We will miss you!!!

It is with a heavy heart that I write this post. A few weeks ago, our black lab got sick and passed away. Over the last six years, he has brought us a love that will never be forgotten.

Ace, we love you and will always remember you in our hearts! Thank you for all your "sloppy sugars" and drooling all over my floors after you took a drink. Thank you for sleeping with Meg every night to fight off the monsters and all the bad things in the night. Thank you for being such a wonder brother to Megan and Dixie. Thank you for always letting Dixie win when we played fetch (we all knew that you were much faster than her, but you always let her win). Thank you for the laughs you brought into our lives. We will always love you!!!

***Meg & Ace in November, 2008***

On Saturday, Meg decided she wanted to buy a balloon to give to you. She wanted us to tie a note to the balloon so you would know that she loves you. I wrote the note for her and she signed it. I think her note says it all!!!

***the note***

***The balloon***


***before Meg let go of the balloon, she reminded Ace of how much she loves him***

***letting go***

***one squeeze***

***Ace, we love you***

Weekend Get Away

We were able to get away for the weekend and went out to the ranch for some much needed r-n-r. The beautiful thing about the ranch is that our phones don't work out there :) The only way to get us is to call at the right time when we're in the house, but that doesn't happen very often.

Every time we go to the ranch, it's the same ritual. We pull up to the house, then Meg, the dogs and I wait patiently (OK, really it's impatiently for the dogs) while Jarrad circles around the house to make sure there aren't any snakes. I have been going out there with Jarrad for 8 years and have yet to see a snake at the house...actually, that's a lie. I have seen a snake or two out there, but it's the bull snake. Did I mention I have only spotted him in the toilet? Yes, he is IN the house. But, I digress...

Jarrad makes his "check" around the house and as he is coming up around by the back door, I suddenly see him reach into the mule for a gun. Yes, he saw not one, but TWO rattlesnakes trying to get back under the house. I used to think that his circling the house was a waste of five minutes (especially since the dogs were driving me crazy in the truck), but now I understand the importance of it.

***the snake***

***Jarrad with his kill***

***Check out all the rattles on this baby***



***Meg with her swollen eye***
it looks a lot better than it did earlier in the day

After the snake incident, Meg rode with Jarrad to dispose of the snake. While they were out, he found a small shed horn. Meg was so excited about it that she actually asked me to take a picture of her holding it.

On Saturday, we did absolutely nothing that involved working. We rode around the property. We hiked a little. Meg and Jarrad definitely hiked more than I did. I don't think my doctor would appreciate me hiking around in the woods. So, I would stay back and watch them until I could no longer see them, then would listen for them. Meg had an absolute blast hiking around with her daddy and the dogs.

We took the dogs to a few of the tanks (of course, most of them are almost completely dry) for a swim. Ace isn't a water lover like Dixie is. She ran around the edge of the tank before finding the perfect entry point. Once that was established, Dixie was off to swim like a champ. She loves the water. In the second picture below, you can see Dixie setting off for a leisurely swim around the tank...Ace on the other hand is turning back to dry land. It's funny to me that he doesn't enjoy swimming because he is an amazing swimmer - fast and strong. The few times he does get in, he can catch up with Dixie in no time flat. I have noticed that the times he does go swimming is when Dixie is far away from the shore. Maybe he's worried that without him to swim her back she won't make it.

***Ace & Dixie looking for the perfect entry point***

***Dixie off to swim, Ace turning back***

Wordless Wednesday

Poor Ace...again!!!

A few weeks ago, I wrote about Ace having surgery on his left ear. Well, he had to have the surgery again because the bottom part of his ear "puffed" up. He has always had horrible ear problems, and it seems that he can't shake it. This time around, we put the "lamp shade" on him so he can't scratch his ear. Hopefully this will work.

This "lamp shade" is going to tear my house up. But, if it fixes Ace's ear, it will be worth it. And, I'm sure I'm going to have bruises all over my legs and any other body part that may get in the lamp shade's way. It's not exactly petite!

Poor baby!

Poor Ace!!!

I interrupt the play back of my visit to SA with this late breaking news...

Back in October 2007, I posted this. It seems to run in the family.

Every night, Ace and I have a ritual that as soon as I climb into bed, he gets in with me for a quick snuggle and some 1-on-1 petting time. As I was petting him, I noticed that his ear was swollen and running a fever. The fever isn't out of the ordinary because he suffers from chronic ear infections, but it's never swelled up like this before. I pointed it out to Jarrad and he said that the swelling would probably go down.

Well, it didn't...not on it's own anyway. I took Ace to the vet first thing this morning and he had to have surgery for hemotoma of the ear. This is a collection of blood under the skin of the ear flap of a dog. It was most likely caused by vigorous head shaking...the vigorous head shaking is a direct result of his chronic ear infections. He's always shaking his head or scratching his ears. It's horrible.

I was able to pick him up a little while ago, so he's home resting.

Weekend at the ranch

Jarrad, Megan and I went to the ranch this weekend. It was so cold and windy, but at least the sun was out! On Saturday morning, Jarrad went hunting...he didn't even see anything. Later in the morning however, we all went out for a ride and he was able to shoot 4 ducks! Dixie fetched all four out of the pond that was covered with a layer of ice! Jarrad was so proud of her. Below is a picture of the happy hunters (and Megan).

Happy New Year!

I'm so sad to see 2007 go. Last year is a complete blur...I'm sure I have the pictures to sum it up though. Will work on that this weekend and post something soon.

downloaded pics

There's nothing like downloading pictures from a camera and being pleasantly surprised. It's like the old days of finding a roll of film and not knowing what's on it until you get the roll back from being developed.

I hadn't used my small digital camera since Labor Day weekend and was surprised to find the following cute pictures. Meg loves being at the ranch and being outside. We had to fill feeders while we were there, so we spent a lot of time out on the mule. I had tried to talk her into staying at the house with me so we could lay down to take a nap, but she wouldn't have that. If her daddy was going out on the mule, then we were too. The picture below explains why I wanted her to stay at the house and nap.

We had been out tooling around on the ranch for probably about 1 hour before she fell asleep. She actually crawled up into the seat herself and laid down while Jarrad and I were filling the feeder (I was opening the corn and he was pouring it into the feeder).

Right before this, we had taken the dogs swimming in one of the tanks at the ranch. As soon as Dixie saw the tank, she was off the mule and in the water. I've never seen a dog that loves to swim as much as she does. Her and Ace are both great swimmers, although Ace is always trying to swim on top of Dixie. Sometimes I worry that he's going to drown her or hurt her. But, she always swims away from him some how.