Friday, August 28, 2009

Max Turns 1!

On Sunday Max celebrated his 1st birthday. He is such a big boy, and we love him so very much. Max received a new doggie bed, and some yummy chew snacks. He also got to play with my parents dog, Barney, and eat a lot of people food courtesy of my mom. We can't believe how long he has been in our little family, we are so grateful for him. He constantly brightens our lives.Our little blue family at my parents house. I love that Max raised his ears for the picture!Isn't he the most precious thing ever! He melts my heart everytime he gives me this look.Max with his partner in crime Barney. They always get in trouble when they are together.

Thursday, August 27, 2009

The Rocky Road to Paradise

Well...we are back from our wonderful vacation, and it was amazing; however, it was a rocky road to get there. We woke up early the morning of Friday the 14th to avoid rush hour through Dallas. As we are crossing through Louisiana we noticed the car was acting funny. We tried everything from putting the top grade of gas in to adding a cleaner to the fuel, but the problem was not going away. As we crossed into Mississippi we noticed that not only was the problem not going away, but it was getting worse. Wes finally decided that we better find a Nissan dealer in the area to look at our car. We found one in Jackson, MS and headed there to get the verdict. After waiting for a little over an hour in their nasty waiting room, some start to our vacation, the damaged was assessed. The transmission was shot and it would cost around $6,000-$7,000 to fix it. Well if that isn't a vacation killer, I don't know what is. Luckily, we remembered that we purchased an extended warranty. We have been thanking our lucky stars ever since then. The dealer called the warranty, and they said they would send an inspector out Monday to decide if they were going to pay for it or not. Our moods were a little dampened, but we decided to rent a car and continue with our vacation while everything was worked out in Mississippi. We headed to Mobile, Alabama to stay for a couple of nights. We viewed the most beautiful plantation homes and ate the greatest sea food at this ugly shack right on the Gulf called Felix's. From there we ended our journey in Pensacola Beach, Florida. It was absolutely beautiful with pure white beaches and blue water. We enjoyed walking the beach, boogie boarding, body surfing, and all the wonderful things to do at the beach. While we were in Pensacola we heard back from the inspector and the warranty was going to fix our car, YAY! Because our car was in the shop, we had extend our stay at the beach:) We ate the most amazing crab legs in Pensacola at a restaurant there! We drove back to Jackson, MS, stayed the night, and picked our practically new car up to head home. To cap off the most interesting vacation of my life, we stopped in Vicksburg, MS to tour the civil war battlefield. It was an amazing vacation, and man am I grateful we purchased that extended warranty. All in all, the warranty has paid over $7K for the new transmission, our rental car, and reimbursement for added vacation expenses. We also got 2 extra days added to our vacation, and a great story! We will definitely be doing this again, minus the transmission thing.