We've got Stuff!

Sorry we haven't updated you in a few days. Our stuff arrived on Friday and we have been really busy making sure Mom and Dad put everything in a good spot. We also had to run around in packing paper for a while too.

Here's what our house looked like Friday night. Total disaster!!It was so bad, I had to go hide under the table.Then the greatest thing happened yesterday. We got tons of snow! So while Mom and Dad were working, Steve and I enjoyed some time on the patio. Dad made me a snowball and I brought it inside. Mom didn't appreciate that very much.
Now things are pretty much unpacked so we have been able to relax more. It seems more like home now that all our fur-covered stuff is here.

Kat

We Made It!

Finally, the part of our story where we actually made it to our new home. Here's a picture of us in front of the townhome with Mom.This video shows us exploring the house the first time.

We don't have a backyard anymore, but we do have a balcony. Steve likes to watch everyone walk along the sidewalk from his balcony perch.You wouldn't believe how many dogs live here! It drives us crazy because we see dogs walk past the front of our house all the time and then we want to go outside like every ten minutes. Since we now have to go out on a leash, Mom and Dad don't like it very much. We still don't have any furniture, so Dad says once we do have some, we won't be able to see out the front window as well. We will see if he's right. Our furniture arrives tomorrow.Since we don't have any furniture, we only have one dog bed because that's all Mom and Dad could fit in the car. So in this picture, Steve is showing how we improvise.
I have been having fun playing with my yellow ball. It's great because there isn't any furniture to get in the way!

Finally, Wilbur doesn't have furniture to jump onto to get away from us. So he's found a new perch.That's all for now!
Kat

If this car ride takes any longer, I might go puppy crazy!

By the end of the car ride to Washington, Kat and I were about to go crazy. It wasn't just that we were riding in the car, but we had to wear our safety harnesses. They were not very fun. We couldn't try to get in the front seat with Mom or do anything good.

You can tell from these pictures that we were not happy.We stopped in Boise at a dog park, but Mom forgot her camera to take pictures. It was kind of muddy, so we wrestled in the mud and then had dried mud on our fur for the rest of the trip. We looked like such tough, outdoorsy dogs!

We finally arrived in Washington after those torturous days on the road and tomorrow we get to the part of the story where we post about our new home!!

Steve

Wyoming is Boring

I spent a lot of the trip riding in the back of the 4Runner, supervising the furry beasts. Luckily the furry monsters had to wear their seat belt harness things and I was free to roam about.I spent some time in the front seat, allowing Mom to pet me when I commanded her to do so. She made me wear a stupid harness so she could attach a leash to me when necessary and I wouldn't escape from the car. So to punish her for those actions, I made her pet me a lot. I also discovered that it's nice to sleep in the floor by her feet because warm air blows about down there.

Anyway, we were driving across Wyoming when I decided that it was taking far too long. There wasn't anything good to stare at and I was getting bored supervising the furry beasts and demanding to be pet. So I took matters into my own paws. I started driving the car. I think we were done with Wyoming within about 30 minutes after I started driving. So that was a success. After I drove, I went back to the floor and took a nap across Utah.Some times a cat has to take charge!
Wilbur

Greetings From Washington!

Hey pups! Kat here. We made it to our new home and now we have internet. We have so much to write about, so I'm going to break it up into bits about our trip and arrival. I'll tell a little bit every day, and maybe I'll let Steve and Wilbur write some too.

On Wednesday, Steve and I went to day camp for the day. Mom and Dad picked us up and we hit the road. We had reservations in Salina, Kansas, that night, but since it took Dad a lot longer to pack the car, we didn't get there until 2 AM!!!

In the morning when we left, Dad was packing the car and left our food bowls on the top of the car. So we lost those somewhere in Kansas. We didn't discover that they were lost until later in the day when Mom and Dad were going to give us some water.

To make the trip easier on Steve and me, we stopped at some dog parks along the way. We stopped in Denver on Thanksgiving. Guess what? There was snow on the ground!! It was so cool. Here's a video of us running around in the snow.

Then I discovered that I could roll around in the snow! That was super good. Here's a video of me rolling around. Steve didn't want to make snow doggie angels like I did.

So that's my first update on our big trip. Today is also our dad's birthday, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!

Kat

Departure Music

In honor of our departure, I wrote this song.

Kat
Come listen to a story ‘bout Valerie and Dave
Two poor engineers, barely kept their A/C paid,
Then one day they were dreamin’ of the North,
And up came a job and called them both forth.

Seattle that is.
Cloudy days, drizzle.

Well the first thing you know they were packing up their stuff,
Steve and Kat said, “Let’s move away from here!”
Said “Snowy mountains is the place we ought to be”
So they loaded up the truck and moved to Mill Creek.

Washington, that is.
Jumbo jets, mountains.

The Puget Sound Texans!

Our House: Tuesday Edition

Here's a picture of our house today. No, I am NOT looking at Steve's butt.

We are leaving tomorrow to drive to Seattle. We get to go to day camp in the morning and then Mom and Dad will pick us up and we will hit the road. Mom is bringing her laptop, so if we have internet at the hotels, we might post some pictures of our trip. Otherwise, we'll post on Monday when we get internet set up at our new residence.

Wish us luck that we see some snow on the trip!!
Kat

Move Details

Now that the big announcement has been made, we have received some questions from our friends, so we're going to fill everypup in on the details.

As most of our friends know, we were going to move to Maryland in the fall of 2008. That move was for a temporary assignment with Mom and Dad's work. They have been talking for months about where they want to move after the Maryland assignment was completed since Dad was positive he didn't want to move back to Texas. He has basically spent his entire life in Texas and wants to move somewhere with mountains, water, and lots of trees and grass. At first he mentioned Denver, but Mom thought it would be too cold for her. (Not for us though!) So they had agreed on Seattle.

Then in early October, Mom got a phone call for an interview with a company in the Seattle area. (Remember when we got the cookies with our names on them? Mom bought them for us in Seattle! We both hope now that we will live there, we will get cookies like those every day.) Apparently the people interviewing Mom liked her and the company gave her a job offer. So long story short, she is going to take it and we are moving over Thanksgiving. Mom and Dad decided just to take the plunge and move up there now instead of in a year or two after the temporary assignment. At first it will just be Mom and "the zoo" (that's what she calls all the pets) living up there. Dad is going to stay back in Texas and work on selling the house for a while, but we are hoping that he comes up there shortly after Christmas. He will definitely be visiting us a lot, because who wouldn't miss our cute faces?

This move is going to mean big changes for Mom and Dad, but also for us! We are going to be living in a townhome. Wilbur is pretty excited because he loves stairs to run up and down. However, Mom is worried about us because we won't have a backyard. It's just a temporary solution so we'll see how it goes. There is a trail right behind the townhome community so we can go on walks there and the townhome is within walking distance of a store that sells Canidae! I don't know who is planning to walk home with a 40 pound bag of dog food on their shoulder! Mom said the store also sells tons of "good for you" treats, so we would be happy to go shopping there and consume our purchases on the premises. We are also excited about the dog parks. We've been reading Royal's blog for a long time and have been really jealous of his cool dog park and now we can go there! Mom has already emailed Royal's mom and we might have a play date sometime. Royal's mom gave us the lowdown on all the area dog parks.

Mom and Dad were surprised at how difficult it was to find somewhere to rent with us. Not just pets in general, but Siberian Huskies. At some complexes, huskies were on the banned breed list. They were so surprised to discover that. They found us a nice place to live, but it costs a bit more than some of the other places that they were considering. It must be a husky's destructive nature that has gotten them banned some places since we aren't typically aggressive dogs.

The best part of this move is that we will finally see some snow. It might not snow much at all where we live, but Mom and Dad promised to take us to see snow in the mountains for a Christmas present. It's going to be so great. We're also going to start working on our Working Pack Dog titles next summer. There will be lots of trails to explore.

Finally we want to share a poem written for us by Star and Jack-a-roo. It's a great poem and in case some of you didn't see it in the comment of our last post, we wanted to publish it here.

Steve and Kat and Wilbur too
Will soon be going on a move.
Pack your bowls and pack your toys,
Pack all the things that bring you joy.
And on your way up to Seattle
Watch out for strays and big-horned cattle.

Thanks so much for the poem, Star and Jack! Everyone else, stay tuned for more moving news. :-)
Steve and Kat

PS (from Kat). Turbo, I will do my best to get the Cowboys beating the Jayhawks. However, did you see what happened when they played the Longhorns last weekend? Aren't Cowboys supposed to be in charge of Longhorns? Oh, and yes, we do know that the mascot for the University of Washington is a husky. Mom said we should get jobs being the mascot at football games so we could earn our treats!

Hungry, hungry Steve

Don't let my cute, happy face in this picture fool you. I was having a very bad night last night. I did not get my supper until after 9:00 PM!! I usually get supper at 6:00 PM, so for the math-challenged puppies out there, that means I had to sit in total hunger and starvation for THREE HOURS!!

Mom and Dad came home from work briefly yesterday to let us all out for a bathroom break, then they left again. We barely got any time to play, so we were all very annoyed when we had to go back in our kennels. Mom and Dad apparently had to go to a meeting about Maryland. We will probably be moving there in about a year or maybe a little more, and Mom and Dad's work had a bunch of speakers to talk about everything associated with the moving and the area and such. Guess what? They got food at their meeting. So they were sitting there, eating, and having fun and I was stuck in my crate, starving. I think I should have been invited to the meeting. I'm going to have to move too, after all. I wanted to ask questions about dog parks, if they have PetsMarts there, and if there is snow. I also wanted to make sure there are no doggie obiedience schools in Maryland. But did I get to go to the meeting to ask my intelligent dog-related questions? NO! Dad says that no kids got to go to the meeting, furry or otherwise, so I wasn't being discriminated against.

Well, I just wanted to rant about my starvation. I hope all of you puppies got fed on time last night!
Steve

PS. Mom and Dad say that it's totally unfair because their company will pay the expenses related to moving human children, but not expenses if the children are furry and of the canine or feline persuasion. Turbo, I was wondering if you could take care of this injustice when you become president. Maybe you can get equal rights for all children - human, furry or otherwise. Actually, fur-children should be ranked higher, I think.