Our new family member!

Yesterday we finally got to pick up our new puppy! She is a golden retriever / brittany spaniel mix. We adopted her through a wonderful organization called 'Adopt a Lab'. They take in labs of all kinds and ages and rescue them until they can be adopted.

Her name is Gracie and she had lots of brothers and sisters - who I'm pretty sure she is missing now since she keeps whining off and on!

This was our first look at her in person! SOOO cute! I love how her snout looks like it has freckles on it and I hope they stay forever and don't go away as she grows!
The girls are totally smitten with her!

Here she is meeting our older dog, Casey for the first time. Yes, now we have a Casey and a Gracie - never planned on rhyming names but that's the name she came with and we decided to keep it.

Casey didn't know what to think at first. She growled a little, then began playing with her and then she wouldn't leave Gracie alone! I think she's going to be protective of her!

We took them out to play in our yard and it was so cute to see them chasing each other and tumbling all over!

This is my beautiful Mom, she came with us to pick up the puppy. I love this picture of her with Gracie!

The first night went pretty well. We're trying to crate train her and she cried a little at bedtime. She doesn't like to be alone so we found that if we kept the crate in a room where the older dog was then Gracie would settle down and go to sleep. She slept most of the night and didn't get up till 7am! I can live with that! I hope that the next nights go just as well!

She has a lot to learn, she's not house trained yet and has already had several accidents. She is also jumping up and nipping at everything. She also has trouble getting her little legs up and down steps - but all these things will come in time!

So far we are totally in love with her. It's definitely a big change in our lives. We're usually so low key around here and now our lives are so busy keeping up with her! I have a feeling I'll be doing a lot of cleaning, vacuuming and puppy bathing! But she's worth it and has already brought so much joy to us. As I'm typing she is sleeping next to me with her paw draped over my arm!

Just be forewarned that this blog is about to be taken over with TONS of puppy pictures!! =)