Time. . .on my side?

Well, that contest was fun! And I hear that our prize-winner has received her booty in the mail, and she is very excited! Yay! And I am excited for her, too. I will have to do that contest thing again. . .when? I am not sure. Actually, I am not quite sure when I will do anything anymore. . .it seems like time is just getting away from me lately. . .Do you ever wish you had more of this precious commodity? Of all the things in the world, I wish I had more time. . .

Time to spend with my family.

Time spent not fighting with my family.

Time spent not regretting fighting with my family. . .

It has been a rough week around Pretty Knitty’s house. . .and I spent a good part of this week thinking about time that has passed and wondering about the time to come. You see, amidst the knitting, and the blogging, and the Etsy selling, and the jewelry making, and the working at my “regular job,” and the doing of the stuff that must be done when your High School Senior is in her last month of school and your oldest is somewhere in the Middle East doing whatever it is that the Army asks him to do, we lost a dear friend this week.

Our beagle (pictured in the last post) was a treasured member of our family for the past 12-and-a-half years, But we had to put the old girl down. Now, I don’t want this to be a bummer of a post, I just want to let you know where I am coming from this week. So, rather than dwell on my days of mourning, I’d like to tell you a little story of how we became dog owners.

Back in the day, we decided to get married, and it was good. We decided that He would go into the Navy, and I would “follow him, follow him wherever he may go, because I love him, I love him, I love him, and where he goes I’ll follow, I’ll follow, I’ll follow. . .” And He is my true love, forever.

After we moved into our first apartment, we talked about pets. We adopted a stray cat, and named her Kitty. About a year later, we moved into our first rental home, and He wanted a dog. I did not. We compromised by adopting an orange tabby kitten that we named Fido.

Fido grew and grew and grew, and so did I. I was pregnant with our first child. While pregnant with our second child, Kitty met her demise, and we bought our first house. He still wanted a dog. I still did not. “But it will be so good for the kids!,” he said. “But I don’t want anything else to potty-train!,” said I. Another compromise, a kitten with a big white stripe down her back. We called her Stripey.

Add a few years, the loss of Fido (who was at this point an outdoor cat because he was not as fond of the litter box as we would have liked), a release from the Navy, a move back to our home state, and our second house purchased. The kids could both speak plainly now, and all three of them wanted a dog. I still protested. Do you know who takes care of the dog? That’s right. Ultimately the Mommy does. We adopted a second cat with a white patch on her back, and we all named her Patchy.

Fast forward about 9 months. It is nearly Christmas. We have two cats. I am in the Christmas Choir Extravaganza at church that night, so I have just gotten out of the shower. I have a towel around my hair and another around everything else, and the 5-year-old bursts through the back door, yelling, “There’s a dog chasing us Mom! Come quick!” SUPER-MOMMY throws the fuzzy, pink robe over the towel and runs out into the December air, bare-footed, to rescue the children from what could be a rabid pit-bull with a bad attitude!

What I found in the back yard, however, was a darling beagle, oh, four- or five- months old, chasing the children and begging them to chase her, too. It was like her little beagle face was saying, “Come-get-me! Come-get-me!!!” She was covered in mud, from her head to her foot, and her beagle-smile was contagious. “Mom! Can we keep her?!,” asked the children. “No,” I said firmly. “She is all muddy. We will tie her up in the garage, and see if we can find her family.” Well, that’s not exactly how it worked out. Before going to church that night, I had bathed the beagle, we had bought her a dog bowl, and a matching leash and collar and food. I also re-showered, and made it to the church in time (barely) for the Choir concert.

Three days later, on Christmas Eve, the calls started coming from my neighbors. Did we see the paper? There is an add for a lost beagle puppy. . .did we want the number? Well, we did not! We were in love with this dog, even though she needed some training. . .

Still, I reluctantly dialed the number from the paper. The man who answered was so relieved to get the call. He came right away to get Rosie, saying that his little girls had gone to see Santa just the day before. They told Santa that all they wanted for Christmas was to have their puppy back. I cried. We gave the dog to her owner, and we all just cried. Stupid beagle.

The day after Christmas, we scoured the ads in the paper, and we found what we didn’t even know was missing from our family a few days earlier. We piled in the van, and drove about an hour to purchase an 8-week-old beagle that smelled of corn chips when she napped, and took all of our hearts captive from the first day we brought her home. She will be missed, but I’m so glad for the time we had with Holly, our just-after-Christmas beagle.

Enjoy some time with your family today, and knit in good health!