Since last Tuesday was Hubbs birthday we headed over to the ocean for a couple of days. It was a very nice mellow weekend. The weather was cold and over cast both days.

Gosh, I've been gone a while. Didn't mean to dissapear for that long but let me catch you up on what happened. It's been so crazy.

Hubbs and I left on Friday, May 20th in the morning to go to Sequoia National Park for four days. It's a four hour drive to the campsite and we got there around 2pm. Got camp set up, hung out for a couple of hours and then cooked dinner. Sometime around 9pm my husband noticed that my dog Rex had thrown up his dinner. It happens some times so we weren't alarmed. But then he began to attempt to vomit with nothing coming up. I tried walking him around the camp ground to see if he would just walk it off but nothing was helping.

When we went back to our trailer I noticed that Rex's abdomen was extremely swollen. I got on the internet and started looking up his symptoms. The internet was saying that he had bloat which is life threatening. We called our vet at home and they said it sounded like bloat and to find an emergency vet hospital where we were and take him in immediately because he could die from this.

The closest Emergency hospital was 40 min's away from where we were camping. We drove like mad to there. Turns out that Rex did have bloat and was rushed into emergency surgery around 3am on Saturday morning. We spent the majority of the rest of our vacation going back and forth between where we were camping and the vet hospital.

We weren't sure if they were going to release Rex to us before we were scheduled to head home on monday but they finally released him late on Sunday afternoon. We left camping early and picked him up at about 5:30pm and drove straight through to our vet, 4 hours. Our vet kept him over night on Sunday for observation. We finally were able to bring him home on Monday night around 10:30pm.

I ended up taking 2 extra days off of work to be home with him. He doesn't really need that much observation but after almost losing him I'm not ready to leave him.

This has been the most stressful week of my life. This dog has been with me through some of the worst times of my life and the best times of my life. I just couldn't let him go without trying everything we could to save his life. What started our as a fairly inexpensive vacation turned into the most expensive 4 days of my life. But I have my dog which is what matters the most to me. We can always make more money but there is only one Rex and he's not replaceable.

I was supposed to go back to work last Thursday and then wouldn't you know it...I got sick. Really sick. Turns out it's pretty common to get sick after you've been under so much stress like I was when I was dealing with poor Rex. I ended up staying home for the rest of the week and I'm still not feeling myself today.

I logged into Sparkpeople but I didn't really track my food. We had to eat out a lot while were dealing with Rex being in the hospital and I was so upset that I just let Hubbs pick where he wanted to eat. Most of the time he had to order for me because I kept saying I wasn't hungry but if you put the food in front of me I would eat. But I'm back on track today. I'm not looking forward to weighing in anytime soon. But I will just do what needs to be done after the weigh in. I haven't run since wednesday before we left for vacation because I'm too scared to leave Rex home alone for more then a few minuets (more of my fear then his need of me) and then getting sick. But I have to admit that I'm really missing it. I'm so glad that Rex is home with us now. June 1 he will get his staples out and we can go forward from there.

Things have been so crazy. I'm looking forward to getting back to normal...whatever that is.

We're back from Yosemite and we had a fantastic time. The weather wasn't ideal but it was still really nice. We had partly cloudy, sunny and a bit of rain while we were in the park. The clouds were very low so it wasn't the best for viewing some of rock formations but we still really enjoyed it. Best of all, since it was Easter weekend, the park wasn't very crowded.

We spent two days in the park and camped about 20 miles outside of the park. Here's just a fraction of the pictures we took.

It was cold enough that there was a lot of snow still on the ground at the higher elevations outside of the park and inside before you dropped down into the valley. I wore my snow jacked both days but I'm always cold and there were plenty of people in sweat shirts and even a few in shorts.

We saw a number of animals including a bobcat, 2 coyotes, 2 bears, lots of deer and squirrels too numerous to count.
Hubbs at El Capitan.

Bridal Veil Falls. All the major falls were running like crazy and there were tons of seasonal falls too.

Due to my knee injuries we only did one hike up to Lower Yosemite Falls. I gimped along pretty good but I don't think this is what the Doctor meant when she said she wanted me to rest. But hey, I didn't want Hubbs to see Yosemite from the truck.

We took the dogs with us and found Yosemite to be very pet friendly. I'm pretty sure that that the dogs thought we were trying to kill them with all the walking that we did.

Half Dome was very elusive while we were there. It was clouded over almost the entire time that we were there. It was only uncovered for about 20 min's that we saw. Other wise the clouds were very low and Half Dome was pretty much completely obscured.

Yosemite falls was amazing as all ways. Beautiful from every angle.

The lupines were amazing.

The deer were so beautiful and very plentiful.

The park rangers were practicing swift water rescue on the Merced River and we enjoyed watching them practice. I'm sure later in the year they will get to put those skills to use.

I even got a chance to work on a sock I started for my grandmother for mother's day.

We even hiked out to Mono Lake.

The weekend was fantastic and I can't wait to go again. We're planning to make a day trip a little later in the spring to see it again and do some real hiking when I'm healed up. I didn't get to run in the valley while we were there but there is always next time.

Guess where I'm going!!!!!

Yosemite!!!

So excited! Hubbs and I are going to be spending Easter weekend in Yosemite this year! When I made the reservations I didn't realize that it was Easter weekend. But I just got approval for the time off so we're going. We'll miss being with family this year but this is going to be a very special trip since it will be Hubbs first time seeing Yosemite. I can not wait!

Thanks everyone for your kind comments for my coworker. My boss stopped by the hospital yesterday afternoon to check on her on his way from one office to another. He said she was all drugged up but doing very well. It was a kidney stone that caused all the problems. She's home now and resting comfortably. I'm so thankful this morning that it wasn't something worse. This poor woman has been through a lot with her family in just the last year and a half that I've known her. I'm sure every ones positive thoughts did her a world of good. The power of prayer is amazing.

I wish I had some camping pictures to share with you but my batteries died in my camera while we were camping and I didn't get any. It snowed 3 inches on Friday and it was beautiful. There was no wind so the snow just came straight down and covered everything. Thank goodness that we were in the 5th wheel otherwise I would have frozen my tushy off! My poor dogs didn't quite know what to do with themselves and were running all over in the snow and rolling it it. They loved walking around and we even allowed our troubled child, Rex, to be off leash for most of the trip. There was no one else in the campground other then our group and my dogs were the only ones there so it was ok.

Stolen from Deanne. Thanks, Deanne!

The above picture was after it snowed the first day. It really wasn't all that cold but the fire really helped. All and all the trip was really good. It was fun to hang out with some old friends and make some new ones. Sadly this is the last trip in the 5th wheel for winter. Now it's just day trips to the mountains for snow wheeling. I'm going to miss the trailer but all I have to do is be patient and spring will be here before I know it.

We finally got another chance to do a little camping over the weekend. We headed about 2 hours North to Collins Lake. The weather was perfect, so perfect it was very hard to believe that it was almost the middle of October. There was a nice cool breeze during the day and the temps were in the mid-80's. The evenings were so mild that I only needed a light sweater the first night and none the second night.

Home Sweet Home (away from home)

The lake from our campsite

I did a little fishing but never caught anything.

Hubby with his prize catch, a piece of a bucket

I did a little knitting on my February Lady Sweater.

Hubby was so proud of his truck, it pulled out little trailer with no problems at all

The boys had a couple of beers

Hubbs and I enjoyed a snuggle

Even the sunrise was beautiful there

Who wouldn't want this view?

There was doggy love

There was bun stealing squirrels

And dogs on the look out.

On the way home, we stopped for a closer look at a rice paddy

I eat rice and I know how it's grown, but I had no idea what it looked like on the plant

It was a great trip and I'm ready to go again. Too bad I haven't won the lottery or found out about some long lost relative that wants to give me a ton of money so I can travel and never have to work again. If you know my long lost relative...send'em my way! lol

Just a few pictures from the trip. Most days the weather was beautiful. Gorgeous Scenery.

One tired dog.

Wild Life

Family Portrait

Good Friends

Hubbs hits the waves .

Good friends and a couple of dogs.

A little bit of drinking (no telling what's in that cup)

I tried to relax

I would have loved a little less drama on this trip but there's always next time!