Meet the Members of Our Zoo: Cloud

Anyone who knows anything at all about me will recognize this sweet face as the canine love my life:

That's my baby, Cloud. She's a 10.5 year old Lab/Husky mix. She was a stray given to me back in 2000. This dog has been with me through thick and thin, good times and bad, through my divorce and single days and second marriage/stepmomhood. I can honestly say she's one of my best friends: I can tell her anything, I can be a total bitch around her, and she still loves me and goes "Weeeee weeeeeeeee" excitedly when I get home. She is precious and amazing. I love this dog so much sometimes I can hardly believe the depth and hugeness of how I feel about her. I would step in front of a train to save her, if it meant I got five more minutes of life with her. That sounds morbid but now that she's almost 11 and is obviously getting elderly, I think sometimes about life without her (can't even begin to imagine) and I know that my heart is going to shatter when it's her time to go, which is now sooner than it is later. All I can do is enjoy the time I have left with her (God willing at least a few more years, please) and treat her like the sweet princess she is. Yes, she's pretty much spoiled rotten. But she's so adorable!

Cloud is most expressive with her ears: I can tell just by the slant of her ears what's she's thinking. She has the "I Did Something Wrong" ears, the "I Want Something From You" ears and the "You Need to Pet Me" ears. Bill loves to play a game where he puts her ears down and says "Lab" and puts her ears up and says "Husky". Lab Husky. Lab Husky. Haha!

One of the things I love best is how vocal she is: because she's part Husky, pretty much every thought that crosses her mind, she feels compelled to share with everyone else. She can make some pretty freakin' adorable noises when she's excited! Sometimes, every now and then, she gets her Husky on and she howls:

She did this when Bill took Snowball for a run on the bike without her the other day! (Lest you feel sorry for her being left behind, he took Cloud first--you would have thought she'd have been too tired to howl like that, but she wasn't!).

We all know you're not supposed to have favorites but everyone in our house (including the animals) recognizes Cloud's position as Oh Favored One. She's such a good girl, she doesn't even abuse it. :) I love my Cloudybaby!