Christmas Puppy & First Snow

How much for the 13 year old blue greyhound in the window? She was an ‘Oops Puppy’. In the sense that we hadn’t planned on adopting another greyhound. She was returned through no fault of her own.
Our kids and some boarders are very excited to meet the new gal.Beth, not so much.Beth stops long enough for a profile shot.She’s on the thin side with ‘old lady butt’. Trina said Henry had ‘old man butt’, but it got better once they got a little weight on him.Learning to be a couch potato.The rest of the gang shows her how it’s done.Beth relaxes by listening to some Pomplamoose.Trying out every bed to find the one that is just right. She liked that this had a separate pillow attachment.Our first snow of the year was just a few inches and fluffy. Perfect for romping around. Stella does her usual couple of laps before calling it quits.Beth shows that even old ladies get frisky in the snow.Stanley sees a blitz coming and calls an audible.While everyone else enjoys romping in the snow, Jaime takes this time to remove tartar from her teeth using tree bark.Butt in the air, Beth is ready for the chase.Stanley joins the act.Done with playing in the snow, Beth comes to give her daddy a kiss.Parker sees his opportunity to snag the fishy.Jaime has a sit-down protest after being told to stop chewing on the bark.Parker doing his part to make everyone aware of the devastation caused to the bat population of the Eastern U.S. by white-nose syndrome.

Babysitting Jorja & Fredericksburg Christmas Parade

Jorja stayed with us for a week. What a cutie patootie.Puppies are so flexible.Jaime played with her for a minute or two before calling it quits.It takes a terrier to keep up with Jorja. Jaime on the couch, and Stella on her bed are not impressed by their antics.Murphy takes a WWE smackdown from Jorja.The weather was much better this year for the Fredericksburg Christmas Parade. Last year it windy and sleeting. We dressed the kids with their coats and lights in the parking garage before heading to the meeting spot.It got dark pretty quickly, so we turned on the lights on their coats.We had a pretty good turnout with about 40 dogs, and approximately 10,000 people lined the streets to cheer us on.

Double Anniversary

My procrastinating gets worse during the Holiday Season. At this rate, my next blog post will be in the New Year. Now I need to go catch up on a month's worth of everyone else's blogs.
These past few weeks have consisted of more babysitting and a couple of anniversaries.
Buck doing his best Nigel Buggers impersonation.Jaime and Stanley taking a nap under the ‘Doggie Snuggies’ blanket.Some downtown Fredericksburg stores opened their doors to doggies and were handing out treats for Halloween. Tourists admire how the kids are willing to dress up for treats.We watched Allie who had all her teeth pulled due to a plaque allergy. Can you say messy eater? Yes, that pink thing is her tongue.With 10 dogs one weekend, it’s just easier to sleep downstairs on the airbed. Clockwise from bottom left is, Gertie, Stanley, Stella, Jaime, Blue, Billy, Allie and Abby standing up, and Nellie and Parker on the bed with Kris.Stella had her 6th Gotcha Day anniversary. Really doesn’t seem like we’ve had her that long. She started it all for us on this greyhound journey. For dinner she got some leg of lamb and barbecue sprinkled on her kibble. She also got lots of hugs and kisses from mommy and daddy.Abby and Blue are the kinda brother and sister who are always poking at each other, then when mommy scolds, exclaim that they weren’t doing anything. They just can’t let the other one have their way.My 40th birthday also marked our 7th year wedding anniversary. We took the kids to Charlottesville for stroll downtown and a bite to eat. We came across this ‘chalk wall’. We first noticed the ‘I Love My Wife’, but then noticed in smaller letters above it, ‘I Like My Wife Okay’. I hope he was alone when he wrote that.Before we even got our food, Stella was ready to leave.Parker is stunned that Stanley can lay down when there is food on the table.Jaime surveys the table. They all got some calamari and onion rings. The beer was for adults only.Kris wanted me to add this one last photo of Jaime because she's just so darn cute in it.

Vegas 40th

I don’t actually turn 40 till mid-November, but we celebrated a bit early. Unlike Trina who was checking off her bucket list, I didn’t leave the Strip at all. After an unexpected nine hour delay in Dallas-Fortworth airport, we managed to miss dinner at Mesa with Trina, and had just enough energy to grab a bite to eat before heading for bed.
The next day, we were more energized, and Kris and Jason did the Stratophere’s Insanity ride. I pucker up at that height, so Trina and I just took pictures. Kris ended up doing all three rides multiple times.Vegas looked dead in the morning when we head to the Stratosphere. But it started to come alive as we waited for the Bellagio water show.The Bellagio and Caesars are now part of ‘Old Vegas’ as new skyscraper hotel/casinos like the Aria, Vdara, and Cosmopolitan open up.Justin and Aubry admire the P.F. Chang’s horse outside Planet Hollywood while we head in for dinner.Good friends, good food, good drink! We hadn’t been in that room since we held our ‘reception’ there almost 7 years ago.Group shot of the dinner group. It’s amazing how many friends are willing to show up to help celebrate when you tell them it’s in Vegas! :)A most appropriate fortune for the night.One tasted like water, the other did not.A few people headed back, a couple more showed up, and this turned out to be the hardcore party crew.With this group of guys, we inevitably ended up at Pirahna Nightclub to watch the DC Cowboy Dance Company (as seen on America’s Got Talent).We made it back with our livers intact.

Return of Sweet Jorja

Some weekends are fairly quiet with only a couple of extra kids.Sly and Cooper are brothers from Texas.And some weekends, not so much. Clockwise from bottom left: Tina, Stanley, Stella, and Dusty on the couch, Sunny, Nellie, and Fern on dog beds, Parker and Jaime stretched out on the floor, and Gertie standing over sweet little Jorja.Gertie and Jaime are trying to figure out what this little bundle of energy is.Whatja doin’ up there, mister? She has grown since I picked her up months ago in the Jorja & Flat Brutus post.