My excitement for the day ( Read more... )

Big day for Butter. Her first non-Alabama bath and grooming. Neighbor M trained T in on the grooming duties, and T did great! He was fearless with the clippers, and I was so impressed by both him and Butter. They were troopers! I was expecting to be needed for emotional support for them both, and instead served mostly as a pillow for a ( Read more... )

Strangely numb today. I'm now officially older than my older sister ever got to be. I usually get excited about birthdays, but I think I'm subconsciously holding back on this one. It doesn't help that her birthday then comes four days after mine -- it sort of focuses the whole issue. She was four years older than me, and always used to say ( Read more... )

So last night I went out with some girlfriends -- my first significant time away since the puppy arrived. After about 2 hours, I was experiencing an actual, physical ache from missing her. I mean, I hadn't even met this dog 11 days ago, and now I can't imagine not having her in our life ( Read more... )

T and I went back through the puppy photos from way back to try and identify Butter in the crowd. I think I've positively ID'd her in two of them. One is a close-up that I'm practically certain is her (the facial expression gives it away). The other has a puppy on her side, with a big puppy belly and its ear flipped back. She's always in that ( Read more... )

My new realization: bully stix are to puppy parenting as Disney videos are to child parenting. Every now and then, when we don't want her in her crate, but need her to just be calm and stay in one place for a little while, we give Butter a bully stick. We feel a little guilty about it. Not that there's anything bad about bully stix, and goodness ( Read more... )

So there she is. Butter. The newest member of our family. An 11-week-old cream standard poodle. I looked at her sleeping in her den tonight and started crying. I can't get over how pretty she is, and how sweet, and how much I want to do well by her. She's such a good dog. Smart, sweet, calm, proud. I just want to pick her up and never put ( Read more... )

My life has been taken over by a 14.8-pound, cream-colored, super-smart, sweet and lovely poodle puppy named Buttercream Frosting. We call her Butter. We brought her back from Alabama, and I will have an entry soon devoted to her. However, I wanted to record a couple of random thoughts from the trip ( Read more... )

Not enough hours in the day for everything that has to be done! Auctions ending on eBay, the first show of the season for Strollers coming up and I've been put in charge of all advertising and publicity, and then there's readying the house and yard for the puppy! Good thing I'm having trouble sleeping -- it gives me more time to work ( Read more... )

A busy weekend spent making preparations for the puppy, including the building of a fence! Thanks to neighbor M for this photo. Don't be fooled, though -- hitting that post with a sledgehammer was the extent of my work on the fence. T did all the labor, through the high heat and humidity. He's a trooper, and it looks great. Still no photo of ( Read more... )