Family,Monday, December 08, 2008
My dream is to one day go mountain biking with my son. And now, we are one step closer to that dream as Matthew is now riding his first bike.
We bought this bike as an early Christmas present. It’s basically the one big item that he would get him Christmas. We didn’t get one for his birthday because he wasn’t really ready for it, and we figure now he’s ready.
Claire’s a lot of fun to push because she looks back and gives that cute smile to show that she’s really enjoying the ride. She doesn’t care for the helmet so much though. We eventually just decided to let her ride without it since the seat has straps that keep her from falling.
At first, helping Matthew ride is a little hard on our backs. You can see Jenn reaching over and holding the handlebars. Matthew was having a mild panic if we let go. I think he was mainly panicked because he realized that he didn’t know how to use the breaks. So we focused on helping him learn to use the breaks. Which basically amounted to me pushing him to experience going fast. I would then encourage and later yell at him to stop, peddle backwards. Then I would reach down and manually push his foot backwards so that he associated and experienced stopping with the backwards peddle motion. He somewhat understood during our training sessions, but was still mostly panicking. Suddenly, one day without my coaching, he pushed the peddles backwards hard, stopping on a dime. And I’ve seen him use the breaks several times to avoid running into things. Now he loves using the breaks so much that we have to ask him to stop using the breaks! 
When I first bought the bike it needed some minor adjustments to the seat height and the training wheels. In the photo above, Matthew is stopping to “pretend” fix things. I think on this adventure we even brought the wrench because Matthew wanted to be prepared to fix the bike along the way. Don’t tell him, but actually, there was nothing wrong with it. Ssshhh! 
Family,Monday, December 08, 2008
We had originally planned for Matthew to be a construction worker, but when Jenn was at Old Navy looking at costumes, he saw the mouse costume and became enthusiastic about being a mouse.
It’s funny how sometimes with kids, the most fun is when you don’t try to plan things and just let the fun happen. In this, case Matthew had lots of fun being a mouse, something we didn’t have to plan for at all.
And here’s Claire as a pink poodle.
One of our neighbors was very scary with her real live snake around her neck.
Another neighbor had setup his sideyard as a haunted house experience, complete with animated skeletons and scary sounds. It was the most crowded house on the block when we first arrived, with literally around 50 people flocking around the front and girls were screaming with terror.
Click Here to see all the Halloween Photos
Family,Monday, December 08, 2008
We visited 2 pumpkin patches this year. One was actually more of a fall harvest at a small farm that something of a lone ranger. Prusch Farm is not really a farm. It functions more like a playground, petting zoo, community garden, event place. We ran into some neighbors that we had just met the week before and were later invited to their house for a birthday party. The harvest festival was fun although we did have to hide out from the rain at times.
Matthew had a chance to fulfill his tractor fantasies.
Did you know Jenn is shortly becoming a tree hugger? For now, she’s a tree shaker.
I think Matthew looked at practically every single pumpkin in this patch and eventually I had to coax him to pick one and get it over with. Yes, it was still fun and a lesson in patience.
We also got to pet some cute bunnies. The same type of bunnies from last years festival. The 4-H club brought these T-Rex bunnies that are so unbelievably soft.
There’s more photos of the petting zoo and Jenn standing in the rain. Click Here to See All the Festival Photos.
Family,Thursday, October 30, 2008
On Monday Oct 27th we took a trip to the Blossom Hill VCA to put Sayrah to sleep. Her osteosarcoma had progressed very rapidly over the previous week and it was starting to cause big blood blisters, or hemotoma’s on her skin. It was quite a unreal site, that was both sickening and very unnerving because we were not sure when we would have pools of blood and a big mess.
Numerous people said we would know when it was time for her to go. And boy was this the time. The hemotoma’s were growing, we only had 1 day left of pain medication, she ate all her dog food and she finished a $25 container of freeze dried liver treats in 3 days.
Sunday we tried to bring her to the beach in San Francisco. We stopped at In and Out burger and she had a cheeseburger. When we arrived at the beach she really wanted to get out. But when I tried to move her from the truck, the hemotoma’s immediately started dripping and causing a pool of blood under her. I tried wrapping it in gauze, but we didn’t have enough to wrap it well enough. I put a surgical dressing pad on top of it, but I was still afraid that we would need to find a local vet in San Francisco to put her to sleep if we tried to take her to the ocean side. After tending to her wounds she had layed down and was content to go nowhere. So I put her back into the truck and let her rest and stay still.
In somewhat a symbolic way, it was as if Sayrah had passed the torch on to my kids. I sat there in the back of the truck at the beach, my kids running around and playing on the beach like Sayrah used to do. And now Sayrah at the beach side, dying, ready to move on, content to let the kids take her place.
Back on the beach, Claire seemed to have the same personality as Sayrah. Claire would get wet by the waves but keep on going back. Sayrah used to do the same thing. And coincidentally we sometimes call Claire, “Sayrah”, by accident. I joke that we’re changing her name to Sayrah from now on.
That night back at home I put her in the backyard for fear that we might wake up to a pool of blood on our carpet. At around 2 am I woke up and checked on her, she was asleep. At around 4 am I woke up again and checked on her and her head was up and she was awake. So I put on some warm cloths and went out and layed with her. I went back and forth from spending time with her, crying and doing other things around the house.
Morning time came, I made latte’s, breakfast, took showers, got dressed, etc. Sayrah’s scheduled time was 11am. So there was plenty of time for everyone to say their goodbyes. Jenn and I were going to the vet while my mother and father watched Claire and Matthew.
The drive to the vet was very difficult. I was crying, and Sayrah was making whimpering sounds in the back. I reassured Sayrah that it’s okay, everything will be already and it will all be over soon. She quieted down after that.
Once we arrived at the vet, Jenn said a prayer of thanx to God for Sayrah while I cried. I went in to let the staff know I was there with Sayrah. They said they would come out and get me. I opened up the back of the Tahoe were Sayrah was laying. Jenn and I sat in the back of the truck with her and told her how good of a dog she’s been and how we love her and will miss her. We talked to her about all the things we appreciated about her. In all her years with us. She never bit anyone. She was always so tolerant of Matthew and Claire’s irritating things they would do. There’s so many good things to say about her.
She was sniffing around at the tidbits of treats that were around her, so I put the rest of the freeze dried liver treats and more of the beef treats and she ate them up.
A lady came out to get us, I carried her through a side door so I didn’t have to go through the lobby. At this point my heart was racing. I was trying not to cry because not only was I walking out in the open, but I had to carry Sayrah and didn’t want to drop her. But I couldn’t hold anything back at this point. I was a sobbing while carrying my dog. I felt like I was in one of those war movies carrying a wounded friend who was shot on the battlefield and wasn’t going to make it.
We walked into a small room and placed her up on the metal table that had a towel covering it. Sayrah didn’t struggle, but quietly layed there. The vet came in and took one look at her wound and knew in a moment that she was ready to go. She explained that the vet techs would come in and prepare her arm to receive the injection. We would step out while they do this and they would call us back in. Then we could spend more time with her. When we were ready for the injection, I would poke my head out into the hallway and let the staff know that we were ready.
The vet techs placed an IV in her leg with a receptical for a syringe. Some dogs would give a struggle and it would become a little unnerving, which is why the wanted us to step out during that time. But we were later told that she was a very sweet and peaceful dog during this and gave no struggle or whimpers to the vet techs. She was ready to go.
Before the injection, we spent maybe 10 minutes with her, saying our goodbyes, crying, telling her we love her, petting her, and kissing her. Then we called the vet in for the injection. She explained that it was basically a narcotic overdose that would first give a cold sensation up her arm and would soon after stop her heart.
I told the vet to wait, while I knelt down next to the table so that my face was level with Sayrah’s. I held her face up to mine, cradled it in my hands and looked into her eyes. I told the vet I was ready. She began the injection and I told Sayrah again and again that I love her, she’s been such a good girl, “that’s my girl”. She pulled her head up out of my hands for a moment as she felt the narcotic solution’s coldness come through her leg. I directed her head back into my hands and continued telling her “I love you Sayrah”. In a moment, I felt the weight of her head slowly rest completely in my hands. I let her head down and kissed her face. Jenn burst out into tears and crying, as did I.
The vet said “that was the most peaceful euthanasia we’ve seen in a long time”. She said, “she was ready to go”. She gave us hugs and comforted us and told us we can spend as much time as we wanted with her. And if I wanted to have some hair shaved off Sayrah, I could pick a spot, and let her know when we were ready.
We spent another 5-10 minutes with Sayrah, telling her our goodbyes, kissing her, smelling her. Each time was to be the last, but I didn’t want it to end. Even though she was dead, I didn’t want to leave her. Her eyes were still open and it seemed perhaps she can still see and hear me. I continued to look into her eyes and tell her, “I love you, Sayrah” and everything else.
Looking into her face I always appreciated how beautiful a dog she is. It was as if God had dressed her face up with makeup. She had beautiful eyes, eyelashes, coloring on her face. I would often tell her, “that’s my beautiful girl”.
I wanted to remember her smell forever, so I breathed in deep to smell her. My favorite spot being the same spot I love to kiss. It’s between her eyes and her nose, right on the side of her face. It’s like three’s a little nook there to hide away a kiss. Jenn also kissed and smelled the spot.
I called the vet back and she shaved the spot under her neck were she has a beautiful strip of white fur that meets with the tan fur. She shaved along the border where we got a mix of white and tan fur and put it in a small ziplock bag.
We spent another 5-10 minutes after with Sayrah, repeatedly spending our last moments with her, and not wanting any moment to be the last. At a break in our emotions, we left, paid the clerk in the front office and got back in the truck. Jenn was driving, so she climbed into the driver’s seat, and I into the passenger’s seat. As we prepared to leave, we each had one last welling up as we realized we were leaving her at the vet and wouldn’t see her again. Jenn was crying more than me at this point. I asked Jenn if she wanted me to drive. She gave a sobbing laugh, saying no. We headed back home where I spent more time crying and sobbing on my bed.
The day before, I had already decided to make use of my day off and take the kids to the pumpkin patch since Halloween would be on Friday. There would be very little time during the rest of the week to take them and it would be a good break from the sadness. When grandma and grandpa brought the kids back to us it’s always amazing how they just cheer me right up. They truly are a blessing.
Matthew doesn’t like me to be sad. He’s says, “Daddy are you sad?”.
I’ll say, “Yes, I miss Sayrah.”
He’ll say, “It’s okay Daddy. It’s okay.”
We’ll ask him. “Where’s Sayrah?”
He’ll say, “She’s in heaven, with Jesus.”
We’ll say, “That’s right Matthew. You’re right, it’s okay.”
