Daisy - It's A Dog's Life

A little over a month ago, we got the bad news that Daisy, our black lab of 12 years, had malignant melanoma. This past Monday April 19, Daisy passed away. I'd say that it was after several more weeks of great memories, but the truth is that it was after 12 full years of wonderful memories.

I started going back through my digital pictures, and realized very quickly that Daisy had been there for many of our lives biggest occasions. Daisy was born in April of 1998, and the day after Beth and I came home from our honeymoon, Daisy was old enough that we went over and picked her up. She was always small for a black lab mix, and she always thought she was a lap dog, no matter how big she got.

The first digital pic I have of her is a little before her first birthday, in February of 1999. Here's a lovely girl hanging out in the backyard. About the only thing she loved more than those rawhide bones was her kong with a healthy swab of peanut butter.


Here's another photo from a couple years later. Everytime Daisy got a bath, we'd leave the cute little scarf on her for as long as she'd let us. She hated clothes (as was demonstrated in a disastrous halloween witches costume attempt), so it usually wasn't more than a day before she'd find a way to get it off.


Before long, Patrick came along and we were a little nervous about how Daisy would react to having someone else in the house getting all the attention. After some initial sniffing and checking him out, she quickly took on the role of fierce protector. We'd often lay Patrick down and find soon after that Daisy had taken up post alongside him, watching over him or snoozing alongside him.


A couple years later in '03, a new house brought new adventures for our family. With Patrick and I rough housing in our new family room, Daisy was right there in the mix playing along with the fun.


As Patrick grew up, he and Daisy were quite the pals, especially since Daisy could always count on Patrick to hook her up with a goldfish or cheerio...


Soon, the family grew again, and Daisy now had two young men to look after. As with Patrick, we'd often find Daisy laying down next to Owen, ever watchful. Owen always got a laugh out of his protector...


Through the years, Daisy was always there, checking out Christmas presents, sniffing Halloween pirates, or refereeing Easter Egg Hunts. She even had to be in on the action as the boys learned to fly kites in the backyard.

And just when she figured she and mommy were going to be forever outnumbered by the boys, along came a princess to add to the mix. While Daisy may have had some initial shock at yet another set of little feet to chase her around the house, she was once again very quickly the watchful protector, this time with some help from some equally watchful big brothers.


So once more through life's little milestones, learning how to crawl, learning how to walk, visits with family, and more Christmas gifts to explore. And as much as Daisy loved her kids, they too loved her just as much.


Which brings us to this Easter. We had a trip planned to visit my brother in D.C., but wanted to make the most of our time with Daisy. Ordinarily, Daisy wasn't a big fan of long car rides, but we decided we'd give it a shot. The trip both ways was fine, and Daisy actually seemed to do pretty well with the trip. And once we were there, Daisy got to explore the park behind my brother's house. This was quite the adventure all by itself. The boys decided they wanted to walk Daisy, so off we went. Owen and Daisy got about 40-50 yards in front of us, when all of a sudden, a small herd of 6-7 deer bounded across the path no more than a couple dozen feet in front of them. They both stopped in their tracks and stared in amazement. Owen turned and yelled "DEEEEER!", and all of us swear Daisy looked back at us as if to say "those are the biggest doggone squirrels I have ever seen!"


It gave us all quite a laugh and a fantastic memory for all of us. We finished up our walk, and even managed another long walk in the park with her before the weekend was up.


So looking back, while we managed to make the most of our last few weeks with Daisy, we've since realized that we more than enough memories to spare. This hasn't been the easiest post to write, but its been fun to look back on not just great memories of Daisy, but great memories of our whole family as we've grown and grown up. Check out "A Dog's Life" on Picasa for even more memories than the one's I linked. We're sad to lose Daisy, but we're glad that she helped create, see, and be a part of so many wonderful memories. RIP Daisy. We'll see you at the Rainbows Bridge...

From Daisy - Its a Dog's Life

Easter in D.C.

We had so much fun visiting my brother in January that we wanted to do it again quick. And Beth really wanted to go to D.C. to see the Cherry Blossom's so we were thrilled when we managed to put together another trip out over Easter Weekend to close out the kids spring break.

Once we got there, it didn't take long at all for the boys to head out back to play on the swingset now that there wasn't 2 feet of snow covering everything. Aidan loved playing with Patrick and Owen, which was obvious by the big smile on his face.


Kate and Emily wasted no time either, but their fun was cuddling on the couch and posing for one of many photo shoots. These two girls are cute as can be and are sure to be trouble as they grow up.


Of course Emily was also quick to soak in all the attention she could get from Patrick and Owen, and they were happy to lavish it on her.


The good weather also gave us plenty of chances to do some sightseeing. A visit to the American History Museum on Saturday was a hit. Kate loved checking out the first ladies dresses exhibit. All the kids enjoyed running around checking out the sights as well as the open spaces. And while everybody was exhausted by the end of the evening, the kids loved every minute, right up to the last monument picture they could squeeze out of the day.


Easter Morning was a lot of fun. The Easter Bunny managed to track the kids down in the D.C. area, and they loved digging through their Easter Baskets. Soon it was time for everybody to get on their Easter best and pose for pictures....lots of pictures. Even with some photo subjects running out of patience, we still managed to get a pretty nice family photo.


After an Easter Egg hunt in the backyard, it was time to head down to see the Cherry Blossoms, and they didn't disappoint. We had a great time walking around the basin, checking out the Jefferson Memorial, and walking through the Roosevelt Memorial.



The last day of the trip we thought we'd take a quick trip back down to see the National Air and Space Museum and maybe even the Capitol. Silly us. The kids LOVED every minute of the Air and Space Museum. The boys were especially happy to see one of Ameila Earhart's airplanes, tying things together with "Night at the Museum 2" for them. :-)


And once we walked out of the museum and realized we were right next to the capitol there was no excuse not to check it out too. We ended up leaving town 5 hours later than planned, which made for a LOOONG drive home, but it was worth every minute. The kids even got to see a Capitol police dog up close and personal. All in all a wonderful trip. As is usual, there are lots more pictures out on Picasa, including a couple of photo series from Patrick and Owen (statues and tulips) as well as Easter and family fun galore.

From Easter in D.C.

Presidents Day In D.C.

As usual, life keeps rolling on by, even if I don't get a chance to update this as often as I'd like. The good news is that we've had the chance to enjoy life, like a long weekend trip over Presidents Day weekend to D.C. for my neice's baptism. We loaded up the family truckster, and after a series of 3 stops before we were on the road more than 20 minutes, we were finally on our way. About 10 hours later we made it into D.C. and found my family as well as more than 2 feet of snow still left from their great blizzard.

We also spent less than 30 minutes in the house before Kate fell and we ended up paying a quick visit to the Emergency room for a possible broken nose. Fortunately, that was the extent of the craziness. The rest of the weekend was great. Emily's baptism was great. The kids all loved seeing each other and playing together. And we had a great time just kicking back and relaxing with my brother's family, something we don't always get a chance to do. All the boys headed outside to play in the snow and sled down the hill in my brother's back yard. And Kate doted on "her baby" Emily like nothing else. Those two are sure to be thick as theives as they grow up. The only thing better than the weekend itself, was planning our next trip back to visit them.

Here's some pictures from the baptism and other shots throughout the weekend. I'll share another set of pictures in a bit that we took during a quick tour of D.C. with the boys. They got to play amateur photographers for a day and had a great time.

First Snow of 2009

We woke up this morning to a winter wonderland. A little over and inch of snow and still falling, but it may as well have been a blizzard as far as the kids were concerned. We headed out shortly after breakfast and discovered snow that was perfect for snow balls, snow men, and even snow forts.


Patrick decided to test his boundaries with a couple of snow balls aimed at dear old dad. Owen was soon in on the mix with a sneak attack on Patrick!


Here's some video of the boys running around throwing snow balls while Kate admired the snow man.


I decided it was probably time to put the camera away and defend myself when all three of them took aim and fired snow balls my way. Even Kate managed to get one in the air.

From First Snow Fall

Welcome Baby Emily!

We (Beth and the kids) got together with my Mom and Dad this past weekend to celebrate Christmas a little early. My brother and his wife were expecting baby number 2 any time, and we decided to celebrate early to give them the flexibility to visit the new baby whenever he/she arrived. We joked that now they could haul out of town first thing Monday morning. Sunday evening that joke turned prophetic. Mike and Betty Ann were on their way to hospital around 9pm, and by 10:40, they had a new baby, and I had a new niece, Emily! Beth went a step further and surprised me with a quick trip to D.C. to visit my nephew and new niece.

Aidan was very eager to show off his new sister "Em-muhl'" to me. He was also quite the proud little brother holding his little sis.


I of course didn't waste too much time getting the chance to hold my little niece. I may have been a bit of a baby hog, but I was only there for a 1 day visit after all. :-)


I did however have to find some time to play with Aidan and learn all about his fascination with trains. So Mom, Grandpa, and Grandma all got their turns holding the newest addition to the clan.




First things first, I helped Aidan pick out an outfit for the day and got him dressed. He loved his bear shirt, so it was a quick choice:


From there, it was an afternoon of playing trains and racquetball with the robot claw.


While I was there, Mike and BA were happy to be able to put me to work helping bring the holidays to life. We got their TV mounted back on the wall, and then took an extended family trip to pick out a Christmas tree. Aidan and I walked around and supervised the selection process while Mike and BA picked out the perfect tree. A little living room rearranging and presto, the perfect tree was ready for Christmas decorating to begin...


I had a fantastic time visiting and it was wonderful to see my brand new niece. I look forward to visiting again soon, and I know that Beth and the kids are eager to get their hands on the newest member of the family.

Lots more pictures out on Picasa, so be sure to look around and see the great shots of the kiddos!

From Emily arrives