Guest Blogger...Remembering Marco

My Boxer Mailing List friend, Joanne lost her boy Marco several weeks ago. I've volunteered my blog as a tribute to her sweet boy. I saw Marco's sweet face on her Christmas card back in December and immediately fell in love! After seeing his puppy pictures, I'm even more enamored with him!

Marco was born on December 3, 2006. The breeder was in the family. We had been contemplating a boxer for a while, as we had grown to love the breed by seeing the boxers that our relatives owned. I had actually picked out another boxer from this litter, a light brindle female. But someone else came to look at the dogs, and fell in love with that same dog. So I had the option of keeping the female or letting someone else buy her and take Marco instead. I guess there was some karma there, as Marco turned out to be my heart dog. But I sometimes wonder how that female is doing.

Wasn't he a cute puppy?


One of the greatest joys in Marco's life was bestowing a face washing on one of his humans. Here he was 3 months old ready to give my grandson, Jordan a face licking!

This is one of anly a few pictures that I have with Marco and I, as I am usually behind the camera, not in front.




My grandkids had to look out for their toys with Marco around, especially when he was young (he was 7 months in this photo).


As you can well imagine this ball didn't last too long.

Again, Marco at his favourite spot with my grandson. They both loved looking out the window.











Marco had a few special dogs that he really liked - one was Gabby - they had some great times running around getting dirty.


As you BML owners with white boxers know,they sure can get dirty. By the way, Gabby is Jades mom.

















Marco was a pretty good big brother, but at first he was pretty rough on little Jade. We had to keep Jade outside the fence when she first got home, because he wouldn't let her go pee, and played quite rough. But as you can see, he also spent some time teaching Jade the 'ropes' on playing with sticks.



Jade and I miss Marco very much!

Lucy's Take... Reportin' For Duty, Ma!

Hi's everybodys! I gots to spend the day with my mama at work today, and thoughts that I would tell you all abouts da fun we had! I really enjoyed havings a girls day with my mom! She gaves me lots of hugs and kisses, and we played hides and go seeks for a little whiles dis morning! For lunch, we hads some pizza and Mikes and Ikes... I likes da yellow ones!

"I'ms ready to helps you sell some furnitures, Ma!! Brings on da customers. Where's dey ats?"

I hads some time on my paws, so I decided to finds a good spot to hide my bone for laters! This spot worked for a little whiles...

... Den da hooman found it and puts it on da desk by her coffee. I don'ts know why she puts it der, but I had to gets it back...

.. So dats I could chew on its! Mom boughts dis bone for Dukes a couples of weeks ago, I dont's know why he didn't likes it! I loves it!

Dis evening she let me clean out a peanuts butter jar! Dats was a lot of fun...

... Ands I mades sure I gots every last drop of da peanuts butter dat I coulds reach! My tongue can only get so far into the jar!

Mom's didn't gets any pictures, but I also gots to meet 3 little kids! She saids I was very good wits them! They gaves me tons of kisses and hugs and tugged on my tail! Dats was awesome... I wonders why we don't have any of dos at home? Mom... Cans we get some little kids? Pleeeeeze?

The Best Spot

The last several nights we have had a battle of sorts in the bed. For many months now, Lucy has been very content to let Duke sleep at the top of the bed next to me. For whatever reason, she's just not content with that anymore. Maybe she's decided it's her turn, and he needs to retire to the end of the bed and give her a shot at snuggling with her mom, but he has no intention of doing that.

Last night started out like every other night. Duke jumped up into the bed and got comfy; the top half of his body on my chest, a paw on either side of my head and his head resting dead center on my chest. Within minutes, he was snoring. Lucy had curled up on the other side of me by my hips. She kept looking up at Duke and I, and she would sigh! I knew it was only a matter of time before she decided to correct the problem.

Somehow I managed to wiggle part of Duke's body off of my chest, which is no small task with an 80 pound boxer I can assure you. I had just settled in and started to get comfortable when I noticed that Lucy had gotten up and was making her way slowly up to the top of the bed and my pillow, with her little bottom wiggling the whole way. She knew exactly what she was doing, and didn't much care what Duke thought about what she was going to do.

It took her only a minute, she circled a couple of times, still wiggling, and settled down right next to me with her head on the pillow, and this time when she sighed, I knew it was a contented sigh and not a frustrated one.

At 4:00 AM, I was awakened by the fact that the room was so hot that I could barely stand it. I got up and turned the space heater off and made a trip to the bathroom. By that time, both kids had gotten up to and figured if I got to make a pit stop, so did they. I let them both out for a quick tinkle, and then we all climbed back into bed. This time Lucy jumped into bed and got first pick of the best spot, right next to my head while Duke had to settle for snuggling in at my hip!

The "Best Spot" in our bed is very clearly next to mama's head!

Moving On...

The stolen porterhouse steaks of a week ago are still a very sore subject in our house. Not so sore that Lucy & Duke's Daddy didn't think of them when he was standing at the butcher's counter ordering a bunch of thick cut porterhouse steaks last evening because those steaks had awesome bones on them!

Rob and I were more than happy to share our bones with the kids, after they sat and waited patiently, of course....

Poor Lucy still doesn't get why Daddy and I are saying funny things to Duke about "The Circle of Trust!"

Be Careful What You Tell A Boxer....

...Because they just might hold you to it! And if they can't make you comply, they're probably going to take matters into their own paws. Let me tell you the story so you can relate to what happened...

You remember that Duke was at work with me on Sunday, and he was such a good boy all day long, greeting customers, making new friends and making people fall in love with him. At the end of the day, I told him that he was being so good that he deserved a steak!

That night on our way home, Rob and I stopped at the grocery store and bought a bunch of steak with the intention of cooking it for dinner. It was a nice thought, but there was something wrong with the grill. And while Rob messed around with the grill and tried to get it to work, I pounded out (2) very thick porterhouse steaks. He came back into the house, and was in the kitchen getting something to drink. The steaks were on the counter, and I had to pee. I figured since my husband was in the kitchen, it was probably safe to go to the bathroom, but what I didn't take into consideration (silly me!) was that there was a football game on in the living room and my darling husband wasn't paying any more attention to what our sweet counter surfing boxer was doing than the fact that I had left the room.

When I came back to kitchen, the steaks weren't on the counter.
Me: "You got the grill fixed?" "No, why would you say that?"
Rob: "No, what made you think that?"
Me: "The steaks are gone!"

I immediately turned around to see my sweet Duke chowing down on the remainder of the porterhouse steak, and poor Lucy trying to get a bite of it for herself! Needless to say that Duke's amazing performance at work with me on Sunday was usurped by his stealing 3 pounds of porterhouse steak from our kitchen counter...