Sittin' Pretty

Matthew is doing a wonderful job of sitting unassisted! He has been practicing for the past few weeks and now he can sit by himself for five minutes! He is able to rock his weight back and forth, lean forward to pick up a toy and then sit tall again. When we read to him, he sits there reaching out for the book with both arms up in the air. It is just another step towards moving!

He had pears for the first time tonight and LOVED them too! He gobbled them up pretty quickly. We tried giving him a sippy cup and he would rather play with it and such on the spout then actually take water from it. Oh well, we will try again soon.

Matthew will have a sister soon! Our new dog will be arriving just in time for Christmas! We are adopting a canine companion dog (golden retriever...only about 40 pounds though!) that did not make it at puppy college. She passed her initial tests, but proved to be too much puppy for a service dog. She got fixed this weekend, so she will be all healed by the time she arrives here. She knows about 25-30 commands, including going to the bathroom on cue! We were supposed to make the ten hour round trip journey this weekend, but another puppy raiser from the area is traveling down there on the 19th to turn in her dog and get her next puppy. They will return on the 20th with our lady! We were relieved when we found out we didn't have to make the ten hour trek to Delaware, Ohio. Her name is Ojala. All the dogs in the program are named based on their litter. Ojala was in the "O" litter last year. All of her brothers and sisters have "O" names as well. We have decided to keep the name Ojala instead of changing it. We will post photos as soon as we get her! What a wonderful Christmas present for all of us!

P.S. Norm and Ojala get along wonderfully! She came over to play in October before she went to puppy college. She will definitely keep him on his toes!