sticking with black

It’s been 3 months since our 12 year old little Toby Bear went to live with Jesus. I still think of him every day… after he died in his bed, we had him cremated and he came back to us in this cute little box. We haven’t yet decided if he’ll live in the dining room or if we’ll bury him in the yard in spring. But one thing we do know is that Tyson (our 7 yr old black lab) is NOT only-child material. Toby was Mr. Bossypants, mind you, but all of September and October, Tyson just moped around, looking sad, and generally older. And we had no plans to get another dog. But then the universe told us otherwise.

Tina, the rescue dog (who looked a strange amount like a female Toby) came in knocked up. She had 8 puppies of all different colors and fur texture. Although the pet population is out of control and we like NOT to have 8 extra dogs to find homes for, it’s exciting to have such tiny little puppies around to entertain us. They were SO ADORABLE. But we refrained from getting attached. They were all adopted by the time they were 8 weeks old…. all but one black one.

See, Toby and Tyson were both black clearance puppies when we adopted them, too.

Universe sign No. 1.

When the 7 adopted puppies were old enough to leave the rescue, we put black baby puppy in with his Mama so he wouldn’t feel alone. And when Tina went in for her spay, we took him to our house to spend the night so he wouldn’t feel alone. But then Tina got adopted, too. : (   …and baby puppy was really alone. So we brought him home for just one more night (against Ryan’s wishes). Although he was adorable and Tyson was falling in love with him, we were able to drop him back off at the rescue and continue about our busy lives.

But then a rescue volunteer went and named baby puppy:  Si.

(my initials)

Universe sign No. 2.

And then another volunteer said this, and I quote:

‘if this were my dog, I’d name him Toby.’

That did it for Ryan and he came to live with us.

the end.

my photography friends Mona + Sarah thought of the name ‘Arrow’ because of his chest marking looking like an Indian Arrowhead. And our neighbor Ashley calls him ‘Rowey‘

he loves shoes, especially my grey felt boots.

he loves to chew string.

he hasn’t had an accident in 3 days!

but his butt toots stink really bad.

semi-big paws… but his mama wasn’t over 45 lbs, so we’ll see.

he’s so sweet and still smells like puppy.

Tyson loves him most. He is finally behaving like the big brother lab we all knew he could be (since Toby made him his bitch).