A Dog's Love

Every...single...day.  Every single day our dogs joyfully leap down the driveway as we near home. They run beside the car or in front of the car so we have to wait until their wagging tails get out of the way. They greet us as we open our car doors and they walk with us to or from the house.

They wait patiently each day until I get the chance to feed them and they love to drink the water as it comes from the faucet. They are proud to do their tricks for me for the 100th time and will run alongside me on my 2 miles runs. They even whimpered through the glass door the day I had such a bad cramp in my foot that I was crying on the living room floor.

Of course they also get into the burnt trash or the cat food that I just bought. I have found them inside the house when the basement door got left open and they tend to think they're invited to sleep inside our tent on our camping trip. They have been known to scare the fish off by leaping into the water for a swim, and they even have costed us our pet ducks.

But they love us every day and they're always there waiting for us, no matter what is going on in our lives, or what mood we're in, or what time of the day or night it may be.

Kylie likes to reminds Rudy that she's 14 in doggy years.  Her favorite place to be is right beside our front door on the porch.  She can shake and even shakes with her back leg, impressive?  She is a good dog but she's very timid and sometimes would rather sit, well, right beside the front door on the porch than go somewhere with us. 

Tanner is 77 in doggy years.  He has gone from a town dog to a country dog in the last few years.  He's a darn good buddy to me.  He will let us know when someone arrives as he is very protective of his home.  He shows emotions to the extreme...when you come to visit him when he hasn't seen you in awhile he can't control his excitement.  Or if he's told to "stay" when we go up the road and he can't join us, he displays the ultimate sad demeanor and walks back to the house, head down, looking a bit like Eeyore. 

I am probably more of a cat person but to be honest, I can say that there's nothing quite like a dog friend.

Kollin Christofer

My little brother...my family's gift from God...a handsome boy who keeps my parents young...

When I was 12 years old and my sister 14, we picked up on a few unordinary things around our house and it didn't take us long to put things together and as we sat on the couch in front of the fireplace well after the lights had been turned off, we pondered "what if Mom really is pregnant...at age 38!"  At the dinner table when our parents attempted to share the news with us, "Girls, we have something to tell you," it was followed up with, "We already know!"  We spent the next few months discussing all the things we had to look forward to and prepare for the fifth member of our family.

Let me just say that he is such a blessing.  His birth seemed to bring our family a little closer together as it was during the time my sister and I were going through our teenage years and were likely a tish difficult.  Kollin began Kindergarten the year I was a senior.  My parents had the help of two teenage daughters to help raise their little one.  We taught him to spell, to do math, and "verb, it's what you do" at a very young age.  He was all of our pride and joy...and still is.

He keeps my parents busy with baseball and basketball and inviting his friends over to play.  He's into his PS3, drawing, making videos (I like to pride myself with influencing him on this one), and of course sports.  He has the brains and he has the looks.  To say that I love him doesn't even begin to express my feelings for him.

I look forward to seeing him grow, and change, and mature, and learn.  I simply look forward to seeing him.