I. Must. Be. Patient.

I need to write that line 500 times, as we had to do decades ago in elementary school when the nuns wanted us never to forget something important. "You will all write that sentence 500 times on loose-leaf paper and turn it in tomorrow...."

"I must be patient. Savannah is still a puppy."

And believe me, there are days when even if I wrote that sentence five thousand times, I would still lose patience with this very stubborn puppy.

I have no idea what had been on the road last night, but when I walked Savannah this morning she put her nose to the ground and didn't lift it up till we were way across the hill and past our barn and nearly to the very end of our property. (And that's a good long way because we have 23 acres.)

When Savannah finally lifted her head up and realized that she was outside to do something, she peed in the grass and I said out loud "Finally, Savannah, finally!"  She looked at me with puppy eyes and of course didn't know what my problem was.  Well, the problem was that it was very windy this morning up at the top of that hill and I had gone outside without so much as a little glass of orange juice and between walking into the wind and then trying to walk without being pulled into the grass face-first by a 65-pound puppy whose only intention was to track down the wildlife that had walked on that grass before her was, at that moment, indeed a problem.

Needless to say, we didn't have a "big girl walk" this morning. What we had was a crazy puppy walk which featured a wildlife-focused puppy whose only intent was to drive me nuts for half an hour as the wind whipped so hard that my hair was hurting my face.

That was how the morning started. Before we got back to the house, I was talking out loud to Savannah, asking her to remind me again why I wanted to get another dog. I think I asked her that question three times between the top of the hill and the steps of our back porch.

And then, this afternoon.... Thursday is the day when the neighbor ladies come for tea and crafts. It used to be mostly tea and sweets, but now the focus is on the crafts. What began last year as a gossip-filled afternoon with laughter so loud you would think I had thirty women here instead of eight has turned into a very quiet and creative couple of hours when one can hear a pin drop in the dining room. Instead of chattering about local gossip and the best recipe for brownies, the only spoken words are now "Can you please pass the scissors" or "Do you have any extra glitter?"

We were all very busy this afternoon with paper crafts and glass ornaments to fill with tiny keepsakes... and all of a sudden I realized that it was way too quiet... where on earth was this morning's crazy puppy?  I looked in the dog-bed in the breakfast room. No Savannah. She wasn't in the dining room with us (which is where she started out when the ladies arrived at three o'clock), and she wasn't in the kitchen.  Into the living room I went, thinking the worst because that room is filled with lots of things that a puppy shouldn't touch.... and there was Savannah... sleeping right in the middle of the room near the fireplace, curled up into a comma-shape and snoring as softly as a cat would purr.

"What a good girl you are, Savannah."-- that's what I said out loud when I saw her there. Savannah opened one eye just a little bit and the snoring stopped as she looked at me. She was probably thinking "Well of course I'm a good girl... you tend to forget that sometimes."  And then she closed her eyes and curled up into a tighter ball and went back to sleep... and that's where she stayed until all the ladies went home at 5:30.

As I said at the beginning:  I must be patient. We have a good dog here, who just happens to still be a puppy... and from time to time will do very puppy-ish things.