Bravest of Puppies

In addition to home decor and related things, I am also obsessed with my dogs. Thus, I feel I should warn you that I'm writing today about an outing completely revolving around them and their silliness. If you think dogs are dirty, useless animals or just boring to read about, this would be the time to stop.

Or now.

Now, perhaps.

No? Still with me?

So be it. On to puppies!

This past weekend, Joe and I went to a river with our puppies...and also four other dogs. There were humans too, our friends Doug and Cait and their sister Stacie. All of these dogs, mind you, were under a year old, so obviously it was impossible to take a picture of them all. (Well, I think Caitlyn managed it, but that's because she has superpowers that I lack.) So we'll just do a roll call instead.

Sadie! Golden-doodle. Fluffy white and oh-so sparkly clean...for now.

Red! Full-on poodle. Looks like a stuffed animal. Less old than Sadie.

Tess! Aussie-collie mix of the most beautiful sort. Smart and bursting with energies.

Ace! Collie extraordinaire. Super cute and well-behaved. Least worrisome of the bunch, and also youngest (I think? Maybe Red is. Hm.)

Magnus! Newfoundland-Great Pyrenees mix. Giant beast with no manners. Handsome and aloof.

aaaand Sawyer! Strangely-shaped mutt. Best guess: collie-newfoundland. Funny and needy.

I really wish I'd gotten a before picture of these guys. Especially Sadie, she was looking pret-ty scraggly by the time we left.

We began the escapade by loading all puppies into the back of Doug's truck with the most worrisome ones tightly leashed. It was kind of a circus. So many puppies! We had a bit of a hard time finding a place to go where they wouldn't immediately attack nearby folk, but we eventually found a pretty nice spot of river and let them free. I'm sure we were all envisioning these 6 dogs leaping with joy into the cool river waters, splashing and swimming with abandon. That didn't happen.

Joe trying to guide his beast into the water.

Tess eyeing the water suspiciously. 

All dogs nervously pacing the bank and tentatively pawing
only the most shallow areas.

None of them would go in. Despite throwing them in (just the ones we knew would recover from it, don't worry), pushing them, enticing them with sticks, tennis ball, and giant branches (a Magnus favorite), they all just watched with hopeless longing as these tempting items floated out of reach in the water, which they must have assumed was actually lava.

Finally the pristinely white golden-doodle Sadie decided to forgo all that silliness and jumped in to get a stick. Hooray! One dog that isn't a scaredy-cat. (Don't you think that's probably the worst insult in dog world? I bet they'd all be giving me some major stink-eyes right now.)

Yay Sadie! Bravest of dogs!

 And for a while that was almost enough to get the rest of them in. They were certainly a little more incessant with their pawing and whining as they hovered at the river edge. But nay, none followed. They just started chasing each other around in the weeds, probably trying to hide their shame by pretending they didn't even know there was a river at all.

Some of the company. Dogs pretending they know of no
river. Caitlyn probably recording Sadie doing
what dogs do best  worst. 

I actually don't remember this happening, but there is
a picture so I guess it did. Go Sawyer! I also love Tess's head
poking in there as if to say "Well? Scale of 1 - 10, how
searing is the lava?"

Magnus finally decided he couldn't be outdone by this curly-furred
girl, so he waded in even futher than all the other scared puppies
to take away the stick she earned with her bravery.

 At one point, a super-loved stick was thrown all the way onto the opposite shore. Sadie, undeterred, went over to fetch it and got stuck after climbing up the bank and deciding that it was way too steep to climb back down. She's no fool, guys. So Magnus, hearing her wimperings for help, finally made the plunge. What would we do without damsels in distress!

The second bravest of puppies. And Joe.
Can you spot Sadie? Bonus points if you can!

Of course, once he got to the other side he helpfully started eating cow poop. I don't know what we expected. Joe made the sacrifice of swimming across to rescue Sadie after Magnus proved to not be very good at it. And Magnus just clambered down himself like it weren't no thing.

Some final attempts at puppy coercion.

After waiting an hour or two we came to the conclusion that the rest were just content to not be brave, so after they'd had a goodly amount of fun-time-scampering we loaded em up and headed home. We might have been dirtier than the dogs.

I don't know how I managed to take a half-clear, half-blurry
photo like this, but I love how it makes Tess look extremely creepy.

And Magnus took up half the truck bed himself. Creepy Sawyer.
And look, Red! I got so few pictures of him for some reason.

 Overall, not what we expected. But the dogs were exhausted when we came home and I'm pretty sure they still had an adventurous time. It was fun to watch them be all nervous around the scary water and run around outside. Ah, man, they're so cute and silly. I do love puppy play dates.