April 3, 2009

Hello Families,

It’s me Austin. Mom said that I should let everyone know how I’m doing since I’ve been in my forever home for 1 year now. Well to start out, I have a big brother Jimmie, he’s great, we are together all the time, except for when Jimmie does something naughty like stealing and eating the remote, that’s when I like to lay on Mom’s feet so she knows it wasn’t me being naughty.

Mom calls me Chummy–Yummy, and for short – Chummies. She said my tummy is chummy-yummy and that’s how I got my nickname. It must be good to have a chummy-yummy tummy because I get tummy tickles and tummy rubs all the time. My favorite time is right before bed. Before Dad comes to bed, Mom lays with us and we talk about our day, we get tickles, kisses, belly rubs, mom sings to us, then we turn off the lights and she tells us that she loves us to the moon and back, and to dream big! Dad always walks in and says “spoiled, spoiled, and spoiled” Mom always laughs and says she wouldn’t have it any other way.

Dad likes to play frisbee and ball with us in the yard. Jimmie is good at frisbee, Me…I’m still learning. I keep trying to catch the frisbee with my paws instead of my mouth. Mom and Dad laugh so hard but they tell me it’s OK, whatever way I want to catch the frisbee is OK with them. After watching Jimmie, I tried to start catching it with my mouth. I did catch it a few times, and Mom and Dad would get so silly. They would start clapping and cheering and doing crazy dances, I would get very excited for the next throw then I would forget and try to catch it with my paws again. Mom said I’m still learning and sometimes these things take time. Dad and I keep practicing.

Jimmie and I have a friend that likes to come and play with us. His name is Buster Brown, he is a chocolate labbie he is only 1 year old so Jimmie and I have to teach him a few things. He is great to run around with. I like to play chase! Chase is my favorite game. It’s more fun when Jimmie or Buster chase me – Mom and Dad are kind of slow. I always have to look back to see if they are still coming. Mom says I run like the wind and that I am to fast for her. Mom added some pictures of me and some of the things I’ve been up to over the past year. I have to go now it’s time for dinner and the crunchie dance or a little moaning to get mom’s attention!

July 19, 2008

Hello Fellow Forever Families and Foster Families,

We are Austin’s forever family and we wanted to give everyone an update on how he is doing. We adopted Austin in March of 2008 and it’s like he has been with us forever! As I am writing this, he has his head on my shoulder. He is a BIG lover. Our story starts out like this. My husband and I also have a 2 year old yellow lab named Jimmie, who was in need of a brother. After searching Labrador rescue sites on the internet we found LRR. After falling in love with every story we decided this was the place for us. After all the paperwork and interviews, we were on our way to see three Labs. We again fell in love with all of them, but when we met Austin we knew he was the one. Jimmie and Austin bonded right away. The following weekend we went and picked him up. Now he was going home, let the fun begin.

Austin settled in right away. After about a week we told him that it was ok to do something naughty, we weren’t going to send him away, he is home forever. He was so well behaved, and still is. It was interesting trying to learn his character traits. We kept looking at him wondering what he was thinking. We never paid to much attention to his paperwork when all of his foster families said he’s very food driven and that he moans, or barks when he’s ready to eat until…..the next day, at 5:30am. Austin likes to make sure we do not forget that he is ready to eat. At 5:30am we get the long moans, hunger moans possibly? To make sure he is successful at getting us out of bed he will get his brother involved and they will double team us on the bed with a combination of moans, barking, or a tag team wrestling match. At dinner time which is around 5:00pm but more like 4:45pm, the moaning starts, and what we like to call the “crunchie dance”. The “Crunchie Dance” is a dance done by Austin with a combination of jumping straight up in the air, some twirling may be involved, along with some swaying and some circles on the floor. The more you laugh at him the louder he gets or the harder the dancing becomes. One more note; while we are talking about food, his favorite treats are Greenies. I’m sure everyone out there knows what Greenies are. If Austin is at the back of the yard, you can yell “Austin, Greenie” and he comes tearing though the yard, ears flying in the wind, we like to sing the Indiana Jones theme as he’s running into the house. He has such flare we thought he needed a theme. We really have never laughed so much until we had two labs…alright let me be honest I meant, kids!

Brothers ‘til the end…Jimmie and Austin are always together. We had to teach Austin what “chummy tummy” rubbies are, and what snuggling toes meant, and what night- night in the bed means. It really means snuggling Mommy in the bed and hogging Daddy’s side. They both enjoy sitting on the sofa and watching the bunnies outside and smelling the air. I almost forgot the garage….they both love the garage. We can’t figure out why, but they do. Their Dad says men, “let’s go to the garage” and Austin and Jimmie are right behind him. He tells me that’s where men go. I’m not really sure what they do out there, I just know there is a whole lot of sniffing going on. When the tasks, and sniffing are done, they come flying in the living room as if they have something so important to tell me. Then again, I’m a girl, they probably don’t want to share the “men’s garage” secrets. We have to say he’s adapted very well. Austin recently went swimming for the first time at the lake near our home. We w ere not sure how he was going to do but with big brother Jimmie by his side he jumped right in and started going. It was hard to get him out when it was time to go, but we let him take his stick and he was one happy boy.

We cannot thank LRR enough! We are grateful that LRR was there for Austin and for all the Labs out there that need homes.

We are looking forward to seeing everyone at the picnic in September. Thank you LRR for matching us with Austin. We’ve attached some pictures of Austin himself and Austin with his brother Jimmie.

See you in September LRR. Austin’s new family