I totally forgot!

Pie & I were working on some winter prep outside, you know the drill... closing stuff up, plugging stuff in, covering equipment that will sit 'til spring, etc, etc.
Then I realized I hadn't shared my awesome birthday present!  (from waaaay back in June!)
Pie may not be a horseman but he sure knows how to do presents for a horse crazy gal  :D

I need a money tree

 It's that time of year... temps are getting cold so things are getting plugged in and the electric dials spin faster and faster.
I had to break down and turn the furnace up (electric heat is NOT cheap y'all!)  Monday we'll probably be kicking in the pellet stove.  I wanted to wait until there was a good week or so when either Pie or I would be home so it wouldn't be unattended for any length of time when we first get it going.
Heaters are on in all the automatic waterers.
Soon the heat lamp will be on full time in the coop.  Hopefully we'll only need one this year.  There are a few more birds plus we've insulated some of the walls.
Still to come are plugging in the tractor and vehicles.  Oh, and I've got to get some straw in for the winter.

On top of all that, Pie took Betty (the Ford F250) in for a wheel alignment and some new tires. 
We got a call that it would be $4500... apparently she needs a ton of work.  Struts, brakes, ball joints, etc etc.
Umm. NO.  I'm not spending that much fixing it up, not when she's only worth about 8k.
Thankfully Pie's buddy Jerry was able to do a bunch of the work, for about $1000 parts & labour.  She still needs the ball joints, wheel alignment and new tires but that other work saved us a l.o.t.of money!
Still that's more money that we didn't really need/want to dish out right now... I guess it will be awhile longer before I replace my broken iPod.

He was a good dog...

even if he did spend the first 8 weeks of his life behind bars.  Along with the rest of his brothers and sisters.
Pie & I had just bought our first home together, we knew we wanted a dog so we went to the local animal shelter and that's where we first saw the cutest little lab cross puppy.  The whole litter had been dropped off right before Christmas so they were named after Santa's reindeer.  Comet had our hearts right from that first day.
That was way back in 2001... and now it has finally come to that inevitable end, we had to say goodbye to our first "child".

(it's taken me almost a week to be able to write this post, I'm only this far and I have tears rolling down my cheeks)

Not only was Comet our first pet together as a couple, he was also Pie's first ever pet. 
He was a great dog, I have tons of wonderful memories of him.
Like when he & I broke the basement window, pretty much in the first week we'd lived in the house ... and Pie walking out the door at just the right moment to witness it.
How he liked to help garden, by digging up freshly planted flowers and following me around the yard with them.
The time he tore the front license plate holder (and license plate) off my car and brought it to the door.
How he loved to help, he'd carry or fetch anything he could.  He knew "remote" and "phone" and would get either one if you asked him to.  He was so obsessed (yeah, that was the Lab in him) that he would follow me around the house when I was cleaning, just waiting for me to drop something so he could pick it up.
He knew how to recycle, when he knew a bottle or can was empty he'd take it to the blue recycling bin.
He wasn't bad too often, but when he was the harshest punishment for him was to put him in time out.  Sit him somewhere out of sight and tell him to stay... that was almost a death sentence to him.
Comet never met a toy he didn't like.  Balls, squeakies, stuffies.   He would play fetch as long as you'd throw.
You could leave food anywhere near him and he wouldn't touch it unless you told him it was okay.  Heck he wouldn't touch the food in his bowl unless you gave him permission. 
His absolutely favourite treat was McDonalds fries.
Even as he got older he still tried to help whenever he could.  He'd carry pails & baskets, the feed scoops, pretty much anything he could.  But old age was slowing him down.
He was having trouble climbing the stairs. He was becoming incontinent.  His hind end was pretty much shot, he had to use his shoulders & front end to drag himself to standing and he was losing weight.  He was easily knocked down by the Bostons and I was worrying about him breaking something if he fell and landed badly.
(one time he fell and landed so awkwardly I thought he may have broken his pelvis, thankfully he didn't)
So we prepared to say goodbye to our boy.  On a particularly bad day last week I told him he only had to hold on for a few more days, I could swear I heard/felt him say Thank You.
Monday our vet (who is amazingly wonderful) came out to our place so we didn't have to try to get Comet in the truck (he could no longer get in the truck).
On that day Comet got his very own order of McDonalds fries all to himself.  Doc gave him a shot to make him drowsy and then walked away to let us say goodbye.  Comet laid down in the grass with his head in my lap while Pie & I talked to him and told him how loved he was and how grateful we were to have had him in our lives and Comet dozed off in the sunshine. 
Doc came back and gave him the lethal dose, he was gone before it was done. 
Thankfully it was perfect, for what it was.  There were no seizures or spasms, he didn't even let go of his bowels or bladder.  After dealing with how badly Cessa's end was I was extremely grateful that Comet's passing was textbook perfect.
We buried him out back in a spot of honour.  I hope he's over that rainbow bridge, running & playing free from pain.