Lil' Buddy Diapers

We had such a wonderful Christmas!

My mother's side of the family came over Christmas Eve night for dinner.  We had a delicious Roanoke Beef Tenderloin- melts in your mouth!, Mashed Potatoes (Lilly Pulitzer's recipe- it's to die for!!!), Green Bean & Tomato Casserole (an unusual but delicious combination), Sweet Potato Casserole, Corn Pudding, Yeast Rolls, Honeybaked Ham, Butterbeans, Pecan Pie and Chocolate Pumpkin Pie.  What a delicious meal!!!

While preparing dinner, I noticed everyone gathered at the laundry room door and so I stopped mashing potatoes long enough to see what all the fuss was about.  A tiny and very old poodle had wandered into our garage.  He was freezing and starving and looked quite pitiful so I, of course, brought him in, gave him a warm bath and fed him a little supper.  He was filthy and covered in fleas.  His fur was quite matted and he smelled awful.  He had cataracts on his eyes and was obviously blind and appeared to be deaf as well.  Poor little guy!

We gave him a flea pill and the fleas were all dead in about 30 minutes (it's called Capstar for those interested- it is amazing!).  Once he was cozy and full, he curled up in a blanket and went to sleep.

I knew he belonged to someone because he was house broken.  He would bark and I would take him out.  He would potty and then I would bring him back in- such a little sweetie!

We don't have a dog.  We used to have an Old English Sheepdog named Lacey.  She was a very smart and beautiful dog.  She was 14 when she started having seizures.  The vet put her on medication for the seizures but over time the meds stopped working and the seizures were happening more often.  They would cause her to be unable to move and she often lost control of her bowels.  Our daughter was less than a year old at the time, so it was unnerving to allow her to be around Lacey because you never knew what would happen.

The day my husband took her to the vet and returned home without her was such a sad day.  When he got home it was apparent that he had been crying but he didn't want to talk about it, so I just loved him and tried to cheer him up. 

We have been talking about possible getting a dog again, but my husband isn't the easiest to persuade.  His heart still belongs to Lacey and I'm not sure he's ready to get another dog.  But finding this sweet little poodle was almost like a sign.  We jokingly kept calling him "a christmas miracle".

My brother (17) and sister (19- I am 30) and I love to watch Elf (with Will Ferrell), it's one of our favorite Christmas comedies.  We started calling the poodle "Lil' Buddy Diapers" (if you've seen the movie then you'll remember the part when the baby crawls out of Santa's bag and the elf reads the diaper and says "I think his name is Lil' Buddy Diapers"), mostly as a joke, but it sort of stuck and everytime one of my kids would call him we all just busted out laughing because it was so funny to hear them say "Lil' Buddy Diapers" so seriously.  We're stupid, I know!

We just fell in love with LBD.  He was such a sweet little lapdog- possible the ugliest dog you've ever seen, but the sweetest and most well behaved all the same.  He slept in our bedroom on top of a big, warm quilt.  He would sleep most of the day and wake up only when he had to potty or was hungry.  I emailed the local newspaper to run an ad to try to find the owners and had decided to take him to the vet on Monday and possibly to the groomers.

Tonight our summer babysitter came over to see the kids and I asked her if she knew anyone in the neighborhood that had lost a little old poodle (her parents live down the road) and of course, she did.  One of her friends had lost his dog- he had her since he was 3.  She immediately called him and he came right over and identified Lil' Buddy Diapers as "Nestle" (apparently Nestle used to be chocolate brown but age had left him very gray.  He was so excited to have found him and we were excited that Nestle was going home to his family, but it also bittersweet because Nestle had become part of our family.  We had bathed him and fed him by hand (he didn't have any teeth!).  We had loved him and cared for him and now he was leaving us.

Nestle is 15 years old, deaf, blind and toothless, but he was our little Christmas miracle.  He lives just a few houses down the street so I'm sure we will visit often.  My dad said something good would come of all this.  I sure hope so because I'm awfully sad that he's gone. 

The Bible says that we often entertain angels, perhaps that's how Nestle (or Lil' Buddy Diapers, it's so much more fun to say) found our doorstep.  Maybe it was time for us to open our hearts and our home to a dog again. 

It's funny how Christmas magic works.

(I'm trying to find a picture of LBD- my sister took a thousand, so maybe she will email them to me.)