Beloved

"His name is Fred,
His favorite color is blue,
He sleeps in my bed,
But we need to find him a home."

Back in October of 2001 I said those fateful words when I found the cutest puppy I had ever seen. What I didn't know at the time was how wonderful my home would be for him.

He became a mascot of sorts to my gang at Cal Arts.
He painted by my side in Denver,
He braved the winters in Minnesota to help me find Chris,

only to be harassed by Alex in the end.

He was an amazingly awesome dog full of energy and love.

Even in the earliest of days he was a charmer .

He was classy when he needed to be....

He was always willing to help me finish my snacks...

In Denver he always made sure to work hard while I painted.

He always let you know when he needed that chip you were eating.

He was often spoiled with treats and bones.

As you can tell he had a hard life.

This past Saturday, Feb 22 2009, I lost my best friend.

I will always think of him as my first child and am so glad to have had him as a part of my life. He was a special dog with many many quirks, but always there for me.
A girl couldn't have asked for a better 50 lb lap dog.

No matter how bad the day, it seemed to melt away when ever I opened the door and was completely smothered by the spastic hopping of my friend, and I really miss that. He had the best talent for cuddling into your legs at night, keeping you warm in the way only he could, even if you were hanging on to the edge for dear life.

He never thought of himself as just a dog...
He was a "PEOPLE" and you knew it.

He touched so many people's hearts along the way, and I hope he knows how much they loved him.

I really miss you Fred and hope you are safe and happy.

Fredrick Love Powers
2001 - 2009

Gettin there....

Someone is not a fan of Xander's new mode of transportation!





And steering seems to be a bit of a problem....



He's been cruising like this for almost two weeks now, so I am hoping that walking will be almost around the corner.
He still much prefers crawling, or climbing up the stairs or, better yet, carried in my arms, but I can see the desire for more freedom starting to twinkle in his eye.
The next big step he has to conquer is getting his butt to line up under his spine and not have his legs buckle -ie standing up un-assisted. And once that happens it will only be a matter of time.

My guess is hopefully by the end of March y'all will be watching a little video of him walking!

The next video being of Fred packing up his dog dishes
and bones and moving out

Styled

A couple of weeks ago I tried to save money and give Alex a haircut....

I still can't give you a really good reason as to why I thought I could do this task.
Part of my reasoning was not wanting to cut off the hair he was born with, combined with not letting some stranger deflower my son's head, with a side of crazy all rolled in.



Either way it was not a successful cut, and by that I mean he got cranky as heck and I was only able to trim the sides therefore leaving him with a mullet.

So when Gamma Q came in town for Xander's party we decided to get some professional help.

Fantastic Sam's here we come.....

This is him on my lap getting our consult.

If you compare these two pictures
you can see how badly and uneven I did his sides.

This does not look like fun...

Sorry Alex...
maybe if you stopped trying to get away......

Now that's what I call a real style!

notice how smooth his hair is -
it lasted maybe five minutes

GET ME OUTTA HERE!

CAKE

I could bore you with the details of Xander's 1st birthday party but we all know the reason why you came by today....

To see him eat CAKE!

This was the fancy store cake we got free!

And........

This was my Creation:

Two layers of cake separated by a layer of banana pudding/whip cream.
The frosting was made from two more layers of the banana cream !

YUM!

Well the candle didn't last very long.

In fact the cake didn't last very long at either.
Once he got going the cake was decimated in about five minutes.

I wounder if he actually got any in his mouth?

Fred wishes he had a chocolate cake of his own.