Farewell, sweet B.J.!

It has taken me a few days to summons up the courage, but the time has come for me to post about sweet B.J. On Monday, we took him to the vet and found out that he had a large mass on his spleen; by Tuesday, we knew that it was cancer that had spread to his heart and lungs. We had prayed for God to make it very obvious to us what we should do, and we are thankful for the very clear (but very sad) answer He gave us - the vet said he was suffering and suggested that we put him to sleep. Our hearts were broken, but we loved that big guy and knew we couldn't let him suffer, so we said our good byes and have become a family with just one pup.

While I still have tears in my eyes thinking about it, we are starting to be able to laugh about some of his antics. We still wonder how a dog that weighed 100+ pounds could squeeze under a chain-link fence - he never dug a hole, just squeezed right under when he wanted to visit a friend or go swimming in the pond. We still laugh that while he could barely go up and down stairs, he could still climb up and get food off the kitchen table. I smile thinking of all the times he went swimming, and how Kadie would climb on his back when she got tired. How when he got lost in the woods he'd just run faster and faster - usually in the wrong direction. When he drank, more water dripped on the floor than landed in his mouth. And we'll always laugh when we remember him falling in the toilet as a puppy!

B.J. (aka Bubba) lived for 2 things - food and attention! He was a sweet, gentle giant - a real companion to Dave, me and the kids (and Papa). It is with sad hearts that we wish B.J. farewell ... but we feel very blessed to have had 12 1/2 years of his companionship!