Jack the Barbarian

Years ago, before Chris and I were married, we were camping in northern Michigan with some friends and we found a puppy. He spent the weekend with us, hanging out and swimming in the lake. Since we were pretty much in the middle of nowhere, we were unable to find his owners, and what do you know, we came home with a puppy. I believe we had some ambitious plan of getting Chris's dad to fall in love with him and agree to keep him, but as it turned out we ended up becoming the proud parents of a rascally pup who we named Jack.

Jack had quite a personality. He was a little on the wild side, so we followed our vet's suggestion and had him fixed. That did, well, pretty much nothing to calm him. We took him to obedience school, where we were humiliated week after week by his sassy behavior. I humbly admit our dog was an obedience school drop-out.

Then there was the chewing. That dog chewed for years. Yes we lost many shoes, but that's not all. Pretty much anything he could reach he chewed like he was a beaver living in a dog's body. Luckily we had old hand me down furniture, because Jack destroyed two couches. Like nothing left to salvage destroyed. We gave him dog toys, but he wanted real stuff. Of course back then we thought there was a good selection of dog toys at the local pet shop, but nowadays there are so many cute options available I almost wish I had a puppy to buy some for. 

My grandma used to babysit Jack while Chris and I went to work. One of us would drop him off in the morning, and the other would pick him up in the evening. We were a little dim because it took us awhile to think to get him a crate. And when we finally did, I'm pretty sure it was my grandma's idea. He loved to go in his crate, cuddled up with his pillows and blankets (which he happily shredded to pieces). It was a relief to not be constantly stressing about what Jack would chew up next. 

When I was expecting Bethany, we loved Jack so much and worried about him feeling left out. So we did the most logical thing we could possibly do...we got another puppy. Cleopatra never shared her big brother's obsession with chewing, thank goodness.

Jack has since gone on to the big doggie pasture in the sky, but Cleo is still with us. She is an old lady now and has little use for dog toys. Heck, we can barely get her to go for a walk around the block. 

Having puppies was fun, but the next dog we get will be fully grown and fully trained!

(My laptop is playing mind games with me and I don't have a scanner, so no pictures of Jack this time.)