Losing Ally: Part One

Before I address the title of this blog I should tell you that we made it home safely on Saturday night. The roads on the way home from the airport were slippery and often covered in small drifts due to the blowing snow, but we got home in one piece...or three rather. The trip home was long but Luke was much more content since we had crackers for him to suck on (and the flight was an hour shorter). He got SO many compliments! "What a little trooper you have!" "You have a delightful child to be on the plane with." "That boy was the best child on the plane." "He is such a handsome boy." So thanks for your prayers, and you'll be hearing more about our trip in the days and weeks to come...there's so much to report! Today however, I need to write about my dog and her "trip". And Luke is getting antsy, so this is from him:
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Several months ago my Mom called and told me that if Derek and I wanted to bring Ally down to California for Christmas, she would love to have her. And by have her she meant keep her. I had shared with Mom some of my troubles with Ally since Luke was born. At first she would go outside and race back in with muddy feet before I could stop her and clean her paws. Sometimes while I fed Luke she would try to wiggle onto my lap between us. I would get frustrated and say "Get lost."

Then she started making messes in the baby's room. And when we closed that off to her she started making messes in the living room. When winter came she decided she did not want to go outside at all because it was too cold. Several times I forced her outside and stood by saying "Go potty" and she would shiver and look at me with sad pitiful eyes and stubbornly refuse to "Go" until her feet were so frozen she could hardly stand. When Derek heard the news that she had pooped in the house, or worse, found the poop himself he would say, "Want to go to California little dog?" or, "Sometimes I wouldn't be sad to see you go!" Still I couldn't bear to part with her. She's my dog, and when Luke started showing interest and delight in her the thought of giving her to Mom was even harder to consider.

Then I noticed Ally was losing weight. I fed her more food, but it seemed to drop into a bottomless pit and just give her more ammunition for messing on the floor. I felt sorry for her in the cold and began to imagine a happier, warmer dog laying in the sun in my Mom's house in California. The thought that she might be healthier with my Mom finally made me seriously consider taking her there. Three days before we were supposed to leave for California I took Ally outside and stood with her until she was frozen and finally let her inside without going potty. I felt sorry for her, so instead of putting her in her crate like I had been doing the last two days I let her lay in her dog bed under a blanket and I went to do dishes while Luke lay on the living room floor. When I looked over Ally was in her dog bed, but there was poop on the rug not far from Luke. I was so disgusted with the stubborn, sneaky mutt that as soon as I cleaned up the poop I got online and bought her a ticket to join us on our flight...one way.