Happy Birthday to our first child

As of last week, Wally is 7 years old.  Wow!  It seems like yesterday that I found this cute little puppy that needed a home and I was immediately smitten.  Fast forward to our first night home where I was asking myself what did I do.  (Very similar to Charlie's first night home, by the way.)  Wally immediately became my best friend and brought me so much joy while the two of us lived on our own for a year.  During that year, Wally made himself a friend that stopped by and gave him walks.  He also taught me to love running and was my travel companion in the car.  I think he also quickly learned that life was going to be okay as long as Matt was around as Matt always brought Wally something nice whenever he came to visit.  I thought the dog only adored me until I saw how he took up with Matt.  Matt and Wally immediately became best buddies and Wally stole Matt's heart just as quickly as he stole mine. 

We've had so much fun since moving to Richmond in 2007:  going to the dog park, taking walks, hanging out with our friends and their dogs, etc..  We officially became a family of 3 in 2008 and Matt even drew up adoption papers when we got married.  :-)  Wally is holding on the Matney name though.  He just added one more name to his long formal name, Wallace (Wally) LaDainian Papi Matney Wheawill. 

As of 2011, our family grew and I realized that Wally really worked at at preparing us for Charlie in many ways.  All of those throw up episodes weren't even close to what Charlie did within 2 weeks of being home.  Wally taught us a little about child proofing when he ate the chicken wings and bones and then the phone book because we think his mouth was on fire and he had already drank all the water from his water bowl. 

Life certainly has changed for little Wally since he went from being an only child to sometimes the forgotten child.  We haven't been to the dog park since before May 10th, 2011 and walks these days are a little more involved, with a stroller or wagon.  He gets his tail pulled, ridden like a horse and even a few times, he's had some fingers in his eyes.  But he loves Charlie and for that, I'm so thankful.  Wally is such a good dog and greets us with a smile everyday when we come home.   I can always count on him to be right by my side at night and first to greet me in the morning.  :-)

Keeping with tradition, we took Wally to Three Dog Bakery to pick out some treats.  Charlie got to help but I could see that this year would bring it's own challenges.  The treats look so delicious and the "pup"cake was just too much for Charlie and he started saying "me" while we were picking it out.  We then celebrated last night after dinner and to help Charlie understand that Wally got his own cake and to aslo help make the occasion fun for Charlie, we had chocolate cupcakes.  Wally's dinner consisted of his favorite, bacon fried toast which he finished off with his very own cake. 

Here are a couple videos and a few pictures from the big birthday party:

 

Charlie fully approved of this birthday party!  The boy loves chocolate.  :-) 

 

Here are a few pictures I came across from Wally's birthdays years past:

(As you can see, the hats come out every year!)