nice to meet you

I was just looking at old pictures of declan on flickr, trying to find a picture of him as a teensy puppy when he was barely 4 pounds. I really don't have so many up on flickr, and I made a note to scan in some more early pictures soon. Then I remembered exactly what pictures I need to find and scan.

When I very first found out that I was going to be getting a dog for Christmas, my parents took a few pictures of Declan and mailed them to me in Seattle. That is, they took film photos, and put them into a physical envelope and dispatched them off via USPS. Very few people who I knew had digital cameras at that time- and it really wasn't that long ago! I remember waiting anxiously for days for the pictures of my new dog back in NJ, and the excitement and tearing into the envelope when it finally arrived. I stood in my apartment lobby & flipped through the pictures over and over and over, then I took them into work and propped them up on my desk, and flipped through them obsessively. I could barely wait to get back to NJ for Christmas to meet Declan to meet him. Those pictures went everywhere with me for a while, and I begged for new ones pretty much every day.

He was of course even cuter in person than in his first pictures. They're pretty adorable, though, he looks like a wee smidge of fluff with his huge brown eyes. I love to look at them now and marvel at much he looks like adult declan, but with less nose. He had the same face all the way back then.

happy

This is my favorite picture of Declan and me together. My mom took it up at Whistler at Christmas 2000 on one of the patios by one of the gondolas. Declan & my mom had been waiting by the chairlift you can see for us to all ski down, and I got a nice tail wagging "welcome to the bottom of the mountain!!" from Declan. He really loved the snow there, and spent a lot of time burying his nose in it and romping around. So why do I love this picture? Mostly because Declan looks blissed out -look at the little sheltie smile on his face! He had a great vacation up there.

sleepy dog

Here is another old photo of declan, probably from some time in early 2001. He used to enjoy napping under our dining room table, since that corner of the apartment had lots of sunshine. I like how this picture shows how long his nose is. His whole head is really one looooooong nose!

Shy

That's Declan as a teensy pup being uncharacteristically shy in front of the camera. This image actually was on my amazon intranet page for years. Declan is generally not camera shy at all, and he never really was even as a puppy. I think I must have taken this right after he woke up from a nap or something. If I remember, it's from January 2000, which would mean that he is about 4 months old in that picture.

impatient

Here's another old photo of Declan in the amazon parking lot. You can see that he was VERY impatient about reaching the lawn at the end of the parking lot so that he could play some frisbee before we went back inside for more work.

Hiking

A very very old of Declan on his first birthday- hiking at Mt Rainier! Not only does he look young, but so does Brian.



Declan is going to be 8 in a few days- he's grown up so fast!