Today is a Happy Sad Day at our home.

You know about those kinds of days, don't you?   When something makes you really, really, happy, but makes you so sad at the same time.     You have the best of memories and yet you are sad cause you miss someone.    Today will be the very first birthday for our Princess Daisy, since she left us to go to The Rainbow Bridge at Dog Heaven.    Gosh.   We miss her so much.   But we have such happy memories too.

Mom says it is like our Hoops & YoYo Desk Calendar of blocks.   When you change the block for a new day, then Hoops and YoYo talk to you.    Sometimes they start to giggle and they say, "this is the best day of your entire life.......... or wait ....... it could be the worst.  Hard to tell".      We love Hoops & YoYo in our office space.    They always make us laugh.  You know where to find them, right?  Just get your Mouse Person to get out of bed and take you to Hoops & YoYo Official Site.   If you ever need a smile on your face, this is the place to find one.

So back to our Princess.   Remember that Daisy was the original writer for our Blogging Business?   She always told me there was little chance that I would be writing the Blog anytime soon.    She actually told me since I was dumb as a stump, she seriously doubted I was good for much more than racing in circles and running into trees.      But you know what?   I didn't care.  I was so young then.

This is the picture we picked to be at the top of our Blog on the very first day we made it.     Daisy, picked this picture actually and everyone always wonders what she was whispering to me.

Actually she was saying :   "Fat chance, little one.   There is very little chance that you will be writing the Blog anytime soon.   It's all about me, The Princess.   Always has been, always will be.    As long as you don't forget that, we will be just fine.  Oh, and I will mention you from time to time.   Maybe.  Or not."

But like I said, I was young then, and I didn't care.   Who wanted to write a Blog anyway.   I had other important business to take care of.   Racing in circles and running into trees.    And when everyone laughed about Daisy's outrageous behaviour and her in your face opinions, I just had another biscuit and listened.       

I never thought I would be taking over in this important job, and I surely didn't want it when I got it.    My Mom said that she and I just had to sit for awhile and think things over together and that soon, when I was ready I would find my own voice.    And you know what?  I did find it.   It wasn't easy at first and I think I made some mistakes, but I did manage to learn a lot by listening to my friends, Ms. Tracie Hotchner and Mr. Erich and they encouraged me.      At first I was concerned because I was not the same as Daisy, but my Mom said that No Dog Ever would be the same as Daisy and that we shouldn't even think about that one.     I was Bob.  Just Bob.  And people would probably love me for that alone.

But you know what too?   I miss the Princess every single day of my life.     She was my first friend in my new home and she knew all about PitBulls, cause she had lived with our Hannah Bananna before I came along.     Hannah and Daisy are probably getting the tables set up right now for The Big Birthday Party at The Bridge.  Hannah, no doubt is doing all the leg work and Daisy is having her toes painted.  So I guess I can safely say that Daisy taught me a lot of what I know..... and a lot of what I should not be doing, too.

                                             I always loved this picture of our Princess.   This was from one of the last photo shoots that our  Ms. Bev Hollis   took of her.    I think this was from the same photo shoot where Ms. Bev did the pictures for Bark Magazine.    Did you know that Daisy and my Sis, Lydia, were in Bark Magazine maybe last year around this time?  Yep.  And Miss Bev took the photos.    

I think this was one of the photos that was in Bark.    This was a quick snap when they were taking a break and Daisy was telling Lydia how the rest of the shoot should be going.    As with everything else in her life, Daisy knew everything there was to know about how pictures should be taken and she had no trouble showing Ms. Bev what to do.

The article in Bark was all about changing careers and how Lydia left her big ole' six figure job to start walking dogs cause she was just so unhappy when she couldn't be home with her girl, Daisy.     And Daisy was the inspiration for Everything & The Dog, too.  Gosh, she practically set the whole thing up, to hear her version of it.

                                        This was one of the first pictures of Lydia and Daisy that we used in our advertising.  This picture wasn't taken by Ms. Bev, but by our good friend Lyn Lindberg, who is probably the Best Wedding Photo Grapher Man in all of Washington D.C. area and is our client and loved our Princess very much.

Once, Ms. Bev let me take a picture of Daisy.

                             

I guess I should stick to Blogging right?      I really did take this, by the way...... just when Ms. Bev was getting ready to get a picture of The Princess, who in my opinion, had already had her fair share that day, I ran straight up and helped Ms. Bev push the buttons.  It was fun!   HA.

Did you know that the first piece of writing that Princess Daisy ever did was called Daisy's Diary for Lydia.    My Mom and Daisy spent a lot of time writing that book down because Lydia had gone off to Germany and left Daisy and Gram all alone to take care of the house.    That was such a long time ago.    My Mom worked as the manager of our bookstore here in Leesburg at the time, and she and Daisy must have had a lot of time on their paws, if you ask me.   

Daisy had an opinion on every single little thing and if you go back to the beginning of our Blogging, you will be able to read about some of the things she talked about.      My favorite however was a letter she wrote to Lydia one day in February.  It concerned the Christmas Tree.   You won't find this in the Blog, cause it was way before we started to do that, but you will get a wonderful idea of how Daisy thought:

Dear Mom:

Thank goodness that Gram decided to take down the decorations from that lousy Christmas Tree.  I do not like Christmas Trees, and have decided that this year, at Christmas, I will go onto some kind of strike to avoid having another one brought into the house.  It isn't fair.

Think about it for a few moments.  First off, having a real Christmas Tree in your home means that a perfectly fine tree must die.  Why would a two-leg want to do that?  Kill a tree?  Trees have a place in the world and that place is outside of the home.  When they are outside, birds can live in them, and boy dogs can pee on them.  What more could a tree want?  I have heard you and my Gram discussing this very subject and my Gram says we need a fiber optic tree, and I agree with her.  You say that the Christmas Tree was planted so that it would grow up to sacrifice it's life for the Holiday Spirit.  Pooh!

So let's just say that you decide to bring the tree into the home, and for a few hours it is fresh and smells pretty good.  But then the damage sets in.  The needles start to shrivel up and die.  Then they fall far from the tree, and then I walk by the tree and I get pine needles stuck in my paws.  Do you know how painful that is?  It is awful.  Gram says she knows exactly how I feel because she stepped on a bunch of crunchy needles this morning while she was taking off the decorations. 

Dad says that if Gram, or you, had ever put any water into the base of the tree stand that this would not have happened.  How long did he expect that you could keep watering a dead tree in your home and have it suck up the water?  Indefinitely?  I think not.  This is one of those times when we just have to draw the line.

Having the tree in the house wouldn't be so bad if Dad had placed it somewhere besides the family room place where my favorite chair belongs.  Up went the tree, and my chair got moved to the opposite side of the room.  I can't watch TV from that location, and it is not close to the fireplace.  So now I can't keep warm, and being cold makes me grumpy.  Whenever I get Grumpy someone has to pay, and since that someone is usualy Jethro, I wind up in trouble again because I'm picking on him.  All of this because of a darn tree.

Next year. Fiber Optic Tree. In the Living Room.

I'm glad we settled this,
Your girl, Daisy. 


So that was our girl.  In a nutshell.   Always told all of what to do and when to do it.   Shopping was probably one of her favorite occupations and she had more bed, toys, collars and leashes than any BullDog on Planet Earth.  When you would question her about that, she would say;  "And your point is?"

So Happy Birthday, my Darling Girl Daisy.   We miss you every single day.   We are never so happy as when we look out our Lily of The Valley, who we know that you picked out just for us, since she was born exactly one week after you left.    We know you found her and you sent her to us, just to drive us absolutely crazy as she is nothing at all like you, except possible some time when we look at her and one of us calls her Daisy.

Please don't eat too much cake tonight at your party.   And stay out of the beer.   Dad says he never should have gotten you started on that habit.  Nor on the cigars.

Kisses and love and licks,

Your Boy Bob
........... doing the best he can with what he has.




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