Ah yes, the holidays are upon us! This past weekend I decorated for Christmas so we could take a family photo near the fireplace with all of our pets to mail out in our Christmas cards. Last year was hard enough with just Coda and Paco. If you recall, we sent out a picture of Paco beating up Coda since it was the best they could do.

This year we threw costumes & Wellesley into the mix and it was incredibly complicated. We knew there was no way to get all 3 kids in the picture to sit still, so Bob & I got in the photo to hold the pets still.

Coda was too bored and kept laying down to sleep. Paco kept swatting at Coda’s antlers and complaining to get out of his elf costume. Wellesley kept trying to eat his own antlers and managed to hold still for a maximum of 19 seconds since the timer on the camera was set for 20 seconds. He always moved right before the photo was snapped. One time he even hacked up a lung when the picture was taken and his mouth is wide open mid-hack.

After what felt like hours of torture for all of us, we finally got a decent picture of all of us. Merry Christmas ya’ll!

Bob had been not-so-subtly hinting about wanting another dog for Coda to play with. He would take me into pet stores and show me pictures of cute dogs and tell me how badly the dogs wanted us to be their parents. Oh the sob stories!

Bob found a picture of a handsome golden retriever online. He was up for adoption at Freedom Service Dogs. He was supposed to be trained to help war veterans, but was too obsessed with tennis balls to focus on his job and was put up for adoption. I said the picture was cute when Bob showed it to me online, and the next thing I knew we had an appointment to meet the pup! I have no idea how that happened.

We took Coda with us and they met at the rescue center play yard and got along well. An hour later, we had our newest son in the car with us and we were going home. Wait a minute…24 hours ago I had no thoughts of getting a dog and suddenly I had a new one in my car?! I must have been drugged.

He is about 10 months old now and fairly mild-mannered for a dog his age. He does enjoy Bob’s shoes, but he doesn’t chew the outside. He likes to rip out the insoles and chomp on that part and leaves the rest of the shoe fully in tact. More incentive to put shoes away so we don’t have a pile at the front door. Looks like the dog is training my husband to put his own stuff away. Hey, I kinda like this new dog!

Wellesley and Coda enjoy chasing each other aroud the yard and trying to figure out what the heck happens to a snowball when I throw it and they catch it. Paco was timid at first, but has no problem swatting at Wellesley now. Wellesley’s tail is much longer than Coda’s and more fun for Paco to play with.

Meet Wellesley from Bob Spryn on Vimeo.

We frequently call Wellesley “Grunter” because he makes a Tim Allen grunting sound to let us know he enjoys being pet all the time. He is also the gassiest dog I have ever met! He burps in our faces daily (mostly because he eats his meals in 2 seconds flat) and has audible farts all the time. At least when we blame the dog we know it really was the dog that did it! Even Wellesley knows how bad the smell is and leaves the room.

We sure knowhow to pick pets with funny, distinct personalities. I can only imagine the shennanigans the three of them can plan…