Oh Brother Where Art Thou?

Our youngest son was coming home from a Boy Scout campout today, but would get home too late for us to go to our puppy raiser meeting this afternoon.  So, this morning I drove out to the camp to pick him up a little early.  I took Barkley with me to let him experience a little bit of nature and more importantly, kids.  One of the reasons Barkley and I were paired up for puppy camp is that I have young boys at home and his raiser, Leslie, does not.  He gets limited exposure to kids.  I did not have him in coat while at the campground, so the boys got to pet him and Barkley got to play with them a little.  He was very fond of the kids and was trying to jump on them.  I let him have some fun, but insisted on him keeping all four paws on the ground. 
Our puppy raiser meeting today was at an Applebee’s Restaurant in Lakeland, which is a ways outside of our regular puppy raiser area.  The restaurant was hosting a “Dining to Donate”  with part of the proceeds going to Southeast Guide Dogs.  We did some obedience in the parking lot and were joined by a few puppies and raisers from the local group.  Before we started, I was talking with one of the ladies from the other group.  We were talking about the size of some of the pups.  She mentioned a goldadore that was in her group and how big he was, and not being a year old yet.  My ears perked up at that!  After a few questions back and forth, we both thought that Joey and this other dog might be brothers.  I think somebody made a phone call, because a little later, they were saying Joey and the dog in the other group, a big yellow boy named Albert, were indeed litter mates.  Too bad he wasn’t there today.  I made sure we got an email address of somebody in the group so they could forward my messages to Albert and we can establish direct contact.  I have pictures of the litter we took at puppy hugging two or three weeks before picking up our puppies.  I also have pictures of the litter the day we picked up Joey. 

One of these is Albert at 9 weeks

Albert did not have any other littermates in his group.  So there are still two other goldadores out there I haven’t found yet.  I hope that if they are in Florida, that I might meet them at the Walkathon next month.  I also hope to meet his parents. 

Meanwhile, back at the meeting, since we are puppy camping Barkley right now, and his raisers are camping Joey, we tried to avoid each other as much as possible to prevent our dogs from getting too distracted.  I don’t think Barkley ever realized that Mama was there. After obedience and the meeting, we headed inside to eat.  We were scattered around the restaurant and I don’t think that anybody that walked in after we did had any idea that there were about ten dogs in there, laying under the tables.  But there were probably some surprised looks when we started walking out, first one, then another, and another…….