My Favorite Place

Every day my mom takes me to the park for a walk. It's right down the street from my house. I love the car ride there. I stick my head out the window... it's great to be a dog. Even though I am just tall enough so that my head barely fits out the window. 

But this is an improvement from how I used to insist to ride in the car...

... which was in the lap... of the driver. 

 This is the trail we walk on. It's a mile long and just enough for me to get my energy worn down for the afternoon!

The trail makes me a very happy puppy! Except for when I see my enemy... the very dangerous and aggressive POST! I make sure to growl and bark at it every time I remember it's there.

Some days my mom will take me to this big field next to the trail... I love this because I get to get off of my leash and run in huge circles. 

Some days I get to go to the park twice. Dad will sometimes go with mom and me when he gets home from work! 

Dad runs with me. It's much more fun to play with dad because running with him is more of a challenge (I can run much faster than mommy) and he plays longer (mom says she needs to get in better shape).

Oh my goodness! I love the park! 

But now that it's fall I've been finding some interesting distractions. There are these things called pine cones and they're all over the place. They are like free toys! I will pounce on them and then sit down to chew on my prize. Sometimes this seems much more interesting to me than walking. 

Free toys are great... especially when you do this to all your store bought ones...

 One a side note... I think I have replaced my love of being under, with my love of being with.

It's been a while...

Here's a little catch up of what I've been up to the past few weeks.

My mom and I went to visit my grandma a few weeks ago to help her out with her eye surgery. I was a very big helper. I was always willing to sit on and offer up my cuteness to make grandma feel better. Nothing is better than a puppy letting you know how cute they are. 

I was also very helpful as a guard dog. My grandparents have this evil, little bulldog in their basement. No worries. I immediately let it know I was in charge. However, the bulldog posed no threat to myself or my family so I quickly engaged it with a play bow.  I don't know what it is about bulldogs... but I just don't like them. Mom says I get that from my daddy's side of the family. 

While we were in Atlanta we decided to address another issue. Too many people call me a boy. I know a lot of people generally assume if you're a dog, you're a boy. Obviously this is not true. So my mom decided I needed a makeover to help people out. 

First, my grandma bought me a very cute, pink collar.

However, Dad likes my Georgia Tech collar very much so mom picked up a little something to dress it up. She found a clip-in hair bow for little girls, but when added to my collar it's the perfect accessory to show off my feminine side. 

Something else very big happened when I visited my grandparents! Remember my Aunt Bailey? She had to wear a muzzle whenever I was around?

Well now we're friends! No more muzzle. We actually L.O.V.E playing together! Yay! This makes my mom and grandma very happy. But confuses my Uncle Luke. He'd rather play with toy playing keep-away rather than wrestle like Bailey and me. 

My grandparents from my dad's side came down to visit a few weekends ago too! I was so excited because they brought my Uncle Scottie! I love playing with him!

 However, the only downside  (according to my mom and dad) to playing with my Uncle Scottie and Aunt Bailey is that I've become a little more vocal recently. So my parents bought this thing that supposedly makes a high pitched noise that only I can hear when I bark. The jury is still out on whether or not it's helping. 

Also, because I do a lot of this:

the white couch often looks like this:

 So mom and dad bought this thing. It's advertised to sweep up pet hair from furniture... ha! Joke is on them! My hair seems to be too short for this tool to be effective.

My Grandmador brought this down with her a couple of weeks ago. 

It's a brush thing that is really effective on my Uncle Scottie. For me, it's more effective as a toy. 

Let's see... what else has been going on?

Remember when I did this?

Well mom replaced it with this...

More appropriate since I spend most of my time out on the porch. It's been out there for a while now and I haven't chewed it up! Snaps for me!

Mom also bought this cute leash-hook thing for my growing collection of harnesses and collars. The sign is very true by the way. It reads "Home is where the dog is"... well duh. 

I still very, very much like to be "on" and "with"... or behind. However I can just be close.

Mom also wants to show you some pictures of some "cute" puppies (obviously not as cute as me) that she and her friend Erin ran into at a pet adoption day in Atlanta this weekend. Mom said she really wanted to bring one home for me to have a little sister or brother, but I like being the only child and am glad it's still just our family of three.

Emma takes a trip to visit Uncle Juan and watch Miguel play in the mud

Emma, Miguel, and I went to visit Miguel's twin brother, Juan, this weekend. Juan recently moved to Greenville so this was our first time to visit him in his new place and city. We were surprised how quick of a trip it felt driving there. From Savannah it takes about four hours, the same amount of time it takes to get back home to Atlanta, but the drive is soooo much more enjoyable. We're not sure if it's because the landscape is prettier or if it's because the drive is broken up into different highways instead of one long road the whole way (if you have ever driven on I-16 you know what I'm talking about).  Emma did really well with the drive again! She's such a good girl! Of course she started out in the back seat but only stayed there for about half an hour before she moved up front to cuddle. I'm proud of her for being so good in the car, but the real accomplishment here was that I drove over this bridge!!!

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Here is a cute picture of Emma sleeping on my lap during the drive to Greenville.

We were excited to go visit Juan and check out Greenville. Greenville is a really cool city. I like the way it's laid out. It feel's a lot like Athens but without the poverty and the craziness and negatives that come with being a college town. Saturday night we went to a bar and played darts and pool and what was really cool was that EVERYTHING was free! Even parking!!!! And it wasn't crowded at all and there were no sketchy people trying to be pool sharks and take advantage of us all. 

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This is in downtown Greenville! It was really beautiful at night when it was lit up with lights.

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Part of the reason for the trip to Greenville was so that Miguel could be on Juan's team for a race in Columbia Saturday. Okay, let me just say... I am SOO proud of Miguel for doing this race, BUT I also think anyone who signs up to do this race is certifiably INSANE!!!!!!

Here are the details:

*14,000 individuals
*3,600 teams
*Officially the largest mud run in North America
*Not actually in Columbia --- in podunk South Carolina 

On their website they post this discription:

The Ultimate Challenge Mud Run is over 4.2 miles, and has 30 obstacles that have to be crossed by each team requiring team work and a lot of determination. The 4.2 mile course is an all-terrain race conducted on dirt roads, improved and unimproved trails through the training area. These trails include mud holes, walls, trenches and other obstacles that require swimming, crawling, climbing and jumping. Some people come to compete, but many come just to complete!

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera and so tried to take pictures with Miguel's phone. Even more unfortunately, I lost his phone at the second obstacle so didn't get that many pictures. But what IS fortunate is that at a race with more than 14,000 people someone found his phone during the five minutes I didn't realize it was missing and turned it in!! Thank the Lord! 

Here are some of the pictures I took... This first one is an eight foot deep trench (I don't know what to call it) and then you have to climb a slippery mud hill. Miguel's team's heat wasn't until after 5 pm so the mudd was REALLY wet and slippery and I saw many people bust their ass on this obstacle. 

 The guy in the red here is one of the marines who yelled at the runners. The runners were completely out of breath and to me looked miserable. They are only about half way through the race at this point, which the marines kindly reminded them with by saying things like "COME ON! PICK UP THE PACE! RUN, RUN, RUN, RUN!!!! YOU'RE ONLY HALF WAY DONE! YOU CAN'T BE THIS SLOW ALREADY!" If I had been running I would have shot them. If I still had the energy to lift up a gun and pull the trigger at this point. 

There's Miguel and Juan!! Miguel had run to the car before the race to get Emma's travel water bowl. They left me in the company of one of their teammate's family. As soon as the team left to get the bowl and do their warm up the family I was with immediately set out to go 'scout out' the race. I, dressed in a sundress and sandals, followed them. I was SOO not prepared for this race. I thought it was going to be like a cross country race and I could plop down in the shade on a tailgating chair and watch from a distance. Ummm, no. My feet are literally still muddy... yes, I have showered since then. Anyways, since Emma and I were being dragged through spider webs and rocky forests, Miguel couldn't find me when he got back from retrieving the bowl and so he ran with it! Miguel was giving the bowl to me in this picture! He's the best! Thinking about others even while going through hell!

 Go Babe! Go!

There goes Juan! Miguel and Juan matched by wearing their 'lucky' shirts! Aww! Twins! ;)

After the race they had the opportunity to take a two minute shower... more like a hose down. I don't know why people bothered saving the shoes they wore...  they all pretty much looked like this. I saw people duct tape their shoes on their feet which I thought looked miserable but after watching people searching for their missing shoes in on of the mud pits didn't seem like such a bad idea. Luckily, for the Amador household and much to Emma's dismay, Miguel tossed his old shoes after the race!

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Miguel and Juan's team did really well! They finished the 4.2 miles and 30 obstacles in about an hour and a half! I love it that Miguel finds so much enjoyment out of things I would never consider in about a million years! Opposites sure did attract when it came to our relationship!

Driving back home with three mud covered, sweaty guys and a dog who had been out in the sun all day was not the worst part of the drive... it was actually passing WAY too many "This is Gamecock Country" billboards (warning: all with Steve Spurrier sporting his visor).

What's amazing is that Emma managed to stay mud free!!!!! I was so happy! This did take some work on my part. I had to pick her up during some of our wanderings through the woods. But mission accomplished! No bath needed for Emma!

On a side note ----> Emma lost her first puppy teeth this week! I think they are adorable but some may think they're gross. She's growing up! I can't believe she's already almost FIVE months old! Biggie girl!!