I know
that I am very tardy in blogging.
Life has been moving at the speed of, well, Matchette so you know what that means -- I’ve been busy!
Here’s a brief recap:
The Little Mermaid, Jr. was a HUGE
success! Jamie nailed his
performance as Flotsom, one of Ursula’s evil pet eels. We (the family) spent most of the first
weekend in May at the theater helping out backstage or, in Jamie’s case,
on-stage. Each night I took home
at least an hour’s worth of mending.
Kids being kids, they were hard on their costumes, but boy, oh boy did
they look great! :0) I figured out that I personally made over thirty costumes
and helped with about thirty more.
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| Jetsom, Ursula and Flotsom - The boys costumes were the hardest to design! |
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| Everyone said they could see Joe's shiny head on stage so we had to help him out a bit. |
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| The main cast - I loved making Scuttle, Sebastian and Flounder's! |
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| Ready for the kids. It was organized chaos backstage! |
Here's a link for one of my favorite scenes from the show. Jamie and his buddy Spencer really hammed it up!
The second weekend in May, one of my BFFs and our sweet, funny,
and lovely Goddaughter came out from Las Vegas for Josie’s First Communion. Alyson and Josie picked up right where
they left off in Hawaii, as did Carolyn and I. I needed some serious stress relief and spending the
weekend with an old, dear friend is the perfect remedy! It was a laugh until your sides and
head hurt kind of weekend with some pretty dresses and a lovely church service
thrown in for good measure. BTW,
my Josie girl did an awesome job doing a reading during the service!
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| Our beautiful daughter and our beautiful Goddaughter |
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| Jamie and Mic were impromptu altar-servers for Josie's First Communion Mass. |
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| She was so nervous about "doing it right". |
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| Josie and her beloved Godmother being posers. |
And then, there were the end of the school year
activities. HOLY COW! I felt like a pinball, bouncing from
one school/ceremony/party to the next!
All the kids finished out the year well, but Jamie took the prize for
most end of the school year awards.
Even his principal jokingly referred to his 5th grade
graduation ceremony as “the James Matchette Show”.
Josie just had another birthday and, as usual, the first
thing on her list of desired gifts was “a Golden Retriever puppy”. When I relayed this information yet again
to Joe, he casually said, “Okay.”
WHAT?! I felt his forehead
for a fever. This is the man who
has been giving us the Heisman for the past two and a half years whenever the
subject of a dog came up. I was at
a race on my birthday and met a sweet doggy that needed a home and Joe said no
– on my birthday! When he said, “Okay” I figured he was
just delirious from the heat and let it go. We had agreed, no dog until we moved to Colorado and had the
space for a big dog to run.
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| In addition to a dog, Josie wanted a "purple mermaid tail cake". It's not up to Lynn's caliber, but the girls didn't mind. |
And then the kids went to tennis camp for a week…
The kids did a one-hour each day tennis camp for the first
week of summer break. On the very
last day, a woman showed up with what looked like an adolescent Golden Retriever
mix on a harness. The dog seemed well
behaved so when the kids asked if they could go pet him, I said yes. When they all clamored back into the
car, Josie announced that the dog was really sweet (all dogs are sweet to her)
and that he neeeeeeeded a home, Mom.
Since I have always been on the “Let’s get a dog bandwagon”, I asked the
kids if they would like me to go talk to the owner. ALL three (even Michelle who has been decidedly on Joe’s
side) said, “YES!”
By this point, kids from the tennis camp were swarming all
over the dog. He was so obviously
over-stimulated and was not minding the owner whatsoever. Despite the overstimulation, I could
tell that he was very good-natured. Big shocker there considering he looked to be part Golden,
right? The woman admitted that
neither she nor her husband had ever had a dog and they had come to realize
that the dog was a lot more than they could handle. The dog, named “Chief”, was actually about two and a half
years old, was a Golden Retriever and Australian Shepherd mix, and they were
his third family. He’d been bounced from his original
family to animal control to another family and then to his current family. Somewhere along the way, there were
legal proceedings surrounding this poor pup, but they didn’t know what
specifically.
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| Our first look |
My number one question was if “Chief” had any experience
with cats. The woman, Kelli, said
that they actually had a kitten and that the dog was really good with her. So, I snapped a couple of pix and texted
Joe. He gave his consent for a
doggy trial, Kelli and I exchanged numbers and we agreed to meet for the doggy
handoff on Sunday. When I got in
the car, all three kids were excited, but Jamie was the most. He has that quiet way about him and I
could tell that something about this dog caught his attention, just like it had
mine.
The rest of the weekend, I pondered his name and Jamie asked
how many hours it was until we could go and get Chief. I was not at all crazy about the name “Chief”;
it just didn’t sit well with me.
Like human babies, I think a pet’s name has to suit him. I never changed Louie’s name because,
well, it just suited him. My other
pets’ names have all just “popped into my head” and they were the right ones
for those pets. Suddenly on Saturday night, Chief’s new name popped into my
head – “Beauregard” and we would call him “Beau”. That is, if Louie got along with him. We figured Murphy wouldn’t take kindly
to any dog, cat, turtle, fish, baby or even an alien that we brought into the
house so we weren’t too fussed about her, but our Louie was the one to impress.
Chief/Beau happily got into our car and went home with us on
Sunday, much to the dismay of one of his young masters. I felt horrible driving away watching
that little boy turn into his dad for a comforting hug, but Kelli told me later
that it was the right thing for them and for us. She had been trying to find a new home for Chief/Beau on
Craigslist for weeks with no bites, so to speak. Then, the night before we met, she prayed that she would
find him a forever family. Lo and
behold, there we were on Friday at tennis camp. I, in turn, thanked her for all the hard work that she and
her family had put into Chief/Beau in the six months that they had had him!
So, Chief/Beau came to our house, tugging and biting on his
leash and stealing any and every shoe left within a five-mile radius, but gung
ho for this new adventure. Louie
took one look at him, puffed himself up as big as he could, hissed, smacked
Chief/Beau HARD upside the head several times and then retreated under our bed
until THAT interloper was sent AWAY,
or at least crated for the night.
By the next day, Louie was coming out, curious to see what this large
misbehaving creature was, so I knew we’d be okay. Louie knew that HE was higher on the food chain tha some
unruly upstart of a dog!
Here's a link that shows you just who really IS in charge -
Chief did not respond consistently to his name or to any
command for that matter on the first day.
Jamie and I took him for a walk/drag-fest that afternoon. We, of course, were the ones getting
dragged. Oh boy, did we have a lot
of work to do! On a chance, I
called Chief “Beau” and, amazingly, he responded like it was his name all along. Well, that was easy. “Beau” he was immediately rechristened. The kids weren’t too keen on the name
“Beauregard”, but I explained to them that it meant “handsome/good look” and
that since he was such a handsome dog (He is.) and that he was getting a “new
and good look” at life, his name was rather fitting. Kids being kids, they didn’t agree, but couldn’t come up
with a better name. Besides, Beau
knew that “Beau” was supposed to be his name even if they didn’t. :0) As a consolation, I told the kids
they could give Beau his middle name.
After several days of nothing, Josie threw out the name “Scout” as Joe
and Jamie were heading out to a Boy Scout meeting. It stuck, and we all agreed “Scout” was a very fitting name
since scouting is such a big part of our lives at this point.
So there you have it.
We would like to formally introduce:
Beauregard Scout Matchette, aka, “Beau”.
DOB: ~ December 15, 2010.
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| Our boy Beau! |
Beau has been with us a week now and he’s settled in quite
nicely. After the first drag-fest,
I got down to business with training.
Beau and I have training time everyday. Beau is a wonderfully sweet pup, but he has some bad
habits/manners.
We work on different skills each day, but a lot of it is
still leash training and trying to get him to “come” and “sit”
consistently. He is easily
distracted and has a bit of a stubborn streak. Also, you can tell that he has herding dog genes since he
tries to nip at heels.
I think he’s come a long way in just a week, but he still
has a long way to go. I feel badly
for Beau, not knowing what his life was like before. I told the kids that he’s like a toddler that’s never had
any guidance; he doesn’t understand boundaries or rules. Beau knows that I’m alpha/mom, but he
still has a hard time understanding that he has to listen to the kids as
well. I think he doesn’t quite
know what to make of Joe. While he
thinks it’s fun to chase Louie, he knows that Louie will wallop him (and does!)
if Louie gets too annoyed. We’ve
hardly seen Murphy, which is just fine with Joe and me. Michelle says that she’s been hand-feeding
Murphy in her room each day. I
doubt that will continue when she goes away to college, so Murphy will just
have to come to terms with Beau’s presence.
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| A boy and his dog - what could be better?! |
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| He's not a purebred, but we don't mind! |
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| Dog is my co-pilot. |
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| We even got him his own pool. |
It’s a bit strange having a dog again after almost seventeen
years without one. Cats are so
easy; dogs, not so much. The logistics
that go along with caring for a dog have tripped me up a couple of times, but
overall, I’m enjoying having a dog again.
It’s comforting to have a dog put his head in your lap at the end of the
day or gently nose your hand for some attention (when he’s not stealing shoes
to get one’s attention). He’s
absolutely beautiful to watch bounding and leaping (seriously) across the yard
as he rushes to chase his toys or greet the dogs on either side of the
house. Overall, I think, like
Louie, Beau was just meant for our family.
Now, you’ll have to excuse me. It’s time to feed the dog.
Happy tails!
Gen =)
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| Time to walk the dog... |
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