Her Favorite Black Uggs

 She LOVES my black Uggs!

Meet Tris

It has been forever since I last blogged, but I felt like Tris deserved her own post. She will be one of our favorite family memories we never want to forget. The kids have been asking forever to get a dog. I have been so overwhelmed with life with 5 kids that my answer was always "no." Still in the back of my mind, I knew that eventually I would have to bite the bullet and give in. I grew up with dogs and can't imagine my kids missing out on having a pet (no matter how much work it takes). My favorite dog growing up was Chelsea. She was a yellow lab. Clark's favorite dog who made the move to Indiana with him from California was Gretzky, a golden retriever. We decided on a yellow lab. Alexis and I are totally outnumbered, and so we decided we wanted a girl. Christmas seemed the best time b/c I wanted to surprise the kids. It did make for a lot of secrecy which was very hard. They had to think we weren't sending out Christmas cards b/c our new addition was our theme. Then I had to stress every day and with every text that someone was going to give it away. In the end I think 4 out of 5 kids were surprised. Nick had the thought of a dog on his radar at the last minute.  We were not able to get the dog until after Christmas b/c she was still too young, but we were able to go visit her on Christmas morning. Kids were counting down the days until we brought her home after that.

 Ummm... I thought about leaving out an important but embarrassing part of the story, but I have never been one to shy away from the truth so try not to laugh too hard. The day after Christmas Clark called and said we had a "slight emergency." What? We haven't even brought the dog home and already an emergency. I was not expecting what he said next. When Clark and I went to pick out the dog originally the girls were separated from the boys for us to pick and then the owner clipped a part of the tail hair so we could identify our dog. So all I thought we were looking at were girls. Well turns out nobody paid any attention, and we actually picked a boy dog. WHAT? I think of this a payback for all the women Clark has told were having a girl when surprise it turned out to be a boy. I had my heart set on a girl. Actually after this I really thought hard about taking 2 but figured that would not be smart with our crazy life. I went back and picked a girl. Still sort of feel like that boy was supposed to join our family too.

Moving along. After several visits to see our dog last Sunday was finally the day we were getting to bring her home. Of course this day also happened to be the same day of a major snow storm around here. I had gone to work crazy early to avoid the snow, and as soon as I got home Clark took off with the big kids to go get our girl.  This first picture is our dog meeting her family for first time. I am sure it must have been on overwhelming experience.

 Clark, Nick, Ryan and Landon had only a few minutes to spend with our new dog b/c they were needing to hit the road to travel to Chicago for the Sharks vs Blackhawk's game. We were having a tough time deciding if they should go or not with the horrible weather and roads but boys wanted to go and we had 800 dollars in tickets, so they went. They made it there in 4 hours which considering the conditions was great.

 Her first meal. You would think this girl never gets to eat the way she attacks her food.

 Before the boys left we threw around a bunch of name ideas. The day kids learned we were getting a dog we thought maybe her name would be Bella. Then few days before she came home I thought we had changed it to Tally. When she actually got home I guess the name game was still on. Several people wanted Tris. Officially her name would be Beatrice but she will be called Tris for short. Alexis hated it and was mad but several of the boys wanted this, and I just wanted something to call her. We decided not to make any final decisions until later. Still during the day Alexis and I needed to call her something, so Tris was her name. Later in the day when my mother went on and on about how she hated the name (making me like it all the more) I asked Alexis if she would like to change it. For someone who hated it at first she was very insistent that Tris was her name, and we were NOT changing it.

So here is our girl.....TRIS

 I will say that having only 2 kids and all day to get to know the dog worked out great. We loved on her ALL day. We took her out every 30 minutes to 1 hour. Luckily she was willing to potty in snow b/c we got around 12 inches of snow essentially closing down everything in Indiana.

 Tris seemed very attached to me and Alexis. She wanted to touch us a lot. Lots of cuddle time. Here she is sleeping on Alexis.

 Sisters......they LOVE each other.

 Now we are on to day number 2 with Tris. I look really tired b/c sleep really did not happen. We are crate training our dog. This is something I have never done, but it has been recommended by enough people that I felt it was our best way to go. My mom may never let me live it down b/c she thinks it is horrible and enjoyed telling me that if I would just let her sleep in bed with me, I would have slept fine. Tris can sleep in my bed all she wants when she is trained, but for now this is what we are doing. She hated her crate. Cried all night. I was warned about this, so I was not surprised. I laid on floor next to her crate with my fingers in her crate all night. We continued our once per hour potty breaks. By morning I was exhausted. Clark and the boys had a great time at the game. Sharks won in 3:2 shoot out. Problem was that they were stuck in Chicago after the game b/c the weather. When I say everything was closed b/c of this snow storm... I mean EVERYTHING was closed from roads, schools, businesses, work, etc. So for much of the day it was still the 3 of us (me, Alexis, Adam) loving on Tris.

 Her favorite spot to sleep is either on top of or at least touching my Uggs.

 Moving along. Everything was still closed on Tuesday. By this point I had been on call for over 90 hours so I was going crazy with phone calls. Still it was a great start to life with Tris b/c we had lots of time just to love on her and get used to each other. This day Alexis and I decided our girl wanted to be clean, so it was bath night. Here are a few shots from her first bath. Adam was taking pictures while Alexis and I bathed her. She didn't seem to mind too much. We tried to go fast.

 Here she is again on my Uggs.

 Looking more tired every day that passes. Now I think we are on Wednesday. Still life is on hold for storm. Kids seem to never be going back to school and everyone going stir crazy. Since I have to watch the dogs every move while we are training her, I have been stuck in kitchen and living room for days now. Training is going okay. We have only had 3 accidents. Only one partial one on my watch. My biggest annoyance is the constant reminders to kids to close doors and keep things off the floor. I am constantly monitoring the area for small things Tris could choke on. She is doing better in her crate at night. Basically Clark and I take shifts which works much better for us.  This is how we survived triplets. Usually he takes first shift, and I take over around 2am. Last night he was at hospital for delivery, so I took first shift and he slept on floor next to crate starting at 1 am.

 Of the triplets, Adam probably loves on her the most. He tells her he loves her all day long. He is so happy to have a dog. I think Ryan will do better when she is past the biting phase b/c he just doesn't know what to do with that. Landon is such a busy body that he pays attention to her some but then is off doing something else. Big kids are huge help with her.

 Doesn't she look so sweet. We are so looking forward to making lots of fun memories with her!!

Welcome to the family Tris! We love you!!