Bringing up baby pup sure is tough!

Well, let me first start off by saying I love my little chocolate covered Lab baby. However, she is rather a tough one to train. First of all, she play bites. Yeah, it's called play biting but it hurts like heck and makes me bleed. I have to wear band aides on my hands when I go to work so people won't thing I have leprosy or am a self mutilator. 2nd of all, I'm having a tough time house training her for potty. You really have to watch them like a hawk in order to get an idea of when they have to poop or pee or they will poop and pee all over your floor and rug. I just simply get exhausted trying to drag her out a million times a night, so I fall short of catching her signals all the time. However yesterday was the first time we went all day without the first accident. Yeah!!! You have no idea of what an accomplishment this is. I could not even start to count how many times I've cleaned poop and pee up off my floor. When she goes and does her business outside, I praise her and give her a treat. They say I got her too young and is why I'm having problems with the biting, she was 6 weeks. They say it's best to wait at least until they are 8 weeks so they can learn bite inhibition from their mother. But I didn't know. The owner said they were all "ready to go."

Anyway, I love her and I'm sure all of this will be worth it. I won't even go into all the crate training we've been doing but she's done wonderful with that. We put her in her crate at night at 9 and she sleeps all night til 5:30 a.m. and she has not wet or pooed.

Oh the things a dog owner will talk about!! haha!

Here are some new pics. If you look closely, you will see on my carpet some stains of cleaned poop and pee (does not always come up well) and some leaves that were brought in by the constant going in and out. Thankfully, we will be getting new carpet when she's trained. (we had planned this even before getting her). I've also included some pics of my hands, you ought to see under the bandages and on my arms that are covered up. They never said puppy-hood with a Lab would be this rough. But I'm betting it will be worth it. I hope so anyway.

More cute pics of my chocolate covered sweetie

How could you NOT love me?????

My new Lab Puppy!!!

Yesterday, after months of reading, researching, and yesterday and the day before buying all the supplies I would need, I picked up my new 7 week old Lab puppy! She was in a big pen with her mother and she picked me out and I couldn't resist her! But she smelled SO bad!! I put her in the pet carrier and she cried and yelped all the way home, 45 minutes, except for the time we stopped at my parents' to show her to them. My pup immediately fell in love with my mother, as all animals do. Then it was on the way back home again and she immediately started the crying again. She came from a litter of 7 pups, so this is all new to her.

I got her home and gave her a good bath and now she smells good. She's so sweet. However, when I put her in her crate last night, she cried 45 minutes before going to sleep, then slept about an hour and a half, cried again so I took her to potty, which she did. This whole thing lasted all night long.(the crying, potty, sleeping, crying, potty). We have a long way to go in our training but it will be worth it.

Her name is Savannah. She is a chocolate lab. It's hard to get a good pic of her because she rarely stays still. She looks a little sad because she misses her mama I guess.

My first ride on back of our Ultra

Today and yesterday were 2 beautiful days in the 70s and 80s here. My husband felt like he had practiced enough on his own on our Ultra Classic that he felt comfortable with me on back and we had a great time! Yesterday we rode through the countryside and wound up in Myrtle Beach. I was surprised because I thought he was just going in the country down some simple roads with little traffic, but no, he hit the big time and he did very well. We had an absolute wonderful time and it was like a dose of good medicine for both of us. We stopped at Krispy Kreme and sinned greatly and then it was on the way home. We also stopped at the Harley dealership in Myrtle beach. We had no trouble from the police with the new laws since we always wear helmets anyway and our exhaust is still stock and sound very quiet now anyway. We rode for about 5 hours.

Today, we rode down to Southport, a very nice ride which took us through miles of the Green Swamp, a refuge for wildlife and lots of trees and swamp area. Southport is a very old Port town and very historic. We ate at a nice restaurant there and we both had stuffed flounder that was delicious. The restaurant sits right in front of the ocean and we had seats right there with a great view watching the boats and seagulls. Then we rode to Wilmington to that Harley dealership and then out into the country. We rode about 6 hours.

The air was filled with the promise spring. The air was fresh, and smelled good, things were starting to bloom, and many fields had been plowed in preparation for planting time. I cannot tell you what healing this did to my soul.

And the Ultra, Oh WOW, we just LOVE it!!! It was so comfortable and my butt or legs did not hurt once during any part of the rides. And the music!!! Guess what the first song on the radio was" "You shook me all night long." And that really got us going. Then lo and behold "Born to be Wild" came on. And the music continued to be that good the whole time. I give the Ultra AAAAAAAA all the way and we should have bought one years ago.

Can't wait to be go on some really long trips!! My gosh we had a great time!!!!!!

His first ride

Today Allyn was able to ride our new Ultra for the very first time! Why has it taken so long to ride? He's been working 60 hours a week lately and has not had time to ride. He took it out today and said he loves it. Still a little on the tall side, but he's going to have someone do some work on the seat to get it a little lower. I'm waiting for when he feels comfortable on the bike before I get on the back. Hopefully not long from now......

Our new 2009 Ultra Classic!!

My husband and I are the proud new owners of this beautiful 2009 Ultra Classic!!!!! Vivid Black. Now ain’t she a beauty to behold!!!!!

Yesterday, I woke up at 12 pm after only sleeping about 3 hours since I worked the night shift the night before. It was tough getting up since I don’t regularly work night shift, much less not sleeping much after, but no way in heck was I going to miss out on going to pick up our Ultra!!

So I got ready and we took off for the 2 and a half hour drive to Rocky Mount, North Carolina to Rocky Mount Harley-Davidson. We got there about 3:30pm. We talked ALL the way down there SO excited to be picking up our dream bike. All the places we will go with it, all the extras we wanted to put on it, just dreaming away.

Once we got there, we were met by the salesman that he had been talking with over the phone the past 2 weeks. He was a very pleasant man. He introduced us to the parts manager, who my husband has also been talking with over the phone. He was great also. We were also met by the guy who gave us instructions about the bike and they all took us back there to meet our new Ultra. Also, they introduced us to the sales girl, but all she did was give us our 2 free t-shirts as we didn’t have any apparel we needed since we’ve been riding since 2001, we had everything we needed there, but she was great.

Then once the numbers were gone over we went to the parts section and had a little spending spree. The one thing that we liked about the deal was they gave us “Harley bucks” where they would match what we would spend at the dealership dollar for dollar up to one thousand bucks. So there we went, through the parts dept just like it was Christmas day and we were wild people saying “we want this, and this….!!!”” It was wonderful. (we had planned what we wanted and how much to spend beforehand though, but it was great!). We bought a rider’s backrest, headset for me, chrome plate for the instrumentation panel, chrome rings for the back speakers, chrome cover for the passenger foot rest, I think there’s more but I forgot the rest. We had also had some things added to the bike before we picked it up….we had it lowered and had chrome forks added. After at least 700 miles we will have the Rush Slip ons and Power Commander added.

I just want to say that Rocky Mount Harley-Davidson made us feel more welcome than at any place we have ever purchased anything, and we felt just like a King and Queen. These folks went above and beyond the call of duty and waited on us hand and foot making us feel very special. We will not hesitate to make the 2 and a half hour drive again for anything we need for the bike, or clothes or anything. What a truly wonderful experience!!! The folks we dealt with were Jay the salesman, Jamie the parts manager, Chris the Service manager, and Eric the business manager. Every single one a class act!!!

Once we got done, we loaded up the bike in our trailer and we left there and it was dark outside and COLD!!! Luckily right next door was this really new looking, old fashioned like drive in diner and we had a fantastic meal in celebration! I even toped it off with a big fat piece of cake!

After our meal, we started the drive home and we talked all the way home, about taking our beautiful black beauty on rides to the mountains of NC, VA, TN, GA, the Blue Ridge Parkway, to Sturgis. We dreamed all the way home. What a wonderful feeling to know we have this beautiful motorcycle and the places it will take us to. I only lost consciousness from my exhaustion for about 20 minutes on the ride home. Then when I woke up, we started talking about it all over again!!






















Story to follow soon!!