So this requires it’s own post, which I’ll do as soon as I have more time to go through finding some good pictures, but I’m sad to report that on May 21st, we said good-bye to our beloved Cody. Cody was a rescue dog when he was around a year old. Tony got him in some time in 2001 and he was pretty skinny and had been abused. He never liked the smell of beer, so we’re assuming the jerk that didn’t take care of him was a drinker. When I met Tony in 2002, Cody was still pretty rough around the edges. He had to be crated a lot of the time and peed on EVERYTHING! When we moved into this house 7 years ago, something totally changed for him. He no longer peed on things in the house (just EVERYTHING outside) and chilled out for the most part, not needing the crate any longer. He was Roman’s buddy even though often times, Cody stayed downstairs and Roman stayed upstairs. He was always so big and was a block head – literally and figuratively (not the brightest bulb and we joked that he couldn’t even catch a cold let alone a ball or a treat!) But he was a real sweetie of a dog too. Even though he was clumsy and excitable, he was always the dog that was gentle around our babies when they came home from the hospital. He was so good with Nicholas as he climbed all over him and ran all his toys into him! All Cody wanted was to make us happy and get a little lovin’. The past couple years, his health was slowly declining. He was getting lumps and bumps all over the place. He refused to get his nails cut and because of that, he often would break them off and then get an infected toe. But mostly, he probably had a cancer in his stomach. He threw up after every meal and toward the end he was throwing up throughout the day and night. He lost a lot of weight and just wasn’t his old self anymore. The Thursday before we put him down, he was up sick all night long and that’s what made us decide it was time for him to go be with Roman. Going through the process with him was clearly very painful, but of course he made it even harder that day because he acted all perky and happy in the car and during the visit. We knew that it was either that day or a day in the near future and since we had worked up the courage to go, there really wasn’t much to reconsider once we were there. Having Hannah say goodbye before we left was very sad. Nicholas didn’t really know what was going on, but he hugged Cody and we all cried together as a family as we said goodbye. Like I mentioned before, I’ll do a special post soon for him to capture a few good memories of him.
So needless to say, that night and the next day (our 7th wedding anniversary) was very sad as was the following week, but we’re getting back to normal for the most part now and have had some awesome days since then.
So now on to the more happy happenings since then…….
Since we missed out on a celebration for our 7th wedding anniversary on the actual day, Tony and I had an awesome splurge weekend the following weekend. The kids went to my moms for the weekend and we spent all day Saturday and Sunday together. We went to the mall Saturday to get a few new clothes and then packed a bag and went downtown. It’s a shame we don’t take advantage of what Cleveland has to offer more often – we really have some great stuff! Anyway, we spent the night at the Hyatt, which is at the Arcade – such an awesome beautiful building!
We ended up getting a room without a view though, which turned out just fine, but we had some good laughs about it anyway! It was off in the corner and had a lovely view of a parking garage!
We got stuck in the elevator a few times – that was before we realized we needed to use our keycard to go up!! Oh, and be careful not to bump your head!!! (I love you Tony!)
Anyway, we walked around for a little while and then got dressed up and got ready and headed out.
We used Tony’s sense of direction to walk to our dinner at Mortons, which means we took the long way! But it was a nice evening and fun to walk around downtown. So our dinner at Morton's was super, extra fabulous! It was definitely first class from the moment we walked in and they greeted us with "Happy Anniversary Mr & Mrs Carrossellia". We sat down and we were waited on with total first class. It was awesome! How about customized menus just for us! (notice the greeting on top)
We enjoyed a lovely bottle of wine, Tony had some oysters, we both had salads (later realized we should have shared a salad) and then had the juiciest, most tender, flavorful steaks we've ever had! We also shared a baked potato and asparagus. We realized too, we could have done without the asparagus, but the lady that came to butter and sour cream our potato was just awesome - again, we felt so pampered and special that night.
We had a "celebrity sighting" if you can call it that. Tim Misney walked in with people that I assume was his family. I wanted so, so badly to walk up to him and say "I know what you do"!!! Anyone that doesn't know what I'm talking about, he's the lawyer with the commercials that say "I'm Tim Misney and I'll make them pay or I'm Tim Misney and you know what I do".
And we finished off our dinner with a chocolate lava cake that I’m sure was so good, but we were so stuffed to really enjoy it (however, we did manage to eat most of it). And the coffee was fantastic – oh and they gave us our dessert on the house. I can’t say enough about how nice it was there. We truly had a memorable dinner. And I even managed not to freak out when the bill came….it was big, especially for a dinner, but it was so worth it, especially as we celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary!
After dinner, we walked back to the hotel (took the shorter direct route this time) and changed our clothes. We stopped in a Lola for a drink. It was really nice in there and we hope to have another evening out soon for dinner there. Then we went to Hilarities for a comedy show. The second guy we saw was super funny. The headliner was OK, but not our type of humor for a majority of the show….it was good though. And then after the show, we went over to the House of Blues for a few more drinks. It was so great to walk around downtown and really get a feel for the nightlife down there and share this night with Tony. We had such a great time!
We got up the next morning and checked out of the hotel, stopped for breakfast and then stopped home for a little while. We ended up going to look at new cars for the heck of it. The Chrysler dealership was closed, so we stopped by the Kia dealership to look at the Optima. It was really nice, but they couldn’t do much with the numbers without our buyoff on the Jeep, so it didn’t really go anywhere. We went to my moms to pick up the kids and stayed for dinner and then came home.
Monday was Memorial Day. It was HOT! We went to the store for a while and then made an impromptu decision to go over to Dawn & Jack’s so we could go swimming in their pool…..and visit them too of course! Nicholas took a little while to get used to being in the pool, but ended up liking it for the most part. Hannah of course was a total fish the entire day and turned into a prune! We need to go over more often this summer so she can get better at actually swimming, she’s getting there!
Nicholas ate some serious picnic food….he actually liked ribs and steak
And totally ate an entire ear of corn – held it just right and went to town!!! (Love it Aunt Susan – don’t know what you’re missing!)
And there you have the update through the end of May…I’ll try to return soon to do a Cody post and fill you in on how June is starting
