first snow

last night our first snow of the season began to fall. this is seamus o'malley's very first snow, and it has been a delight to watch him puzzle at it and lick the ground. last night i held the flashlight so he could see the flakes drifting through the beam of light, and he chased them.

here is the view from our front deck this morning...

worth thousands of words...

our driveway

puppy love

thought i'd share some more photos of seamus o'malley from the past month.

i took him to his second vet visit last weekend, and he had grown from 14.5 lbs to 35 lbs in a month! he is going to be a BIG boy. he keeps us laughing with his constant "talking" at us. you'd think he is part siamese cat! he is also an incredible jumper--i've never seen a dog have mad vertical from a stand still like this one does--so we're looking forward to when he's old enough to dock dive or play frisbee.

the softest ears EVER

attempting a "prison break" (i knew i shouldn't have let him watch "the great escape".)

little dog blue

"stop with the flash already--i'm trying to sleep!"

snuggling after his 1st bath

seamus telling josh about his day

"you first, dad..."

seamus o'malley

before i headed to ireland for MAP in 2002, i jokingly told all my friends that i just knew that i was going to fall in love and marry an irishman named seamus (pronounced "SHAY-mus") o'malley. (making me emily o'malley. heehee!) but the only seamus i met while in ireland was a toothless old man who wandered over during street ministry. sooo...i thought better of marrying him.

ever the romantic, i figured my prediction must've been slightly off, and that there was still bound to be a seamus o'malley i would fall madly in love with. and here he is...

seamus o'malley smoyer

who could help but fall in love with this li'l guy? :o)

and, fittingly, seamus came from one of my dear teammates & roommates from my time in ireland, debby (gifford) vannoy! debs and her husband bred their chocolate lab, mattie, and we were able to bring home one of the 8 pups from that litter.

seamus was born on march 21st, so he is almost 4 months old now. we drove over to chattanooga the weekend of june 21st to pick him up, and were able to squeeze in some good visits with debby's fam, one of my best friends from college, terrie and her fam, and my "surrogate parents", scott & carol collier. we even got to worship at new city fellowship on sunday morning. yaay! it was a whirlwind of a weekend, but a good whirlwind.

terrie & her girls on the coolidge park carousel

a delightful lunch at scott & carol's

debby, sarah, & jon vannoy

meeting seamus for the 1st time