garden updated

well things have finally taken off here now that the rain has tapered and it's hot hOT HOT! tomatoes love heat & humidity. and you can see that mine have grown a ton! the heirloom varieties are indeterminate which means they just keep growing & growing up! they must be almost 6 feet tall! the romas are a bit more bushy-like and so far have the most green fruit. no fruit yet on the striped german tomato or any of the peppers (boooooooooooooo) but the ground cherry tomatillo is huge with tons of fruit and i have some purple string beans too! did i mention i got some cukes too? july 4th weekend i bought a six pack for $1.25 and figured i'd toss them in the front yard by the fence and see what happens. we'll be lucky if we get any fruit before the frost but hey it was only $1.25. puppy seems pleased with the garden's progress. fingers crossed the warm summer weather continues and things keep growing!

bark-b-q

my friend at work had a summer BBQ or bark-b-q as he wrote in the evite. there were all sorts of human and canines alike roaming around the yard & pool. foster got to meet some new friends who were fast (fenway the visla), short (comet & mattie the corgis) and female (gracie the mixed breed). but that was only half the fun. best friend baron was there and he & foster did their usual amount of running around and attacking eachother (while freaking out some of the guests at the same time). i only took a few pics of all the fun...
AZ peeps taking a 2 second break from the madness foster & gracie thanks alan for a very fun day!

birthday ball

foster got a very fun birthday gift from memere and grampie! it's just a simple blue ball from the life is good store but he LOVES it! it used to have the life is good logo on it and a picture of the yellow doggie in all their shirts but those disappeared quickly. puppy is always walking around with it in his mouth or dropping it at our feet. currently i think it's lost under a piece of furniture but it will pop back up again. thanks memere and grampie!!

gigantic raw hide bone!

foster got a VERY fun present last week from his BF baron's mom mali. it's an absolutely enormous raw hide bone!! here daddy holds it up for a frame of reference. mostly puppy just likes to carry it around the house but lately he has finally started trying to destroy it. problem is it's SO BIG that he can't really even get his mouth around it! this proves to be quite entertaining! thanks mali for a super fun gift!

birthday bone

i got foster a birthday bone from a fun store up in the old port of portland, maine called fetch. it came fully equipped with a candle and little hole in the bone to fit it into! one quick rousing version of happy birthday (sung mostly by me i think) and then puppy dug in. he seemed to enjoyed it. it was a fun treat sunday night before the blurry day at the vet on monday.

happy birthday marisa!!

today is my dear friend marisa's birthday!!
here's an old pic of her and puppy before her baby norah came along...and since she is such a faithful blog reader and commenter she gets a BIG shout out today! HAPPY BIRTHDAY RIS!! hope you had a great day today!! love ya!

a blurry day-updated

yesterday was a bit of a blur for puppy. the day had finally arrived that foster would loose his manhood. before you go calling dave and i mean and insensitive to do that to him on his birthday it was the ONLY time this summer we had 10-12 days free for him to heal. and dave wants him nice and healthy by fall when big time retriever training starts. it was pretty upsetting seeing him when i got home last night. he was very groggy and wobbly. i guess the anesthesia takes a little while to wear off. but after an hour or two he was already looking much better.
update: daddy had to take foster back today and fit him with a cone. seems there was some unsupervised licking going on and messing up the stitches.
so there won't be much news to report on this week as foster is healing and getting back to being a normal 1 year old puppy! not don't worry tho...i have some other pics and stories from the last week or so to report on in the meantime! stay tuned!
get well puppy!!

happy birthday sweet one!

foster the puppy turns one year old today! we celebrated yesterday with some fun new toys and a birthday bone! here's a few (well maybe more than a few....it was hard to narrow them down!) of my fav pics of puppy from year one...
6 weeks oldfirst day home and beyond...happy birthday puppy! (and yes i will still be referring to him as a puppy after he turns one) it's been so much fun! can't wait to see what year two has in store! we love you!!

katie & bob

dave's cousin katie's birthday is today too!! it just so happens cousin k got married about a week ago too! so congrats katie and bob and happy birthday to the new mrs. c!! lots to celebrate this month!!

happy birthday hunny!

today is my darling hubby's birthday!! happy day hunny!! i love you!

july 4th float

fourth of july weekend was our first in MA in a long time and we really enjoyed it! the rain FINALLY ended and it was a sunny, beautiful weekend! THANK GOD!!
on sunday we took a short trip down the assabet river in our canoe with foster. he was in a canoe once as a small pup but this was our first trip out together with him. he proved, as usual, to be a very good boy! he moved around at first which caused the canoe to rock a bit and list to one side. but eventually he settled down and sat towards the back with daddy and enjoyed the sights.a great blue heron flying i finally bought myself one of those seats with a back that you attach to the canoe bench so you can lean back and really get your lounge on. it was spectacular! although they don't read this i gotta give a shout out to stevie and angie who got us the beans gift card for our wedding that we have finally started using! thanks guys!
we're heading down to CT today for dave's cousin katie's wedding! #3 out of 6 for the year!
then next week i'm heading up to maine for a few days to relax at the beach with my sis and nephews. wait a sec.....three boys age 6 & 4....maybe less relaxing and more summertime fun!
so puppies foster will likely be on hiatus for about a week. don't miss us too much!

this dog absolutely loves dave

over the weekend foster and dave were having one of their little snugglefests (these happen more often than you might think! read:dave is a softie for this pup!!)
anyway so daddy sat on the floor and foster decided to curl up in his fav spot, right between dave's legs. this used to be pretty easy when he was a wee pup....but now that he's so gigantic it doesn't seem as comfy to me. what the heck do i know tho? as i was sitting there snapping pics foster fell asleep between dave's legs and started snoring! my goodness!

two toys!

aren't i an amazing puppy? i can hold 2 toys in my mouth!!yup, foster was running around the other morning with two of his current favs in his mouth at the same time: his squeaky ball ( a gift from sarah & josh) and his nyla-ring (a gift from aunt mary & uncle larry).
so much fun!! thanks everyone!

a visit from baron

last week baron came over for a visit one evening after work. of course it was raining out so the dogs had to run around inside. after a few minutes of tearing through the house i decided to break out the ol' puppy gate and restrict them to the porch. foster likes to eat mouthfuls of baron's fur and it's leaves quite the mess!
here's a few pics of the puppy fun...the porch stunk like wet dog afterwards and good thorough cleaning was in order!