What a Lucky Mungkee

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Hills Pet Nutrition for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

Today's post is dedicated to our quietest and gentlest family member. You have seen him waddling about our house but I don't think we've talked much about the mystery that is Mungkee. The kind folks over at Hill's Pet Nutrition haven't forgotten our little man and they even took the time to make him feel like a star when they sent him a baggy full of surprises recently. They were awesome to send him some new food, a pile of toys and a little sony Bloggie video camera for me to help document more of our family time with him (talk about generous!! I've been attached at the wrist to this thing)

Mungkee joined our little family back in 2006 when he was about 3 and a half years old. Sadly, his owner had passed away and he and his 3 fellow pekingese siblings all went back to their breeder to find new homes. I have always loved and adored pekingese dogs (don't they just have the squishiest faces??) and being the awesome husband that he is, Sean set out on a secret mission to find me one when he came across Mungkee. In his 3 short years Mungkee had travelled across the country competing in dog shows, eventually becoming a bona fide best-in-show dog. I don't know whether is it because of all the travel and hours of grooming or if he was just born this way, but Mungkee is the single most docile and patient dog I've ever come across. Everyone who meets him instantly falls in love with his sweet personality, and it was no brainer that he would be the perfect addition to our family.

As he's gotten older he really hasn't gotten more or less perky, but recently we gave him a bit of a makeover with a major hair cut and adding some new food to his routine now that he is considered a "mature" dog. I was a little worried about changing his food, but after just a couple weeks he has a little extra spunk in his walk. He has never been one to play with dog toys, but during the last few weeks of our renos we've taken up residence at my parent's house and he has been a very popular boy with my Mom's dog, Dede, who LOVES all the goodies.

Here are just a few mini-movies of our playful boy and his shorter summer 'do (please promise me you won't laugh at our annoying/embarassing background conversations LOL)

Untitled from Holly Baker on Vimeo.

Untitled from Holly Baker on Vimeo.

I want to send a GIANT thank you to our friends over at Hill's for all their generosity, specially because they are going to be giving one lucky reader a $1000 gift card to PetSmart!!

To enter simply leave a comment on this blog post telling us about your favorite moment with your dog. You can earn 1 extra entry by tweeting a message linking back to this blog post as well as using the hash tag #HillsPet . Click here for full contest rules.

And if you are interested in getting more info on switching your dog's food be sure to check out Hill's Pet Nutrition on Facebook or register online for their Hill's Healthy Mobility Coupon while also entering to win 1 years free pet food!

The Kitchen Chronicles: Budget Blowout

I am one of those not-so-rare birds that hate to admit defeat. Even worse? Admitting I was wrong. And when it comes to our projected budget of $15,000 for this kitchen I was DEAD wrong. I thought I knew what we were getting ourselves into ( I did know enough to expect to go over budget!), but I really didn't anticipate blogging with my tail between my legs telling you that we are twice the original budget.

If there is one thing I love about blogland it is that you can live vacariously through reading other people's blogs, get great feedback and ideas on your own blog, and learn some things in the process, hopefully avoiding the same pitfalls. So not only did I intend to bore you with every decicion, purchase and obsticle when I started blogging about this kitchen, but I also wanted to share where every penny went. I guess magazine worthy, drooled over kitchens do cost more than a little blood, sweat and tears. Plus, I am always nosy like that when I am reading someone else's blog.

This was our intended spending plan when we went into the project. We did our research, planned on doing everything ourselves and aimed to keep it looking like a million bucks while only spending $15,000.

Embarassingly enough, a bachelor's degree in business didn't help me too much when it came to remembering all the components of a kitchen. Hello, where are countertops and sink on that budget???? Right there I under budgetted $6,000. Whew, I'd rather be over budget thanks to a math error than a judgement error.

We were sorely under estimating cabinet costs due to a few factors:

1. When we had our cabinet quotes done by various local suppliers we did not yet decide on adding the peninsula (an additional 9 feet of cabinets that also require a pretty, finished backside=$$$$). We went from 32 feet at $150/ft to 54 feet at $194/ft

2. When you see the listed price per foot of cabinets that basically means you get 2 doors. Obviously we wanted some drawers as well! Any extras only add to that price.

The other contributing factor to our over spending was our decision to call in some help. After talking with several people who have been through kitchen renos we thought it was well worth the expense to have the cabinets installed professionally. And after having them piled up in our garage for a week now I can understand why! It is the biggest, most annoying looking puzzle ever made. We also made the decision to hire an electrician to move all the necessary outlets and lighting. This is something that Sean could have done, but we thought we should at least get a quote for the work and once we did it was a no brainer. We would have spent half the cost just on supplies at Home Depot so it made sense to just pay a few hundred dollars and have the work done fast and right. As for plumbing, it is still in-progress. But we would definitely be doing it ourselves if Sean didn't have a commercial contact that was willing to take us on the side for a fraction of the price because the other quotes we've gotten are through the roof over $3000!

Here is what we're really spending to pull this kitchen together. All the grey items are things we still need to pay for so they may be slightly more or less.

We've surprisingly spent less on counters than I thought we would. And the windows also came in under budget thanks to a credit they issued us for all the delays. YAyyyy!!

At the end of the day we are still happy with that number because we honestly feel like we are getting the kitchen of our dreams. Some of that money was also spent in the family room (like the ceiling, lighting and electrical) so we are kind of getting 2 rooms for that price, at least thats what I tell myself. Once it came down to actually making our dream come true we figured we should LOVE everything. Spending an extra thousand dollars or so on adding nicer baseboards, trim and doors to our cabinets seem money well spent in the long run.

We aren't at the finish line just yet so stay tuned on how the final tally adds up!

Diva Dog

Remember when you were a teenager and would spend hours playing with make up, drawing on inanimate objects (occassionally even body parts) and playing in front of the mirror assembling various outfits from the same 10 items of clothing? It probably had a lot to do with just being a teenager, but I think it also had to do with being bored. And we have been all kinds of bored the last few weeks.

Don't get me wrong, things are busy! But they are kind of boring too. Mainly because Wren and I have 2 choices when we wake up each day: 1. go outside or 2. hang out upstairs. And when you are confined to the same 2 or 3 rooms they start to feel awfully small and my bag of tricks runs dry by about noon most days.

It's been said that 2 year olds are much like teenagers (or maybe it's the other way around), and I couldn't agree more. Each day Wren plays dress up with her favorite 3 or 4 dresses, does her 'make up' (her routine consists of lip chap and combing her eyebrows with an old mascara wand I've cleaned for her, and once when I wasn't looking a nice eye liner drawing of a heart on her forehead) but by 1 o'clock she is usually looking for a few more thrills.

Which is where our angel of a dog, Mungkee, has been very helpful. He submits to hair combings, wardrobe changes and make up applications like the old pro he is. And while he was a good sport for an hour or so...

Like most boys he decided he'd had enough and headed for cover... no matter how hard she pulled that tail. And after being paraded around in a tutu for one afternoon he has made it clear it was a one time only event.

It's true, our former tomboy-turned-girly girl has taken our diva-show dog and turned him into a regular old pooch!