Happy days, sad days

I'm amazed to see that it's been over a month since I posted. I certainly have had plenty to talk about, but it's been a rough month and some things are hard to put into words.

Pretty much the entire month of August revolved around our sweet Golden Retriever Molly, who I'm very saddened to say we had to put to sleep just 2 weeks ago. She was 11 and had been showing her age more and more over the past year, but this summer she was getting worse and by the end of July seemed to have no energy to do anything. We took her to the vet early in the month to find out that she had a heart problem and was put on 2 different pills, one to regulate her heartbeat and the other to alleviate all this fluid build-up around her heart, both of them she needed 2 times a day. Now my Molly was always pretty good about taking meds if I stuck them into a treat or table scrap as needed, but as any dog owner probably knows they get wise to you after a few days of that and soon enough she was eating the treat and spitting out the ills. So then here we were shoving pills down her throat twice a day, which is not fun for the dog or the owner. They did seem to help for a while and we were so hopeful that this would prolong her life for a few years...but then she seemed to get worse again and then she stopped eating completely. I couldn't even force feed chicken broth down her and she could hardly get up without help anymore and would not walk more than a few feet without sitting back down to rest. She was clearly not getting better and we had to make the most difficult decision I can remember making in my lifetime, we had to let her go.

I don't know what it is about the bond between pets and owners, there is something there that cannot be explained unless you have experienced it. At work that day after I had said my goodbyes (and yes, I was a crazy fool for even showing up but I don't think "had dog put to sleep" counds for sick time) I was such a mess and couldn't stop crying. I'm embarrassed to say that I'm crying right now, 2 weeks later, and probably will still cry over her a month from now. She was my baby, and I miss her so much.

We still have our other dog Maggy who is a great companion and also is my little baby. She's doing well considering she lost her sister but she was more of a loner than Molly was. She's also getting spoiled rotten now and no longer has to share the Cameron "droppings" at dinnertime and gets extra treats just for being cute and cuddly! Everyone keeps asking us when we're going to get another dog now but I think I'm happy with a one kid, one dog family for now. Things could change but I think it's the best for now.

Anyway, on to a happer topic, our vacation over the past week and a half! We took Cameron on a long road trip to Nebraska to visit/meet his Great Grandma. My Grandma is such an rincredible lady, she's 89 years old and still lives alone out on the family farm. She doesn't farm anymore, she just rents out the land, but she still has a sizeable property to keep up with. She has a big garden that she plants and tends to on her own and she still does most of her own house work and a lot of yard work. I hope that if I live that long I'm able to do as much as she does!

So we packed up my parents mini van then the 5 of us headed out. It was a LONG 2 days in the car but we were really glad we broke it up into 2 shorter days instead of trying to drive the whole way in one day. Cameron did pretty well in the car all things considered. Our new portable DVD player was a lifesaver and he was pretty content to watch movies and of course Fraggle Rock for most of the ride. He did get restless and I think the last 2 hours in the car on the ride home were the worst as he was just DONE being in the car but mostly he was a trooper.

He just loved being out at Great Grandma's with all the room to run and places to explore. She has a really long gravel driveway and his favorite thing to do was collect rocks along the way when we would go for walks to get the mail and such. One of our big projects for the week was to cut a bunch of dead trees down around the property and he was "helping" with that by picking up sticks and things. During the project we made the mistake of giving him a ride in the yard cart once and after that he thought he should be carted around in it all the time! It was a source of several tantrums whe we started putting sticks and other yard waste in the cart instead of the boy!! Luckily for us he's also easily distracted so we would quickly find other things for him to do or help with which sometimes worked and sometimes didn't. And we haven't even hit the terrible two's yet...

My husband just loves doing yardwork so this trip was right up his alley. He spent hours on the riding mower cleaning up the surrounding yard areas. Unfortunately it was super hot (in the upper 90's most days) and dry so the mower would kick up dust pretty badly. He enjoyed it though so it was all good. He mowed so much that he blew the belt on the mower and they had to give it a tune-up! Of course Cameron was right there getting dirty and "helping" to fix it!

Here is a halfway decent self portrait of Cameron and I. I'm never in pictures since I'm always the one taking them!

So basically it was a low-key vacation involving a lot of yard work and hanging out with family but it was fun and we all enjoyed ourselves. My dad and I even got along pretty well, or at least there weren't any shouting matches so that was good! When we left Grandma was already talking about us coming out next year! We'll see Grandma, we'll see!

And one more thing, while we were on our trip I became an Aunt! My brother and sister-in-law had their baby! It was a girl who they named Gemma Maria. She's adorable of course, and has a full head of dark hair just like her cousin Cameron! My SIL is Mexican and Gemma appears to have her mother's skin tone so Cameron and Gemma look more like cousins than they would if he were our bio child! I'll leave you with a picture of the little beauty, here is her very first picture! Welcome to the world Gemma!