A month in Utah: week 1

When we lived in MA, I had several friends from Utah who would travel back to Utah for the whole summer with their kids.  I was so jealous of them.  David thought it was ridiculous and pretty much said "dream on" if I even let the thought cross my mind.  So, I was pretty surprised this summer when he suggested that I spend a month in Salt Lake.  I wanted to take a longer trip than my normal week or two.  I thought maybe three.  He said - you might as well just stay a month!  He knew I desperately needed a break from some things in ABQ, and was totally on board with me getting away.  I think he ended up regretting that generosity sometime around week 3, but he was a trooper and made it.  My high school reunion was scheduled for the first weekend of August, so leaving for the 4th of July and stretching it out until then was quite a bit.

So, after our 4th of July weekend in Denver, David drove back to ABQ with his parents and Christine.  I loaded up the kids, dog, and cat into the truck.  The 5 of us drove across Wyoming (my least favorite drive EVER- I hate I-80 in Wyoming!) and headed to Salt Lake.  The kids were BEYOND excited to be making this big long trip and staying with Sean and Kate for a month.  I was looking forward to getting to do all the things we never have time to do and maybe helping my family a bit since I'm never around when people need help.

We tried letting Kitty out during this drive.  She just snuggled up with Shadow.

After a long day of driving with kids and pets, we finally made it!  I know - Melissa just cringes inside when I pull up with a truck load of crap, including furry creatures.  She is such a good sport to host us, no matter what menagerie we bring.

Week 1 turned out to be a lot of helping.  I am glad I was there.  Lots of things went wrong and they kind of needed an extra warm body to man the posts.  The kids didn't care - they just played with their cousins for days on end.  I had all these visions of having tons of time to just sit in Melissa's kitchen while the kids went in and out the back door all day.  It definitely happened.

Barnhisel Beach

Sloan tried so hard to play like a big kid. 

Shadow sure likes Aunt Lissie's yard.

Randy and Grace had lots of fun jamming in the basement.  Those two are kindred spirits for sure.

Mom's birthday was that first week too, so it was super nice to be there for that.  Dad came over that night with a sack full of rocket supplies and helped the kids build their own rockets for a future launch date.  He is such a fun Grandpa.  I love that he spends quality time with the kids when he can.

We did make it to the zoo with this crowd.  I love the pictures of the kids from the back standing at this fence.  It's kind of like a growth chart.  I have so many of Grace (and Hattie too) standing at the fence when they were Sloan's size.  We couldn't get enough of this cool Arctic wolf.

I really can't believe how much we did on this trip.  This is only the first few days.  I think I'll let the weekends have their own posts because they were all huge adventures.

4th of July in DENVER

Man oh man, am I regretting letting the summer go by without keeping this up.  It's proof that we were too busy living life to write about it, but we really had an EPIC summer and it deserves to be remembered.

We started the 4th of July weekend by driving to Denver as a family, cat, dog, and all.  Jane was lovely and let us take over her basement for the weekend so that kitty could have her own spot away from the dogs.  We drove into Denver on July 3rd and got there very late around 10pm.  As we drove through downtown on the freeway, heading to Arvada, we were treated to several awesome fireworks shows above the lit-up city.  It was pretty awesome.

David's parents and Christine drove up too, and were already there.   So, we had a fun-filled weekend of sitting on the back porch, watching Tour de France, playing board games, and eating!  We celebrated Barbara's birthday and we did take all the kids to the town firework display on the 4th.  It was great.  

Kitty's first car ride.  I was soooo nervous to bring her on this trip, but she did GREAT!

 Shadow all snuggled in the back seat.

Evan was super excited to get to hold Kitty on his lap.  

The girls and Grandma on her bday.

lazy cousins waiting for fireworks

 One thing about the Chapmans. They will play games for eternity.  And they sometimes aren't nice about it either.  They get very concerned with rule following, strategy, and really like for other people to play the game the way they want it to be played.  It can get intense.  If you are a Chapman or married one, you know what I'm talking about.  ;-)

Thanks, Jane and Richard, for all your hospitality.  We love spending time with your family!  The kids cried for miles after we drove away.  We simply just don't get enough time with our favorite Vigils.  

remember when Shadow...

(I think this will be the last Shadow post.  With new pup moving in, I just haven't been able to get to all of this and think about it for longer than it takes for him to need to pee again, which is like 10 minutes.)

When we were saying good-bye to Shadow, David started telling "remember when" stories.  I should have written them down right away as I know I've already forgotten a lot of it.  But, here are a few:

Remember when Shadow:

*got sprayed by a skunk and had to be quarantined?  That was funny AND sad.   It was our first year in MA.  We were sitting in the kitchen/dining room with the back window open.  The dogs were outside and all of a sudden, the house filled with the smell of skunk.  Instantly, we knew what we would open the door to find.  Shadow was at the door with her eyes barely open, looking very worried and if a dog's face can cringe, hers did.  She was clearly disgusted with her situation as she was soaked in skunk spray, face first.  We washed her for days.  Our house smelled bad for months.  The skunk had scratched her on the neck, causing an infection, causing a vet visit, causing an in-home quarantine for rabies (since they had current rabies vaccines, the dogs were not taken from us as long as we promised to keep them in the house except to go potty on leash for 45 days and not let them interact with anyone or anything.  It was a long 45 days.)

(on an unrelated note, if you click on that link - remember when my blog posts were ONE paragraph and ONE picture?  I think I need to go back to that.  This is getting to be a lot of stuff!)

*had her own song?  Blink 182:  All the Small Things.  She was in the car as a puppy one day when the song came on and we decided it fit her bouncy personality.  Every time since, when I hear that song, I think of Shadow.

*even though Velvet was the alpha dog in the house, whenever we were with other dogs, Shadow tried to be the alpha over them?  She knew she couldn't compete with Velvet, but everyone else was under her rule.  She especially liked to give Max and Sneakers a hard time at their own houses.

*trapped a baby fox and barked like crazy to tell us that she had found a friend!  She was so disappointed when we let it get away.

*used to chase squirrels until we thought we'd have to pay for knee surgery (we knew other dogs who had blown their knees out chasing squirrels.)  oh, and swimming after ducks in our yard when the rain storms lasted so long that our yard became one giant pond.

*could jump into the back of our truck with the tailgate shut!  She would leap over the back of it without touching it.  I always wished I had a horse who could move like she could.  She was so beautiful to watch as she ran or jumped.

Shadow dog, I am missing you a lot right now as I take care of your "baby brother."  I'm sure you would have LOVED playing with him.  He likes to do all the same things you like, especially chase games.  You two would be able to chase each other for hours.  He also dreams like you and sticks his tongue out when he sleeps, just like you used to.  And, just like you, he can't catch anything in his mouth to save his life, nor does he fetch.  He will do exactly what you used to, he runs after the ball and gets it, but has no interest in bringing it back for another throw.   Velvet would have her paw on her forehead in embarrassment.
I chose him because he didn't remind me of you, but he managed to do it anyway.

Well, those are all the ones I can think of for now.  If anyone else has any "remember Shadow" stories, feel free to post in the comments.

Shadow, continued

Make no mistake, just because I'm cleaning up new puppy pee (Stryder will definitely get his share of posts later, I'm sure) does not mean that we have forgotten Shadow, at all.  I have been having such a hard time finding time to finish blogging about her.  Life has been so busy since last weekend.  I wanted to do one more post of memories, and one of pictures.  Today, hopefully, I can accomplish the pictures.  I'm really joking myself to think I could put all the great Shadow pictures in one post.  I think there are 80 here and it's just a small fraction of what I could choose from.  She was with us for 14.5 years and did everything with us.  A lot of these have probably been on the blog before because the dogs have been such an integral part of our lives and raising our kids.  Still, I want to have a spot where we can find a bunch of them.

For lots of pictures of Shadow and Velvet together, head to the posts I did last year for Velvet.

Here are some more Shadow snaps, in no particular order:

Hattie and Shadow

Gracie and Shadow

with Grace

 chasing Velvet

drying from a swim in the pond

 with Harriet

 at our house in Stow

 with Harriet

 building a snowman with Grace

 first birthday party the girls threw for her

 with David at Tanner Park

with Grace the day she got her first bike for Christmas

 chewing a rawhide she got for Christmas

 on a mesa walk in ABQ

 waiting for us to come home and guarding the house from South Salt Lake criminals

 always underfoot

playing in our empty house as we left Stow

 licking peanut butter from a kong

 playing in the deep snow at Roger and Jeanne's house

 watching Harriet open Christmas presents

with Velvet, and one of her favorite buddies - Max Merrill

playing the part of a sheep in the nativity on Christmas Eve with the Merrills

hiking the volcanoes in ABQ

with Velvet and her cousin, Sneakers, in Denver at Jane's house

hiking the volcanoes

with Velvet and her cousins, Argos and Helios, at our house in Stow

I can't tell you how many mornings we started at the top of the stairs like this.  Shadow with her nose over the top, waiting for me to go down.  I sit down to pet her, and Kit Cat comes and sits on my lap so that we end up staying there for a while.

 Sweetest dog, ever.  Seriously, let this cat come to live with us and made friends with her.  I took this photo after coming in from the bus stop.  Shadow was ALWAYS there waiting for me to come back in and she taught the cat to do the same.

playing in the only ABQ snowstorm last winter with the girls

snuggled by the fire with Kit Cat

camping in the Uintas in 2013 with the Covilis

playing with Janie and Evan when they came to Salt Lake for Grace's blessing day

 with baby Grace

Grace's first day of nursery at church, saying good-bye to Shadow as we left, pencils in hand, ready to go.

BFF's

First "family" photo - Shadow was only about 10 weeks old

 with Evan at our house in Salt Lake

in our backyard in Salt Lake

 snuggling with Dad when she was a little puppy

first and last time we made her dress up for Halloween

photos Bret took of Harriet and Shadow right before we moved from MA to NM

 living room camping with the girls this summer

begging for the milk from my cereal in the morning

using Grace's guitar cases for afternoon laziness

more cat snuggling

one of Shadow's awesome dreams 

What I hope Shadow and Velvet get to do all the time now.