LONG Lovely Day

Snuggled Up Chewing Bones Together On The Bed

Well, today little Lily Girl joined our family. We are so excited. It's a little scary too, only in the sense that we didn't realize just how grown up (lazy) Brutus had gotten! Wow, what a difference. This little girl is filled with energy. I'm guessing that she'll be that way for a couple more years. :)

Brutus went with me to pick Lily up, so he was in the car for a really long time today. It took me about two and a half hours to get to Fairmont, MN, to meet up with Amy and her son Ryan, who were two members of Lily's amazing Foster Family. I always capitalize Foster Family, because honestly, the people that Foster these cats and dogs are angels. They take animals that have sometimes been beaten, starved, neglected or worse, and nurse them back to health. Lily fell in to those categories, and this little punkin is amazing. Because of this family, she has a twinkle in her eye, a spring in her step (a giant one) and gives kisses so freely that you wouldn't believe it. All the way home she kept sneaking up behind my seat and sneaking kisses to me.

I will admit that I was pretty frazzled by the time I got to Fairmont to pick Lily up. After posting on my blog last night that I was going to be picking her up, and that she was a Beagle, I had a couple negative comments about how awful Beagles are. It got me worrying. I heard comments like "she'll eat your cats", "she'll run away every chance she gets", etc. I am a worrier anyway, so worry away I did. When I finally calmed myself down and reminded myself that Brutus came to us as an adolescent with absolutely no manners or training, and he has turned out to be an amazing dog, then I started worrying that I wouldn't wake up in time. I needed to be up at 7:00 to be on the road by 8:30. I didn't need the whole time for myself to get ready, but Brutus wakes up about as slow as I do in the morning, and I knew that he would need a good fifteen minutes to get moving and get his "business" taken care of. And, I needed to stop and get gas. So yeah, I think I slept about three hours last night. Not cool.

Ryan and our twisted up dogs!

I got to the meeting place to meet Lily's Foster Mom and Brother, and I was kind of a wreck. It was SO WINDY, and then Brutus was so excited that he wouldn't listen to me, so the leashes kept getting tangled. Lily had just been spayed this past week, and her tummy is still tender, and I swear that anytime I would try to get a hold of her to separate the leashes, I would end up getting the wrong part of her tummy. Ugh! You know how you want to make a good impression, and you leave feeling like a big fat failure? That was me today. Foster Family, if you're reading this, please know that Lily has gone to a family that couldn't possibly love her more. Brutus hasn't put in his vote yet. I think he needs about two more days to get used to being jumped on. :)

So anyway, we got home, and Lily ran right up to Don and planted a bunch of kisses all over his face. Adorable. Princess, our oldest kitty came up to say hello, and Lily got scared and decided to hide behind me. So much for eating the cats! Then Sophie, our youngest cat came running up the stairs. At first Sophie was scared of Lily, and Lily was scared of Sophie, but tonight they were smelling each other up on the bed, and I don't think they'll be fast friends, but at least they have become acquainted. We never see Bernice, our middle kitty. She still hates Brutus, and it's been two and a half years. Only once has she gotten brave enough to hiss at him and put him in his place. She was in desperate need of some loving from mom, and when Brutus came walking in the bedroom she stood up and let him have it. He hung his head and walked away. Pretty pathetic.

So, forward we go. I can honestly say that my Brutus Blog will have a whole new twist to it now that Brutus has a little sister. She might get that boy in shape!

And, unfortunately, all of my pictures turned out kind of blurry today. I don't know if it was the wind, or my nervousness! I'm so bummed. Ryan, Lily's Foster Brother is absolutely adorable, and I really wanted to post some awesome pictures of him with Lily. Ryan, if you're reading this, email me some cool pictures that I can put on my blog.

Welcome Lily Girl.

Lily Bear

Tonight Brutus boy had a bath, had his ears cleaned, and had lots and lots of wrestle time with dad, and snuggle time with mom. Tomorrow Brutus is meeting his little sister Lily. I know what a LOT of you out there are thinking. WHAT??? I know, I know. We already have three cats, that I adore, and we have Brutus who is like a mini tornado of energy and love all wrapped up in to one. Trust me when I say that we had never planned on adding another pup to our family. BUT, and there is always a but, I saw this little face. I am blaming my cousin Janice for this one.

Janice runs an animal rescue called P.A.W.S. of Jackson County in Southern Minnesota. She also has a Facebook page for her rescue, so when these precious little faces come along, I see them. The majority of the animals that come through her rescue are cats, and I am at my city limit, thank goodness. Otherwise, I would be the cat lady, and probably divorced. Don is so patient (and I think he might even secretly love) the cats. He has always been a dog lover, and I was the cat lover. After we adopted Brutus, I became a "both" lover. They are completely different animals, and both offer such wonderful companionship and unconditional love.

So, about Lily. Lily lived in a home where she was beaten, had food withheld, and probably many more things that I don't even want to know about. Her Foster Mom Amy took her in to her home without reservation. She said that she could just see the hurt and fear in this little girl's face. Amy has fallen in love with Lily, and would keep her herself, but she already has three dogs, so..... she gets to come and be Brutus's little sister. As all of you who know us know, she will be one spoiled little girl. She is very small. She only weighs 15 lbs. and stands 13 inches tall. She is one year old.

Our hope is that she and Brutus will become fast friends. Brutus is fearful of large dogs, and tiny yippy dogs, so Lily should be just right. When we go to the dog park, or when Brutus goes to daycare, Lily is the type of dog that Brutus usually hangs with. Actually, it's usually the type of dog trying to hump him, but that's a whole different story! Lily isn't a barker, and she has been bell trained to go outside to go potty, which Brutus is also bell trained. We understand that it is going to take some time for this little to adjust to the house and to us, as well as the cats and Brutus, so I'm sure there will be accidents. Nothing can compare to Brutus's first couple days here. The first day he lifted his leg and peed all over my white sofa, and the second day here was our first day alone together. Do any of you remember this? Yeah, two minutes alone and there was white pillow stuffing all over my living room! I couldn't scold him because I was too busy laughing and trying to take his picture. This is still Don's screen saver at work. It's definitely a great conversation starter!

We should be home by dinner time tomorrow, and after some warming up and loving time, I will be sure to log back on to the blog and update everyone, hopefully with pictures and some great news.

Keep us in your thoughts tomorrow. I'm going to have a long drive with the two dogs together on my way back home, and I'm really hoping it goes OK. I feel bad for little Lily being pulled from the first family that loved her enough to show her kindness. Hopefully she will adjust quickly.

Until tomorrow........

If Heaven Is Blue, This Is It

The ice went out at the lake this week, which is a huge relief. As the owner of a dog who loves the lake, I hate that sort of in between time. I have this terrible fear that Brutus will go running out on the ice and fall through, but we won't be able to save him. We have a canoe that we keep next to the shed that we could grab in a heart beat, but the thought of it still scares the heck out of me. Thankfully, we made it through another spring with no ice accidents.

It's hard to comprehend, but Brutus probably went swimming four or five times today. He picked up right where he left off last Fall. He remembered the same rotting log along the shore that holds the little critters he likes to go after, and the same shrub on the bank that he likes to pee on. It was like there was never a winter in between. I love it. In my head it just means that he's "home".

I was checking out the purple pool today, and I'm afraid it isn't going to make it through another summer. I'm so sad about that, because Brutus adores his big purple pool. Maybe the store will have purple again this year. Brutus is going to have a new little sister this summer to show the ropes to, so he'll have to share his pool, no matter what the color. I can't wait for all of the photo opportunities.

More updates to come on "Lily Bear" in the next few days.

I hope everyone is enjoying their weekend.
Sheri

Missing Out



SUMMER IS COMING BUDDY!

Between my camera and my keyboard, I have missed out on sharing so many awesome moments in the last few weeks, darn it! It always bums me out when something inspires me to write, and then I get distracted (lazy) and don't get it done. So, today I'm going to do a little bit of back tracking.

Let's go back about two weeks ago. It had been warm enough outside to melt the little bit of snow that we had finally gotten in Minnesota, but not warm enough to make the melted snow really go anywhere. Thus, our back yard turned in to a virtual skating rink. Brutus always does his business in the back yard, and that morning when I let him outside, it was a bit of a challenge. Lifting his leg on the shrub wasn't too bad because there is mulch there to dig his nails in to, but heading out to the yard to do the rest of his business turned in to a comedy, at least for me, and probably our neighbors.

He always does this little dance of going back and forth several times until suddenly he squats. It's like all of a sudden his body says "now"! Well, first he was having trouble getting his grip while he was pacing back and forth, and then when he was finally ready to squat, he went sliding right down the hill. It completely freaked him out. He slowly crawled his way back up the slope of the yard and tried again (there's only one area that he's willing to poo). The same thing happened. This time he gave up and came crawling to me, but the problem with that scenario was that it got his tie twisted around the tree. That meant that I had to go out and get him untangled. I headed out to get him and landed right on my bum. It didn't feel that funny to me, but I was convinced that if the neighbors were watching, they were probably laughing so hard that they had wet their pants by that point. Just the site of watching a poor dog who's trying to poop sliding down a hill was funny enough. I was finally able to reach Brutus, and instead of untangling his tie, I just unhooked him. We both crawled to the screened in porch. He did end up taking care of his business out front by the garage, but he wasn't happy about it. He's a creature of habit!

The other funny thing that has disrupted Brutus's life in the last couple weeks is that Don and I switched sides of the bed. You are probably wondering why. Well, in a nutshell, I'm always warm at night, and Don is always cold. Don sleeps on the side of the bed where the heating vent is, and even though it's blowing warm air, he still doesn't like the feeling of the air blowing on him. We've talked about this for the last fifteen years, and we finally just decided to make the change. It has completely thrown all of the animals for a loop. I don't think that Don and I had more than two or three hours of sleep the first night. He didn't realize how often the cats sneak in and snuggle with me after Brutus goes to sleep, and they give off a lot of body heat. I didn't realize how often Brutus lays right on top of Don's legs.

The first night we both woke up at midnight. I said "I can't feel my legs". Don said "I am covered in cats and I am so hot"! It went like that the whole night. The second night was a little better, mostly just because I couldn't sleep and at about 1:00 I finally went in to Ashley's old room and crawled in to bed in there. The cats followed me, so Don was very comfortable in the bed with just Brutus. Night number three, Don slept in Ashley's room. I think we both actually slept in the same bed on Thursday, and then Don and Brutus went to the lake for the weekend. I WILL say that I enjoy having that little breeze on me at night, and Don seems to be staying nice and warm on my old side of the bed, so we'll keep giving it a chance. We are all creatures of habit!

Other than that, Brutus's life is still awesome. He spent the weekend at the lake running and playing outside, and visiting with the neighbor dog Kiera. He loves being at the lake, and always pouts for a while when he gets back to the Cities. Especially when mom insists that he have a bath, which I did! He was filthy, just like he wanted to be. :)

It's just about purple pool time again. Woot Woot!

Love For The Little Guys

I love Brutus. He seriously has no idea how big he is, and it just cracks me up. I haven't been walking him for the last several weeks because my back has been on the fritz. Don't worry, Don has stepped up to the plate and made sure that he's gotten plenty of walking in, and Andrew was staying with us for a couple weeks before he moved in to his new apartment, and Brutus got to go running with Andrew. The jury is still out on whether he actually enjoyed the "running" or not. He seemed to love the first half of the run, but Andrew said that he spent the second half trailing behind him with a look on his face that said "really dude?"! He always slept really really good on those nights though, so I was super sad to see Andrew go. That wasn't the only reason, but it was a biggy!

Anyway, today I took Brutus to the dog park to play. We are expecting a big snow storm, which probably won't happen, but just in case, I figured I better get him out for some good exercise. Often times when we go to the dog park, there are a bunch of big dogs there, and surprisingly, Brutus is a little fearful of big dogs. He prefers to play with the medium sized dogs. The small dogs kind of freak him out because they "yip" at him, and he doesn't like that either. We have three little Pomeranians that live next door, and Brutus won't even go outside to pee if they are outside, because they bark constantly. He hates it! When the big dogs are at the park, and they all come running to say "hello" to him, he lays down on his back and basically says "have at me". It's so pathetic. I mean seriously, Brutus weighs 90 lbs. His psyche obviously weighs about 45 lbs. He just gets overwhelmed.

Today there were only medium sized dogs at the dog park, and it was awesome! There were five dogs in total, and those five dogs ran and played like crazy. I threw a bunch of tennis balls one after the other, and after about forty minutes Brutus walked over to the gate and scratched at the door to leave. He had had a great time, no fear, no fights, lots of fresh air and fun.

I met a girl at the dog park that had two gorgeous dogs, both lovely mutts. I asked her about her dogs, which is always the polite thing to do, and she said that they weren't technically rescues, but she acquired them through the Guardian Angels for Soldier's Pets. The service itself sounds like a great idea, and something I hadn't really thought about. I always figured that when someone went in to the service, their family members would step up and care for their canine or feline family members, but I guess that not everyone can or will do that. I tend to think of my animals as my kids, which again, not everyone does. Anyway, in this particular case, the guy left for the service, and when he came back he no longer wanted his two dogs. Thankfully, the girl who had taken care of them had fallen in love with both of them, and was willing to keep them. Just imagine how terribly stressful it would be for those dogs to lose a second owner after all that. It melted my heart that this girl stepped up to the plate.

It's my personal opinion that if this guy would let his dogs go when he no longer had out of state commitments, she was the better choice as a parent for them anyway. I don't know his personal circumstances, so I am truly being judgmental as an animal lover. But, on a positive note, I did add a link to the program in case you know someone that needs help with a pet while they are gone.

So, that was our Tuesday. I hope everyone out there is having a great day.
Sheri....and Brutus

Kissing

Hello Hello Hello! I promise that I haven't forgotten about my Brutus Blog. I love this little blog, and all that it stands for. I will always remember my first few months with my Brutus boy, and how blogging about our experiences was the only thing that kept both of us alive some days. He is such a different boy from the dog that we picked up on that cold January day two years ago.

For instance....it used to be that if we took a treat out, he would practically take our hand off to get to it. These days he will wait patiently (well, kind of patiently) for us to give it to him, or to give him permission to eat it. He's learned all kinds of commands, like sit, stay (depending on the circumstance), come (if he wants to), and shake (he shakes with us if he wants a treat, not the other way around). Looking back on the last couple sentences, I'm kind of wondering who has trained who! I'm kind of kidding. He's an awesome boy.

Today I thought I would try to teach him to kiss my nose. He gives us kisses (with his nose only, thank goodness) which are very sweet, but I was going to try to get him to aim for the nose. I thought that holding a treat next to my nose and saying "kiss" and then letting him have the treat would work great. Well, it didn't work out exactly like I thought it would. To add to this story, I'm also doing a photo project this year, and this weeks project was taking a picture that included myself in the photo. I had no desire to do a self portrait, so I thought I would get a picture of me teaching Brutus his new trick. Well, here is how it went.....all six seconds of it!

Coming in for the "kiss" and snatching the treat instead.

Making sure the treat is safely in his mouth.

The very cute escape.

Thankfully, Brutus is very treat motivated, so he'll get it eventually. I think that next time I will be a little more cautious about protecting my nose instead of taking pictures!

Puppy Love

It has been such a fun weekend. We had our "Christmas" with the kiddos a week early. Nick and Ashley both had troubles with scheduling a visit during the week of the 25th, so we just moved our gathering up by a week. Nick was able to bring his girlfriend Liz along for the whole visit this year, which was awesome. She is such a love, and such a perfect match for Nick. It's been so much fun to see them together.

Andrew's girlfriend Amber was able to join us on Friday and Saturday evening. She was scheduled to work this weekend so she had to come to the party a little late, but she was nice enough to let her dog Mabel come over and play with Brutus for the weekend while she was at work. Needless to say, Brutus is exhausted!! Every once in a while he would jump up on our bed to hide from Mabel (because she's very well trained and won't jump up on our bed) and he knows it. lol! They spent the weekend playing tug of war, wrestling, kissing, snuggling, and running around like crazy! I'm thinking he will sleep for a good two days! Ahhhhh...........puppy love.

Here's a little slide show of their play date.


http://s935.photobucket.com/albums/ad196/PetersonSheri/?albumview=slideshow