Before we had kids, we had her. A tri-colored basset hound that my parents brought to us on one of their visits. She was kind of a crazy girl, so it didn't take us that long to start calling her "Crazy Daisy", a name that stuck.
She quickly grew and wormed her way into our hearts, even though all of her mischief. Looking back, she was certainly a lot more like Marley than Lassie....
But, she was a really sweet dog. She loved kids-- so when we had Kyle, she was usually in the same room as him (if she was allowed!)
Here she was getting her first glimpse of Kyle, just a few hours after he was born. She was always watching over him- she loved "her boy".
No one took the job of keeping the the baby (and the floor surrounding the baby) quite as serious as Daisy. She wasn't a picky eater, either-- she would clean up anything that was dropped!
And, just when she got the hang of that kid-- we gave her another one to look after. And, she continued to do a great job of breaking in the kids....keeping them clean....and showing them how to love a dog by loving them.
After moving to Illinois, she met SNOW. Snow can be a challenge for a dog with really short legs-- especially when it gets deep.
But, Illinois also brought other fun things-- like a deck to sun on and a big yard!
The big yard meant a lot of work for us, but mostly for Mike and Kyle...
When Ryan joined the family, even though she was getting older- she was gentle and sweet, even when he pulled her tail and tried to wrestle with her. She loved to help the kids do anything-- including hunting easter eggs. She would usually find and eat any that we missed.
Mike and I used to appreciate her help in the garden-- or really, her support and company while we worked in the garden.
This year, we will have to work on the garden alone. The kids will have to start to learn to clean up after themselves. Our friend is gone.
Saturday morning, she went out to do her business, like any other day. She couldn't come back in on her own. We carried her in and took her to the vet. The news wasn't good, it was degenerative disc disease, but we chose to see if the medications would help.
They didn't. On Sunday afternoon, she was starting to look like she was in pain. When I woke up at 5 am to give her her pain medication, she looked at me as if she was asking me to help her. I knew at that moment that we had to take her in to put her to sleep....it was what was going to be best for her. I cried until 7 am. When the kids woke up, we told them and they spent some time with her before school.
With all three kids in school and at a friend's house, we took her to VCA. The vet we saw on Saturday agreed that she had gotten worse and our friend, Kelly, a vet at the clinic saw us and offered to do the procedure herself, with her tech, Jen, who is a friend too. They supported us through saying goodbye and being with her in her final minutes. She peacefully left us just after 11 am today-- with her head on my lap and both Mike and I petting her. She was a pain in the butt-- but she was our pain in the butt, and we loved her. We will really miss her.
Our short, stubby-legged Marley...
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