R.I.P.

Matthew Jewkes "Bud" Cherished dad, son, brother, grandson, and friend, Matthew Garth Jewkes passed away Friday, November 5, 2010. Born February 20, 1969 in Salt Lake City, Utah. Married Mindy Long Jewkes who preceded him in death. Graduate of Cottonwood High, 1987 and Utah Police Academy. Police Officer South Salt Lake 17 years. Survived by Larry and Jeanne Jewkes (parents), Morgan and Sterling, (brothers), son Mason, Grandmother Hardy and his beloved canine partner, Tyger, and many other family members and close friends. Matt loved his son, family, dirt biking, snowboarding, and Lake Powell.


We'll miss you Matt. I hope you find in the next life the peace you couldn't find here.

Puppies!

Ok, so in all my experience with dogs (which is fairly extensive considering my age) I have never had a female who came into heat more than twice a year, and that was generally on the rare side. My Laborador defies the odds by coming into heat 3-4 times a year and it always catches us off guard. This last time for example. We didn't notice that she was in heat because we were distracted by taking care of a family member in hospice and since it was warm she spent a lot of time outside (cause we weren't home too much). One night we hear this bloodcurdling scream and we go outside and lo and behold she's gotten a tie with the German Shepherd. And 65 days later we had puppies! They're so flipping precious. There are six of them and they are 17 days old today. Their eyes are open, their ears are starting to unseal, they have little bumps along their gums where their teeth are starting to come in, and they are beginning to walk on their paws instead of crawling on their bellies. It's wonderful. The largest of the group is a female we've dubbed Big Mama and she's about 3 pounds. Usually when puppies are born you have to tear the amniotic sac away, clean their face and nose and convince them to breathe. Well Big Mama wasn't about to wait for me to remove the sac; she was squirming the second she came out and hasn't stopped moving since. She walked and opened her eyes before all the other puppies and she has the biggest attitude. She's a huge Diva! The other puppies are about 2.5 pounds with the exception of our little runt. He got his head stepped on about 4 days in (Koda is such a bad mother!) and his head swelled up pretty badly. We didn't think he would make it but he pulled through. He hasn't nursed properly since then so he's not growing like the others. We feed him from a bottle every 3 hours but he's still pretty thin and small; he's about 1.5 pounds. He such a sweet, mellow little guy. We handle him so much that he's really comfortable with us and relaxes very well. He sleeps a lot cause he's so weak. :) Since he's sustained a head injury and is smaller than the others we've named him Kimahri Ronso (Final Fantasy X fans will get the reference). Here are some photos of our babies! Haha I love them so much but Kimahri is definitely my favorite. I just adore him! Here are some pictures; the pics that all have just one puppy in them are pictures of Kimahri. :)

2nd Anniversary (plus updates)

So it's been awhile huh! Lots to report I guess. Spencer and I are STILL getting settled in our house, even though it's been a year. Bowser is a BIG BOY now! He got up to 63 pounds but the vet said he was a little too heavy so we cut back his food and he's down to 59 now. He's such a good dog and he has such a quirky personality! He LOVES sleeping on the couch. He'll climb up on the back of the couch and make a nice little bed to prop himself up on. And he's the same color of the couch so he blends in! So I'll walk into the room and I'll be able to hear him (Cause he's such a loud breather) but I won't be able to see him. It's absolutely hilarious.

So we have 3 dogs at our house: the bulldog, a german shepherd named Daivi, and a chocolate lab named Koda. Well, Koda went into heat a couple months ago and we tried our darndest to keep the shepherd away from her but we must not have done a very good job because last week we had puppies! And yes, we knew she was pregnant before the puppies were born. We're not that clueless! And after a few failed attempts at counting (and a couple stillborns ): ) we ended up with 6 live, healthy puppies. They are all black (not surprising) and they have BIG noses like their father! Haha Daivi is such a good dad. It's SO cute cause dogs are not generally paternal in nature, but he's SO interested in them. He'll sit next to the puppy pen for hours and watch them with his ears up, and every now and then they'll make noise and he'll cock his head cause he's curious. And when we actually let him at the puppies, he'll lick them and nose them a little bit. It makes me so happy. I miss having puppies so much so I'm just LOVING this! I'll post pictures soon, as soon as I take some that aren't on my phone and aren't fuzzy.

So Spencer and I passed our 2-year mark last month. September 20th marked our 2nd anniversary. And I have been trying so hard to avoid making "best 2 years jokes" but I haven't been succeeding. We've been together 6 years now, though it doesn't feel like that long. And yet, it feels like forever. It's very weird. But we actually celebrated our anniversary this last weekend. We couldn't get any time off in September, and because of the way our pay periods work out we get an extra paycheck in October, so we decided to go out of town. We went to Park City and stayed at the Waldorf Astoria, one of only three 5-star resorts in the area. It was WONDERFUL! We drove up Sunday after church and checked in about 4 o'clock. It was so nice to be treated like someone special!
the view from our room
Champagne!

When we pulled up the valets opened the car doors, they knew our names already, they opened the door to the hotel and carried our bags for us. When we got to our room there was a bottle of real champagne waiting for us, with a personalized note welcoming us! We changed into our suits and went down to the heated pool and spent some time swimming and soaking in the whirlpool. Because we went in the off-season the hotel was almost empty so we had most of the place to ourselves (plus we got a great deal on the room)! After we soaked up some chlorine we went back to the room and we just had to order room service. We both ate shortrib chili (served with sour cream, promontory cheddar, green onions, avocado and lime) and cornbread popovers. Then for dessert we ordered beignets; little doughnut-hole-like pastries that were served with vanilla creme anglaise and raspberry preserves.

The room had a gas fireplace and cable-HD tv so we enjoyed the fire and some Discovery Channel while we ate. :) The next morning we woke up early and went a couple miles down the street to a local stable to go horseback riding! It was my anniversary gift to Spencer because he had never ridden a horse before. We went on a 2-hour tour and got LOTS of pictures! Because we actually get a Fall this year and the leaves were turning WHILE we were up there, the views were absolutely stunning. And Spencer loved riding the horse (so did I, for that matter!). I knew that we would both be super sore afterward (I'm STILL sore!) so I booked a special treat for us that afternoon.

After the ride we went back to the hotel and had lunch and then we went to the on-site spa. It's called the Golden Door spa and it's one of only 9 in the country. We got a 50-minute couples massage in their special couples futari suite. I also took serious advantage of their onsen. They had a steam room which felt incredible, and showers that had those funky square heads in the ceiling so it was like getting rained on. After the spa we went back to the room to get all "spruced" up and went to dinner at the Spruce restaurant, which is also on-site. It was expensive but it was SO worth it. Spencer had a bavette steak with greens and duck fat potatoes, and a French Rhone Valley red wine. I had the - get this - honey-lacquered duck breast with caramelized black mission figs and cinnamon foie gras, with a New World Pinot Noir. It was incredible! Then after dinner we took the hotel's complimentary "shuttle," which was actually a Mercedes SUV, up to main street so have ice cream and Java Cow. I LOVE the ice cream place. I have an affinity for holstein cows and they sell a bunch of cute cow stuff, so I make it a point to go there every time we're in Park City. We each got sundaes with hot fudge of course! Then we went back to the hotel and had a nice soak in the extra-large jetted tub in our room. Mmmmmm. Yesterday morning we woke up and ordered breakfast from room service. We their full-moon cake (a GIANT pancake big enough for three hungry people) served with sweetened nut butter and vermont maple syrup, and local honey yogurt which I could have gorged myself on. Seriously. Then we checked out (sadly I might add) and came home. Turns out Bowser missed us so much he refused to eat the whole time we were gone. It was so cute to see him absolutely flip out when we got home! And it was so nice to be treated so well by everyone at the hotel. They all knew who we were. When I would call room service they'd pick up the phone and say "What can I get for you Mrs. Miller?" I definitely want to go back!

Jewelry!

Ok, so for the last couple weeks I've been making my own jewelry. I feel so much better when I'm creating something. All of these pieces I've sold, but as soon as I have some pieces to spare they're going to be going up on Etsy! I've been pretty successful so far, and it's really fun to come up with my own designs. Here's what I've been up to lately!

Here are some gold chain maille earrings. Pretty simple


These are some filagree lilies. They were the first thing I made. I liked the contrast between the copper and the green



Here's a gold chain maille ring I made. I was pretty proud of it. There's a closeup too. :)



These are my peacock bead stud earrings


These are shooting star earrings, made with swarovski crystals. I was particularly proud of these. :)



This is my current masterpiece. Took me between 3-4 hours to make but it was worth it. I'm so proud of it. It's a bracelet and for those of you who are skeptics: Yes, I made the chain by hand.



Anyway, soon I'll be able to put some stuff on Etsy. For now though, I'm just selling to friends and coworkers, mainly because they all keep claiming stuff before I have a chance to list it! It's a great feeling though. :)

The Next Step

I've decided to start designing and making my own jewelry to sell. I had a booth at Taylorsville Dayzz and I didn't have a sign (my bad) and every time someone came into the booth they would ask "did you make this?" and each time I was just filled with this sense of shame that I hadn't. So I'm going to. I've made a pair of earrings that have been sold to someone else but I'm making another couple pair, if anyone is interested. I'm thinking I'll sell my stuff on etsy to start out with!


The house is still coming along. We just have to put the finishing touches on the office and it will be finished!

Well Hum

So Spencer and I had a pregnance, well, I guess I'll say "scare" for lack of a better term. My body has just been acting SO weird the last few weeks that I decided to get a pregnancy test. After like a week of wondering it ended up coming back negative. Now I repeat, for those of you who just scan things instead of actually reading them, I AM NOT PREGNANT. So don't go gettin' all excited. But it was an interesting few days as we tried to emotionally prepare ourselves for the possibility that I was. If you had asked us a week or a month ago what we wanted, we would have both absolutely said that we weren't ready yet and we wanted to wait, even a few more years. But when the test came back negative, we were both actually a little disappointed. I know that God has a plan for our family and that when His time is right, I will get pregnant. But now neither of us are quite sure how we want the next year or so of our lives to play out. Hmmmm....

Viva Le Entrepreneurship!

Well, it's official: I now own my own business! Now I don't own the company, but it's essentially a franchise and it's MINE! I have decided to do independent sales for a jewelry company called Park Lane. They are the country's #1 party planning jewelry sales company. I have fallen in love with the jewelry and I have such a passion for it and a belief in it. I'm so excited! I'm already 80% of the way towards making my first sales goal! If you want to place an order or just check out the jewelry, you can go to www.myparklane.com/caitlinmiller orders are of course appreciated, and if you have any questions you can email me at mrscaitiemiller@aol.com or call me at 801-647-7776. I love hearing from people about this! There's also a special going on right now where you can save hundreds of dollars off your order and even get jewelry for free! Gimme a call and I'll explain how it works!

I'm also having a lauch show on friday, May 7th at 7:00 pm. It's a great opportunity to bring your mom with you and buy her a lovely gift for Mother's Day! And remember we also have men's jewelry as well! Give me a call and I'll tell you all about it!

Awesome day

Yesterday was an awesome day. I had so much fun! First, Spencer and I went to church and got to hear a sermon from Pastor Jim, since Pastor Terry was still stuck in Europe because of the volcano. It was nice to hear Pastor Jim speak. He's kind of excitable, but in a different way than Terry, so it made it fun. After church Spencer and I went home and we had some bread that was starting to mold so we went out to feed it to the chickens. I love the chickens so much; they're so fun. If they know you have food they will follow you around the yard like a little herd. They even followed me up onto the deck. Then I went to collect eggs and there were some eggs that were hot to the touch they were so fresh! It was such a cool experience. Then I made dinner. I decided to try a new recipe. I made almond-crusted halibut with a buerre blanc sauce. It was tasty. I mean, of course it would be tasty, the sauce was comprised entirely of white wine, butter and cream. After dinner I decided to take Bowser for a walk. He behaved himself so well on the leash! I was impressed. It was a great day.

Bowser's Namesake

This weekend Spencer and I were walking around Sugarhouse and we passed one of those Play N Trade stores. We might not have a lot of money in the budget for entertainment right now, but we felt compelled to go in. When we did we discovered that not only did they have an original NES but a bunch of games for it. We got the NES, the original Metroid, and the ORIGINAL Super Mario Bros (with Duck Hunt) for $50. It was a pretty great deal we thought. So we get home and we're playing Mario Bros and at the end of the first world, the boss you fight is a freakin-sweet 8-bit Bowser!

So I yell across the house "Mom, get in here!" and she comes running in. I explain to her that this is the original Bowser after whom we named the dog. He's a big tough guy that causes a lot of collateral damage, but he's not necessarily evil, just misunderstood. So she's looking at the two Bowsers (mine doesn't breathe fire though, thank God) and she says "Ok, I get why you wanted to name him Bowser. It's perfect for him!" And it's true. I'm glad I named him Boswer cause it fits him perfectly!

Bowser

Ok so since Bowser is the newest member of the family and quite the character, I decided to do a post about him. He has such a great little personality and I just want to share some of his quirks.




He refuses to set his butt down on anything that's not soft. if we tell him to sit, he'll seek out a rug or bed or laundry pile and THEN he'll sit. He loves sleeping on our recliner, but since he can't get up on his own, he'll ask. Kind of. He'll stand in front of the chair and growl at it until someone comes and lifts him up onto it. When he's finished with his nap, he'll growl at the floor til someone comes to put him down.




He enjoys going to the dog park but when we take him he's KINDA interested in the other dogs (particularly dogs with flat faces, he seems to relate to them) but he's much more interested in the people. We can't leave until he goes up to every person there and has them pet him at least once.



He doesn't sit back on his haunches. He sits with his back legs sticking through his front legs, like a person would sit. And because we taught him to sit before we feed him, whenever he's hungry he'll come sit right in front of you. And we taught him to high-five (which is just adorable) so if he wants a treat he'll come and start pawing at you, like "I'm doing a trick; where's my treat!"




When he was smaller he used to be able to fit under the couch. He can't anymore of course, but he still tries. All he can get under there now is his head and that's getting so fat as it is that it probably won't last for long.




He LOVES the fire. Whenever we build a fire, it doesn't matter how hot it is, he'll sit RIGHT in front of it and just stare at it. When the fire dies and cools we'll catch him eating charcoal, which we really don't approve of. But it doesn't matter how warm the room is, if there's a fire going, he has to be there. Whenever Spencer tries to build a fire, Bowser will try to climb into the fireplace and help. It's so sweet.



Now that his adult teeth are in, he's starting to get quite the underbite! It's so cute to see his bottom teeth sticking through his lips when his mouth is closed. It's just absolutely adorable.







When I lie flat on my back, he's discovered that his chin fits perfectly into my eye socket. So he'll use my face as a chin rest.







He hates having his nails clipped. Even though we don't his quick and we don't hurt him, he still doesn't like it one bit. When we're finished, he'll go into the bedroom and sit between the open door and the wall facing the corner, and he'll pout. It's so ridiculous. It's like, "I know you didn't feel a damn thing so stop trying to play that trick. But nice try." It takes him all night to forgive us, but by morning he acts like nothing at all happened.






He likes climbing on the back of the couch to see out the window. The other day he was looking outside and just watching cars go by and Spencer said to him "You wanna go outside boy? You can't, it's glass." and he tapped on the glass. It was so funny cause as soon as Bowser realized he couldn't get through, he started growling at the window.








Oh and he loves having his belly rubbed. Whenever we have company, the first thing he does is roll over on his back so they'll rub his stomach.






He is just the funniest dog. His temperment and personality are just great for our little family. I love having and We absolutely adore him.

I guess it's time I blogged...

It's been a CRAZY couple of months! Spencer and I have been working non-stop; in general but also on this house. It's really coming along! We have all the common areas completely done; painted, curtained, decorated, everything. We're still finishing the bedroom and the office but with the bulk of the house done, we're feeling pretty good about it. Next month we'll start working on the yard. We have a whole landscape planned out and the yard is pretty torn up as it is so it's gonna be a lot of work. But when we're finished with this place, damn it's gonna look awesome! I'll be posting some pictures soon. As soon as I take them...

Bowser is doing great! He's getting so big and if it's even possible he's cuter now than when we got him. Bulldogs seem to work in reverse: the older they get, the cuter they get. We're teaching him stupid pet tricks. He can spin and high five and jump. He knows how to sit and he knows to sit by the back door and bark when he needs to go out. His housetraining is coming along great. I don't even remember the last time he had an accident in the house! He's really good about holding it until we let him out. I took him to the dog park yesterday and he had a GREAT time! He loved playing with all the other dogs and he actually loved playing with all the people more! It's so funny to watch him sleep. He rarely curls up in his bed. Usually he'll sleep with his butt in the bed and his head on the floor. He's very particular about what he lies on. He refuses to put his butt on anything that's not soft. If we tell him to sit, he'll go find a rug or a towel or a laundry pile and sit there. :)






The craziest thing happened the other day. My boss actually came to me and offerred me a promotion! This is really cool cause usually when positions become available you have to apply and interview and compete like everyone else. But my boss came to me and said this position was open and if I wanted it, it's mine. I was shocked! And, quite frankly, kind of flattered. It's not like a full step up from what I'm doing now. It's full-time hours with benefits but no retirement, and it's guaranteed for five years. And I can apply for other jobs and move in that, but at the end of that time the position won't exist anymore. I'm happy though. We'll have double coverage on our medical insurance now and I'll be getting a raise too. And it was offered to me. So I'm considering it a promotion. :)

I went to a rheumatologist awhile ago and it turns out I have something called psoriatic arthritis. It's actually an autoimmune disorder where the body things that tissue in the joints is dead and order more tissue to be produced even though there is healthy tissue there. It results in a a buildup of tissue in the joints which causes the pain, swelling and inflammation. The way they treat it is actually by prescribing and immuno-suppressant, which causes the body to stop sending those signals to the joints, but also decreases its ability to fight off infections in general. Unfortunately they can't engineer pills to only work on a specific area of the body (yet) so I have to live with it. I've been lucky so far that I haven't picked up anything too bad, but now I have a cold! Let's hope it doesn't latch on too bad!

Well Spencer and I are going to Wendover this weekend with some of our coworkers. I think we're gonna have a great time. I'm really looking forward to just kicking back for the weekend, relaxing, and maybe having a couple drinks. See you all next week!