Hi Marie! It sounds like you're having a great time and we'll be looking forward to those toddler pictures... Your baby Bouv. here is doing well. I consider all puppy accidents to be the fault of us humans for not paying attention/reading the signals right. It takes a bit of time to adjust to read her particular language so some accidents were expected... Today was a very mellow day here. Misty has now fully accepted Phoebe as a member of her pack - she initiated her into the joys of head wrestling today...:-) Head wrestling is a game she and Copper invented. The only rule I enforce is that the big beast has to keep her feet on the ground. The way it works is Misty is on higher ground (the lounger on the back porch in today's case) and the big dog is standing on the floor beside her. Misty pounces on the big dog's head and that dog tries to grab her and flip her over. They then proceed to wrestle back and forth until one of them tires of the game. Unfortunately I didn't have the camera with me so didn't get any pictures, but maybe some of you remember the pictures of her and Copper playing on the loveseat. The same thing was going on with Phoebe this moning on the lounger on the back porch. Barb was here today. She and Phoebe got along very well and they had a vigorous game of chase-me (Barb pretended to chase Phoebe and Phoebe joyously raced around the paths...) We all went for a walk past the library to drop off some books. I like this picture, in part because the sign on the library window says Laugh Out Loud - a comedy reading program for kids - seems appropriate for Phoebe! Here's the classic Woody's Doggie Holiday Camp picture from this afternoon (just after this picture Phoebe nuzzled my waist with her head, rooted in the training pouch with dog cookies that I'm wearing, and absconded with a cookie or two! I handn't realized the pouch was unzipped... She's a smart dog. Misty and Phoebe are definitely much mellower together now. When Randy got home tonight, we went for the third walk of the day. Zoe (yearling Rottweiller) was out on her driveway so introductions were made. Phoebe was skittish but eager; Zoe was dubious :-) A generous dose of cookies was applied all round. It takes more than a strange big hairy dog on her driveway to keep Zoe away from her cookies! So Phoebe had a good day at camp today :-)

We just got back from our, first in several years, camp out we slept in the back of the truck with a canopy over us. We put a piece of plywood on first then 2 layers of carpet,left over from remodeling, then our memory foam then a matress pad then a few wool blankets. We never felt the cold, but as we are both getting artheritis we did feel the hard. We are trying to decide if we would ever get back to camping or not. I did not like the crowded campground and Hubby did not like getting up with me twice to go potty in the middle of the night. He had to return to work the next day he didn't think he would but.... I will always enjoy camping, but next time we hit the far out there woods! Where his @#$% cell phone can't reach us!

Can't believe I missed such a wonderfully anticipated get-together!! Half way there and stopped in my tracks! They released me about the same time you were done at Camp Cheerio. I will now see my gastro doctor here in Fl. on Thurs. Looks like it was a huge success, as usual. Missed seeing and meeting everyone. Marge

Your time alone this summer while SO & his kids are off at summer camp has brought home the reality that you're alone in this relationship. You're not part of their family, you're not getting the respect & support you need & deserve, you're the photographer who's never in the picture. Your boyfriend doesn't *sound* like a wonderful loving person at all. He sounds like someone who has you where he wants you. & "selfish" is not a nice thing to say to *anybody* who's alone & feeling abandoned. "Selfish", in fact, sounds like a very accurate thing to call someone who's having a great time & who doesn't want to hear about anyone else's pain or loneliness. Children who remind you that you don't share their last name are *not* signs of a good, loving, 'family' environment, & I wonder how it occurred to them to say such a thing; my very strong suspicion is that they heard it from their mother or their father. According to my uncle & my brother, both of whom know, grieving for a lost child is the worst grief there is. & you not only lost a child, you lost her before you knew her. You lost her when your anticipation was at its height, when your maternal hormones & feelings were at their most intense. It sounds like he!!, & evidently nobody has acknowledged the depth of your grief & the pain you feel every day. Although you must make your own decisions, my impulse is to say, shake the dust of this relationship off your dainty slippers & find someone who is thrilled to have you, who will be ecstatic & honored to share his family with you, who'll be open to marriage & adoption (how many children do you suppose are living in foster care because women who would love to be mothers are tangled up with men who are satisfied with the number of children they have & who don't care if their partners are happy with their position on the perimeter of family life?). Those nice men are out there, & they'll never get a chance while you're living with this guy. Take very good care of yourself. I wish you happiness & fulfillment.