Cabbages, Sharkdogs and Holiday Cards, Oh My!

Guess what? My Shutterfly holiday cards came in the mail yesterday and I'm obsessed with them! Maybe I won't send them out and I'll just keep all 50 of them to myself. Would that make me a hoarder? Oh well, I guess I'll mail them out. This is the design we ended up choosing.

They're such great quality and with the blog promo Shutterfly is doing, I paid about $8 for 50! Great deal. We used an engagement picture, a wedding picture and one of the Sharkdog. Speaking of the Sharkdog, Sawyer has recently developed another bad habit. What is odd about this picture? (Besides Nurse A's obvious frustration.)

 One family member of the canine variety is in a very odd position. The pupster's latest thing is rolling over on his back, and then being dragged across the yard (by is harness, not his neck). He also likes to roll down the hill near our house.

Since I'm on the subject of updates, remember this?

It's the Box of Everything Thank-You Note. I wasn't very organized when keeping up with our thank you note list (to all the wedding planners out there, definitely keep a spreadsheet!), and I resolved to get them out before our two month anniversary. I failed, but I did put the very last one in the mailbox Saturday, a day before our three month anniversary on Sunday, which I'm putting in the win category. (I don't count the fact that it was after the mail ran, so it didn't actually go out until Monday.)

My next update is not not so successful. A couple of months ago, we spent Saturday planting a garden. It started off well. We had sprouts, and our broccoli transplants were growing quite large.

Grow broccoli plant, grow!

About a month ago, we noticed our jalapeno plant had been completely eaten, all the leaves, jalapenos, everything. Odd, we thought. I don't envy the animal that ate our jalapenos. It was also fall now, and we'd had jalapenos all summer, so it wasn't too sad. But then last week we went out to the garden and saw this. Oh the horror!

Little leafless broccoli plants.

Every single one of our broccoli plants had been eaten. And our tiny lettuces are getting picked off one by one.  What would do this to us? I have a really good guess:

The accused.

We have lots of deer in our neighborhood, and they seem to have switched from eating the pears off our tree to eating our broccoli. Or maybe it's raccoons. We saw a very sad neighbor looking at his uprooted flower bed awhile back and he blamed it on raccoons.

For some reason, the one random cabbage has gone untouched and is growing quite large. I have no idea what to do with it, except be proud that it hasn't died. Does anyone have any delicious cabbage recipes?

Well this was a sufficiently random post. Happy Tuesday, everyone!

Thank You Note Therapy

Nurse A and I have been married more than a month and let me tell you, we've been living up the non-wedding-planning life. Half-price sushi has replaced trips to the florist, and Instant Netflix has taken the time slot usually allotted for phone calls to the event rentals company about weird sized table cloths. It is a beautiful thing.

But we have one big wedding cloud hanging over our heads that we just can't shake because, well, we haven't done it yet: the thank-you notes. I am ashamed to admit that I have only sent out like 10 notes and Andrew has only written to his groomsmen. We had a big shower earlier on in the engagement and I did get those out in a timely manner, but following my lingerie shower in July I really dropped the ball. I wrote notes to all of the wonderful ladies who came and/or had a hand in putting it together, but writing the card is just half the battle. I never mailed them and then they were out of date. So I've been putting off writing thank-you notes because I need to write one to the lingerie shower guests and then another to said lingerie shower guest and wedding date for the wedding gift. Excuses, excuses, right? Because you all love to come home from a day at work and write thank you notes and I'm the only person in the world who would rather watch TV. But I'm seriously thankful  for everyone who came to the wedding and/or sent a gift, which is another reason it takes me so long to get through thank-you notes--I don't want them to sound formulaic. But no more excuses.

Actually just one more excuse (because he's so darn cute. And so damn bad. He has eaten more than one thank-you note.)

Please note the pupster is leisurely enjoying a pizzle stick.

But everything changed today. I was making my usual blog stalking rounds, and two bloggers in a row had posted about finishing their thank-you notes! Laura, at Luckiest in Love, finished hers before her three-month anniversary date (at the rate I'm going it would be six months for us) and Katie at Spirals and Spatulas finished hers within 17 days. Seventeen days, people. I was inspired. And slightly ashamed. But for the most part inspired! I can't thank the ladies enough (maybe I should send a note?) for getting me into gear.

I didn't keep a spreadsheet with gifts and names like Katie did (what a great idea, by the way), but I did have a finalized guest list and this:

Alas, it is the Basket of Everything Thank-You Note. This is horrible, right? Inside you will find gift cards with quickly scrawled descriptions of the gifts and names of people who gave them, a variety of thank-you notes (I love these Target ones) and some cat stickers. (Don't be a hata--I used them tonight on the note to my sweet little flower girl!) And I apologize that everything I photograph is sitting on this table outside (also a thank-you-less wedding gift); I can only take decent pictures in natural light.

So yesterday night I organized the Basket of Everything Thank-You Note, wrote about 12 notes and am already feeling much more on top of things. I have a goal to get them all out before our two month anniversary on October 14. No more excuses. Although I do firmly believe that if I had a desk like this, I would not have a Father's Day card sitting in the door of my car.

How long did it take you to get your notes out? Did you think ahead and have a super-organized process or did you just hope everything would work out for the best? And did your dog ever eat any of your thank-yous?