Church Family Tales

This last weekend Jeff and I had a great visit with my parents at their house. We celebrated my mom's birthday early, and just had a great time relaxing at their house. Thanks for having us, mom and dad!

As we were driving back from Idaho Falls, my sister called and asked if I could go with her the next morning to put our family dog, Bandit, to sleep. You see, when my parents moved to Idaho Falls about a year ago, my sister Jackie and her husband offered to keep Bandit at their house in Boise. They had been talking about putting him down for a few weeks since Banny had lost his bladder control and was pretty much destroying their house---and making it smell terrible too! Plus he was getting pretty old! He was about 14 years old so he had a good run. I told Jackie to bring some dog treats with her, and I even put a little tiny bit of meat loaf in a tupperware to give to Bandit. I just felt the need to spoil the heck out of him. Let me tell you, he enjoyed that! Jackie and I got to spend a few minutes in a room with Bandit to say bye. It started to really hit us then, and we were crying a lot. We then had to hand him off to one of the girls at the veterinary office. As we were walking out, we really started to bawl. We didn't expect to either. But just being the ones to actually take him there made it really hard. I've had that dog since I was 11. We got him not long after my family's car accident, in which we lost our puppy Cody, who was only a few months old. He was a special dog to us, because really he partially symbolized us getting on with our lives after the accident. Forward motion, you know. Banny was always the sweetest dog. I still remember when we went and picked him out at the breeder's house. He was so adorable! We debated for the entire rest of the day what we would name him. Some of the suggested names were: Buddy and Shiloh (from a popular book and movie around that time). There were so many more that I can't remember fourteen years later. The breeder told us: "We named him Columbus--because he likes to explore." Well, there was no way that was going to be his name! Lame. We will miss you Bandit! aka Bandito, Ban-boy, Banny...

This weekend we're going golfing with Jeff's parents! Well, I'll pretty much just be watching, since I'm terrible, but at least I'll be out in the fresh air with great company! On Saturday night we're having our friends over for dinner. I still don't know what I'm going to make--guess it's time to hit up the grocery store. And we're also going to see a show this weekend put on by Idaho Dance Theatre. It will be a full weekend!