by Kelli Bowen
This past weekend we drove almost 3 hours to join my maternal family for a weekend together. We stayed at a hunting lodge (off season) where our kids and dogs could run free. We’ll take the dogs, we thought. This will be fun, we thought.
Our almost 2-year-old rescue dog, Denali, was charming everyone with her beauty and the fact she wasn’t being completely obnoxious…well except maybe my aunt who’s in the dogs-belong-outside school of thought.
Most mornings the dogs and I get up at 5 a.m. and I haven’t been able to explain the concept of weekends to them, so at 5 a.m. they started whining to go out. With my being one of the last people at the bonfire the night before, my less than 5 hours of sleep wasn’t amazing, but I’ve gotten by with less.
The first morning, my brother-in-law was cooking breakfast on his outdoor griddle: eggs and bacon. He may have an unhealthy obsession with his griddle, but from what I hear, it is a special kind of cult we may find ourselves in some day. When he was done cooking, the bacon grease was on the patio.
As the kids were playing in the water and we adults were playing yard games and keeping a semi-watchful eye, we noticed Denali had disappeared. She had gone to the patio and there found herself a bucket of wonder…and a one-way ticket to cable-ville.
Being near noon, we figured she’d have plenty of time to metabolize it. Denali laid there either extremely proud of herself, or in pain, I’m not sure which.
We took her back to the cabin and put her in her crate during dinner. Hubby discovered that while Denali had been in our room, she had “an explosion.” A half roll of paper towels, some dish soap, a garden hose, and some Clorox wipes later, we had the mess taken care of and at least knew the demon had passed.
That night we put both dogs in the crate with the padded bed (that way when they move-we don’t hear them). Hubby was laying with Miss E, Miss A and I were sleeping in the other room.
About 2 a.m. I heard our smallest dog Jack “tap dancing” around our room. He was pacing back and forth like he was trying to find a spot to lay down…odd as I distinctly remember putting him in his crate.
I got up and looked around. Jack was out of the crate. No Hubby with Miss E. No Hubby with Miss A. Denali was laying in the crate with no padded bed, uh oh.
I texted Hubby asking where he had gone and if he needed assistance. He assured me that everything was taken care of, so I went back to sleep, for another couple hours until the dogs felt it time to get up for the day.
I found out that about 1:45 a.m. Hubby was awoken by the frightening sound of a squirt-bang coming from the crate and then took it upon himself to try to clean out the dog bed with the aforementioned garden hose. Apparently the bacon grease felt it needed an encore in the middle of the night.
Sunday, very much sleep-deprived, we had everyone packed up and ready to ride home in the Mom-tank, complete with the soiled dog bed stuffed into a garbage bag. The garbage bag of bedding rode in the crate with Denali on the way home. Jack rode in the front with the humans. We’ll take the dogs, we thought. This will be fun, we thought.
Kelli makes her home in Cass County with her husband, two daughters (8 and 5) and two dogs. She works for a regional seed company by day and tries to be an alright mom, wife, friend and writer by night.
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