For today at least! Overnight we got a few inches of snow. The kids are all excited. They spent a good 3 or 4 hours out there sledding down the hill. Spirit was outside with them. She didn't want to come in. She started crying at the door to go back out once everyone was cold enough to come back inside.

Later today we head over to my sisters for Thanksgiving dinner. Neiko, Dakota, Molly and Spirit will be romping around in the snow. We're gonna have some tired puppies!

Well that's it! Happy Thanksgiving everybody!

Today I took Spirit for a walk through the trail out back. It's not a super huge area, but it's interesting with the woods and the ponds and stuff. We got all the way to the far side before turning back when it finally struck me that Spirit had been sniffing every young tree we had passed. I focused in the one we were at and noticed a pretty sizable deer rub. It's amazing what you see if you only open your eyes. Deer have glands in their hoves which they secret to mark their territory and play a role in the mating season. Spirit was obviously keying in on that. So, we turned around and walked back. Now here's the amazing part. There were 5 or 6 more trees right off the trail with deer rubs that I didn't notice on the way in.

Note to self: pay more attention to what's around you.

Later that night Spirit and I went to my sisters to pick up my poker table in preparation of next weeks tournament. Molly and Spirit got to run around in the back yard for about 45 minutes. That does wonders. She slept in the truck all the way back home instead of getting the windows all slimed up like she usually does.

We took Spirit up to our church this morning to get blessed.  There was a huge turnout.. tons of dogs, cats, bunnies and even a chicken!  Of course two trains went by 400 yards away, and fire trucks or police cars with sirens went by 3 separate times. Spirit was shakin' in her boots, but I think all the other dogs around acting like it was no big deal was very helpful. The second train she wasn't nearly as afraid, and even started sniffing the ground for the bits of donuts people had dropped.  After the blessing I took Spirit over to the park for the kids and we played around on the 25ft long line. Good fun!

Hello! I just signed up for this and it looks like a bit of fun.  I'll have to upload more photo's when I boot up my laptop.

So we got through our first Halloween as dog owners. We played the scary sounds CD in the house while we were getting ready and Spirit was giving us her "I'm afraid of that" woof. A steady, never ending stream of it.

We kept her inside for the first half of trick or treating and then as it settled down I brought her out and she did pretty well. She had her buddy, Molly, there which helped. They had a good time in the house later on, playing chase around the furniture while we munched on the kids goodies.