Monday Musings: Reflections on our Two Biggest Milestones

Instead of sharing links with you today I wanted to reflect a little on the past year.  I don't normally do this kind of thing, but this past year has been filled with change, so I thought this might be rather timely.

First of all, as you know, my husband and I bought our first house.  Becoming new homeowners has its own set of challenges and firsts.  This change has allowed us to begin many of our sentences with "you know you're an adult when...".  For example, "you know you're an adult when you spend Friday and Saturday night at Home Depot."  "You know you're an adult when you look forward to the flyer delivery."  

So, not only have we spent far too much time getting to know each aisle of Home Depot, but we have also learned many things, like what thermostats are for, how expensive oil heat is, how to patch drywall and we met our forever plumber named Barney.  We have also learned that a house cannot be decorated in one, six or even 12 months.  It is taking way longer than we thought to get our house pulled together!  Thank goodness for Ikea and spray paint.

And if buying a house wasn't exciting enough, we adopted our little (currently 70 lbs and counting) furbaby Hugo.  He is the light of our life, we adore him and our world revolves around him.  "You know you're an adult when you spend Sunday afternoons at puppy school."  "You know you're an adult when you have to clean up crap off your kitchen walls."

He has made us more active - we now look forward to walks in the torrential rain, because we know it will tire him out.  We have actually met our neighbours and refer to them like so: Mimi's mom, Shaggy's dad. We have explored our neighbourhood in ways we had never done before.  For once, we dread silence, it means he is eating something he shouldn't, like socks, or ant raid, or kleenex, or plastic bags, or any other paper or plastic product, or the bath mat, or my coupons, or my dayplanner.  

He has made the holidays so much more exciting.  He is thrilled with the wrapping paper, the bags, the glitter and the food.  He is convinced every package is for him.  

He got jealous when the people were hogging the cheeseball, so he stole it - briefly, but he did put it back. He did the same with the Munchie Mix - he had a small victory there.  He got halfway on the table and licked the flour off of the prepared surface ready for the pie crust.  He licked faster when he saw his Nana coming.  He pooped out her plaid sock this weekend. She was looking everywhere for that sock.  

But, most of all, Hugo has turned our house into a home.  He makes us laugh all the time, even when we are trying to be mad.  He is beyond easy going, even when the bathtub leaked onto his head below.  He is a healthy eater and will eat everything from garlic to broccoli, from bananas to coconut oil, from carob to flour, everything except celery or mint.  He loves his sleep and allows us to sleep in.  He cuddles when he is exhausted, otherwise, he just wants to follow us and be in on the action.  He loves children and adults, men and women and other dogs.  He is convinced everyone is madly in love with him.  We certainly are!  

We are looking forward to 2014 as Hugo grows into what will likely be 130 lbs of goofy, lovable fun.  

Exploring Pup-Friendly Places

Since getting our fur baby, Hugo, my husband and I have not only been initiated into the sub-culture of dog-ownership, but our lives are slowly beginning to center around "cool places" for Hugo to go for a walk and/or play.  Most of my evenings are spent shoveling down some food followed by a jaunt with the baby that will hopefully tire him out long enough for me to work on the blog (as you can see, that is going really well!), homework, writing about IBS or housework.  I have stopped thinking about what I want to do and imagine what is going on in his little brain and think - would Hugo like this?  And how could I not - he is just so damn cute!

In this vein, I have found a few of those "cool places".  These discoveries occurred out of necessity as I quickly realized that Hugo is too stubborn and too nosy to walk up and down our street.  He wants to stop and watch everything - that leaf blowing by, that car pulling out of the driveway, that bird flying in the air, those people shutting their curtains - Hugo is now the neighbourhood watch.

As endearing as this can sometimes be, it drives me nuts.  I am not one for standing around, I like to move and at a good clip.  Hugo has not yet adopted this habit of mine.  So, I was forced to be creative - I took him over to Hail Pond, a little trail around a pond that I never want him to swim in.  He doesn't do too badly there, you have to drag him the first half of the way, armed with treats and a black heart that will allow you to ignore his fake choking dramatics.  But, once he reaches that invisible halfway point he books it.

Now that he has been doing Hail Pond for awhile, we have added another spot into our routine - Hemlock Ravine Park.  This park is all charm, especially given the story behind the heart-shaped pond.

Hugo loves it here - this is where he met his friend Axel, the Bernese therapy dog.  They became fast friends and I had a glimpse of Hugo's future size - he will likely outweigh Axel!

I let him off leash here and we are working to ensure he sticks close to me.  He does pretty well; he likes to do short bursts of galloping - perhaps he is imagining himself frolicking in the Swiss Alps, the land of his ancestors!

Bringing Home the Baby ...

Last week my husband and I had the great pleasure of adopting our first puppy - an eight-week-old Bernese Mountain Dog named Hugo.

Hugo's arrival home

Needless to say, our life changed pretty quickly.  This became crystal clear when in the middle of the night, my husband sat up in bed, looked at me and said ... "go get the ball" ... and rolled over and went back to sleep.

My conversations this week have sounded like this "have a pee", "have a pee on the grass", "no peeing in the house", "no biting", "be gentle", "have a poop", "no! don't poop there!", "come out from under the deck" and "good boy, Hugo, Mommy loves you!".  If I were my neighbour I would lose my mind if I heard any more about peeing in the grass.

Our little goof, into everything! 

Loving the "wilderness" in our backyard

It has been really fun watching him learn so much in only one week.  He has learned to come and to sit - we are still working on lie down.  He has learned to climb stairs, to ride in the car, to wrestle with his new friend Leo the poodle, to sleep in his crate, to work the room at a party, to be "gentle" (lick instead of bite) and he is slowly learning to go for a walk.

Hugo's first solo car ride

My husband and I are having great fun raising our little pup and have spent the vast majority of the week in our backyard or at the soccer field across the street.  I have not been up this early consistently since my days of lifeguardiing - 5:30 am on Friday morning running around the field with him, and I enjoyed it!