"I miss you Remy!"

This morning (after Teri put me thru a tough Billy Blanks workout...I think it was payback for aerobics class yesterday), the boys and I went with Teri to pick up Remington. When we moved to TX, Teri's brother adopted Remington from us so that he could continue to live the life of a country, hunting lab. We've really missed him and Brody was sooooo excited to see him!

I could tell (from Remy's enthusiasm) that he remembered us. He got in the mini van and gave the boys kisses (and then tried to climb into my lap...not a good thing when he weighs at least 115-120 lbs). Brody said, "I remember you Remy! I've really missed you!" Then he sat there petting and hugging on him all the way back to Chris & Teri's. When we got back to their house, Brody didn't want to let Remy out of his sight. He followed him around everywhere he went.

At one point Brody leaned over hugging Remington and said, "Mommy? Will you take a picture of us? I want to hang it up in my room at home."

When Mike & Chris got back from their morning hunt, Brody stopped following Remy for a few minutes to check out one of the geese they shot.

During lunch we were talking about how the guys were going to take Remington with them to hunt this afternoon. Before I knew it, Brody had his face buried in my lap sobbing! When I finally got him to breathe enough to talk to me, he explained that he didn't want Remy to leave. I guess he'd planned to take Remy on a walk this afternoon. So I bundled us up and we headed out to take Remy on a walk (with instructions from Mike not to wear him out so that he'd still have energy to go hunt). I told Brody that Remington would just be gone while he was taking a nap and he finally decided that it would be ok.

Remington is suffering from cancer and has several large tumors on his body. He still seems to feel good, but it's been sad for us to know that this is the last time that we'll get to see him. With as large as some of the tumors are, I don't think he'll still be with us next Thanksgiving. He has been such an amazing dog and after only 9 years...it just seems too soon to have to say goodbye! We still have one more day before we leave Sterling...so we'll get lots of hugs and kisses (and hunting retrieves) during that time.