Our Sweet Sadie

It's always so painful to lose a member of the family and I just want to start crying all over again working on this post. I've put it off for a few days because I hate to relive this in my head again. This last Thursday, April 11th, our wonderful Sadie Dog died. We don't know exactly how old she is because we adopted her many years ago from the Humane Society and they were just guessing at her age, but we're guessing she was at least 12 years old. It's not like this was sudden, it's not like we weren't expecting this - in fact we've been saying for about the last year that she would probably go soon - but wow, it still hurts to lose her.

All fluffy after playing outside and getting wet.

In her younger days Sadie was about as hyper as dogs can get. She never stopped going. She would try to herd the other animals around the house, she would play catch with squeaky toys all day if she could, she'd play Tug-Of-War with ropes that she'd bring to you, she'd wear a path in the grass in the back yard from literally running circles around the trampoline, and she would chase water sprinklers until her tongue was hanging down to her knees in exhaustion. She was the only dog we had that we could trust without a leash, she was our only dog that we took camping, and she was truly such a fun-loving, happy dog.

I wasn't kidding about her tongue hanging down to her knees.

We had a feeling it would happen soon. We noticed last week that even though mealtime was her absolute favorite time of day, she was leaving her food untouched. She was sleeping more and having more trouble than usual getting around. Normally she would gallop up the stairs as fast as she could to get her food but we'd have to coax and prompt her and even then she left the food untouched for hours when usually she inhales it within 5 seconds. On Thursday her food from Wednesday was still in her food dish and she didn't sleep on the bathroom floor, which is extremely unusual because for some reason she always slept on the bathroom floor (maybe so she could get a drink of water from the toilet whenever she wanted). Her second favorite thing in the world was going for walks but on Thursday she got a few houses up the street and just refused to go anymore. She wouldn't put weight on her back legs anymore and when we finally got her back in the house all she did was whine. Her breathing was getting labored and not even petting and rubbing her ears made her wag her tail.

Mark had touched base with a friend of his who works for Animal Control who said that she could come by after 9 PM but when poor Sadie just kept whining and whining all afternoon, we finally made the decision that it would be cruel to let her be miserable for several more hours. Mark called his friend who came to the house to make Sadie comfortable. We loved her and loved her so she knew we'd never forget her and told her it was okay to go. Mira of course didn't know what was going on but she did pet and hug Sadie and even put her headband on Sadie's head. It took a record amount of Ketamine to finally get Sadie to fall asleep (the previous record had been held by a Great Dane) but at least her leaving us was peaceful. We knew she was going to leave and I think it killed Mark inside to have to make the decision to help her go sooner (afterwards he begged me several times to tell him that he'd made the right decision) but we really didn't have a choice. How could we let her suffer when she had already told us that she was going to die? But it still feels heavy and yet empty.

We got some help to dig Sadie's grave in the backyard, next to Stewie and Porsche, and following our tradition we found a flowering crabapple tree to plant over our Sadie Girl.

Left to right: Sadie, Stewie, Porsche.

Our Sadie

The house feels so empty without this energetic dog. It's so strange to not rest my feet on her while sitting on the couch, and to not trip over her while trying to use the restroom in the middle of the night. So strange to just not have her. Dogs permeate themselves into your life more than a cat - not that I'm stating a preference, but dogs are definitely more dependent on humans in so many ways, and I guess because of that it's more noticeable when they're gone. But as much as I miss my pets who have left, I would do it all over again. The pain of losing a pet is still worth it because of all the good years we get. Sadie, I hope where you are there are endless water sprinklers and squeaky toys for you. We'll miss you.

Okay, now that I'm crying, again, it's time to move on to other news that's not as sad. Speaking of energetic, Mira just doesn't stop. I wish I had her energy!

Before Mira came along I'd heard people talking about how different boys and girls are - boys are energetic but at least if something is wrong it's easy to figure out. Girls, on the other hand, are all drama and mood swings. I was skeptical about this at first but lately I believe it wholeheartedly. Those two X chromosomes definitely mean drama! I need to start another blog dedicated to things that will make Mira throw a tempter tantrum. A few days ago I put Mira down for her nap and when she got up, literally everything made her throw a fit. So here's a list for what made her have a tantrum that afternoon.

1) We offered her a snack.
2) We asked if she wanted to go outside.
3) We took her outside.
4) We brought her inside.
5) We offered her a drink.
6) We said her name.
7) We tried to give her a hug.

I wish kids came with instructions! Gee whiz. I hope this isn't too predictive of her teenage years.

Yep, she's all drama

Whatever she was eating must have been tasty

Well, as my mom keeps telling me, it's all "just a phase" and before I know it I'll be looking back at this and wondering where the time went. I know each age is challenging in its own way but I have to say, I can't wait for a breather. I've also heard many people say 3-year-olds are worse than 2-year-olds and I hope that's not too true. As I jokingly say to friends who ask how Mira is doing, "It's a good thing she's cute!"

She's definitely getting better with talking though, which I'm hoping dispels some of her tantrums. Some of her favorite phrases are, "Uh oh!", "Oh no!", and "There it is!" She's really good with animal sounds (cat, dog, monkey, bird, chicken, frog), she loves trains, building towers with blocks and then knocking them over, the Toy Story movies and anything princess-related, and of course any excuse to be outside running around.

And speaking of outside, Mark and I had our last ski day of the season last week. Boo. It'll be nice to spend more time at home with Mira (as much as I love skiing and spending time with Mark, I always felt a bit of Mommy Guilt for not spending time with Mira whenever we went off skiing every week) and now I can be excited about the warmer weather, but I'm going to miss skiing. I think we'll definitely have to save up for season passes next winter. I feel like I've definitely progressed in my skills over the winter - Mark took this video of me skiing some obstacles and catching air on our last day.

Mark pointed out that I didn't get as much air as I thought because the back ends of my skis never left the ground, but we can't all be perfect. At least the majority of my skis got off the ground.

And since it's spring I guess it's time to talk about rebirth and all that crap. We've been tossing around the idea of increasing our chicken population a bit since we're down to 3 hens (the roosters as you might remember had to be disposed of and the other hens met some unsightly and unfortunate ends at the jaws of our dog Archie), and even though the three are giving us 2-3 eggs a day, we're suckers for cute little baby chicks. And who wouldn't want more fresh eggs, right? So, here are the three new babies.

We got one more of each type of chicken we already have, so another Red Sex Link, an Americauna (crossing our fingers this one will give us more blue/green eggs when the time comes!), and a Barred Rock. Also crossing our fingers we don't have more roosters, those were a pain to get rid of. It's nice to listen to the cheeping, and I've forgotten how funny it is to watch a baby chick fall asleep - because they literally fall asleep. Get ready for more cute baby chick pictures in the near future.