and they call it puppy love.

juliet. jules. who-lee-who. julie boolie. julie boo. boo. stinky. these are all names to which my baby girl will respond. she's my child. and i love her. today, i thought i would write about how she came to be my lapshark. or, rather, how i came to be her person {we all know our pets keep us, we don't keep them}.

it's kind of a funny story.

back in may or june of 2005, someone i knew called to tell me he had just adopted a purebred teacup chihuahua puppy. i really think this he mostly wanted to rub it in my face that he had a teacup chihuahua, because i had always wanted a teacup chihuahua. either way. he called saying he wanted me to pick out a name for the puppy. i chose the name "hamlet." 

wait, you say, aren't we talking about juliet?

why, yes. yes we are. i was told that the teacup chihuahua was a male. so i named "him" hamlet.

a few weeks, maybe a month, pass and i make a trip to tennessee where i get to see said puppy. the owner was keeping the poor baby in a cardboard liquor box, rarely taking it out, and basically mistreating the poor thing. i couldn't stand it. i told the guy {after begging and pleading for my parentals to allow} i would take the puppy home to virginia to house train it. that way it would not have to be kept in a cardboard box and not have to be yelled at for not being house trained. and i was to return the puppy to his original owner when i returned to tennessee for school in the fall. i was, afterall, to be staying on campus, which has a strict no pets policy.

so the pup and i travelled to virginia to begin house training. that's when we realized, hmm... this does not seem to be a male puppy at all. so, since "hamlet" had already learned "his" name, i needed to find a female name that sounded similar, to make it less confusing for the transition. the best i could come up with was juliet. so it stuck.

then, one fateful day, the puppy's original owner called me to say "hey, i don't want that dog back. you keep it."

what? i was supposed to be living on campus. no pets allowed, remember? but i couldn't just abandon poor juliet! what's a girl to do?

litter box training a dog is difficult. but we did it. juliet and i managed sneak in and out and to live in campus housing for a whole year without ever getting caught. sneaky us {so much for that strict no pets policy}.

and now, juliet is all grown up. weighing in around 10 pounds, she's definitely not a teacup anything. i'm not sold she's even part chihuahua. but whatever she is, i love her to pieces. she'll be turning SIX this coming april. we celebrate her birthday on april 26. seemed like a good date, huh?

and yes, i take more pictures of juliet than of myself. she's just so cute!

she likes to sleep under the covers.

sometimes she gets confused, though.

it pretty much never fails. if i'm having a bad day, she'll make me laugh. or she'll just cuddle with me for hours. she keeps me warm. and happy.

she is my puppy. and i am her person.

finally finished friday.

since it's friday, i think i'm going to try to make a point to list all of the things i have finished this past week. you know, to sort of list my accomplishments, i guess. and perhaps i'll list a few things i would like to have finished by this time next week.

finally, i finished taking down and returning to storage all of my halloween decorations. and boy, where there a lot of them. since austin and i had our zombie dinner party, i kind of went all out with the decor {still plan to make a post about our dinner party, later though}.

finally, i finished reading the lovely bones, by alice sebold. i literally started reading this book in high school. yes. high. school. and i just read it in its entirety. i took it with me to the cabin in georgia with austin's family and read it there. i had to start all the way back at page one, since it had been so long since i started it.

finally, i finished packing up all of my summer clothes and putting them in storage, as well. all of my tank tops, shorts, summer dresses, and sandals: gone. it was a sad day. but, the good news is that i got to pull all of my fun scarves and cute, warm hats out of storage. i also get to break out my overly large collection of cute winter jackets!

finally, i finished transplanting my houseplant into a more appropriately sized container. i kept putting it off and putting it off. but look! he's flourishing!

ok. so just don't look at the few broken pieces... apparently dinger wanted to see if my plant was edible. twice.

finally, i finished {well, we finished} our thank-you notes for our wedding gifts we received and got them sent out in the mail. we have so many loving friends and family that every time i thought about all of the notes we had to write i just got overwhelmed. but austin and i finally sat down and knocked them out, doing just a few every night until they were all done.

well, i suppose that's all i've finally finished this week. now, things i would like to have finally finished by next friday.

• finally, post a blog about our halloween dinner party
• finally, assemble the headboard for our bed {it took me weeks to get austin to make the pieces for it}
• finally, plant daffodils in the front flowerbed {hope it's not too late}
• finally, get juliet's nails cut at the vet {her talons are beginning to hurt me}
• finally, send our wedding photographer our picks to make our coffee table book
• finally, fill some of the empty picture frames in our house

so that's that. anyone want to share what they've finally finished this week? or maybe i've just inspired you to start your own lists on finally finished fridays. it's always good to be able to put a big fat line through the things you've finished on your to-do list.

recap.

hi. welcome to my {under construction} blog. it seems like all of my friends have blogs lately, and whether they know it or not, i like to stalk their blogs to see what's going on in their lives. so, just in case they {friends, family, strangers even} want to know what's going on in my newly married life, i'm putting it all out there for you to read. ok. so not all of it, you creeps.

since this is my first, well, technically second, post, i'll do a quick recap of me.

so i mentioned i'm a newlywed.

that's me. and austin. and i love him. :)

we honeymooned in jamaica. it was perfection.

basically, things have been kind of chaotic since i moved to tennessee. i quit my job back home and moved here just in time to tie the knot. i found a job here, just in time to pay the bills. oh and last week, i lost my job here. so i'm back on the market. the job market, that is. still married (d.u.h.).

let's see... i basically run a zoo, in my house. i have a dog named juliet. she's basically my world. a cat named schrodinger {yes, like the physicist, i'm a nerd}. and a dove named guinevere. their pictures are at the bottom of the page. i just love them.

the most significant events in the past few months will now be summed up in a few pictures.

i went to the georgia winery grape stomp with lindsy and sarah. and juliet and gus, of course. gus is lindsy's pup.

utc's homecoming football game with sarah, sarah's sister becca, and katie. 

ok. so little to no football was seen that day, by us at least...

austin and i hosted a zombie dinner party. i'll probably write a post about that later, because i was really proud of it. just sayin'. 

for halloween, austin and i went out with lindsy and sarah. lindsy was a ballerina. sarah was snooki, from jersey shore. and i was hello kitty. {i'm obsessed}. austin was a doctor. which means he wore the scrubs he wears to work. so no picture of his lame, last-minute costume. 

and lastly, austin and i spent this past weekend at a cabin in blue ridge, georgia with his parents and brother. we go there at least once a year or so. i think juliet ends up having more fun running through the woods than i do. this year, she was brave enough to walk on her own paws across the moving swinging bridge. proud mama right here. 

well, i guess that's my recap. it's not much, but it's all i got.

she had a cocktail in her hand and confetti in her hair.

so, this is my blog. and i totally stole the name from kate spade's new perfume, twirl. thought it was cute. stole it. don't judge.

soon, i will have a real post. first, i'm getting the setup i like.

i know the suspense will have everyone on the edge of their seat.