Catching up part one

I keep saying I will get better about posting and then I don't. I apologize to anyone who reads. I've been thinking about posting pretty constantly, feeling like I need to and then I don't. Sometimes it feels like complaining, even if I'm just talking about what's been going on in my life. This one will be long and in two parts since I am catching up on things that have happened since my last post. I do write this primarily for myself, so I won't fault anyone who skips this one.

Something that happened recently was going on a mini vacation. We were supposed to be spending an entire long weekend with our best friends who live in Southern California. I thought it was going to be great like every visit has been in the past. It's always been extremely busy, but fun. I was wrong. There were times we were having fun, sure, but overall, this trip made me never want to go visit them again. The more I think about it, the surer I am that we probably won't go back, at least not any time soon.

I'll explain a bit. In the last three years, we have visited our friends several times, I believe it's been three or four times since they bought their house. The first time, we brought our dogs, and it was fine. The second time we went to visit, they had recently gotten a rescue dog themselves that was a little nervous around other dogs, so we found a puppy sitter and went without the dogs. We were worried about our dogs because we got them during COVID, so the longest they had been away from us was about 10 hours. The sitter took great care of them though and they had a great time with her (although they were definitely ready to come home when I went to pick them up! lol) Anyway, the second visit went fine, their dog loved us and he is super sweet and playful. So, this most recent time, we were told we could bring our dogs with us. We were going to be there from Friday until Tuesday morning. That's not what happened.

If you've read any of my previous posts, you know my husband is sickly. On the Friday we were supposed to leave, he wasn't feeling well until about 4pm. It takes us about six hours to drive to our friend's house, so I texted them saying we were finally about to load the car and go and they told us not to because they do not have lights in their backyard and were worried about the meet and greet with the dogs in the dark. Total bummer, but understandable. So, we leave first thing in the morning on Saturday. We get there without any trouble, the dogs get along great, and we're all happy. We decided to go to a baseball game, which was SO fun! My dogs were crated at our friend's house because they go in the crate at our house when we're not home. They did have a massive change though. My dogs are trained to go to the bathroom on trays in my house because I work nights and my husband is sickly, it was easier. So, I go to put the trays by the backdoor and our friends say they don't want them to go potty in the house. Since, apart from walks, they had only gone potty "in the house" (on the trays), I wasn't sure about it, but it was their house, so I put the trays outside the sliding glass doors hoping the dogs would understand to ask to go outside to go potty. (Side note: The dogs did great! They had only one accident in the house each and my husband and I cleaned it up right away, so no harm no foul. at least that's what we thought.)

Sunday rolls around, and we go to Disneyland and California Adventure for the day. When we are there, we start talking about possibly going home the next day instead of Tuesday morning. This is where the next issue happened. We were there all day long, so I was worried about my dogs being in the crate all day and they were going to take their dog for a walk to get out energy and go potty and all that. They said they were going to get their dog real quick and walk him right away so I could let my dogs in the backyard to just run around to burn off energy and go potty out back. When we got to their house, they went to grab their dog and he freaked out and peed (we didn't know this) so, they stopped getting him ready for a walk so they could clean up really quick. My husband was the last one through the door and saw their dog in a harness and leash, so he left the door open because they said they want to go right away. However, their dog did not have the leash clipped to the harness, so he booked it out the door. We offered to help corral their dog so we could get the leash on, but our friends were so angry at us for leaving the door open that they told us to leave them alone. So, we went back inside, got our puppies taken care of, and finished cleaning up their dog's pee off the floor and everything. We also stayed up in case they changed their mind and wanted out help. They never did. We all went to bed feeling awful. My husband and I felt guilty for misunderstanding and leaving the door open, upsetting our friends and our friends went to bed angry that we'd let their dog outside.

The next day started fine, we all decided to go to a mall nearby because one of our friends wanted a specific shirt that was on sale. I ended up getting new shoes as well. We got special donuts on the way and stopped by a special sandwich shop for one of our friends. While we were there, my husband started to not feel well. I was getting progressively more concerned and mentioned we may need to leave tomorrow morning (Tuesday morning) like we'd originally planned. Our friends told us that wasn't an option because they had things to do. At this point, it was after 3pm. Had we realized they were not going to allow us to follow the original plan of leaving Tuesday morning if we needed to, we'd have left that morning without going out for so long. Maybe had breakfast with them and then left for home. Our friends also informed me that they expected me to crate my dogs, lock them in the room we were using, or put them outside in the 110+ degree heat because they couldn't "watch" all three dogs.

As soon as we got back to their house, I let the dogs out of the crate, took them outside, gave them lots of water, and immediately started packing as quickly as I could while my husband slept on their couch. I was packing a little haphazardly so my dogs wouldn't be outside too long (I didn't want them crated or locked in a room since they were about to spend six hours in the car after already being in the crate from 10am until almost 4pm). I was packing stuff in our room for maybe five minutes and when I came out, my dogs were already back in the house because our friends had let their dog out and when he came in, so did my dogs. I was extremely irritated because they made all these stipulations about where my dogs were allowed to be while I was packing and then interfered. So, I moved my dogs into my room so they could be with me while I packed. That didn't last long either because they wanted to play and I needed to hurry, so, even though it made me feel terrible, I crated them again. They whined/cried while I packed our stuff and then the car.

When I was done, I noticed the gas in the car was low. With my husband being as sick as he was, I was contemplating getting gas and returning for him. While I was trying to decide if I would take the dogs with me, when I did that, one of our friends offered to go with me to find the cheapest gas. I figured it'd go faster with his guidance since he knew the area, so I agreed and left my dogs in the crate at their house. As soon as that was done, I got my dogs and my husband in the car, said a quick goodbye, and left.

I have never been so happy to leave. It was the strangest visit we'd ever had with them. I've never felt so unwelcome while being with them. This wasn't even the end.

When we were an hour and forty-five minutes away, they called us saying we'd left the canister of dog food we'd brought at their house. I was frustrated with myself but told them to donate it or throw it out because we were too far away to come back, and we still had five hours to go in the car. They offered to drive to where we were to bring it to us. I was livid! I wanted to yell at them because they had just kicked us out stating they had too much going on to allow us to stay and rushed me to pack up and leave. I turned them down politely, and they offered more than once, too. I told them it would prolong our drive and we already left much later than we should have.

After about another hour, I got a text message from the female half of our couple friends to just me apologizing for her behavior while we were there. She said other people made her feel bad about her house with how it was decorated, and stuff, and other people made her feel bad about her dog saying he wasn't well trained. I told her that what other people say doesn't matter, all that matters is that she likes her house the way it is. As for her dog, he's a young rescue and does very well considering how short a time they've had him for. He's a sweet dog. Then I told her that since my husband and I have only said good things about her house and her dog, it's not fair to treat us like we were the ones making them feel bad. I also informed her I wouldn't be bringing my dogs back there anymore because we followed all of their rules, they set out for us, even though it was against our dogs' routine, and they did really well! But it still wasn't enough for them.

Maybe I am being dramatic? I even waited over a week to write about this because I thought I would calm down, but that trip altered our friendship in a way that I don't think things can go back to the way it was. They are acting like everything is all good, but my husband and I are very cautious now. :(

The more I think about it, the more it solidifies. We did everything they asked, and they still made us feel unwelcome. I even would have been fine being kicked out on Monday if they had said something to us about it before it was three in the afternoon.

This guy actually knew what he was doing. 💪🏼🙌🏼 #Rare #unusual #fun! LMBO! 💃🏼💃🏼💃🏼 He was a great #lead! 💃🏼💃🏼💃🏼And the next guy I danced with kept asking me to stop #leading lol! Oops! #girlcanthelpit! He just wasn't a good lead. I tried. Too bad. Lol! You can see I totally messed up here in a couple places. 😳😁 He is better than me. I love two-stepping because it's #classy! Guys are mostly #gentlemen. 🙏🏼🙌🏼😉 #Cowboys #IFyouleadiwillfollow #twostep #twostepping #buffalochip #justdance #countrymusic #countrydancing #thechip #cowboyboots #cowgirl #dance #twostepping #buffalochip #tomwagnermusic #weirdcrowd #nothowitusedtobe #countrygirls #countryboys @buffalochipaz @tomwagnermusic