Christmas Part 2 & Pebbles and Me

As promised here is Christmas Part 2. Doug, Lauren and I drove up to Ft. Worth on Christmas Eve. Christmas day, Lauren was visited by Santa again as we all opened our Stockings. Christmas Day was very low key, just as I like it. The troops rolled in around 1. We had a nice meal prepared in most part by my Mom. Then present time. We all got lots of great stuff. My favorite was probably the picture frame my Mom got me with multiple spots to place pictures. I couldn't wait to get home to figure it all out and hang it! Lauren had one of her best days yet. All of the older cousins doting on her and her not realizing she is so much younger matched them step for step. Here are a couple of cousin pictures.......

The rest of the week was spent shopping and eating. Two of my favorite activities. On the night before we left, Doug and I did slip out for a movie. We saw Marely and Me. My choice not his. While it was a great movie, I don't think I can recommend it to anyone who has ever loved and lost a dog. For anyone who doesn't know, our first baby was not Lauren, it was Pebbles. We got Pebbles when she was a few years old and perfect. She was house trained, playful and loving. Everything you want in a dog. It's funny how so apart of you life a dog can become. How angry they can make you at times, how loved they can make you feel in others. Pebbles was such a caring dog. One of my favorite memories of her was watching her around babies. She was so protective of them, she would sit on guard by their side. She had such a feel for babies, I have know doubt that she knew I was pregnant with Lauren. She would lay on the couch with me and put her protective paw on my belly. She was a sensitive dog. She knew when I was sad and would comfort me the way a dog can. She knew when to play and when to give us space. As you can tell we were attached to this dog. As she grew older her hips gave out. The doctors tried what they could and nothing helped much. Just a few weeks after Lauren was born, Pebbles got to the point she could no longer go up and down the stairs or stand to use the bathroom. It was really heartbreaking. She would just lay at the top of the stairs and stare down at the rest of us. But she preferred to be there. Doug would carry her up and down the stairs to eat and go outside. As much as our heart ached from the void her absence would leave, we knew it was no way for a dog, this dog, to live. So after one more last ditch effort at the vet, we made the horrible choice no one should have to make for a family member, and had Pebbles put to sleep. I was not there for her final moments (I was with the new born at home) but Doug stayed with her through it all. Tears well in my eyes even now when I think about how awful that must have been for him. It was such a happy time for us with our sweet Lauren joining us, but we could not help but cry randomly when something would remind us of Pebbles. The silence at the doggy door, the emptiness under our bed (where she slept), the empty food dish, no one greeting you when you got home......every little thing brought on the tears. So almost 3 years later going to see a movie about life with a lab (Pebbles was part lab, chow, German Sheppard, but was more lab than anything) all the way to end, was horrible. I have NEVER cried like that in a movie. I mean sobs. The similarities were too much. Pebbles was never as "bad" as Marley, but she had her moments (chewing through the dry wall would be up there), but how she was so much a part of the family, just as Marely was. Then in the end making the choice to put Marely out of his pain was too much of what we went through. So, I would not recommend this movie to anyone not looking for anything but a good cry, which we all need sometimes.

And one more thing, "Here's to Pebbles the greatest dog, friend, pseudo baby two people could ever have."