If anyone ever figures out how to go back.. say even 15 years let me know.

I live in a tiny little apartment with my daughter (pre teen going on teen angst!) and my guinea-kids.

I used to live in roomy 3 bedroom townhouse before down sizing to my current divot of an apartment as a faster means of saving to buy a house. I don't like big houses so this should be working great. Only thing is that there is precious little room for everyone!

I moved to this place before getting my pigs and was woefully undereducated in them when I brought them home. Now I'm struggling to get them the space they need without sacrificing our own living space in a negative way.

My daughter's room is too small also. In some homes I see on tv their walk in closets are the size of her bedroom! I think that I should switch rooms with her most times as mine is more of a normal room size. With her going into her teens soon she will need more space.

I want us to be able to move out of this little place and into a nice home. It is also really depressing that at my age I am still renting. I see all these things that should have been done differently.

A coworker of mine is trying to talk me into going away on a real holiday this summer. It has been a few years since I have done that. It is hard for me to justify spending $$ on a holiday when I could be putting it to a down payment. She keeps saying how you only go around once, enjoy it. While that is true it is easier for her who has a husband, two incomes and isn't renting. I on the other hand have no hubby, just my income and am still renting.

Ok... pity party over.:melodrama

Well for anyone who has been reading my little blog-thingy, here's an update.

My allergies to my pigs are all but a thing of the past now that I've switched 100% to orchard grass and have had some time to let my system settle down from that havoc that caused. One bonus to the whole situation is that with taking allergy meds everyday now I'm not reacting to the cheap metal on some of my favorite necklaces and now can wear them again! YAY :)

TV is now pretty much a thing of the past here in our little apartment. K now only watches 1 hour a week and is doing much better in school. Arguments such as:
"Why aren't your chores done?"
"I forgot"
"How can you forget! This is the same stuff you're to do everyday!"
"Sorry, but I was watchin' tv....."
are now a thing of the past too. Double:):)

My laundry room woes were overblown it seems too. But that is good and bad news. Good news: I don't have to move. The latest closing was not due to moronic behavior.
Bad news: The closing was due to a rabbit having fallen into the dryer venting pipes and passing away. So sad...:sad:

So how does this all relate to internet shopping? I guess it doesn't really. It's just that I succumb to amazon and ebay the last two day and bought 2 DVDs and a CD. I'm considering one of the DVDs (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead) and the CD (Soundtrack to the Sopranos) birthday presents to myself. The second DVD is something that might have been a mistake. It is a DVD of "When the Wind Blows"-Raymond Briggs. If you have never seen it I highly recommend it but it isn't light fare by a long shot. Very unforgettable! Only problem is that it is only in the PAL format. So I am trying to find a company who can convert it to NTSC so I can give it to my sister as a present.:shhh:

Sadly I am contimplating having to move... again. My daughter and I have moved 4 times in less than 4 years and the last 2 moves were like one big move from hell.

We moved from Calgary to Medicine Hat 11 months ago. The first apartment we lived in had a major spider problem and I didn't feel safe living on the ground floor of an apartment building. So we moved into a third floor apartment in the same building.

However we seem to have a real sicko living in the building. This wack-job seems to get his jollies from vandalizing the laundry room. One time I was washing my daughter's quilt and when I went to get it out of the washer someone had relieved themselves in the non-liquid form in the washer all over her quilt! :mad: :sick:

The laundry room was already shut down "due to missuse" for a week and a half at the beginning of this month. I went down today to do a load and it is closed again!! A big 'Out of Order' sign is on the door.

So now ... do I wait it out and see if things improve? Do I try to find a place? I hate the thought of having to move again so soon. I really thought that I could stay here until I could buy a place.

Sheesh... if this looser likes to mess with the laundry room, what else might he do?:sad:

We live with nine pets at the moment. Three firebelly newts (Reese, Malcolm and Dewey), three Apple snails (Gary, Gary and his other brother Gary) and of course our fave boys the Guinea pigs (Truffle, Gizmo and Rolo). Ya, I know. I seem to have a thing about trios.

We are currently now on day 5 of our tv free week. It is the best thing I've ever done. Last night in fact K said to me that she really likes not watching tv anymore! I was so proud to come home from work today to find that she was writing a story featuring the GPs. I'm sure that the rest of them will probably figure into her story at some point.

She finished making the hidey house for the pigs yesterday. It is complete with a shuddered window, flap door and a doorbell. She also read a whole book on the weekend and is now almost done reading The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. This is from the kid who I had to send to her room with the instructions that she wasn't to come out until she had read at least 2 chapters of her school reading book.

In fact I made a deal with her. There is a series of book that she really likes. It is more of a comic in hardcover, but if it keeps her reading... It's called Diary of a Wimpy Kid. The new one is out now and we agreed that if she is willing to give up tv for another week I'll get her the book tomorrow. Guess what.. she agreed!! :D

It has now been a full week of the Great Hay Experiment. Tada!

I'm feeling a lot better, still a wee bit stuffy but not to the extent that I was last weekend. I don't know exactly what was the main contributing factor since out of desperation I changed a bunch of things all at the same time. Not that I really think it matters at this point.

I felt too sorry for the pigs to make them go a full week without hay. I think it was Wednesday when I gave them some Alfalfa. OOhh the popcorning! Now they have Orchard grass which I thinks works best until I can figure out how to get some blue grass.

So here is what I have figured out has worked best for me:
1) Being masked when cleaning the cage.
2) Using Loratadine for allergy meds
3) Washing hands EVERY time after handling the pigs.
4) Keeping them on my lap. While snuggling them close to my face is enjoyable, I'm a mess for hours after!
5) Giving the boys Orchard grass not Timothy.

Pigsmakemesmile: I plan on getting an air purifier at some point and get a handvac with a hepa filter to use just for the cage. I'll look at the oreck. Thanks! :)

Otherwise the weekend was pretty good. It was nice to have a break from work. Hopefully this next week won't be so crazy busy. Brush Floss Smile!:D

We are having a tv free week here at home. I'm loving it! My daughter is doing really well with it too. She is doing more drawing and just being more social. My only concession to the no tv rule is our sunday afternoon movie (Big Fish this weekend) and K is in love with AFV so I'm letting her watch that on sunday eve only.

Have a good week everyone.

Thank you so much to everyone who has posted suggestions and well wishes for my fight with the dastardly allergies!

So far my relief has been negligible. I'm hoping that given a few more days I will see some improvement. I'm trying a new allergy medicine and wear a medical mask when I clean their cage. My daughter laughs at me when she sees me masked. "It looks like your going to clean my teeth not the cage." Ah kids!

If I don't see any improvement...I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm really enjoying their being a part of our family and we are so attached to them.:weepy:

I updated my boys cage (again) this weekend. They are now in a 4x4 C&C. Loads of running room. Wheee!

Dra: My fellow Twilightaholic! I hear that there is a new Twilight in the works. It was put on hold because her notes were leaked (so I hear), but some day we will have a book 5! I can't wait to see where it goes from here. The first 4 books seemed like a long introduction and the best parts could be yet to come.

Piggiesmakemesmile: I'm very glad that I have my pigs as an adult. I couldn't imagine being able to keep up with the work and expense as a teen/kid. I love the idea of 'pigtures' at work. I'm going to see if I can get some bluegrass from a local farm, maybe the Huterites?

lissie: a month or a year guinea pigs are so easy to fall in love with!

Current concern: Getting a proper night sleep what with all the stuffyness. I'm thinking of starting the Wild Rose cleanse this weekend and would hate to add sleep deprivation to a sugar crash. That could make me a very scary person to be around.:eek:

Ok, it's confirmed.. I don't have a cold. This is the first and only time that I have ever wished I was sick.

Here is how I figured it out for sure. I read the post on here about the seed heads and how it's fine for pigs to eat them to their hearts content. Since my pigs love them I went and broke off a bunch of seed heads to feed by hand to Rolo to help with bonding to him.

I was sitting in my chair with Rolo, feeding him the timothy when I got an itch in the corner of my eye. Thinking nothing of it, I put down the hay and touched the inside corner of my eye. AAAARRGGHH! Instantly my eye started to burn, itch and tear up. The next day was interesting at work. I had to explain a bunch of times why my eye was the colour of a baboons behind. :eye-poppi

So it was back to this fab forum to see what could be done about allergies. I've cleaned out the boys cage, bathed them and removed all traces of hay. After a week of this I should be able to confirm that it is just the hay and not my gps that are making me sick. I am pretty confident that it is, but better to be sure. I feel bad for my boys being without hay, but I'm sure there is some trick that I'll be able to do to keep them in hay and me away from the kleenex, Visine and Claritine.:optimist:

Now for the late intro:
I'm a 34 year old dental receptionist living in Canada. My daughter and I are true (albeit new) Cavy Slaves. I love that term by the way... very fitting. Our cavies are actually helping us live heathier! Since we make sure that they have fresh veg every day, we are eating more salad too! We live in a very small apartment while I'm saving to buy a house. So the 'guinea-kids' cage is very prominant in our living room. It's a 2x6 C&C, but I wish it could be a little bigger.

I'm a huge fan of Lost (but only watch it on DVD, commericals ruin it), Stephen King, Dexter, and anything that makes you go "whoa..." I've pandered to my inner teenager with the Twilight series and loved it (once the mushy romantic stuff was toned down.)

Well, enough rambling for now. I'm off to cuddle a piggie...where's my kleenex?

I was so determined that I was going to wait and get the Oxbow that I wanted! But with only a day left I ended up getting the Oxbow for adult cavies and a bunch of alfalfa hay. I'm trying to impress upon the owner of the store that Oxbow is great so I have bought 3 different kinds of hay and all of the Cavy Cuisine that he had.

Hopefully he gets the message.:optimist:

Current concerns: none really, I think that my 'allergies' might actually be a cold... please be a cold! I couldn't bear being allergic to my boys and I think my daughter would start to feel guilty if our pets were making me sick.

I've never had a blog before and I know that I am pretty new here, but I thought what the 'hay'! Might as well have a bit of fun and see what happens.:)

I live in Medicine Hat with my 4 kidlets, 3 of which are of the piggie variety.

I am really enjoying this whole forum and have learned a lot from it!

My pigs as you can see from my avatar are (from left to right) Rolo, Truffle and Gizmo. They live in a 2x6 C&C which I wish I could make bigger but we live in a very small apartment for now, so space is at a premium!

Current concern: I think I might be very allergic to Guinea Pigs and I can't find a pet store in The Hat that regularly carries Oxbow.:unsure:

The people at the pet store that I walk by every day on my way to and from work must think I really need a life. I have been going in there every couple of days to see if they have finally gotten in Cavy Performance. I bought it there once but it turns out that the owner didn't really know about it, he just saw a display of it somewhere and got the whole display. He said he would order it again, and it is supposed to be in this week, so I keep checking on my way home from work.
I must look like an idiot!lol I walk in to the store, make a bee-line for the GP food, look at it, sigh and leave. I refuse to buy the other crap (coloured bit and corn-meal) that they have there.

Well, that is more than enough for the first blog entry I think. Probably more than enough. I'm off to freshen hay, vaccum up poops and then spend the next hour with a handful of Kleenex.