First Wednesday without Kelsie.

Today Robert worked from home. Yes, indeed, only one week after his surgery. It's spring break, so our normal routine is gone at the moment. Usually Robert heads off to Scout Canada meeting with his cub scouts. He's a leader and enjoys it immensely. When the weather was good, and when Kelsie felt more peppy than she has been the past 2 weeks, she would always know when he was returning home around 9 pm and she would always be anxiously waiting at the back door, looking out the sliding glass door to see if she could see him. Each night Robert would take her for a walk around the block. On nice evenings I would often go with them. Lately the walks were very slow, and just up to Wellington, across the street, up half a block, and back. That's all she could manage lately. Just a week ago, before Robert went on his trip to Victoria with the cubs, we took her for a long walk, as she seemed up to it. We walked all the way to Ann Street and back along the lane and up Ruby. Kelsie was going really slow by the time we got half way up the street. That was our very last long walk together.

 I took her for her very last walk, just by myself, last Friday March 16. Little did I know it was the last. We went up the street, to the right, and down the back lane. Kelsie seemed really happy and I'm so glad I had that last wander with her. She was a terrific walker up until last summer. I even walked all the way to my parent's home last May, although that nearly did her in. I miss my walking buddy so much. We often took afternoon rambles together, and it was really sad to see her get older. But of course it was inevitable! She didn't have any arthritis as we left the laundry room floor on for her each night. Lately I'd just kept it on full time as we've had a very cold and damp winter. The first photo above is of Paul and Matthew walking Kelsie in Oct 2001. On that day she was 6 months old. The last photo was taken Feb 20. This is the last dinner photo with Kelsie in it; she always loved to have her picture taken!