Job 1:21

"....The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away....."





After the loss of our 14 year old Lab, Bailey, in February, God gave us a very special gift in March:







And on Sunday, He took part of it away:





As the result of a tragic accident in our backyard, Allie has gone on to the Rainbow Bridge.


Her time with us was WAY too brief.



Our house and hearts are now filled with grief.



She made the most of her short dog life in so many ways.



She lived her life to the fullest each and every day.




Her sister, Sophie, adored her; while the squirrels loathed her.




She was loved deeply and she gave MUCH love.




We will dearly miss those dark brown eyes and her Labrador "smile".




Our hearts are so heavy and our eyes filled with tears.




Time heals all wounds, or so they say......I don't know why God gave and then took away?!

Labrador Diaries -- Volume 5

This post is not for the weak.

There will be no pictures. You are welcome.

Because the horrid images are seared into my brain, as well as my kid's.

We last left our villains dog wonders on the hunt for fresh meat. Squirrel meat.

The hunt was over last weekend when they captured victim #1, an unsuspecting young squirrel who was obviously not paying attention while coming down the tree.

With the details spared........suffice it to say we had our first and hopefully last squirrel funeral in the GRITS backyard.

After the private ceremony, the Princess declared, "I think all those other squirrels up in that tree probably learned a very important lesson today!"


Not so much......fast forward to this morning as we rushed around getting ready for church.

I gazed out the kitchen window only to find Sophie with "something" in the yard. As I stepped out on the patio, I realized she had victim #2 between her jaws.

Again, I will spare you the details, but when I hollered for LegoMan to come help me.....I almost had to resuscitate him! He will probably never come when I call him again. Ever.


I suspect the Princess was wrong......there were NO lessons learned from the squirrel viewing deck in that tree. And I'm sure today's burial will probably not be the last. There will be plenty more squirrels unknowingly making that final trip down the tree trunk. For it is natures way.


WARNING TO ALL SQUIRRELS, these deceivingly, sweet, smiling faces may be the last ones you see:

The Labrador Diaries -- Volume 2

The Alpha-Dog has left the building for a few days which allowed us to hijack the blog again and let you know what we've been up to.


2 months later, and I think we are officially settled in and loving our new family. We stay outside for most of the day and when the humans come home they play with us, feed us dinner, and take us on a walk around our neighborhood. We sure do love that walk outside our compound yard.


We are not normally allowed in any other room of the house except the great room; however, the humans sometimes forget to put up the gate that keeps us out of the rest of the house. We love to make a mad dash down the hall and find our way into their sleeping dens. Alas, we are usually quickly captured and returned to our proper area. Drats!


Allie got the thrill of her life when the boy let her stay in his room for a while. Lucky dog.







Sometimes we get a little bored outside. What's a dog to do? How about this:



I am Sophie, Queen of the Woooooorld! I bet the humans won't leave the chairs out from the table again. Of course, I won't get up there again. Do you know how HIGH it is up there??? I was scared to death and needed assistance getting down.



We love the patio furniture....it's a great place for a nap and also for hiding under when we are playing Hide-N-Seek. You won't believe just how comfortable those chair cushions are! They rank right up there with a Tempur-pedic bed. We could lounge on them all day:



That is, if the Alpha-Dog ever puts them back on the chairs.

Until next time, we are still Sophie and Allie.

The Labrador Diaries-- Volume 1

Hello Greek GRITS fans, it's Sophie and Allie.....AGAIN!

Rumor has it, we were a big hit with our very first post, so the Alpha-Dog has decided we can make an appearance around here every once and a while. We were so excited we came up with a name for our posts......"The Labrador Diaries".

The Alpha-Dog wanted to go with "The Destructo Duo" but we voted her down.....8 paws to none!


The weather has gotten warmer and we've been spending a lot of time outside in our big back yard. Our humans have provided us with so many things to play with.....Nylabones, tennis balls, and even a couple of stuffed animals.

Pshhaaww, who wants to play with that junk?! Not us.


We added a little flair to the grill cover:




The neighbor dog told us we could dig a hole to China to help keep ourselves busy and out of trouble while our humans are not home. We aren't sure he was right, be we've had fun trying:




A couple of weeks ago, we need a little roughage and ate the flowers off this fancy stick we found stuck in the ground. Today we decided the fancy stick had to go:


The little brown headed girl was not very happy with us. She brought the fancy stick to us and started screaming, "NO, NO, NO....bad dogs!" which sounded an awful lot like Charlie Brown's teacher talking?!





We sometimes get to play with a little blue disc, but hello, there are two of us and one is clearly not enough:





However, our favorite object to play with, by far was this:


We're not really sure what it's called but the Alpha-Dog left it on the patio after sweeping off all the dirt we got on there. Our motto is, "finders, keepers" and, buddy, we kept it all right. The pole thing was a bit too hard, but the straw bristles at the bottom just flew off everywhere when we chewed on them. We bet the Alpha-Dog won't leave another one of those out based on her incoherent babbling when she found us with this.


We love it here as you can see!

Until next time....we are Sophie and Allie!

We Can Haz Mud?

Hello, humans.....it's Sophie and Allie, the Alpha-Dog may have mentioned us.

We've had a great two weeks here with our new family. We love our new fenced in back yard filled with sticks and rocks to chew on. We go on walks almost every day around the neighborhood. Down the street is a cute little dog named Buster. We love to chase him in circles until he pants like he's about to pass out.

Squirrels!! They are all over the place. The word on the street is our neighbors have noticed more squirrels in their yards since our arrival. The Alpha-Dog doesn't have to worry about those pesky chipmunks either, we did them all a favor by digging up their little hole. We haven't seen Chip or Dale since. It didn't take us long to figure out the best place to get a mid-day snack is right under the bird feeders. The seed is so tasty and very crunchy; however, it sure can mess with your bowels!

THIS PLACE IS GREAT!!


Our family has two humans that are just about our size. One of them talks to us in a squeaky high-pitched voice and repeats her commands over and over .....but she's pretty cute so we can over look it. The boy is very tall and loves for us to chase him around our yard. His Legos and socks are delicious!

Today was our most fun day ever! As usual, our family left us in the backyard while they went to church. They put these dog house things in the yard, but who wants to get in there when you can stand out in the open during a passing rain storm?! Not us....no way.

Guess what?! When the rain falls and it mixes with the dirt in our hole, it makes this super fun brown stuff. We had a ball......until the humans got home.

The Alpha-Dog began speaking incoherently and the boy was laughing at us. Suddenly we saw the hose being rolled out and our shampoo made an appearance! *gasp* We.Had.To.Get.A.Bath.

The water was FREEZING?! We whined, cried, and tried to get away, but the humans are pretty smart and quick.

You tell us, is there anything wrong with looking like this????




We don't think so either! Don't tell the Alpha-Dog, but next time we get the chance, we're picking back up where we left off.