in memory

These are photos of Skippy. It's been a week and a half since he died. Still hard for me. He was with me nearly every day for 11 years and was such a vibrant, active, protective, and smart dog. Good bye Skip, my friend. I miss you.

Skippy was a Portuguese water dog. He was bred by C-Lion PWDs in Bedford MA. His mom was Clio and his dad, Brisco. He was born the day before Easter in 2005. Skippy was my companion. He was an unruly pup and because of this we did a lot of training with him. Maybe his unruliness was because we were novices and he was our first dog, maybe it was his vibrant nature, or maybe he wanted to learn how to communicate with us. Maybe it was all of this. Whatever, we figured it out together. Skippy did over 50 hours as an excellent therapy dog with Caring Canines. He was an accomplished gardening dog with 11 years of experience (wink). He did a bit of agility work, loved swimming and boating, and loved his little buddy Suzie, who came to live with us when Skippy was 8. He taught Suzie all sorts of things, most of which were good things. Skippy was a great protector and vigorously protected me and my gardens. He could run like the wind, down sledding hills, across open fields, after Suzie, and down the beach. He was healthy his entire life, never sick a day. On August 26, when he was 11 years old, he died suddenly from a burst spleen tumor, going into cardiac arrest before they could get him into surgery. I think he had a great life, I certainly enjoyed being with him. I will remember him always.

Thanks very much to all who have sent their condolences.

Skippy has died in surgery. My faithful friend. We are heartbroken.

Skippy

I'm at an emergency pet hospital now, waiting for Skippy. He's not doing well. A mass in his abdomen has ruptured. The doctor says it's probably liver or spleen cancer, and there's a 50 50 chance that it's malignant. They're doing ultrasound now and will operate soon if it's in the spleen and hasn't already spread. :-( My poor buddy.

skippy and suzie by the garden gate

ice out

The ice melted in our local ponds today. A perfect day for a swim, Skippy thought. He swam around quite a while and seemed to love it. Pretty brisk I think.

the perfect stick!

skippy in the garden

skippy

its Skippy's birthday!

Skippy is 10 years old today. Here are some pictures.

Suzie and Skippy!

Skippy in T-shirt on Emily's quilt

Skippy is looking very handsome in his T-shirt. He's wearing it to protect his surgery site. He got 6 stitches in his back where a suspicious lump was removed. It was an ugly lump - I'm glad its gone. The surgery doesn't seem to have bothered Skippy much, but I am keeping him quiet for a week - no running or jumping or playing.

Skippy is sitting on a quilt that a reader of my blog, Emily Lewis, hand quilted for me. She did a really beautiful job! Her website is: Emily Lewis Quilts. There's a picture of my quilt on her site. She finished my quilt in March of 2013, I remember. I remember I got a notice to pick it up at the post office, but couldn't get there for two days because of the house arrest in the Watertown area after the Marathon bombing. What a time!

new clips

Skippy and Suzie got new hairdos yesterday. Their breeder, Heather, spent the day with us and groomed the dogs. She's teaching me how to do this and helped with selecting the tools I will need. She clipped their muzzles and ears short, lion clip-style, took a lot of fur off their bodies, and shaped their legs.

That's Suzie above, and Skippy below.

our new puppy, Suzie, and her 2 sisters!

I went to visit the puppies today. They are 5 weeks old now and SO cute. They are playing and chewing and so interested in everything. We don't know which pup will be ours yet - the breeder will choose when they are 8 weeks old. We just know now that it will be one of these three females. There is one brother in the litter, too (not in this photo).

More puppy pictures: my Flickr site

Not to be outdone, here's a photo of Skippy today. He had a nice walk along a lake shore with quick swims every few minutes of the way.

its hard to play fetch in 30 inches of snow

frozen whiskers

The little creek by the gardens is freezing over. Skippy loves to drink the icy water. He ends up with icicles hanging from his whiskers that stay there for the rest of our walk.

skippy in his garden

Skippy

I haven't been taking many photos of Skippy this summer.  I don't know why - he's as cute as ever. And always very good company. Here are a few photos from the past month. A bit of salt water, a bit of fresh water. And lots of gardening.

skippy

Skippy and I spent the afternoon at my community garden plot today. After a bit of weeding and setting up my tomato tent, the skies got really dark. I have a big umbrella stashed under the lilac bush and we hunkered down under it. Turns out the old umbrella has developed a few holes. We stayed mostly dry as the skies opened up. Thunder and giant rain drops for about half an hour. Skippy moved around to avoid the drips and we stayed pretty dry. I amused myself taking photos of rain drops and mud.

skippy - the day before the haircut

A kid said to Skip today, "Who pulled the wool over your eyes?"

Tomorrow is his haircut day. I'll see if I can get an "after" photo, too.

Skippy

another garden animal .... Looks like I need to start doing some weed whacking on those paths.