3 Cheers for Goldens

My dear friend just lost her sweet golden retriever, Gus, and reading her sad story made me cry. It made me think about how much I love our sweet golden, Kansas. The poor guy has been through a lot this past year. When I had my little "vacation" in the hospital for 5 weeks, Kansas got the shaft. Chad was always either working or hanging out at the hospital...not a lot of time for walking the dog. Kansas did come to visit me once at the hospital. I held on real tight to his leash and he pulled me around the sidewalk. And now, with Brooks around, Kansas has taken a back seat. He has been so wonderful through it all. He is the best dog, considering that instead of tons of fun walks and chasing rabbits, he gets attacked by a little boy. Brooks will seriously lay on Kansas and just pull out his hair, or pinch his nose, or crawl over his body. Kansas just lays there. Don't feel too bad for Kansas though. He is still deeply loved. He gets to sleep on the couch every night, we just went on a fun hike the other day and he went swimming in the river, and now he gets extra treats that Brooks drops from the table. In saying all of this, I would be very sad if Kansas were no longer around. Now, if you don't have a dog you probably don't understand what I'm saying or what my friend is going through, and you probably didn't see "Marley and Me", and if you did you didn't like it. (Oddly enough, "Must Love Dogs" is on T.V. right now.)
Anyways, I love Kansas. And I am very sad for my friend that lost her buddy, Gus. Here are some pictures of Brooks and Kansas to make sure that we treasure every moment with him.





Chad and I are marking Brooks' first word as "dog". When he sees Kansas we point and say, "doggie...woof, woof!", and Brooks says, "uDU". Sometimes he even gets the /g/ sound in there. The word is very different from "dada". Brooks loves Kansas as much as we do.

Birdie and Scoops in Colorado

Birdie and Scoops came out for a long weekend to hang out. The original plan was for me to join the youth ski trip and Birdie and Scoops would babysit. The girls that were planning on going on the ski trip backed out last minute, so there was no need for me to go. But, it worked out well to have them around to help since Chad was gone. We had lots of fun and lots of meals out. Every time we went out we just packed tons of food and Brooks - he loved it! He is really getting excited about feeding himself noodles, peas, black beans, and turkey meatballs. He had so much fun showing off for Birdie and Scoops - He is getting real good at pulling up on everything and crawling real fast. Thanks Birdie and Scoops for the great weekend!