"A Wonderful Challenge!"

A week after Easter this year, the Donahues endured one of the toughest things to go through, the death of a beloved pet, Dante our Old English Sheepdog. Dante was rescued by us when he was nine months old and he was a integral part of our family for 11 years. He will be remembered fondly, but now a new era has begun...the arrival of 9 week old (was that age when we got him) labradoodle puppy which we have named "Wrigley." Now 11 weeks old he has proved to be cute, lovable and frustrating all at the same time.

Of course being a puppy he wants to chew on everything, but his favorite thing to chew has us all amused. Wrigley loves to chew plastic clothes hangers...yes I said hangers. Kari has a clothes basket with a lot of plastic hangers in it. Wrigley goes over pulls out three to five hangers and chews on one of them. When he is tired of that one he goes back and gets some more. By the time he is done our living room looks like we tried to have a floor made of hangers.

One of the things we are trying to get used to is his tail. Now I know how weird that sounds, but remember we had a dog that had no tail, Dante's was docked when he was born. So we get a chuckle watching his tail wag back and forth when he gets excited. We are also prepared for Wrigley to be a large dog, since the breeder said expect him to weigh around 75 lbs. That will not be a problem since Dante was 95 lbs.

So the next time you come to my office don't be surprised to see this very adorable addition to our family asleep under my desk. I bring him over every day, for a couple of hours, so that he will become used to the office.

Yes it is a new experience in our home, but as each day passes it is obvious that this will be a "wonderful challenge."

"It's Time!"

It has been a long time since I have made an entry into my blog. I am a firm believer that in our spirituality we have different seasons. For the past several months it has not been my season to write. Fortunately I now feel like it is my season to make entries into this blog. So I apologize for it taking so long, but I hope you will now start visiting the blog on a regular basis.

A lot of things have taken place since I last blogged. In February, the West Clark School Board named me Silver Creek High School's head varsity football coach; the church is in a major renovation project; and our youngest son had one of his biggest leads in a Silver Creek High School musical. He played the "beast" in the musical "Beauty and the Beast."

We are also beginning a phase in our lives, that we knew was coming but I don't think you are ever ready for. Mitchell will be graduating from Silver Creek High School in June and in August we will officially become empty nesters. I think as parents we look forward to the day our children go out into the world, but I (for one) will miss having Mitchell's jokes, singing and just being down right crazy in the home.

One thing that makes this empty nester thing more difficult than we were ready for is that our Old English Sheepdog, Dante, was overcome by cancer and now the house will be really quiet. Dante was with us for 11 years and for up to a week before he died, was just the crazy clown he had always been. So the search now begins to find another Old English Sheepdog...I think this time it will be a female...since our last two Old English Sheepdogs were male.

I invite you to check back once a week as I will try and give you some of my thoughts and reports on my faith journey.