Our first adoption

I've been thinking that this is actually not the first time we adopted.  Our first adoption occurred in November 2008.  We adopted the cutest little one year old red haired...dog.

We were on our way home from visiting Noel's parents over the Thanksgiving weekend.  We pulled onto our street when we see this tiny little dog running after our car.  We got out and he, although slightly timidly, came right up to us.  It was cold outside and he was just so cute.  I couldn't recall that any of our neighbors had a dog like this, but I took him from door to door asking anyways.  Our neighbor across the street said that he showed up over the weekend and she felt bad for him so she had been feeding him.  We decided to make fliers and put them up around the neighborhood.  In the meantime, we went to HEB to get dog food and we kept him in the back yard-- well we tried to keep him in the back yard.

This leads me to the conclusion of how he got lost in the first place.  Every day we would leave for work and he would escape out of the back yard and chase our cars down the street.  We would have to try and hurry out the door every morning before he noticed.  This dog has an adventurous spirit.  To make a long story short, we never found his owners and decided to keep him.  We named this little doggie Charlie.  He has been my shadow and buddy every since.

Having Charlie has really tested our "parenting" skills.  That little 10 lb dog is so stubborn!!  Noel and I have had many "conversations" on how to deal with him.  If it were up to Noel, Charlie would have fond a new home a long time ago.  But I fell in love with that little pup, so he is here to stay.  Fortunately over the past several months, we have been working really hard training him.  After attending the Burns Family doggie boot camp, I am happy to say that Charlie is much better behaved- although is still quite stubborn at times.

I relate this a lot to parenting because it is a work in progress and a learning process for us all.  My mom did always say that she thought our first child would take after Noel and be a red head-  who knew he'd also have four legs and a tail??

Say cheese!

Yo quiero Taco Bell

Charlie watching Noel mow the backyard