Playing catch (up)

How was your summer vacation?

I'm taking it as a sign of a good summer that I am, once again, not ready. Last week at the swimming hole I sat with a friend watching the children splash about picking blackberries from the overhanging vines. Feet in the cool water, with pebbles massaging our toes and the laughter of eight or nine swimmers entertaining our ears, we watched the first of the turning leaves float to the water's surface and skim downstream. Our shady spot will be exposed to the autumn sky in a month or two.

But we'll be inside with books and tablets and schedules to make the gas gauge sigh.

How not to make a two-month catch-up letter a series of "been there, done that?' How to capture the feeling of summer? We took some drives. We splashed in the creek and swam in our "secret" swimming hole. We went to a big family wedding in the redwoods and we went to the movies with friends.

Madeleine stretched her musical theatre skills with singing/dancing/acting camps and Sarah attended a ballet intensive and a melodrama performance camp. The big girls were in our local heritage parade too, on the Storybook Theatre float. Sarah was the blue fairy from Pinocchio, reprising her role from last spring's performance. Maddy was Tiger Lily and Grace was a mermaid, both from Peter Pan. I broke three sewing machine needles on Grace's costume but she glittered like an undersea princess. Salvador and Laura caught a lot of candy and waved at all the floats. I ran after the Storybook float with my camera and Mr. Suite was impressed with my speed in pursuit of the photo.

Then! Grace worked on a new quilt top and on her model horse barn. Mr. Suite bought her a miter saw and she uses it with more confidence than do I. Grace and Laura won ribbons at the fair. Grace exhibited a blue-ribbon bookhouse and her handmade puppet collection, also a blue ribbon winner. Laura showed a Lego coffee delivery boat of her own design (blue!) and her pony collection (red).

The whole family plus some friends hung out at the fair and watched the steam engine demonstrations. We ate caramel corn and drank lemonade and I regretted that but not in the baking hot moment.

Mr. Suite and I had a few date nights. We celebrated our anniversary -- 22 years -- with a Tom Petty concert where almost every song made me feel younger. We hiked the mountain above our house a few times and took photos at the river bar where he grew up and learned to drive. We drove over a floating bridge and visited farm stands and old haunts and longtime friends.

On the pet front, Laura has two guinea pigs. I am informed they are not rodents. Charlie the Spaniel took a brief vacation with another family whose mama works at the self-sustainability workshop on our road. He went camping by the lake and then came home and we were very, very glad. Murphy the Bernese went up the mountain with Maddy and Mr. Suite on a hike and came back down in the Suburban. I understand the hip joint pain.

Maddy and Sam cut new trails in the woods above our pasture. We made hay in record amounts and two teen boys with more energy and bigger appetites than imaginable helped get all eight tons in the loft before it rained. We picked blackberries and visited friends. We hosted a mini craft and swimming day camp for friends. We took some more drives. I am gathering rose hips for wreaths and tea. I am gathering the school books and calendars and my wits for another year of sharp pencils and sharper minds.

Dogs and other happinesses

Today as I quickly upload these snaps of late-summer fun and games I have six students at my school table. It's transition time.

We are still jogging through the last bits of summer chez Suite but the autumn rituals are tapping in for a good run.

A cozy wrap after bedtime bath.

Some wildflowers gathered for seed.

Mommy's seasonless dreams of pictures wherein everyone is smiling angelically and no one is pulling anyone else's hair or last nerve. It's the tradition that transcends cultural and national boundaries. (And you thought that was music?)

A dog's life

Bonnie Belle wouldn't move off the couch. She'd lived too long to be denied.

Plus she was just cute.

I am beginning to understand that I could easily become a purse dog person.

Please don't be offended if you currently have a teacup dog in your handbag.

There's something so portable about a smaller dog. I truly enjoyed being able to bathe Bonnie without a forklift or a garden hose. I loved how she never brought home large unidentifiable bones from the woods across the road. And I liked having her on the front seat of the Suburban as we went to town. She asked so politely for treats at the coffee drive-through. She never pulled on the leash and she usually didn't smell too eau de dog like some other outdoorsy canines I've known.

And don't tell anyone but I kinda liked watching a movie with a dog by my side on the sofa. It turns out I'm not so much the go-out-and-play-ball kind of dog owner but rather the sit-by-the-fire-and-read kind of dog owner. You know, where a dog appreciates good literature and is basically a cat with a wagging tail who (bonus!) doesn't get on the counters.

Recently I got in big trouble, and by that I mean Luuuu-ceeeEE, for attempting to rescue yet another and even smaller spaniel. But who could blame me? (My long-suffering husband, apparently.)

I'm on dog begging hiatus. There's an amendment to our pre-nup and everything. (Joking! Joking!)

But I miss Bonnie Belle. She went to puppy heaven far too soon. The fact that it coincided with postpartum whatever notwithstanding, I'd love to love another Bonnie Belle. (I was planning on naming the new spaniel "Maybelline.")

We will likely have a large, farm- and ranch-appropriate dog again. Don't get me wrong; I did love Jake with all my heart. That was a DOG. All Golden Retriever and golden boy, he was a great, athletic, supersmart dog's dog. Police officers were known to compliment him (and my husband) on Jake's manners. Heeling without a leash? No problem. Saving random children's pool noodles from the treacherous lake wakes? He was on it. Command of "sit," "stay" and "spot" in three languages? That was one smart dog. (Plus he hardly ever got on the couch unless he was sure we weren't coming home before he could vacuum it off.)

Our next dog may be another Golden and may be a Bernese Mountain Dog (even bigger and doggier I'm sure). But there will always be a place in my heart for the little Springer Spaniels and the way they look like they're straight out of a Dick and Jane reader. It's a simpler, gentler dog. Mostly understanding only single-syllable words. But still.

A little of this, a little of that

Bonnie Bell. The newest couch kumquat chez Suite.

I'd love to say we were able to remove all those leaves before the snow fell.

But even with an extra "driver" in the family this year, we didn't keep up with the leaves.

It might have had something to do with that little boy. He just turned five months old last week. He says, in this order, "Mama," "Dada," "hi" and "truck." I do like a child with priorities.

And consummate cuteness!
I may not be objective exactly, but he's pretty much the cutest five-month-old ever.
(Did I mention he's cute? And that he said "Mama" first?)

Even daddies in their work boots can be persuaded to take a break
when the baby toes are that delicious.

Keep on thanking

This little farm is wrapped in picket fences. Bicycles. Quilts. Babies.

A thin dusting of snow graced our Thanksgiving weekend. The ice and threat of ice kept schools closed -- except for our kitchen table school -- and made for a cozy week.

However. It also kept my computer in limbo at the tech guy's shop for an extra nine days. Let me tell you, if you want to simplify your life a lot, let the computer take an extended vacation. And then let the cell service in your area go down due to ice on the tower. If you're hoping for such a perfect storm of Ludditism (word? not a word?), be sure to lay in plenty of reading material and groceries and of course animal feed.

WHICH LEADS ME TO MY HUGE NEWS.

We have a new puppy!

Pictures to follow.

She's not technically a puppy. The animal shelter thinks she's possibly of advanced age. But we haven't had her in to our veterinarian just yet. (Ice on the roads and all.)

Mr. Suite surprised the girls with Bonnie Bell, our new Springer Spaniel, the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. She's so cute that she inspires baby talk, even in those of us long determined that vocabulary is not built on such wee wittle woidy woids. She's even adorable enough to let me consider breaking the decades-held cardinal rule of no dogs on the furniture. What? She's smaller than a Golden Retriever. By a lot. Also easier to bathe. And if you're still partying with my justification festival you'll think it makes perfect sense that she's allowed on the couches, where no dog has snored before.

So between our lack of computer and related use of hardbound reference books for research papers (again with the WHAT?), between our somewhat self-extended cabin fever and our putting the garden to bed and the leaves to good use on the compost heaps, between turkey with loved ones and making the traditional thankful tree... between the cracks of all that beautiful life... we've been grateful.

Tell me about your thanksgiving. Go on. It's not too late. I for one believe it's in fashion year-round. Just like small(ish) dogs on the couch. And vintage bikes on the fence. For a certain type of girl, these are the little black dress, the classic cardigan, the new-old haute couture so blessedly ubiquitous as to be reported on rarely but enjoyed continuously by those in the know.

The thanks are the thing.

How much is that doggie in the window?

Should you lose your beloved canine and go all melancholy crazy with the doglessness, try not to do as I do.

Try not to snap pictures of random other peoples' dogs thinking they look like they'd fill the hole in your family.

Or at least try not to stop in the middle of the street when doing so.

Dog envy. It's not pretty, people.

The dog days?

During our recent hot spell it became evident that Jake the dog was a little too aromatic for mixed company.

No time for the groomer. No interest in infecting the Suburban with his royal stinkiness. (And, frankly, no $60 for the groomer either.) The only problem, er, challenge, with this set of circumstances was that I was not interested in either of the bathrooms getting covered in dog hair nor in the lingering wet dog scent that would of course follow an indoor canine bath.

At farmsuite we can meet these challenges with a rusty clawfoot tub, the garden hose, and some intrepid junior groomer types in colorful outfits and rubber boots:

Thanks, Laura, Grace and Mr. Suite, for taking care of that little dog days of summer problem. (Er, challenge.)

Dog days: Help wanted

We got the dog at 11 months old. He was so weak: dehydrated, malnourished, defeated.

Despite having been a papered purebred with a price tag higher than that of my first car, he had been neglected and abused, tied up for probably two August weeks with a short length of speaker wire and no access to water under a leafless tree in the middle of a fenced yard in a very, very upscale neighborhood.

An acquaintance (our Realtor at the time) snatched him from the yard of her former clients and brought him to dogless me. I took one look at him, lifted him into my minivan first and called my husband for permission second.

Even though he was a puppy, he was too weak to climb down from the van at the vet's office. My two daughters were shocked at this procession. Madeleine was 3 and Sarah not quite 2. Neither one of them, obviously, had any concept of what he could bring to our family. Their paradigm for dogs included Grandpa's enormous German Shepherd pair who knock toddlers down and never look back. And weeks before the Golden rescue we'd kept for honeymooning friends an energetic Rhodesian Ridgeback mix who'd knocked over Sarah's oak high chair and broken her baby nose, ending the dog-sitting stint and our dog-owning thoughts in one fell swoop.


(This is how Jake has been since Day 2 of joining our family. A snugglebug to the furthest extreme. Our little friend Hannah and her sister were scared of dogs. But he's not just any dog.)

Regardless of my mixed-up feelings for dogs at the point of loading him into my van, the emaciated one in front of me clearly needed rescue. Our vet suggested we leave him there for hydration, further evaluation and a flea bath, so even though the girls by this time were crying at the thought of leaving "our" dog behind, we did leave for frozen yogurt.

By the time we picked up a cleaner albeit weak puppy, having called Daddy for permission/forgiveness, the dog was ours. I was prepared to move should his former owners seek his return. Picture me running out of country like a bad custody dispute movie on the Lifetime movie network.

At home in our two-story house, we tucked him in the first night in a makeshift bed at the bottom of the stairs. But lo and behold sometime in the night he had decided he could manage the stairs, retrieving stacks of folded laundry from the family room coffee table no less. He delivered all the (now slobbery) baby clothes and socks to the stair landing and spent the rest of the night at the foot of our bed. (On the floor. I'd decided to love a dog, not lost my mind.)

We re-named him Jake because (1) when my husband and I were first married we used to foster a dog named Jake whom we had considered snatching and (2) his registered name is biblical and official-sounding. I generally think people names ought to be for people and dogs should have names like "Bullet" or "King." My silly opinion has proven to have its points as one of the girls' best friends in our country neighborhood is named Jacob and he tends to come running when I call the dog.

(That's our sweet neighbor Jacob. (Even more eager to please than the Golden Retriever who bears his name.) Try not to think about the way he looks at Madeleine, wouldja?)



For a decade Jake has been such an integral part of our family that I barely noticed his aging. Sure, I had a few moments of breakthrough panic when I realized he probably wouldn't still be with us when Madeleine and Sarah leave for college. And, yes, when a friend's dog locked into him with savage teeth for no apparent reason I cried over Jake's newly scarred face and continued trusting demeanor.

A little over a year ago, when President Obama was new to his office and seeking the presidential family canine, Sarah took it upon herself to sit down at our favorite cafe and write a letter:

It says:

Dear President Obama,

Congratulations on being President! I think you should get a Golden Retriever like our dog. His name is Jake. I also have a friend named Jake. I have three sisters too. I have lots of friends.

I live in Oregon. A small town. I have three horse and three cats. One dog, one fish, snail, frog.

And we used to have a bunny but he died a couple weeks ago.

Your friend,

Sarah

age 8

Please write back.

.



I know I should but I'm not sure I can forgive the President for failing to write back. At least have an aide send a postcard for crying out loud.

.

Despite his failing to inspire the White House, I know we lucked out, rescuing Jake.

.

I had a firm talk with him about the laundry that second day and he has ignored that instruction ever since. (The dog loves to pack around socks and underwear, and clean or dirty, deliver them to their rightful owners. Ew.) However, he has never (knock wood) broken my other cardinal dog rules: dug up a plant, chased our cats, growled or even looked sideways at a child. He has perfect manners in the jumping-up department and my husband has taught him never to lick, beg or sniff inappropriately. Jake makes sure to find a way to make even the most dog-resistant love him. He likes to listen to new readers. He waits his turn to go through doorways. He politely asks for treats at the bank and coffee drive-through. Sometimes more politely than my children. Who could ask for a better four-legged companion?

Don't get me wrong. He's still a dog, with all the disgusting dogginess that goes with it. Think trash gourmand. Chicken manure aficionado. And the fur. We could build a new dog each month with all the dog hair we sweep up.

Anyway. Jake is nearly 11 years old now. He's a little gray around the temples. I'm worried. We'll never find another dog like Jake. I'm not sure whether we should consider a puppy (yikes) to help keep Jake young and to ease the blow that's likely coming in the next three or four years.

Any thoughts on this? Is it a good idea to bring another dog into our family when we're expecting baby number 5? Or will we (I) just be disappointed by the reality of doggyness in comparison to the Golden one?

Because Dogs Are People Too

The whole concept of Hallmark Holidays has been on my mind. There's a day for everything, and boy, if you miss it, it'll come around again next year. Because it's not only the National Day Of [fillintheblank], it's the ANNUAL National Day Of.

On the other hand, the NDO you're most interested in might recur tomorrow, because no one's in charge of this "National Day Of" business... it's not trademarked, or service marked or otherwise the intellectual property of anyone as far as I can tell. And my research was intensive: I Googled it.

Probably someone somewhere knows how to make money on this. After all, there's gobs of money to be made in blogging (so I've been told). It's no less likely that the National Day Of Raking In The Bucks is right around my proverbial corner.

ANYWHAT, today, according to my holiday-laden calendar, is National Bring Your Dog To Work Day.


Look at that dog. I had to search pretty hard to find some pictures of him. I have mentioned before that he seems to be in the background of every picture, but it now comes to light that I never set out to take a picture of him. Poor, poor Jake. (Name changed to protect the innocent. Or not. He kind of gets in the trash a lot.)

So National Bring Your Dog To Work Day is like every other day in our house. YAY. The EGE takes Jake (yes, it's his real name; he's named after our former foster dog; we're unoriginal that way) to work every day. Woo Hoo! Hurray! I am the luckiest girl on the planet!

It's not that I don't love the dog. I do. I have to say that or my children will stage a protest and refuse to eat dinner.

I love the dog, but I do not love his actions. He is a retriever and it shows in all sorts of obnoxious ways. A few weeks ago I read a lovely post of Barb's in which she photojournaled her dog's retrieval of the paper. How helpful! How All-American! Barb's husband even told her how to tell me how to teach Jake to do such a marvelous chore daily. Unfortunately, Jake is too smart to be that helpful.

He certainly knows how to retrieve, and this is my main reason for rejoicing as soon as he leaves the house with the EGE every morning. He spends every waking hour retrieving. Dirty socks. Our front and back doors are usually littered with these gifts, and a nine-hour break from repeatedly returning socks to their proper hamper residences is welcome. When there is no dirty laundry, Jake will settle for clean laundry. He picks up folded towels and carries them to me. He drives me up the retrieving wall.

Once I even called a pet counselor, I mean dog trainer, who told me that Jake was merely looking for a job to do. Um, psychic, hunh?

Now that Jake goes to the office every day, he has a favorite drafter. This hurts the EGE's dog-owning ego a little, maybe. The favorite drafter runs at lunch and leaves his running shoes at the back door of the office. That is, he tries to leave them there, but of course the dog keeps retrieving them. Don't you just love a dog who keeps his job consistent?

Come to think of it, National Take Your Dog To Work Day might've been meant for me. Maybe Jake was trying to remind me to catch up on the laundry. Don't tell my husband, willya?