Swim Meets, Father's Day, and a NEW BABY

Let's not bury the lede here, we became a family of 6 today.

Sir Winston Churchill has joined our family from the Lone Star Bulldog Club Rescue organization. He is approximately 4 years old, weighs a stocky 65 lbs, and has a tongue that won't quit.

James surprised me by submitting an application to adopt from the bulldog rescue group about 4 weeks ago, on what turned out to be the 1-year anniversary of Tex's passing. We had just put the kids to sleep that night when he said, "hey, I have a surprise for you, we have a call in 10 minutes to be interviewed to maybe adopt a bulldog."

Whaaaa?

He knew I was ready to add another animal to our family whenever he was, but I thought he might not be ready until our kids left our house. But on what he says was an impulse he researched lazy dog breeds- in his paraphrased words, "we're active people who are super lazy at home... I want a dog that doesn't make me feel guilty when I work out in a gym and not by taking it on long walks every day." So true.

1 block walking

So we had our call, learned a lot about bulldogs, explained our wants and limitations, waited for our home visit, added rocks to block a gap we'd never noticed under our fence, waited for another home visit, and then we were approved! Winston Churchill popped up on the website somewhere in the middle of this process and James emailed our liaison at nearly midnight when we saw him. He was an owner surrender by a college student who was going up north for medical school and didn't think she could keep taking care of him. He does not have a sad story and has been loved every day of his clearly happy life.

We had a "meet and greet" last night after the swim meet. It went well, though he was a little aggressively affectionate with Cora. Not actually aggressive, he just REALLY wanted to love on her and since he weighs double what she does, she did "not like that Mom." But we all think he'll chill out once the kids are an everyday thing instead of an exciting novelty.

Speaking of the swim meet- because we have to - it was also on Saturday and it was awesome.

We all wore our new team t-shirts, matching as only the coolest of families do.

Cora donned a swim cap for warm-up and I got a million pictures because Cora in a swim cap is my new favorite Cora.

"No mama, I like it like this, 'kay?"

her poor adorable ears

She LOVES her "sweeming."

James remains the only person she acknowledges as coach and I love the two of them together SO much.

Tiny swimmer, big pool.

Cora's 25 free was amazing. She wasn't intimidated the by the big pool or giant blocks and spent the minutes leading up to her heat dancing for the crowd.

She managed to add time from last week, mostly because she started her race with a front flip over the wall and took a little while to figure out what she was supposed to be doing once she came back to the surface. Then she discovered lane ropes and thought those were fun to hang on, but once James coaxed her away from the rope, she found her focus, and her 1:45 second swim ended in the biggest round of applause of the night.

Love her. Even if her method of entry almost made me drop my phone.

My new suit came in the mail the day after my last swim meet, so I finally looked like a coordinated member of the team.

Lag Liv Family Swimmers!

My plan of just showing up for meets and not swimming in between is working out well so far. I dropped time in all my events, and though I had to swim next to James in the 100 free (ugh) and he beat me by 16 seconds (UGH), I still got second- beating all the men and feeling quite speedy indeed (even though I STILL didn't break a minute- 1:01.00. Next time, I can feel it.).

In my long break between 100 free and 100 IM I snuck some old school swim meet nachos in the stands with Cora. Mr. I-packed-us-all-almonds-for-snacks didn't need to know.

It was an afternoon meet, which is weird, and in Southlake 45 minutes away, so it made for a long day. Particularly since we went to visit Winston on the far side of Dallas afterward.

We got home at 9:30 and everyone was exhausted. The kids let us sleep in until 9, which was amazing, and then even more amazing- we realized the TV wasn't on when we woke up! The kids had slept in past 8 and then used their time to surprise make James Father's Day cards since we didn't have time to properly prepare on Saturday.

They were adorable.

And 3-dimensional!

We went on a short walk/bike ride/shoulder ride, tested out some new exercise equipment at our park, and then explored a river bed at the insistence of Landon.

Father's Day Adventuring

Then we just lazed about the house debating whether or not we should really get a dog.

It felt like when we used to debate having a third baby. We could think of so many reasons not to and yet we wanted one anyway. Finally we just pulled the trigger and texted the foster mom, made our kids very happy, and piled everyone in the car for another hour+ drive past Dallas.

And came home with this fine fellow.

And now here we are, a family of six once again. Winston is snoring up a storm in his crate in the living room. He was in the TV room but he breathes so loud we couldn't hear our movie over his noises and I think the violent stylings of John Wick II weren't exactly soothing to him in his new environment. We're looking forward to getting to know the little/big man and to start using all the bulldog care accessories I ordered on Amazon on my way home from Dallas. I look forward to sharing his antics and the stories of cleaning his nose folds with you all for years to come!