We had a wonderful year with some sad endings, some happy beginnings, and lots of special memories.

While every session doesn’t get put on the blog, a lot do.  Here is our 2009 blog in review:

Thanks to all of our wonderful friends and supporters!

We love that we get to see Abbey and Shakespeare, two very sweet Basset Hounds, every year, and each year it’s something new and different. This year, we decided to go to Mount Vernon, the house where George Washington lived. Interestingly enough, we found historical references that Lafayette brought Basset Hounds to George Washington as a gift, so they fit right in.

Mount Vernon allows dogs and is a great place to visit with your best friend.  (Leashes are required, and Abbey and Shakespeare were on leash the whole time – any images sans leashes were removed in Photoshop.)

They posed for the standard pictures . . .

. . . then we set off to look at all of the cool things Mount Vernon has to offer . . .

. . . we found a lot of interesting people at work and got to see inside some of the cabins   . . .

The outside of Mount Vernon is really nice as well, especially the back that looks out to the Potomac River.

We enjoyed looking at the interesting farm animals . . .

. . . and I think they enjoyed looking at us!

Thanks to Mount Vernon for being so welcoming and for allowing dogs to visit this historic and beautiful place.  Tails were wagging the whole time.

Can’t wait for their next adventure!!!!

I recently had the opportunity to see the unloading of wild horses and burros in Virginia with my friend, Kathy Winkler, who is a wonderful painter.  They were brought here by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) who rounded them up in Illinois.  They are all descendants of animals that were released or escaped from Spanish explorers, ranchers, miners, the U.S. Cavalry, and American Indians.  If it looks like they are at risk of not having enough food or water, the BLM gathers them and offers them for adoption to qualified applicants.  To find out more about the program, visit:  http://www.blm.gov/wo/st/en/prog/wild_horse_and_burro.html

Who knew there were longhorns in Virginia?  A friend of mine did – she is an incredible painter who specializes in painting longhorns.  You have to see her work to believe it – go to http://www.dejavuimpressions.com/.  (BTW, she also does commissions for other animals as well.)

We went to a longhorn ranch together one foggy morning.  Here is what it looked like:

These guys were in the same field as a couple of horses.