Kathy,
Good to hear from you.  I am doing well. I'm glad you liked the Christmas card, I think it turned out pretty well.  I wanted to get a good family picture before Mike went off to Iraq.  I took that with my tripod and camera timer.  Christmas was good, and we stayed busy, even taking a four day trip to Kauai, which was lovely.  My parents spent the holiday with us.  Mike left the first week in January, and we miss him, but have gotten into a routine that keeps us busy and the days seem to go by fast.  I am firm on getting the kids into bed by 8pm.  So I can have a few hours in the evening all to myself. I think this helps me to stay sane.

Wow, it's so nice of you to donate the puppies to become assistance dogs!  Your dogs are wonderful and I know they will make for a good line of dogs for that purpose.  I love Sulley more and more as the time passes.  He is such a excellent dog!  Maddie is so attached to him!  She usually won't even share him with Noah or Grace, he is her dog as far as she's concerned.  He sleeps with her at night.  She actually lays her head on him like he's her pillow!  He doesn't mind, but he waits untill she falls asleep and slips out from under her and lays on the floor or the foot of her bed.  I think maybe he gets to hot.  Then he jumps up on the bed with me for the rest of the night.  He is just the best dog! 

I keep thinking maybe we'll order another from you someday, but probably best to wait a little while longer.  Since we are moving soon.  But the kids keep saying they would like to have one more dog, so that they get the opprotunity to love on one. Maddie really won't let them pet or love on him at all.  It's too funny!  The other two have to sneak when she's not looking and pet and love on him. I told them maybe we will someday.  I certainly love the one we have now, and I bet he'd love the company, he just loves to play with other dogs.  In the mean time I am trying to encourage my brother in law to get a labradoodle from you for his family.  They live in California.  They have wonderful children.

We move May 1st, that's the day we actually fly out of here to Montery California.  I have good friends in the San Francisco area and they love dogs and have a golden retriever, they are going to pick us up from the airport and we will stay with them as long as we need to.  We will hopefully be given a home by the military right away.  It's nice to have some friends to stay with though, especially ones that will take in Sulley too!  I don't want to board him, I just hate that, and I haven't had to do it once yet!

I will keep this email address, I have no plans to change it, but I will of course give you a forwarding address once I get a house.  If you are ever in Northern California in the next two years, please let me know, you are welcome in our home anytime!  I do hope we get to visit you sometime in Australia, I really would love to see such a beautiful country, with such unique wildlife. 

I can't believe how much rain you've had!!  Wow, we had that happen here a couple years ago.  It was 40 days and 40 nights of rain, seriously unbelievable.  It was really depressing, and caused a lot of flooding.  I know what you mean about the mold, ugh!  Yuck!  We are always fighting a losing battle with it here, since is almost always humid.  It has been really pleasant lately though, almost spring like, cool and breezy.  I have had all the windows open lately and it's so refreshing!  Even spotted some humpback whales passing by outside from the backyard!

We had a great day today, I treated the kids to a movie, called The Spiderwick Chronicles, based on the children's books of the same name.  They really enjoyed it, and so did I!  Then they passed out Valentines to the neighborhood kids and received some as well.  They had a good time.  Mike managed to send flowers even from Iraq and I was so surprised to get them. 

They are planning a doodle romp for April 20th here, and it will be hosted at the house where Tom Selleck's character, Magnum PI lived in the TV show.  It's a really nice estate and will be awfully nice to visit. Should be a lot of fun.  Wish you were closer, would be nice to have you attend.

Anyway, we are all doing really well and in good health.  I hope despite the rain and mold you are doing well and the pups and dogs are all well even though they must be soggy most of the time!  It was really nice to hear from you.  I am attaching a photo of Maddie and Sulley that I took recently.  I just love it, because they are such good buddies.  Feel free to add it to your website with your photos of families and their dogs if you want.  I will try and send a photo of Maddie asleep on him, it's so sweet!  Talk to you later.

Take care,
Kate