Oh gosh-- speaking of fun places my money has gone lately...

 WE GOT A NEW PUPPY!!

Blog friends, meet ANNABEL SQUISHMALLOW (Minnie chose her middle name). She is a cavapoo and was born on 8/24. Friday at the vet, she weighed a whopping 2 pounds, 13 ounces, and we love her so much already.

Seriously, you guys. She is like a little wind up dog toy.

Minnie is SMITTEN and very smug about being the only kid who got to go pick her up from her (pretty idyllic) farm. (The others met her the weekend before we got to bring her home though)

She hung out on my lap in the car the whole time Dorothy had ballet on Friday, and now she is pretty sure I am her bio mom.

She is VERY SWEET. Like, she hated her bath but she was so nice about it (a thousand treats really helped).

When she has had enough of constant playing and adoration, she puts herself down for a nap in her crate.

Everyone adores her, of course

I actually think she's really smart (it's ok to roll your eye at me) because she's super expressive, and it is really easy to tell when she needs to go outside. She's also really getting the hang of walking with a leash (it helps to have someone in front of you with treats. We got these little heart-shaped puppy training treats, and each one is about 6 servings for her-- that's how teeny tiny she is.)

It took her about a day to be comfortable enough around us to eat and drink. The first night she was home, she ate about 6 pieces of kibble and just sort of gently put her tongue in her water (but only the water in her collapsable travel bowl and only if I was holding her and the bowl). She slept all night the first night in a small crate on our bedroom floor, and when she woke up the next morning (she is SO CUTE in the morning because she's all messy and disheveled with bed head only all over her body), she peed and pooped and then ate breakfast and drank a TON of water, and she's been in the groove since then.

The farm was feeding her a pretty cheap brand of food, and we want to use Blue Buffalo, so we've been mixing the two. and her stomach has been fine. We do free feeding, so it's hard to estimate how much she's getting, but the vet said you really cannot overfeed a puppy.

So far, she has slept all night long every night (please universe, do not let me have just screwed that up by typing those words), and I think it's because she is getting SO MUCH ACTIVITY during the day. By the time the dinner hour rolls around, she is EXHAUSTED and naps a bit on and off from about 6-10:30 when we all go to bed. I bought a Snuggle Puppy, and she seems to really like it-- might be helping her sleep? She sleeps in a big crate in the laundry room right next to the dryer. (Our laundry room is ridic now, but it was pretty terrible before, so **shrug**). Eventually, I hope she just sleeps on the couch or in her little dog bed or with Dorothy on on the old American Girl bed Dorothy dreams of her sleeping in.

I am worried that she might wake up during my work out time when Ben is out of town (although she slept until almost 7 on Monday), and I am not totally sure how I will work around that since we are not letting her be anywhere unsupervised right now to help her get the hang of going outside to pee and poop. I think maybe I will take her on a little walk until it's 6 and then give her to a kid to snuggle for a bit while I jump on the elliptical. I feel like she'll be a good addition to yoga, actually-- like a tiny goat. I am also concerned that when everyone is at school and she has either some time by herself taking a nap or is just home with a boring WFH grown up, she might not be as exhausted by bedtime as she is over the weekend. She's going to be my car buddy for the evening drop off/pick up slog (maybe she will make it more fun??), but I think she'll sleep a lot then, too. Also! She shivers outside, and it is like 60-degrees, so we gotta buy some dog clothes (Dorothy is ALL IN for this!).

We are SO EXCITED to have 4 little paws thumping around the house again.