Sleeping dog

This dog really knows how to sleep!

Harley Angel Bell

Wood's friend, Brian, sent him a Harley Angel bell for his birthday. It has been prominently and safely hung from the middle front frame between the forks. :-)

My first ride with Big Dog

Wood got his license Friday. Yah!!!! So yesterday he took me on my very first Harley ride. I think I am hooked. We rode through Red Top and then went out to the Indian mounds and came back through town. I could see so many things that I am not usually able to see. I LOVED it. It was about 59 when we left and Wood convinced me I needed to wear my leather jacket (his former leather bomber jacket). For once I listened and boy am I glad I did. 60 degrees is definitely leather jacket weather on a bike. I have a helmet with a face shield and that was pretty cool too. Petey LOVES the bike and I think he wants to come. Last Friday when Wood went to get his license, Petey and I sat on the back porch drinking a beer and just enjoying the early evening. Petey knows the sound of the Harley and was alerting sitting on my lap looking for him to come back in our neighborhood gates. Problem is, it is Harley riding weather and there were a number of Harleys that passed by on the street going into Redtop State park. He was sure everyone of them was Wood and went to the edge of our yard, just at the brink of the downward slope (if you can call it a slope- more like a drop off) checking to see if it was him returning. When Wood finally did come back, Petey raced around the deck, through the garage and then down the driveway to welcome him back. A wee bit of a challenge for Wood, coming up the driveway with the little pipsqueek jumping all around him. But both survived :-). We're looking at getting a little dog/sack thing for Petey to ride in for short intown rides. We just know this truck lovin, car lovin riding dog wants to be part of the Harley family too :-)

Hurray, yippeeee yahoooooo

We had the best Easter dinner with Bryan and Kim and we're going to be grandparents !!!!

The Saturday of Petey's life

Ok just like Petey knew it was time to get Wood yesterday, he knows Saturdays. He knows that Saturdays usually mean at walk at Redtop Mtn state park. He knows that Saturdays usually mean at least one other ride in the truck. So today we captured how Petey likes to ride. He loves to just perch on the door and watch the world go by. But his all time favorite, is out full force, leaning forward as if he could be a hood ornament. I haven't a clue how he sees. He even loves to do this when it is 40 degrees and less outside (usually my hand and his face freezes about the same time)

Wood, his dog and his hog

Yesterday morning at 3:30 when I decided I really had too much to do and should get up, Petey knew immediately that this was a special day. He just KNEW we had somewhere to go and he KNEW it was going to the airport to pick up Wood. I took an early shower and went over to the office to work. Wait Petey says this is WRONG! First he just wouldn't come in the door to go upstairs but sat outside the garage door, waiting for me to open it so he could hop in the car. Then when I finally persuaded him to come in (ie went and picked him up and tossed him in the door) he runs to the top of the stairs and when I sit down to work, he starts biting and clawing at my arm to get me to stop. Then he jumps up on my lap, which makes it very difficult to work and starts licking my face and trying in his best doggie way to get me to goooooo. Ok well I got about 2.5 hours out of him before we had to leave. Pretty hard to get him to take the time to go to the bathroom when he knows he is going for a ride. We drive to the airport, all the time his is on my lap inbetween it and the steering wheel, looking out the window. We get to the airport and he recognizes the way we go to pick up Wood and he jumps up and puts his paws on the steering wheel and looks forward (like he is driving- its ok, we are only going about 20 mph right now), spots Wood and goes bananas. Well when Wood gets in the car, Petey jumps on his lap, puts his paws up on his chest and starts licking his face. After the initial excitement, he wants to get as close as he possibly can, so he climbs up about clavicle level, read just below Wood's chin and shoulders and lays down with his head just as close as it can possibly be too Wood's. Now is that love or what! Jill wrote on her blog (the DHX one), yesterday about dogs. I have to tell you this is why I love dogs. They so unconditionally shower you in love. Now, I know sometimes that comes with responsibilities that are a bit of a bother. Like when I need to keep working for awhile and Petey is biting my arm and trying to get me to stop working on the computer because we have already been at it 9 + hours and he wants to either play or go for a walk. Or when he literally keeps after me until I either take him for a car ride or a walk (he is the most persistent communicator). So there really are times when I would like to wriggle my nose and get the dog out of my space for a while so I can do what I need to do and not what he wants me to do. But it is that true unconditional love that just does it for me, when it comes to dogs :-) Ok so Petey and Wood love each other. But Wood also loves and I mean loves, his 'hog'. He couldn't wait to get home yesterday and take it for a spin.

Spring is also the time of beautiful sunsets

A pretty common sight during the spring and fall but for some reason this sunset just captured me. I love seeing the rays shooting up through the clouds into the skyThen I noticed a monster cloud in front of the sun. See his squinty eyes.And here he is winking ;-) See the rainbow through the still-winter-trees after the tornados that whipped through on Saturday

Spring time = storm time

Well Spring time in Georgia means many things. Trees start flowering, daffodils begin blooming and the grass slowly shifts from brown to green. Hopefully this year our azaleas and hollys will respond and come back. Azaleas because it has frozen here several times this winter and they really don't like to freeze. The holly bushes because for the first time since I have moved here, the deer have eaten them. Guess they were so hungry due to the drought that they were gobbling up anything they could. Spring time also means fantastic storms. We had some this weekend that were a little more than fantastic. A tornado touched down in Atlanta Friday night early Saturday morning and hit very close to where our downtown Atlanta office is located causing lots of damage to the CNN building and Centenial park (we are across the street from these). Saturday a tornado came through Cartersville and jumped across to Red Top Mountain and Lake Allatoona (not at all normal to get them right here, in fact Bry has told me that we probably never would because of the topography and all the hills around us- might be why it jumped right over us and hit the lake). We had gone out for a late breakfast and heard the tornado sirens going off as we walked into IHOP. We probably should have paid attention, but didn't. So we ate breakfast and just as we were leaving it started raining and blowing harder than we have seen in a long time. Now, Wood is used to driving when it is raining so hard you can't hardly see. But this time we had really strong winds to deal with too and his truck was kind of bucking on the drive home. You can imagine how glad we were to get home and how truly DEEEElighted Petey was to see us We thought the storms were over so an hour or two later we hopped back in the truck to go spend Wood's birthday money at the Harley store and to pick up some groceries. Wood thought maybe he would take a little spin on the bike when we got home.... hmmm. Well we got home...kind of blue skies with puffy clouds but it looked a little iffy still to the west of us. Sure enough another very blustery storm blew through in about 30 minutes, this time with hail, extreme wind and couldn't see across the street rain. Boy were we glad Wood had decided to forgo the ride. This time we lost our electricity. So much for cooking some tasty Parmesan Chicken for dinner. Amazingly the brownies that were in the oven sort of finished on their own and were a nice compliment to our Taco bell candle lit dinner. Anyway power is on this AM and as soon as it is light we'll drive through our neighborhood to make sure no one lost any trees. We think so far we are ok.

Sunrise ship approach

Watching this ship come into harbor while the sun rose was really more interesting than I thought it would be.