn't even the thing that scared me the most.  Everyone was feeling sorry for my coworker and her husband, and don't get me wrong - I felt terrible for them.  But who I felt the worst for, was his brother.  This family so closely mimicked my own.  There were the just two kids.  And if I remember right, they were two years apart in age.  That's the same as Monte and me.  I can tell you that when there's only two of you - you're constantly together.  As I watched the video of this young man's life - there was picture after picture of when they were kids - two little boys together.  I think of my photo album and in it lies picture after picture of Monte and I growing up.  I had my mom send me a few for your viewing pleasure - I think we were keepers. :)

Anyways, I realized how seldom I actually take the time to tell my brother how much I love him and how much I look up to him - even more than I think he knows.  So Monte - this post is for you!  I hope I never find out what it's like to to be a solo child.

Weekend Happenings...

So this weekend is almost finished, and it has been a good one.  I took Friday off work, as I was going to go to the Cities to visit friends, but they're actually in the middle of packing to move - so plans changed and I just decided to stay home.  So Friday I slept in and then worked on my backyard project that you'll learn more about when it's completed.  I also ran errands and signed up for Farrells Body Fitness 10 week extreme body sculpting program.  You'll learn about this once I've started that as well September 10th.
Then I just relaxed Friday evening.

Saturday dawned and off to the Farmers market Neko and I went.

The farmer's market is held every Saturday morning from 8-1 at Falls Park.  I always end up coming home with different things.  This week I was feeling some beets that I found, another melon (I had one last week and it was really good), and some Sourdough bread (Dad picked some up last weekend and it was good - so I picked up another loaf.  Here's a picture of my loot:

After the farmer's market, Neko and I headed to the falls to walk around for a little bit.  Here's a picture of the falls.

Neko was enthralled with a couple of ducks that she could see, but that I wouldn't let her off the leash to chase.

I spent the afternoon cleaning my house because it was getting pretty bad since I've been spending quite a bit of time outside recently.  The evening ended by going to the 2011 Sanford Children's Gala.  My friend Dan's (you'll hear more about him and his fiance Ashley in the upcoming weeks as I'm in their wedding Sept 3) family were sponsors of the Gala and had an extra ticket to their table and invited me along.  It was a lot of fun to get all dressed up and go out for the evening.  Unfortunately I forgot my camera, but I'll get pictures from Dan's mom, Lori, and post them for you all to see.

Sunday I relaxed until 11ish and then Neko and I headed to the dog park:

(Neko's face looks wet because she had just dunked her head in a water bucket)

Neko is worn out and taking a nap and this afternoon will be spent mowing the backyard and working on my backyard project. 

Hope you all had a productive and relaxing weekend!

The Beginning

Hello, my name is Stacey and I've decided to document what happens on any given day in my life.  I'm 26 years old, a financial analyst for Sanford Health and living in Sioux Falls, SD. 

I own a house, in an amazing older area of town known as McKennan Park, that was built in the 1930's - which means there's often something that needs a little updating or tweaking.  (Although it was mostly redone before I bought it - so there aren't too many major changes that I have to make.) 

I have a black lab named Neko that I adopted from the Humane Society in April of 2009 when she was 5 months old.  More on her later as well.

I'm originally from Wall, SD - no, I never worked at Wall Drug - and my parents own a farm/ranch operation near Wall that I like to retreat to for some R&R.  I came to college at Augustana and that's how I ended up in Sioux Falls.

So, I've decided blogging is a great way to keep family and friends up to date about what's happening in my life and what I'm up to - so here goes!  I hope to post at least a couple times a week!  Let the fun begin!