Gracie & Sam

These are our dogs. The one with her tongue sticking out is Gracie, and the fluffy yellow one is Sam. These dogs love the snow. Actually they love to go for a walk or a ride or anything that lets them be involved with Alex and me. We got snow just like so many people over the last day or so. These two dogs were raised in Colorado, so this really wasn't that much snow to them, but dang they enjoyed it! Gracie loves to have you kick snow into the air and her catch it. It's even better if the snow is wet enough that it will form a snowball! For some reason, she loves eating snow, and will even run along, drop her head and scoop up snow like she was a shovel or something. Gracie would be in heaven if she could live in Alaska and pull our sleigh team on an Iditarod.

Sam is what we call by another name as a cow. He loves the summer grass that he can eat by the mouthful as we go for walks. He would rather hang out with people any day of the week, and he just loves life to the very fullest. His idea of heaven would have something to do with bacon and people petting him.  

These are the dogs of our life right now, and we are blessed to have them with us. God, I'm sure, has a special plan for dogs, who are probably hairy angels that he uses in our lives to make us less human and more Christ-like. They love us with a love that has no limit, no condition and no end. They just love us like the world revolves around us. I will never be able to love my dogs the way they love me, but I can care for them as a part of our family. I can give them the respect they deserve as creatures on this planet with me, and I can be there for them when they need me, even to the end. We had to put Shyela down after diabetes and life had gotten the best of her. I will never forget the rainbow that God showed me the day that Alex took her to the vet. It was as if he was saying, “This is going to hurt, but I am here, and I will take care of all of you.” I love my dogs with a love that goes beyond reason sometimes —I guess in the same way that God loves me.