Reading and Playing (by: Carlo)

Yesterday was filled with FUN stuff! It was the perfect day... I wish we could do that kind of stuff ALL the time, EVERY single day!

In the morning, my pal and her SGF took Lucky, me, and Gerrit on a long walk. Then, my pal took me to my very first R.E.A.D. session at the library. For those of you who don't know, my pal and I recently became an official registered R.E.A.D. Program team. R.E.A.D. (which stands for Reading Education Assistance Dog) is a program that started in 1999 to help improve the literacy skills of kids, by having them read to dogs! The idea behind the program is that kids will improve their reading skills if they read while doing something fun... and what's more fun than reading to a dog?! Plus, us dogs aren't like adults... we don't criticize kids or correct them for making mistakes. We just let them relax and be themselves!

When my pal and I first started looking into the R.E.A.D. program and going through the application process, I thought I was going to enjoy it... but, dang I had NO idea just how much I would enjoy it! It's awesome! There were 3 other R.E.A.D. teams at the library yesterday and each team got their very own blankie and pillows. We had two different sessions... so, two different kids read to me! "My" kids were a boy and a girl. They were sooooo nice. I put my paw on the girl's lap and she pet my paw the whole time she read to me. And, the boy... he kept selecting books about dogs that looked just like me! My favorite book was about a service dog named Buddy!

After the R.E.A.D. program ended we headed up to Tahoe with Gerrit, Nick, and Nick's puppy raiser. Every year our local chapter of CCI has an annual snow day event in Tahoe. The event is held at a puppy raiser's house... they have a HUGE back yard. This is the first year I got to go cause I think last year it was canceled because of a storm or something. Anyways, snow day is the bomb! There were about 40 dogs there and TONS of snow. We played, and played, and played. My pal did make us stop playing a few times... like when she took our portrait above in our cool blue bandannas (which we wore so that she could easily spot us among all the other yellow dogs playing). But, other than that, we PLAYED!

Gerrit, as usual, ran non-stop...

And, he played keep away games with snowballs... which made NO sense to me. This photo is of Gerrit (in the shadows) and Nick trying to take a snow ball away from some poor sap...

I, on the other hand, played more sophisticated games like dance revolution (without a Wii)...

And, I played football (minus a football)... yes, that is me getting body slammed...

After we got home from Tahoe, we all crashed! Sure am glad today is Sunday so we can all recuperate from yesterday's fun!