My Boys & Me: Man's Best Friend

Well, we've been in our house for nearly 2 months now and things are going very well. We're getting settled, cleaning the garage, organizing and de-cluttering things, and slowly but surely ridding ourselves of boxes one at a time. Things could not be better except for one thing...we (mostly Riley and I) miss our dog Penny. She has been a part of our family since 2003 and since the end of February she's been staying at my parents house in Arkansas. She was our first baby and we've taken her on vacations with us, to visit family with us, gotten her Christmas presents, Halloween costumes, her pictures are framed and she has a stocking for Christmas. When we had to move to Texas on such short notice we really didn't want to have to pay a pet deposit for an apartment so we asked my parents to dog-sit her for 6 months. They took her in and she seems happy, but Riley saw a picture of her the other day and started crying because he missed her. She was there when we brought all 3 boys home from the hospital and she was right there with me each time I was on bed rest with my pregnancies. She truly is a part of our family. We haven't gotten her back yet because we weren't sure if we wanted an inside dog again in our new house. We have a rottweiler puppy named Gambit but he mostly stays outside, and it just doesn't seem fair to have a dog inside with the family while the other one has to stay outside by himself.

Well, we decided to get Penny back, so my parents are going to bring her with them when they come visit for Christmas. We are going to let Gambit inside more often to let him calm down and get used to the privilege of being in the house. I bathed him today and brushed him really well so he wouldn't shed and we've had him inside most of the evening. He is LOVING it! He's not sure what his limits are though so we've had to discipline him a few times, but for the most part he is adjusting very well. The older two boys have been upset because they want him to sleep in their room and he wants to be in the living room with us. He is also much bigger than he thinks he is because he keeps trying to jump up on the couch and sit in our laps. I'm not sure how much he weighs but I can assure you he's way too big to sit in my lap. He's heavy enough that the foot part of the recliner won't stay up with his weight on it. :-) I took a few pictures of him this evening with his clean shiny coat and his Halloween shirt on. He did not like his shirt though, he kept biting at it. It's hard to believe by looking at the pictures of him that Gambit is only 5 months old. I think this new situation will all work out and we'll be one big happy family with both dogs....hopefully. :-)