Puppy Raising Shadow

February pictures!! wow!

2009-02-16T19:59:00.000-08:00

Trainer update!!

2009-02-16T05:21:00.000-08:00

Shadow: Stops at curbs, finds seats and doors, avoids obstacles. Has done escalators, train and subway. No problem areas at this point. He is happy, calm, smart, friendly and has a low distraction level. Excellent potential as a guide dog.

Still calling her a "he" but we're glad she's doing well!

January training pictures are here!!

2009-01-27T07:24:00.000-08:00

More Shadow Training Pictures!!!

2008-12-12T05:39:00.000-08:00

The December pictures of Shadow are here!! Take a look.
The trainer says Shadow is working in harness, has great potential, and is a little worried about traffic noise (which is surprising for us, since she never seemed afraid of it before).

Email update!

2008-10-21T08:09:00.000-07:00

"Stops at curbs and good straight line. Building confidence around noisy traffic. Listens well, easy to control, fun, happy, smart, learns quickly and sensitive. The trainer wants to know if he has any fears and how are his housemanners."

Still listed as a "he"...isn't that weird? Anyway, that's exciting!!

Pictures in training!!!

2008-10-15T04:36:00.000-07:00

Shadow has been in NY for formal training for several weeks and we recently saw the first pictures of her!! And fyi all, pictures of training and updates will be the only posts on Shadow's blog until her graduation picture, because of Shear. I'll also probably post the pictures and things on Shear's blog.With trainer

Yay!

Playtime!!

New puppy!!

2008-08-27T13:31:00.000-07:00

Today we received word that we will probably be getting a male golden retriever breeder candidate puppy September 8. THAT'S ONLY A WEEK AND A HALF AWAY!!! I'm so excited. He was probably born July 3rd. I can't wait to have a new little fuzzball puppy around here again. We still don't have Shadow's turn-in date, though.

The new puppy's blog is at www.erin2gdf.blogspot.com and I will continue to give updates on Shadow on that blog as we receive them from GDF.

:)

2008-08-26T05:29:00.000-07:00

Smelling Bath and Body soaps while waiting for Mom to purchase stuff.

Pictures and Memories

2008-08-15T08:51:00.000-07:00

Pretty puppy!

Now for the memory part...

Big girl
Baby girl

<3

Pictures

2008-08-15T08:42:00.001-07:00

Last GDF Meeting

2008-08-15T08:19:00.001-07:00

Shadow went to her very last GDF meeting last month, and you're finally about to see them!
Shadow
Tired puppy!
Puppies at the water bowl
Shadow and me
Again
Albert. Doesn't he look amazing?
I love this picture!

Beach and Date

2008-08-15T08:01:00.000-07:00

We went to the beach last week with Shadow and she LOVED IT! She turned one year old on May 9th and the Guide Dog Foundation wants her in New York for training by August 30. The exact date isn't here yet.

Drinking from the hose before getting rinsed off.
Shadow giving Mommy kisses. =]

SO MUCH FUN!!!

This is my all-time favorite picture of Shadow. She's happy, has sand on her nose, as the beach in the background, and shows off my beautiful girl.

Shadow Pictures

2008-05-21T15:52:00.000-07:00

From below...
...and above. She looks like a bobble-head in this one. =P

I've been trying to get a picture of this. She'll stand there in a bow for a long time playing with a toy before flopping down.
To chase or not to chase?

My mom was using the hair-dryer, and Shadow went to investigate. Mom pointed it in her direction, and she play bowed and got all excited and started running down the stairs, "going nutty," as we call it, and running up again. I just got the end of it.

Mudcats game

2008-05-13T09:18:00.001-07:00

Last Saturday the Raleigh group went to a Mudcats game and we all got to meet the FOUR seven-week-old additions to our group - brothers Snickers and Rocky, Golden Retrievers, and brother and sister yellow labs Lucky and Tish. Tish is the only other girl besides Shadow...yay Tish!
Shadow

Lucky
Tish

5 month old James. Unfortunately I only got one picture of him. =[

ONE YEAR OLD!!

2008-05-09T09:02:00.001-07:00

Shadow turned 1 today!! I can't believe it. We couldn't believe it when she was 10 months old, and I guess it felt like she froze at 10 months and didn't get any older than that. I took some pictures of her today out by the mailbox on her birthday since I need to take some and I haven't posted (again) in a while.

Finally - pictures!!

2008-04-16T12:23:00.000-07:00

Mom cut the bushes back outside this window and she LOVES to lay there.
Kong.
She lays like this all the time! Silly girl.
Outside with the pretty flowers. =]

Looking outside with Shadow.

Random Puppy Walker Questions

2008-04-16T11:59:00.000-07:00

Here's an idea another puppy walker named Erin came up with and hopefully you all will participate :-) She had a list of questions that have been floating around her head and she put her answers down on her blog, so I'm going to pass it on. Now any other puppy walkers can keep it going by responding on your blogs with your answers. =]

How many puppies have you raised? So far, only one - Shadow
Why did you start raising? I have loved dogs ever since I knew what one was. My 1st birthday cake had a puppy on it sucking on a baby bottle. I used to pester my parents constantly about it, and I'd cry because they said no. Luckily for them I grew up a little and quit it. But 3 years ago while I was searching for rescues to volunteer at I found Guiding Eyes for the Blind. My parents considered it and finally after well over 6 months said no, mostly because we had commitments on Wednesday nights and that's when the meetings were. We met somebody later on though that had just applied, and that's how we found out about Guide Dog Foundation. And now we have Shadow. =D
How Long have you been a puppy raiser? About 10 months
What is one thing you have learned in raising? I've learned more about people with disabilities, how much the dogs have to learn, responsibility (though I'm still working on that one), and more about the Foundation, the dogs, and the people who will eventually get the dogs.
What is the strangest thing someone has asked/said to you about your puppy? Not sure...I love it when people think you're the one who has a problem. The time when Mom had a cool whip container for a portable bowl though was classic. Shadow had just finished drinking, and Mom was sitting outside waiting for us to finish paying at a restaurant when a lady came by and dropped money in the bowl.
Do you give your puppies real name out in public? Yes!
What is the most embarrassing incident that you've had with your puppy? Not sure.
What is the most proud moment you've had with your puppy? Again not sure haha.
What advice do you have for newbie puppy raisers/owners? Take time to get to know your dog, try to understand the dog, and realize what they are capable of - challenge them, but at the same time don't expect too much. Hard to say, I guess.

Commands

2008-04-13T09:46:00.000-07:00

Sorry everybody I haven't posted lately, but I'll be putting up more pictures soon. Shadow is doing great, and knows a ton of words at 10 months old. She knows the normal sit, down, stay, come, forward, left, right, stop, steady, okay, no, leave it, and we're working on heel and find the door. I don't think I forgot any, but anyway she also has learned inside, outside, ice, treat, trashcan (the one outside), tail and get your tail, see Abbott (the rabbit), and maybe a couple of others. We haven't gotten pictures of her doing anything new recently, but I'll try. :)

D.C.

2008-03-18T14:31:00.000-07:00

We went to D.C. this past weekend!! Here are a few pictures of Shadow on our trip.
Mom with Shadow beside the National Monument.

At the Capitol

She found a stick!
Being cute at Ulysses S. Grant's memorial. =]

On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
That's it!

2008-03-13T17:33:00.001-07:00

Thanks to Shabby Princess's Dinner Party collection for the flower, ribbon, background, and letters I used for the header. Still trying to figure out how to put up the header, there's one little section of how to do it I'm confused about, so hopefully it'll be up soon.

SHADOW'S BACK!!!

2008-03-11T06:11:00.000-07:00

Shadow came back Saturday! It's weird though...She's been kind of aloof or something. Doesn't get very excited either. She came home from a home with another dog though, so maybe she misses the dog. We have no idea.

I'll post pictures when I get some more.

Shadow pictures

2008-03-04T17:28:00.000-08:00

Shadow comes back from "Puppy Camp" on Saturday, and meanwhile I'll post a few pictures I forgot to post before.
Sorry about the sleeve...
Sleepy!

Phoenix!

2008-03-03T14:57:00.000-08:00

Here are some pictures of the gorgeous puppy we have for "Puppy Camp."
Pretty boy!! He's so white.
I love this picture!
Haha there's the spot on his tongue...
So pretty! Can you believe he's only TWO WEEKS older than Shadow??
With the rope...
And again...

Puppy Camp

2008-02-23T19:04:00.000-08:00

No pictures right now, just an update on what's going on. Today we had a puppy meeting at the mall and at the end each dog went to a different puppy walker home for two weeks. So we won't have Shadow for two weeks, but we have Phoenix with us now. He's a beautiful Golden Retriever who is mostly white.

I still have more Slugger/Shadow pictures, so if I have time, they're loaded, and I'm not already way behind I'll put them up eventually. =]

I took a bunch of pictures with Mom's camera today at the meet too.

More Shadow/Slugger pictures

2008-02-13T10:34:00.000-08:00

Slugger on top, Shadow on the bottom...
Shadow
The two of them...
Shadow at left.

Slugger
Shadow's laying down.
Slugger again...
Slugger sleeping. =]
Shadow sleeping. =]
Slugger

I have a few more taken with a different camera, but they're not uploaded yet. =)

Slugger's Visit

2008-02-12T09:25:00.001-08:00

Slugger, another future guide dog in our group, is staying with us for a week. Here are a bunch of pictures...
Introducing Slugger...
Again...
Again...Look at his eyes!! They're a light brown. Mom says they're "unnerving." haha
Slugger's on the bottom here.
Blurry, but you get the idea. They ran around like this with their heads together for forever!
Waiting for promised ice.
...
A weird view of shadow looking up at me.
Shadow
And Shadow again... =P

Slugger gets his teeth brushed. Shadow gets hers brushed too, but not in the video.

Slugger and Shadow get ice. They are SO LOUD! I hope the audio is good enough.

Shadow pictures

2008-02-12T08:56:00.000-08:00

Shadow and all her toys...The round world ball is the replacement for that green bone with the life gaurantee. It's rated a 5 out of 5 on the "chew-o-meter." The other bone was a 4 out of 5. She loves this thing!

She looks weird in this one. =]

3 POSTS IN ONE DAY!!!! Wow!!

2008-02-06T19:56:00.000-08:00

3 posts in ONE day?!? I'm extremely proud of myself. Here are some pictures from the last couple weeks.
Crate.
Crate again...
Leash!
In the car...
Looking out of the window through her crate...

Looking out of the window! If you haven't noticed, she loves it. This particular window looks at the street.

Bigger!

2008-02-06T19:51:00.000-08:00

So big!!

In Coat!!!

2008-02-06T19:06:00.000-08:00

I know I've needed some in-coat pictures of Shadow, so here they are! This is Shadow in the mall.
Looking cute
Outside the mall...

After the mall I made her wait so I could take some pictures. She wasn't too excited about that.

The way she always lays in the car...
Holding her puppy-bone funny. =]

Bone, video, and eyes...?

2008-02-01T18:17:00.001-08:00

Creepy picture of Shadow chewing her bone...
...
Pretty Shadow eyes!!

This is a video of Shadow doing the sit, stay, down, come thing. She pays attention and reacts quicker a lot of times, but this time she's a little slow. Oh well! She's cute anyway.

Tatra comes to visit

2008-01-22T06:57:00.000-08:00

Tatra and Beamer, two 10-week-old sister Lab puppies, came from NY and needed homes for the night before continuing their journeys to Georgia to their new puppy raiser families. We kept Tatra overnight.
Shadow looking at her new friend. She was attempting to calm down so she can see the puppy.
Tatra! She was adorable! Smelled like puppy. :)
awww!
Shadow was the one who started most of the play fights and ended up too rowdy, but Tatra will definitely be able to hold her own. She fights back and did actually start some of the feisty-ness.
Adorable face!!! If Shadow got too rowdy, she'd take her favorite puppy-sized toy of Shadow's (like the black one in the background) and calmly climb up into your lap.

Worn out!
Tatra was taken from her litter-mates that morning, so we let Shadow sleep nearby on her bed. Tatra was put in Shadow's crate with a towel. She cried...a lot.
Eating together! Her ears got all in her food.

Snow??

2008-01-20T09:31:00.000-08:00

Supposedly it was going to snow 2-4 inches and we were so excited we were FINALLY getting a little snow. What we got is half-gone already and really pathetic. This picture is the snow at its heaviest last night.
This is from a few minutes ago. Note the lack of snow on the grass where it's already started melting. Shadow got to play in it and went wild. She's way too distracted to busy every time she goes out, too.
Laying in the sun. :)

A few pictures...

2008-01-19T18:05:00.000-08:00

Shadow chewing her blue Christmas bone.
Laying in the sun! She lays downstairs for as long as she can to stay in the sun, and then she comes upstairs to the bonus room here and lays in down in from of the window seat.

Life-guarantee bone. Did NOT take Shadow long to totally ruin and start EATING this thing. We're getting our money back, obviously.

Christmas!!

2007-12-29T09:17:00.000-08:00

The blanket was my friend's idea...
When she's laying on her back and her ears flop back her teeth show and she looks like a little demon. I got the perfect picture of her!!
A friend of mine with Shadow...
Again... =]
Laying on her bed.
Under the fake tree in the bonus room
Cute puppy!

2007-12-12T14:05:00.000-08:00

So basically I'm extremely proud of myself for remembering to post lately. Here are some more pictures.
By the front door with the mini tree.
Shadow loves watching Abbott the rabbit.
Cute! And I'm SO excited that adorable crease on her nose is there to stay!!! =]
Laying in the sunshine. She looks really comfy.
The ever fascinating Christmas tree. She'll bump the ornaments with her nose. When we first got it she tried to eat the sticks and everything lying around, and she's gotten the stuffed Veggietales Larry ornament at least 5 times. She LOVES that thing - not good. Shadow is getting used to the tree, but we're still watching her carefully. :)

In front of the tree. Yay!

Random

2007-12-06T16:53:00.000-08:00

Just a couple random shots of her...
=]

Visitor!

2007-11-28T07:48:00.000-08:00

We puppy-sat another future guide dog a couple weeks ago and I kinda didn't put any pictures up. Oops. So here they are!

The two of them. After they tired themselves out playing outside, they did pretty well. They followed each other around and did everything together.
Doing everything at the same time, looking cute.
Acting like clones again...
...And again...
And finally resting!

And here are some more recent pictures:

My friend and I were outside taking pictures of the beautiful autumn trees. Here we're standing on the trailer at the side of the house.
We came in and were still in a picture taking mood, so Shadow became our victim! =]

...She put up with us pretty well.

YAY! I got more pictures!!

2007-10-26T17:27:00.000-07:00

YAY! I forgot I hadn't uploaded these (sorry, half of them are blurry), so I will now. And immediately after reading Aunt Heidi's comment on my last post, I took a couple more. =D
Shadow enjoys her bone with her rope toy nearby. Awwww! (if you don't think that's cute, just realize that almost anything non-destructive a puppy does is absolutely adorable, so just get over it.)
I called her name. Look at those huge brown puppy-dog eyes! Just kills you, doesn't it? Well, if it doesn't, it WILL if you're getting ice out and trying to avoid giving some to her whenever she begs, too.
I can't decide! What should I do?
The puppy is almost asleep, in her favoritest place to be - the bed. When the bed was by the laundry room door to be washed, she laid down on it for ages. And when it went in the wash, she sat by the laundry room door with those killer eyes, whining. Poor thing. Here she's in the school room, where we tend to move the bed during the day from her crate.
P.S. - this is where the stuff I took about 5 minutes ago starts.
...Closer up, as she gradually becomes aware that I am WAKING HER UP some. It's okay, people, she really wasn't all the way asleep. And I had to get more pictures for my aunt. (Yes, you gave me the idea, and I am definitely going to take advantage of it.) O=-)

Does the sleepyhead want some ice? I took a short video too. Boredom+annoyance-with-lighting+sleepy dog, not good for good pictures+camera+aunt wanting pictures = video. You're very welcome. I didn't mind at all, actually, but I'm probably boring you guys to tears.

Notice that nice sit. The obedience. The focus. All out the window 70% of the time when there's no ice.

EDIT: ACK! I just watched that video and remembered how I HATE the sound of my own voice. I sound stupid. =)
A very tired puppy. You can tell she's only partially awake, because I just told her I'd give her ICE and she's still laying down, not dashing over to the fridge. She's much more awake, though, as the news begins to sink in, and you'll notice that her eyes are fully open.A bad picture of Shadow enjoying her eyes. She's sooo pretty!!

...And now she is fast asleep on her beloved bed once more.

=)
:]
=]
:)

TARDY!!!

2007-10-08T16:39:00.000-07:00

Ok so it's been almost exactly two months since my last post and I apologize!!!
Mom's calling Shadow "Cutestuff" a lot less now and has been transitioning into "Pretty Girl." She's still cute, but a lot bigger. She's doing very well and now has a very large vocabulary including Shadow, come, sit, stay, down under (the table), outside, inside, eat, leave it, out (...OF YOUR MOUTH!), ice, treat, busy, forward, stop, down, off, no bite, quiet, and maybe "right about". We're also still working on "down under", too. Here are my very late pictures...
AWWWWWWWW!!! So what if it's really blurry; I caught the perfect moment! She's sooo adorable! This was while she was upstairs after Chemistry class. She stays up there while Mom teaches.

Looking quite guilty after dropping her leash. I told her to "leave it." Her leash isn't a chew toy, but I'm not sure she knows that yet. We switched her over to her big girl leash, by the way, as you can tell. AND (oooh this is SOOOOOOOOO exciting!!) guess what? She gets in the car ALL ON HER LONESOME!!!!! The SUV! It's amazing. Oh yeah, and she needs the big girl coat, too. Her puppy coat looks funny on her now and it's too big. We'll be getting the new one Saturday.
She's growing up!! So sad! So big at 5 months old!!!
What's that? The best idea since who knows when! My aunt gave me this little plaster thingie for my birthday to capture her paw print in!!! I thought it was the bestest idea ever, but Shadow didn't. She squirmed and hated the feeling of it between her toes. Got it all over her feet AND nose the first time. This is the plaster while it's still setting a little. It's in liquid form in the picture above.
Evidence of the struggles...Yep. And you can tell she slid coming back towards the kitchen.
The end result. It's not too deep, because the plaster had started to harden by this time. And further evidence of Shadow's stressful experience are the pieces of fur in the plaster. =)
She was easily consoled with an ice cube.

ICE

2007-08-09T14:40:00.000-07:00

Shadow loves ice. As in, LOVES. She knows the word and does know stay, but doesn't always do it so well. Today I took her out to busy, she little busied almost immediately, and I asked her if she wanted ice. She got excited, wagging her tail, and jogged with me to the door. She sat beautifully, but, as she often does, started getting up before I had entered. I asked her if she wanted ice and she sat and stayed immediately, big eyes glued on me. Once inside and without the leash, she made a contented beeline to the fridge and I got her the promised ice.
Doesn't sound very interesting probably, but to me it's great. =D

Sorry I haven't posted lately...update.

2007-08-09T12:51:00.000-07:00

Sorry I haven't posted lately! I don't have any pics, but I'll do a quick update. Shadow is bigger and her nose is getting longer, and she's really cute (obviously...puppies usually are). She's really smart, and I don't even think it's just me! The vet said so too (yay!).
Shadow goes and sits by the door sometimes when she needs out, but she'll also sit there to take us outside to play if she doesn't think she's getting enough attention. Apparently she doesn't like our reactions when she "goes" inside the house, and wanted to stay inside or something, because the other day Shadow was playing with me and managed to little busy on the carpet LAYING DOWN. Not on her side, but still!!! Geez. Raised her tail up just enough. *sigh*.
She sits, comes, leaves it (unless she really doesn't want to and it's inconvenient), and is starting to crate, stay, and down. We're working most on no bite and off. YAYZERZ! She's great. And she knows the sound of the ice maker tray sliding out a little. I'll grab a piece of ice for myself and she'll come running...and I usually end up giving her one, too. =D
Plus, I think that adorable crease on her nose is gonna stay. YESSSSS!!! Anyway, I gotta go...more later!

Weekend at the beach...

2007-07-31T10:27:00.000-07:00

We took Shadow with us this past weekend to the beach to visit family. She had a blast with the busy kids and sand. She LOVED the sand!! On the way down, Dad was paying in a restaurant and Shadow had just finished eating outside from a plastic container we bring along for travel. A lady stopped and dropped a few dollars in, saying something about how she loved these types of charities. She was really sweet, but Mom explained that she could go to the website to donate. She wasn't gathering money!With cousins (above & below)

Me in their sotally awesome swingy thing

My brother Ryan, me, Shadow, and a cousin (from left to right, obviously... =] )

And did I mention that Shadow LOVED the sand??? She was totally plastered before we left that day! She never digs holes, but she thoroughly enjoyed digging this one - if not just for the pleasure of seeing and feeling the sand go flying!

She would lay down like this when she was tired of digging, and then get bored without the sand moving. She'd move or kick or somehow make the sand move, then get all excited and start digging again. She was hilarious!

I love this one!
And that pretty much concludes the episode of At the Beach with Shadow. =)

Play-date with Mollie

2007-07-21T15:30:00.000-07:00

Today we took Shadow over to our grandparents' house, where our cousins were visiting with the newfoundland puppy they got yesterday. She's 8 weeks old, has blue eyes, and basically looks like an adorable little rolly-polly fluff ball. My grandparents have a Goldendoodle (golden/poodle cross) too, and she's a year and a half...huge as ever.As soon as Shadow saw the big huge Goldendoodle fluff, she wanted to play. Shadow wasn't daunted at all by her "opponent's" size, and Granddad called it a submarine attack when Shadow dashing under and puppy-nipped from there, jumping in and out. She went nuts and ran from one dof to the other to play.

All tired out! They were so cute!!

The Bunny-Wabbit Encounter

2007-07-18T17:07:00.000-07:00

Dun-dun-dun-DUN...It actually went very well, and Shadow was very good most of the time. She was on leash and Abbott the Wabbot was let out. Shadow sat when we told her too most times and only whined a little at having to sit. She tried to paw and half-jump at him (yes, that's our uber-exuberantly-friendly pup) a fair amount, but that was the extent. They politely sniffed noses a few times too, but other than a few things like that Abbott pretty much ignored her. He didn't seem frightened at all for the most part and minded his own business.PS-all the pics so far have been taken by Mom - She takes better pictures anyway. =] That's how these beautifully digiscrapped pages got here, too.

PHOTO OP!!!

2007-07-17T18:09:00.000-07:00

Shadow made the GDF Yahoo Groups home page...YAY! =P We took a few pictures of Shadow with on the steps to the front porch a few days ago and they look so cute! (Click for a clearer picture - it's worth it!)

We got Abbott the Rabbit out today with Shadow on leash - I'll put pictures of that up later. SOOO adorable! And Mom and I bought a baby pool she'll be using pretty soon too. I can't wait.

More...

2007-07-14T17:30:00.000-07:00

A picture with the guy who drove 6 puppies down + 2 dogs and took 4 different doggies back with him to NY...I think his name was Johnny.
First I had to post a pic of Lee, the senior here in Raleigh...Now Swifty's the oldest, at 7 months old! Shadow's the youngest.
FIRST OUTING! Wendy's, on the way home from Baltimore. As you can see, Shadow's coat is HUGE on her. Her collar is too; Ron had an extra (I think cat collar) that we're borrowing for a few days 'til we buy one Shadow can't slip out of.
J.J. doing amazingly well in Wendy's. He plopped right down and looked like he would fall asleep for almost the entire meal...unlike Shadow. Shadow whimpered and whined her way through the meal, just like dinner a few minutes ago when she whined and howled for the beginning.

WELCOME HOME, SHADOW!

2007-07-14T16:32:00.000-07:00

We left the house at 5am this morning and, soon after meeting up with Marc, Nancy and Ron, were told that our puppy had switched once again but at 7:00pm last night Shadow was assigned to us for sure. Shadow is a black, lab/golden mix (Marc called it a Goldendor) and is the cutest thing she could be at 9 weeks old. Everybody was excited about their new puppies, although it was sad (even for me, not knowing the dog much) giving Lee up. Ron and Marc & Nancy got golden retriever puppies. The Marc and Nancy have J.J. and Ron and Debbie have Pheonix. Don't these three have the COOLEST names?!? Haha...

Here was our first glimpse of Shadow...All the way on the left. J.J. and Pheonix were in another crate. YAY SHADOW!

Ron with Pheonix

Marc with J.J.

Me with Shadow

TOMORROW!

2007-07-13T14:37:00.001-07:00

We're picking up Unknown Doggie tomorrow and leaving the house at 5:00 am. We are not getting a lab because the lab they were GOING to give us has an overbite, so for some reason it's been kicked from the program. We're getting a lab/golden mix instead but that's all we know for sure so far...unless they change dogs again. Another family is going up with us too, so the GDF people in NY are ending up bringing THREE puppies and taking one dog back with them. The other two puppies are both goldens.

I'm tired but absolutely ecstatic about getting the puppy. I'll be posting pictures when we get back.

WE'VE GOT A DATE!!!

2007-06-21T10:41:00.001-07:00

We're picking up our puppy on July 14! That's half-way through my 2-week drama camp, so the first week I won't be at home all day with him/her ='( but it's still great!

Welcome

2007-06-16T10:32:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my blog, everybody!!!

My family is going to raise a future guide dog puppy for the Guide Dog Foundation!!! And I'm SOOO EXCITED!!!!!! GDF gives us the crate,brushes, collar, ID tags - everything but tick medication, toys and food. And they even start you off with a bag of puppy food and a chew-toy.

Our "Area Coordinator" also raises puppies and just finished raising their fourth. Leslie (they call him Lee) will be taken to D.C. to give to the GDF people who will take him to New York. GDF often flies puppies down to NC raisers, but this time it's easier to just meet in D.C. since they'll be bringing two very new puppies and taking one 14-16 month old puppy (Leslie) back with them to NY. One of the two puppies will be "ours" (YAY!) and the other will be our A/C's. We'll drive up with the other family to get our puppy.

Most likely we'll get a lab, but the other family is getting a golden retriever puppy. We don't know whether it'll be male or female and we don't know its name yet either. I'm going ballistic waiting. We'll leave to pick up our puppy at D.C. July 7 or the next weekend. Hopefully not a weekday; we want the whole family to be able to go down.