Just a couple of more pictures to show how beautiful Marley was!

Here is a picture of Marley, as we would like to remember him! We were at our friend's little boys birthday party. Yes, Marley is wearing a birthday hat. Like I said, he was a member of our family. We didn't want him to be left out!

Yesterday was a sad day for the Few family. He laid to rest our beloved dog Marley. Marley came to join our family about 5 yrs ago. He was a collie and looked just like Lassie. He was 12 yrs old when he died. Collie's only live to be about 13. he had a good life and was such a great dog. He was our baby when we didn't have any babies. He lived in the house and was spoiled wrotten. Marley loved to play. We bought him all kinds of toys and I think he was the happiest when it was just him and Antione, or me, playing with him. We used to tease him and say" Marley, where's the kitty, where's the kitty"? and I would meow like a little kitten. He would just start barking and go over to the back door and look out the blinds, looking for the kitty. Without fail he would bark and go over to the door every time. Good times! Marley was also incredibly intelligent. He knew several commands. Sit. Shake. Lie Down. Stay. Come here. He was so obedient. Of course, it helped that he would get treats. He loved treats, but only Pupperoni! Everyone loved Marley, old and young. People would always comment that he was such a pretty dog. He loved the attention. Marley gave a lot of love in return. He seemed to always know when I had a bad day and he was very protective of me, especially when I was pregnant. If I started attacking Antione (in a playful way, of course) and say "Help, Help" he would always bark at Antione, always. I used to love that. You always knew if Marley did something he wasn't supposed to, like get in the laundry (hey, he's a dog and dog's are perverts). He would be standing in the doorway and his ears would be hanging down. You'd say," Marley, what did you do?" He would just hand his head down in shame. The first signs of Marley being sick happened about a year and a half ago. We took him in for minor surgery on his eye. Two days later he was still lethargic and weak and would barley eat anything. he wasn't peeing either. We took him in to the vet and they found he had a tumor on his kidney about the size of a tennis ball. They had to put a catheter in his bladder to drain it. We thought we would have to put him down then but over the next few days he got better and better and was like his old self. I told the vet but he said, he will get sick again. I thought he meant sooner than later but it never happened so we didn't really think about it. About six months after that we took him into get groomed and ended up having to shave him. His hair was so matted and dirty they said nothing else could have been done. I felt so bad when I saw him. He just looked at me and I could tell that he felt like he was "naked." When Antione saw him for the first time he laughed so hard. In, fact most people did. They didn't shave his head or ears so it looked like Marley on a pig's body. Seriously, his body was pink and he was so skinny without all that hair. We thought it would grown back in a few months. But it didn't. And gradually over time he looked skinnier and skinnier. We didn't realize it but he was sick again. Lately it didn't seem like he had been eating very much. Then a couple of days ago when I opened the garage in the morning, instead of him standing there waiting to go out, he was standing over his bed and I could tell something was wrong. Antione said the same thing when he came home and saw him. He was struggling to walk and appeared very weak. He was also leaking urine, just like he did when he was sick before. I knew then that we needed to take him in to the vet and it might be time to let him go. So much easier said than done. Antione took him in yesterday about 3pm. The doctor said Marley was very sick! The tumor had grown to the size of a small melon. He had lost 35lbs since his last appt. almost half of his weight. He was just skin and bones. There was nothing we could do nor nothing we could have done. It was time to say goodbye to one of our family members. Antione spent the next hour with him, talking to him and saying goodbye. We both cried. It's was hard to imagine our home without Marley. Even now, when I came home from work this morning, I expected to see him run out and greet me the way he always did, but he wasn't there. We know Marley is in a better place and he is happy now. We couldn't stand to see him suffer anymore. We will be together with him again someday. And when the time is right we will get another dog. No one will ever replace Marley, though. He was one in a million!! We will always love you Marley and will never forget you. You will be missed.

Well this week has been a fun one. Last Sunday at about 2pm Jada threw up. From then on until about 9pm she was throwing up about every 20 min. It was so sad. I have never seen anyone throw up that much. Ava never did anyway. Jada didn't act or look sick the beginning but a few hours into she became more lethargic. She just laid there and looked up at me with those big brown eyes. I felt so helpless. She could not keep anything down. I tried to give her just 3ml of pedialyte and within 15 min she threw it up. We took her in to the Dr.s that night and they gave her a shot of Phenergan. She threw up one more time on the way home and that was it for 2 days. Then Tues. night about 12:30am she threw up 2 more times. Ava, on the other hand has only thrown up once but she has had diarrhea every night. So pretty much we have been cleaning up a lot of poop and throw up. You can see why I said it has been a fun week. Speaking of fun, 2 weeks ago we went to Disneyland with Ruth and her family. We left Wed. and came home on Mon. It was a lot of fun and great to spend time with Ruth, Joe and the kids. I do however, think that 3 days in a row of amusement parks is a lot for a 3 yrs old. Jada did pretty good. She only cried or became upset if she was tired or hungry. Ava on the other hand was a little harder. The first day was a 12hr day and it was very hot, so you can imagine how tired and cranky she was. The second day we decided to break it up and take the girls back to the hotel for a nap. I think that day did go a little smoother although, again by the end of the night Ava was being a pill. The third day was just wrong. We met up with Antione's mom, aunt and her boyfriend at Universal Studios. We love the Jurassic park ride there and thought that his family would have more fun there. Well they did but Ava did not! I was ready to kill her by the end of the day. Not really, of course, but she was very very cranky. The few things they did have for kids she didn't like. I decided that I will never take a 3 yrs old there again. It is NOT a place for kids that young. I feel bad about it now because I know she was so bored. After we got home from Universal we went back over to Disneyland and Ava got to watch the fireworks and go on the Winnie the Pooh ride with aunt Ruth while I went on Splash Mountain and the Matterhorn with Joe and the kids. Ava had a lot of fun Ruth said. It's funny because you would never know it by the pictures but overall Ava did have fun. She is not smiling in any of the pictures. I think she was just mesmerized by the princesses. The first day we had lunch at Ariel's Grato and got to meet and take pictures of all the princesses. Ava is obsessed. She got so excited when each one would come out but when it came time to taking pictures with them she just put her finger in her mouth like she does when she's scared, and and just looked up at them in awe. Our only misfortunes on the trip was Ava threw up 3 times in the car (yes, it looks like she takes after me and has motion sickness) and Jada fell out of the stroller and landed on her face. But other than that we had a great time and made a lot of fun memories. Here are some of the pictures from our vacation. I will post more when I get them from my sister.