Confessions of a Skateboarding Widow: Two Dogs + Baby = Hair Pulling Fun!

For the past week, my Mom and Andy have had it rough.....they've been on vacation in Mexico. Sucks to be them.....I'm not jealous at all. While they've been gone, we've been dog-sitting Abby, their 4 year-old black lab. We already own one rather large black lab, so having two really isn't that much harder on us. However, Abby has some funny quirks, to say the least. For example, she likes to walk around with one of our shoes in her mouth. She doesn't chew on or wreck the shoe, she just likes to carry it around. The other day, Edison was napping so I decided I would lay down on the bed for a few minutes. Abby followed me up (with my running shoe in her mouth) proceeded to invite herself up onto the bed with me, lay down and cuddle with my shoe. Later, when I went back downstairs, she also followed me down....with shoe in mouth.

When Jonathan and I are trying to leave the house, our conversation usually goes something like this:

Jonathan: "Have you seen my other shoe?"
Michelle: "I'm pretty sure I saw it upstairs on my side of the bed. Have you seen my pink runner?"
Jonathan: "I think its in the kitchen"
Fast forward to when we arrive back home.....
Michelle: "Oh man!! Where are my slippers?!?"

Abby is a very active dog, unlike Albert who's pretty lazy. Yesterday we decided to take Abby to the field beside the skatepark, that way Jonathan could skateboard and I could throw the ball for the dog and hopefully use up some of her insane amounts of energy. We decided to leave Albert at home (poor guy) because I didn't think I could juggle baby and two dogs in public. For about a half hour things went really well. Jonathan was off skateboarding, Edison was happy in the stroller, and Abby was running like the wind chasing after her ball. (They have one of those ball chucker thingies for her so that you can throw the ball really far).

I don't know if she would ever get tired of chasing that ball.....I think she could last all day. Unfortunately, Edison had other ideas. This is when the gong show began: Baby starts to cry. I take baby out of stroller to try to calm him down. Meanwhile, also trying to throw the ball to keep the dog entertained. Baby doesn't want to stop crying. Dog gets bored of me and decides it would be fun to chase random skateboarders around the skatepark. Me, shushing baby while calling dog....afraid dog will knock random skateboarders off their boards. Dog jumps into 8-foot deep skate-bowl after Jonathan. Me, "Oh crap, how are we going to get the dog out of the bowl?". 2 seconds later, dog leaps out of 8-foot deep bowl like its nothing. Baby still crying. Me, get the dog out of the skatepark and chasing the ball again. Edison, tears running down his face in the freezing cold weather must be getting cold. Me: "Jonathan, I'm going to take Edison to the car and warm him up". Jonathan: "Ok, I'll just skate for a few more minutes". Me: "Ok, could you keep throwing the ball for the dog?". Random skateboarding guy: "Ummmm....your dog is sitting in a puddle". I turn around to look and sure enough, she's in the middle of the field with her butt plopped right into a puddle...I wish I had the camera! Needless to say, it was a relief to get home.

Jonathan and I have been having a battle of the wills at night with Abby. She likes to sleep on our bed. For the first couple of nights we tried to accommodate her, however that didn't last long. She starts out innocently enough, curled into a little ball at the end of the bed. But as the night goes on, she slowly expands to take up most of the bed. So there's the dog, sprawled out as comfortable as can be, while Jonathan and I are clinging for dear life on the edges of the bed, trying not to fall off. Well, that doesn't work for me. I already get limited sleep, nursing a baby multiple times a night. I don't want to spend the time I do have to sleep battling for leg room with a dog. So as soon as she comes on, we just boot her off and she usually ends up downstairs, sleeping on the couch. However....every once and a while, she still sneaks up.

Edison loves having two dogs around. He is always watching Albert and smiling at him, so now he has double the entertainment. Both dogs are totally gentle and great with Edison. I find it amusing that Edison doesn't mind having dogs right in his face, sniffing him out. And the dogs are also very patient with Edison when he reaches out for one of them and pulls a hand-full of their fur out.

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Today we walked the dogs down to Kanaka Creek (a 5 minute walk from our house) for a swim. Abby loves to swim and will swim around just for the heck of it. Albert will swim as long as he has a stick to go for. It was a nice little outing as the weather has perked up, but it's quite cold out.