H.B. and Helen

H.B. had his first Seeing Eye puppy meeting on Monday. His sister, Helen, is also in our puppy club so they had a littermate reunion. She's on the left and definitely smaller than H.B. Maybe H.B. stands for Hefty Boy.

Helen and H.B. had fun saying hello.

H., Q. and H.B.

When H.B. arrived, Harley and Quail were in the backyard. I was a little worried that H.B. would get trampled when H. and Q. came inside but they were amazing really good. They walked in, gave him a sniff and then thought...oh, another pup. I guess it's a good thing we puppysit for other Seeing Eye pups -- it's gotten them used to having strange dogs in the house for a little bit.

Quail has definitely adjusted to having H.B. around. They play a lot although I do have to moderate since Q. does have the tendency to play rough.

As for Harley, he's being a bit of a cranky old man. He tolerates H.B. But based on past puppy interactions, it takes him about a week to warm up to a little nippy thing.

H Stands For...

H.B.

Yes, our new Seeing Eye Puppy's name is H.B. We've never had a puppy named with initials before and I've never met one either. So I guess the next question is what does H.B. stand for? Our Area Coordinator who drops and picks up the puppies didn't know. If you make a large enough donation to The Seeing Eye, you can name a puppy so maybe he is named for someone.

He is a big boy! He is 10.3 pounds and a little chunky thing. Our last three puppies were girls so I guess I am used to the more petite 7-8 pound puppies. Gusto was 9.1 pounds and Harley was 10.4. Maybe H.B. stands for Huge Boy.

Either way, it doesn't matter because he is just too cute!!!

Waiting for H Puppy...

We are waiting rather impatiently for our H puppy to arrive. He is supposed to be in our home around noon on Monday.

In the meantime, we had to kidnap another yellow male lab for my puppy fix.

Okay, in reality, his puppy raisers went away and we offered to care for Fathom. He's a six month old yellow lab (in case you couldn't tell from the photo). He's so cute and actually sits when you tell him to (unlike our Quail).

He came to stay with us on Thursday and left today (Sunday). Harley did his best to ignore Fathom while Quail played, played and played until even she didn't want to play anymore.

I do believe that in the picture Quail and Harley are thinking...geez, doesn't she know it is mealtime? Why is she taking another picture of us when she should be getting our food ready???

Wednesday Morning I Do's

A few of us went to City Hall Wednesday morning for my sister-in-law's wedding. She really is not one to want a big huge fancy wedding so she decided on something short and sweet...so off to City Hall we went. The ceremony took all of five minutes -- long enough for them to exchange their vows and to make the moms cry. It was beautiful.

I won't get all corny and say something hokey but I am very happy for the both of them.

Don't Sit Under the Banyan Tree with Anyone Else But Me

We saw so many beautiful flowers in Hawaii but I kind of expected that. I was just blown away by the Banyan Trees though. They were massive and really looked like they should have a family of tree elves living in them.

This Banyan Tree was in Kepaniwai Park and Heritage Gardens in Maui. At the time, I didn't know what kind of tree it was beyond knowing it was huge!

We saw this tree on a hike to Waimoku Falls in Haleakala National Park. I'm so tiny compared to the tree. It is neat how it drops roots into the ground from its branches -- eventually the roots will grow wide enough to look like a tree trunk.

This Banyan Tree in Lahaina, Maui -- yes, this is one single tree -- was so massive I couldn't fit it into the frame of my camera unless I wanted to cross the street in which case cars would have blocked my picture. When we walked under the tree, it was easy to tell where the originating tree trunk was but I'm not sure where it is in the photo.
Imagine the tree houses you could build in a Banyan Tree! You could have an entire village up there.

Rock Wins!

We walked on lots of beaches in Hawaii but didn't actually take the time to lie out in the sun or swim. Hubby said it wasn't in the agenda. And our travel agent had a good point -- we can lie on the beach anywhere. Or rather, I can lie on a beach anywhere since hubby has absolutely no desire to.

One of the beaches we went to was a black sand beach at Wai'anapanapa State Park towards the end of the Road to Hana on Maui. It had a section of really pretty rocks.

Since we had some great sand along the surf, hubby wrote in it and I took pictures while the waves came in. Of course, I miscalculated one wave and we had to outrun it or get wet.
See those big rocks on the beach? They are huge lava rocks and I had a slight "right of way" discussion with one of them. The rock won and I took a tumble. Hubby was really worried because he said it was a bad fall -- I had scrapes and bruises -- but all I cared about was whether my camera and brand new lens survived. And it did.

Photographer versus Rock -- Rock Wins and probably always will.

P.S. Did I use lie correctly??? :-)

It's a Boy!!!

Woo hoo!

We just got back from Hawaii yesterday. While we were gone, we got a message that a puppy is being held for us. We're tentatively expecting a boy on June 20th. Yippee!

I'm still sorting through Hawaii photos and will blog them over the next week. I was tempted to blog while I was away but hey, I had better things to do :-)

In the meantime, here's a picture of us.