the end of an era...

Bailey Brewer...

What can I say?

If you are relatively new to the Brewer Bunch, you may not know the extent of this epic adventure that has been our life with a dog. Here is it in a nutshell:

We bought a house the 2nd year of med school. Since we had fertility issues (5 kids later you would never have known that little tid-bit, would ya?!), we thought it would be quite a while before we actually had any kids, so I thought, "hey, we can get a dog, and it can be our little family until we have kids..."

So I got a dog for Jerry... in October

and got pregnant with twins... in November

And after the first few chewed up poopy diapers (among many other chewed up things), I pretty much have been at my wits end with Bailey ever since...

And so began our love/hate relationship with Bailey (Jerry loved him, I, well... hate is a strong word... let's just say I had other emotions towards our dog...).

After way too many incidents to re-iterate on the blog, I have been trying to find a new home for our very canine dog.

But Jerry has resisted

...Until we decided to upgrade our housing situation

...To a beautiful NEW house (read: CLEAN house- not 50 years of grime built up everywhere!!)

... with white carpet...

... and no fenced back yard...

... and a sprinkler system (which makes it hard to put in an underground fence for dogs)

... and after a last ditch effort to make it work (getting a bark collar for Bailey, and a new 'walking collar' and suddenly becoming very interested on taking Bailey for walks every day...)

... Jerry came to the sad realization that it was probably best to find Bailey a new home...

... and he put many stipulations on such a new home (which I thought would be downright impossible to meet...)

Until I met Susan Perkins aka our fairy dog-mother...

Who called me up out of the blue after receiving an email about Bailey's plight to find a new home.

She came to meet him, and they hit it off smashingly.

Took him out to meet her two dogs, and Bailey actually liked them as well.

And suddenly Bailey found himself a new home, with TONS of room to run around free, and get to be, well, a dog!

We even get full visitation rights, whenever we want (one of Jerry's stipulations...)
We have already been out to visit twice at his new home, and I have to admit, he looks so HAPPY - there is just a content look on his face at getting to have a whole new lease on life in a fun, new place that is VERY conducive to extremely active, somewhat ADD dogs :).

... and the kids? Well, they get the best of both worlds...

They get to visit Bailey, but even more exciting for them, they get to see all of the other animals on the farm...

... and help feed all the other animals on the farm...

(I actually think they are more excited about being with the other animals then actually visiting Bailey...)

And Jerry gets to still have his beloved Canine in his life...

... just not on his new white carpet... ;)

And thus ends the era of the Dog.

... and me? Well, I would be lying if I said I wasn't overjoyed at finding a new home for Bailey.

... But I do have to say, It does seem a bit quiet around here without the boisterous Bailey -

... and I do find myself missing him a bunch (did I actually say that??!) (shh!!! don't tell my husband!!)