Tobias, our new Guide Dog Puppy

This past Saturday Jamie and I received Tobias from the GDB puppy truck. This is now our fourth junior guide dog that Jamie and I have had. But, this is the first puppy at 8 weeks old. He's a jewel of a puppy and mostly just plays tug and pees. We are having a blast with him and other than waking us up every two hours to pee (hopefully when bambino sleeps outside the womb they will coordinate together) everything is just dandy with him. Bette is slowly warming up to the young buck. Here are some photos of him.

Baby Registry

If you have an inkling to help us out with what we need for Bambino, here is where we are registered:

(click on the word "Registry" on top of page in the middle)

Thanks!

Jamie the Dog Whisperer

Being Blessed is the Best

Some wonderful friends of ours sent us a box of slightly used baby clothes! All of the articles and items were amazing and filled our new dresser (also slightly used from craigslist.com)! The Lord is blessing us in ways we never thought possible and we are gratefully thankful. Here is Jamie sorting through the loot and putting clothes away in the changing table/dresser.

Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park

This past spring, Jamie and I went on a trip up north to go see Curt the guide dog puppy graduate from GDB. He is in GDB's breeder program and will be having lots of romantic fun for the rest of his procreating life. We drove north on the historic route 1 and after camping in Big Sur, we headed a little past Santa Cruz and camped at Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park (http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=546). It was not even half occupied and was absolutely spectacular, we highly recommend it. Here is a pic of Jamie amongst the redwoods and the other pic is Jamie plus Curt (who is wearing his breeder scarf) in the GDB kennel.

Bambino's first picture on the internet

Meet Bambino Becker, the baby inside Jamie. He is kicking and punching Jamie's uterus like you wouldn't believe. Even at an early age in his first trimester Bambino was waving and kicking his wee little limbs. Jamie and I still have not settled on his name, so he will be addressed in the blog as Bambino. In this particular ultrasound picture he is 21 weeks old.

2 More months until baby becker breathes air!

Sorry for not posting faithful followers. I do not really have a legitimate excuse other than busy. Baby is healthy and Jamie is not having any episodes of sickness. We just got a loot of clothes and supplies from a generous friend. I will post a pic later of Jamie opening the box.
For the pictures today we have Curt smelling the baby inside Jamie and us in Big Sur making breakfast. Enjoy and stay tuned

Wonderful and Blessed

This past week has been a blessing. The doctor confirmed that Jamie is super healthy and when we heard the resounding pounding of baby Becker's heartbeat it gave tickles to our ossicles. Such a strong rhythm it is. Bambino has now been growing in Jamie for 24 weeks, and Jamie is looking awesome.
This past weekend Jamie and I drove to San Rafael, CA to see our third guide dog puppy graduate from the program. Curt is a breeder dog and he will be making future generations of guide dogs. We met the family that he lives with and they are immensely lucky and blessed to have him in their home. Visit this page later for some pictures.

Mojave the Lost Puppy

This past Thursday, one of Jamie's pilates client brought a puppy, which she found lost and running around in streets, into Jamie's class. After learning the client couldn't keep the dog at her house until she found the owner, Jamie brought him to our home. So, on Thursday Jamie bathed him, prepared him some rice and cottage cheese to calm his stomach, and brushed off the dead fleas on him. We later found out that this is the second time in a week that this same puppy had been found running around on a busy street. Mojave is the name that we gave him because he had no I.D. or any tags of any kind, not even a microchip implanted. We finally handed him over the SB county animal services and put in an application to keep him if his owner doesn't fetch him. Here is a picture of the little 4 month old German Shepherd in our car.

Susie Getting Air Time

Exodus 14:14

"The Lord will fight for you while you keep silent"- Exodus 14:14. Jamie shared this verse to me yesterday while I, Ryan, was worrying about our financial situation.

Curt with His Mighty Jowls

Susie the Guide Dog

This post is about Susie, the guide dog puppy that was. We received Susie March of 2007, and having been the first guide dog puppy that we raised, we were a little scared. She came home to us with a furor of energy and a keen sense of adventure. Susie did end up graduating from Guide Dogs for the Blind in October of 2008 with her blind partner Hank, a man who got news of his loss of sight when Susie was born in October of 2006. They were destined to be together, however only a year after receiving Susie, Hank felt that she was too dog distracted. Susie ended up being retired by GDB and now Hank has another seeing eye dog named Lincoln. Hank had final say in where Susie would live and ultimately Susie ended up with Hank's sister-in-law in Arkansas.
Pics: here are some pictures of Susie and Hank. The one with the dog running through a wide open field is Susie living with her new owner, Hank's sister-in-law.

Bambino it is

The little one crawling and spinning around in Jamie has a gender. It's a boy! We would have been just as excited if it were a girl. We are grateful that the boy is healthy, and according to the Dr, "bigger than normal". We have some pictures of him so once I scan those, they will be posted. There are some 3D pictures that we received, however those make the baby look a tad weird, a little like a Picasso painting.
Thoughts from us on having a boy: Jamie "what do we do with a boy?" (Go-karting by 5 years old!) / How do we discipline a boy, or a baby for that matter? / yada yada yada.

Christmas 2009

Here is the picture that we used for our Christmas card for 2009. Don't feel gloomy if you did not get a hard copy of this in the mail from us. We only got a few out and the rest we still have stamped envelopes filled with the picture so some of you may still get one. Also, introducing Bette and Curt. Bette is a "career change" (she failed the sightseeing program and we kept her as a pet) from Guide Dogs for the Blind (here on out I will refer to them as GDB) and Curt, who is now a breeder dog for GDB (he will procreate future GDB puppies to be trained for sightseeing work, aka a stud)

Work, Vocation

Ryan works for a Land Rover dealership as a technician (formerly called mechanic, however, since the increase of electronics utilized in modern day vehicles, they are now referred to as technicians) and Jamie works as a Pilates instructor. Jamie also has a part time job at Renaud's Patisserie located in Santa Barbara with two locations (visit them on the web at www.renaudsbakery.com ) Jamie is going to try to help with the food photography on their website. The french bakery has amazing food and if you ever visit Santa Barbara it is a must to dine there.

The First Blog

Well, after two walks and humping her bed for ten minutes straight, our dog Bette is sleeping on the kitchen floor. After all that humping her body is only half way on the bed. That bed has some good history behind it. The Legends of Guide Dogs for the blind have all slept there with Susie, Bette and Curt all getting their cozy sleeps in on that very bed. I will post a picture as soon as I find a worthy one. Jamie is going to bed so I have to stop typing