A (nother) New Addition

No, the baby isn't here already. (I'm only 16 weeks.) We adopted a beautiful, sweet 16 month old St. Bernard from the animal shelter yesterday. Are we crazy you ask? Well, we might be. Who knows. I didn't really know we needed another dog, but I've been hearing a lot about dogs lately. Gina and Ryan are looking for the perfect dog for their family, and my friend Pauline volunteers at the animal shelter, so she's been on the lookout for a dog for them. And she was the one who told us about our other dog, Boof.

I went to see Pauline's greenhouse the other day and she was telling me about a couple of the dogs at the shelter that might or might not be what Gina is looking for. So I came home and looked up one of them - a 10 year old Rottweiler who is very mild, housebroken and needing a good home. When I told Jeremey about him, he immediately said no. We don't need a decrepid old dog who is going to die shortly. Then yesterday, Jeremey and Ryan were in town helping some friends move and Jeremey decided to go to the shelter to check out this dog. He was afraid I'd come home with it. Well, Roscoe wasn't there anymore. They sent him to the extended life sanctuary to live out his days. But Jeremey did see Lily, and he fell in love with her. So he took a picture of her and emailed it to me. He said he wasn't allowed to bring her home unless I brought in Boof and all three children to make sure we were all compatible. (The very first dog we adopted was a golden retriever who we ended up returning the same night we brought her home due to her biting my nephew - she had a problem with men. They actually had to put her down because of it.) So the people at the shelter remembered us, and wanted us to all get along with our possible new dog.

After Gavin and I got our afternoon nap, I loaded the kids and Boof up in the car and we all went to the shelter. I wasn't too sure about Lily at first. She's HUGE. And she sheds (but what dog doesn't), and she's kind of slobbery. But she's a short haired St. Bernard, and she's also a dry mouth breed. Which means she does drool occasionally, but she doesn't constantly have 6 inches of drool hanging out either side of her face! She is also a purebred. Her previous owners had to bring her and another dog to the shelter because one of their children developed an allergy to the dogs. So she wasn't abused or neglected or anything, which is a BIG factor in adopting any dog.

I asked Jeremey if we could take the long weekend to think it over, but he just looked so heartbroken that I gave in and said maybe we can try her out for the long weekend. Well, of course we're attached to her already. We can't take her back now! She is very sweet and obeys well. She still needs some work, but I think she'll be a really good dog for us.

Lynzie's husband, Miles, with Lily

Lily and the girls