To Christopher

We have had a bit of sad news. For those who haven't seen on Facebook, our beloved dog, Christopher, passed away last week. I won't bog you down with the details, but he was starting to get sick, and then suddenly was in distress. Last Friday, we made the tough decision to let him go.

Everyone who has come to visit has noticed a change in the air in our home. Everyone thought of Chris as people, and he was quite the presence wherever her was. There's definitely a missing energy in this house now, and his absence is affecting us all. Not only are the two-legged parents still grieving, but the four-legged siblings are as well. In particular, our little husky Fox appeared to be hit the hardest. She and Chris did live together for a while before Jacob, Kandi and Pepino moved in, and she showed her sadness those first few days. The day after it happened, we had Chris' collar in our hands and the little tags clinked together. When they did, Fox ran for Chris' bed, looking for him, and when he wasn't there, she just flopped onto his bed. She also had a tough time eating, but that thankfully has since gone away.

We wanted to thank everyone with their thoughts, emails, texts, and phone calls. We are keeping all of these lovely notes and putting a little book together for us to remember our Christopher. We also requested that the vet take footprints for us to keep, and will be getting those after we receive his ashes. We haven't decided what to do with them, but we are also thinking of getting a miniature orange tree in his honor. For those that don't know, Chris LOVED oranges and orange juice. When he was at his sickest, he would only eat cottage cheese with blueberries and orange juice, so we want to get a small tree we can take with us when/if we ever move.

Had it not been for Chris, we would not have any dogs in our family. Because of him we rescued not only three of our pups (Fox, Jake and Pepino), but we also took in Kandi, and Jen's sisters each adopted a "cousin": Mason and Hiccup. Because Chris was the pioneer, a few dogs were saved from being put down. And someday, another one will be brought in when the time is right into our pack, and our house will be happy again.

And before we sign off, we have read this wonderful poem many times prior to Chris' death, and it's how we try to think of him now.

Our first day with Chris

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.

When an animal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge. There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so they can run and play together. There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.

All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to health and vigor. Those who were hurt or maimed are made whole and strong again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by. The animals are happy and content, except for one small thing; they each miss someone very special to them, who had to be left behind.

They all run and play together, but the day comes when one suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes are intent. His eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group, flying over the green grass, his legs carrying him faster and faster.

You have been spotted, and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again. The happy kisses rain upon your face; your hands again caress the beloved head, and you look once more into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from your life but never absent from your heart.

Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together.... 

Author unknown...

Our last photo shoot with Chris

 Christopher Perry: Rescued 1/13/08 at age 1; Returned Home 1/17/14

Paint Nite!

On Monday, January 13th, Jen went with her friends for Girl's Night to do Paint Nite. One of her friends found a Groupon for it and treated everyone because their birthdays had just come up, or in Jen's case, would be at the end of the month. So it was her, her three friends from high school and her sister Myra painting. The way it works is, for two hours, you get instructions on how to paint a picture. The one they did that night was a picture of a cherry blossom tree on a dark day. It came out really cool, and Jen was very happy with it.

The girls all had so much fun that they're planning on doing it again. In fact, this Monday a larger group of ladies (plus a few guys) will head over to paint a new picture with the same instructor!

Phase 1; about halfway through the class, when they took a break.

The final product, up close

All of the girls! (L-R: Tarra, Tee, Stacey, Jen, Myra)

 

Displayed in all it's glory!

Hopefully, soon, we can add more artwork to the wall, along with some family photos and other wonderful things to decorate the house with!

The Year In Review (Just A Few Days Into the New Year!)

Hello to all! For those who aren't in the know: Our Christmas cards came late this year. In fact, they arrived yesterday. So we missed sending out the holiday cards and from what I've read on Facebook, we are in good company! Oh well. You'll still get them in the mail this week if I can find everyone's addresses. :-) We didn't do a newsletter, but here is what we would've written: This year has been a bit of a roller coaster. Good and bad, we survived another year, and are happy to be looking forward to new adventures. There have been a few struggles, changes and challenges this year. In February, we found out our dog, Christopher, had Stage 4 Lymphoma. After a lot of thinking through things and prayers, we decided as a family to try to give Chris the best shot we could, and he underwent chemotherapy. After two rounds (out of 12!) he went into clinical remission. Currently, his lymph nodes are starting to grow in size, but he does not seem to have any illness or appear sick, thankfully. Also, we were told that the average amount of time he would have left would be between 6-9 months, and even less because his cancer was the more aggressive t-cell and he was later staged. However, as of this post, Chris is hitting 11 months post-diagnosis, so we are all happy with that! As if one sick dog wasn't enough, we also acquired two more this year! Kandi is Jeff's childhood dog, and at 15, she is still around. Jeff's parents moved into a new place that she couldn't go to, so we took her in. For an older dog, she has not been difficult. The last few weeks of the year, however, have been really tough on her. California has been extremely cold (actually reaching freezing temperatures) and that is not good for an old dog that has arthritis. We took her to the vet at the beginning of the month, but the first medications she got not only weren't helping her, but made her even more frail and ill. To be honest, we weren't sure she'd make it to the new year, but when we changed her medicine, she went back to being her old self. She's not moving the greatest, but at least she isn't in pain and can get around. We also found another addition this year. Around the fourth of July, a little chihuahua found his way into our garage. We kept him, thinking his family was just on vacation, but no one ever claimed him, and a few weeks later, we discovered why he might have been thrown out. Pepino (what we've named him) is epileptic and prone to seizures. The first time this happened was very scary and we had nighgtmares the next few days about it. Now that we are more versed, we have had his seizures under better control. Medications fortunately aren't that expensive (about $10 for a 60-day script) and they have worked very well for him. He went from about a seizure every 2-3 weeks to now having had his last seizure in October! Both Pepino and Kandi get along great with our other pets, and both Fox and Jacob enjoy having new people to play with when Chris decides he's done with them! But our year wasn't just about the dogs. Both of us have returned to school. Jen took a leave of absence last year because of her migraines, and started back up this past summer. So far she has been doing well with her classes, and this semester she will not have a "bookwork" class. Rather, her bosses at Easter Seals helped her acquire an internship with their speech pathologists. She will be driving to Oakland once a week, every Monday, to do this. It means that, from mid-January until mid-May, she will essentially be "working" 6 days a week, but she is excited to learn more about her company and about how they perform therapy. In fact, her advisors are excited to have her, because they use a play-based method of interaction with the clients and have wanted BIs (Behavior Interventionists, Jen's current position) to come in and show them some tips, so everyone will be learning in this new endeavor. Jeff is also going back to school, and has completed his first term at the local junior college. Because of his company's policy, he is only able to take 2 classes at a time, which works out well enough. So far he has been looking at business classes, but ultimately he wants to go for his MBA as well as his Series 6 and 63 or Series 7. He is still working with New York Life and has enjoyed it thus far. Starting out as a new associate isn't easy but he's had some success, and a lot of his colleagues go to him for questions, especially with the Hispanic market, as Jeff is the only Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking agent in his office in Fremont. Over the past year, Jeff has acquired licenses to sell insurance in California, Utah, Arizona, Idaho and North Carolina, and recently was certified to sell health insurance as well. We haven't been able to travel, but that doesn't mean we didn't have fun! We were able to take the puppies to the snow, we went to two formal galas for our work, we went to different museums, had Thanksgiving in our house for the first time in four years of living here, celebrated our anniversary sick (And had a do-over at the ballet a few weeks later), and enjoyed a VERY long holiday season. This year, we even decked out our house, enjoyed the light show a neighbor put on that got him on the news, celebrated Christmas multiple times, and basically had a holiday-type thing every day from December 22nd until today. We really embraced the holidays! This coming year has a lot more to look forward to: hopefully another snow trip, Jeff's gala coming up in a month, more learning and growing and more travel. But we aren't going to tell you all the details; you'll just have to stay tuned to find out what we are up to. Love you you all, and we hope you had a fun and wonderful 2013. Here's to 2014! Jeffery and Jennifer Perry (and their zoo)

The Christmas Photos, AKA How Jeff Fractured His Ribs

Hello, all!

We hope you all had a great holiday! Unfortunately, this year, our holiday cards won't be in until next week, so I will send out some when I get them. Until then, enjoy the photos of us that I posted. And our card does not have the individual photos of the dogs, so here's an extra special treat!

A story until our next post: We took these at a local park, and Jeff got the idea to try to put the dogs on the playground equipment. It was a VERY cold day in Newark, about 35 degrees when we took the pictures, and there was dew all over the place. Well, Jeff decided to see if Chris would go on the suspension bridge with him. When Chris refused, Jeff walked onto it. 

Now, remember I told you how everything was covered with dew? It also made the bridge extremely slippery, because the next thing we knew, Jeff's feet slipped out from under him, and he fell forward into the bridge. He's feeling much better now, but the holidays were very difficult, and his doctor thinks he fractured his ribs. So for the next few weeks, he will still have to be careful with the lifts!

And now, for your enjoyment, the dogs!! 

(oh, yeah, and us)

Kandi

Fox

Pepino in his jacket. I told you it was cold!

Jacob

Christopher

Jeff and Jen

Happy Holidays from The Perry People!