All About Our Dogs

When I was reflecting on what to write about this week, I realized that there was a recurring dog theme. Mother was released from the home on Tuesday and her very kind next door neighbors Sandy and Bill brought over this adorable floral arrangement done by Sylvia's Amling Flowers in Arlington Heights. The name of the arrangement is Ruff! Sandy said they did not have black carnations to match Vivi's coloring but that is OK, the arrangement is darling nonetheless. Sandy and Bill have a cute little white dog named Bear and Vivi gets along great with all of them. Their driveway runs right next to the house so they see Vivi outside a lot.

I took this quick photo to share the arrangement with Melinda and Sue G., I knew they would think it was so cute and they did! I wish I would have taken a better photo of the arrangement outdoors but at least I captured this one. This is a fun way to send flowers to a dog lover. I imagine they have a version for boy dogs too.

Rachel bought a felt teepee on Amazon for her 1 year old dog Ozzy and he took to it right away. However it really surprised her when 15 year old Tootsie loved it as well! She bought a second one for her and now the two dogs switch back and forth between the two teepees.

Mother and I thought it would be a good idea to get one for Vivi because she likes her "alone time" in the evening and often buries her head in a couch or chair to block out the light. I only ordered one because Margot loves her little beds in each room and I knew she would not be into it.

When the teepee arrived Vivi and Margot were both at my house. Vivi was not interested in it and Margot got in there a couple of times to get away from Vivi. Now that Mother and Vivi are back home I brought the teepee along as well. I had to encourage Vivi to get in there but she did and slept in there for a couple of nights in a row. I think she will use it once she gets into the routine. We are calling it the "house" because teepee sounds too much like going out for a "pee-pee." Vivi and Margot picked up on the slight difference but were still hopeful that they were going to get to go outside.

Rachel designed this hilarious graphic to make a T-shirt for John. Just like us, their dogs are like their kids. Their building also has a newsletter strictly for news about the dogs who live there. It is really cute!

Kuochun and I took a few moments during the week to check out Annie's Pancake House in Mount Prospect. It is located in the former Greek Feast location at Wolf and Kensington Roads. Neither of us was expecting much as there are so many pancake houses in the area but we wanted to be able to say we tried it. I was very pleasantly surprised by the decor, the theme is modern bohemian and it looks great. The menu is quite extensive for both breakfast and lunch, there is definitely something for everyone.

I could not decide between the bacon Belgian waffle which is a favorite of mine but is not served everywhere and a lemon poppyseed pancake special so I skipped the hash browns this time and ordered both. I figured I could give Mother what was left over. Kuochun decided to go with a skillet and the choice was hash browns and diced potatoes. He asked for the diced potatoes but was given the hash browns. Not a major issue which would warrant sending it back but he did not get what he ordered. My waffle was kind of dry and flavorless. The pancakes were more moist but they did not have a lot of flavor either. The syrup was served in an attractive white ceramic warmed bottle which I had never experienced before but thought was a fantastic touch.

The service was great all the way around. There was a big basket of Dum-Dums at the cashier and the hostess noticed that I was taking a moment to look at the basket. She asked if I was looking for a particular flavor and I said cherry. I wanted to bring one back for Mother and cherry is her favorite. The hostess actually got the bag out and pulled two cherry Dum-Dums for me. I give the decor a 5, the service a 5 but the food a 3.5. If I go back, I would try a lunch offering to see if I have better luck.

I have been staying with Mother while she works to get back up to speed. I moved my computer and label printer over to her house and have been doing lots of estate sale paperwork. Recovery has been a slow process due to Mother's breathing issues. She had her first physical therapy session Thursday night and she was so exhausted by it she slept for two days. The next session is Monday afternoon and it will be three times per week for four weeks. Luckily it is adjacent to the doctor's office which is not too far from her home. The hope is after these sessions her knee will be working well and then she can resume her respiratory therapy. Of all the health problems the breathing issues are the worst. It is so heartbreaking to see her struggle to breathe all the time.

After some back and forth between all of the doctors involved, Kuochun has been approved to have his procedure as originally scheduled on June 23. I am still very worried about it as they are not going to have him stop his blood thinners and the procedure comes with a high risk for bleeding. This combined with the low blood pressure issues these past three months add to the worry. I am hoping for the best for both Mother and Kuochun as they certainly deserve it!

This week the focus was on estate sale paperwork and preparing jewelry for the caravan so I was not able to post a new jewelry lot. I do have some great new pieces as well as some more on the way in a variety of price ranges so I would really like to resume the weekly posting next week. The plan will be to gradually spend more and more time at home and see how Mother adjusts.

The photos above are of some of the cases we put together for the caravan. Luckily Mother had a good day and helped me. She went for this "organized chaos" look which I think works. I will take all the help I can get these days! All of this jewelry went to our Lake Forest sale. Lake Forest is usually an amazing place to sell jewelry but no luck this time. The sale was more focused on useful household items. However this jewelry will go to our Naperville and Deerfield sales next week.

Over the weekend I plan to price new jewelry and organize it into shoe boxes so it will be easy to replenish items when they sell out of the cases. There is so much great silver jewelry but it all needs to be polished and priced! As Melinda says, I have to eat the elephant one bite at a time.