Seriously.
You guys are all the best. I love reading all your comments, they always make me smile.
So I’m sorry I’ve been lousy at replying to them and I’m especially sorry I’ve been lousy about commenting at your blogs in return. I will be better about this.

I want to share something with you guys. Something that has just brightened my days.

One day I opened my email and found one of the sweetest messages I have ever received.
It was from one of my lovely blog readers. She told me she was a new reader and she loved all the shenanigans my pack gets into.
Then, as if that wasn’t enough to make my day, she tells me she found a vintage Lassie book that she would like to give to me as a gift, because she knew how hard it is to lose a pet.
I had been missing Ella a lot that day, as I do every day (has it really been two months already? It feels as though it’s only been a few days), so her email had me in tears.
These selfless little acts of kindness always get to me.
They may seem little, but they mean so much to me.
I’m about to put myself in tears again, so let’s skip ahead to this past weekend, when this lovely gift arrived and made my entire week.

This book is in beautiful condition. It’s something I will always treasure.
The artwork is beautiful. The story is adorable. I can’t get over it.
I keep putting it back in the bubble wrap it was mailed in for safe keeping.
I know: dork.

I told Jade, the lovely gift-giver, that I would get a picture of Lassie with this book.
Well, the weekend ended up being a bit of a whirlwind for me, so I wasn’t able to get pictures of either of my collies with our Lassie book until Tuesday.
This post was actually meant to be posted on Tuesday, but one thing or another prevented that— like me wanting more pictures, but not feeling well enough for it—, so I took a few more photos on Wednesday.

Which basically means: prepare yourselves for a large amount of photos, because I’m not just going to post the best ones, I’m going to post the bloopers as well.
Why?
Because they make me giggle and I hope you’ll kick out of them, too.

I get lots and lots of compliments on well my collies pose and behave for the camera. And it’s true, they are excellent models.
But even they have their moments.
(And I always have those moments and they’re so patient about it, so they’re allowed to have moments of their own ;))

We’ll start with what is quite possibly my favorite blooper of the bunch.

Yes. She was seriously watching a bird fly in the sky.
I have always loved this about her. She’s so observant and she’s always been so fascinated by flying birds. But c’mon, Petal! You’re not a bird dog! Focus!

Also, notice Lassie has reading glasses on?
I thought this was hilarious, but we quickly ran into a bit of a problem. Whenever I would toss them treats, Lassie would look down to get it, and the glasses would slide down his nose and then they’d get all slobbery and booger-y.
So I didn’t bother with the glasses much after that as I wasn’t in the mood to mess with them, for one, and two, I wanted him to look down. You’ll see why in this next picture.

See? When he looks down he looks like he’s really reading the book!
This picture makes me smile.
But Petal, it looks like I caught her in mid-wink or something.
And the shadows. Heh, right, I should have them facing the other way.
Oops. My bad.

So let’s relocate them and try again.

I love this one, even if Petal did get distracted again.

I like this one, even if they are all squinty eyed. I wish I had got them paying attention to the book though. But it was kind of hard to get them to look at the book without getting close enough to drool on it (did I mention I keep putting the book back in it’s bubble wrap?).

Even though Petal is watching something else, again, I kind of like this one.

I think this is one of my very favorites from Tuesday.

On Wednesday we went out to get a few pictures for Wordless Wednesday, and a few more pictures of them with the book. There aren’t really any bloopers (on the dogs’ part, I made plenty of camera setting mistakes, haha) to share from Wednesday, so I’ll just share my top three favorites from then.

These two I edited slightly, adjusting the lighting and colors and stuff, but this next one I left unedited.

Then yesterday, when taking pictures of just the book itself (the first two pictures in this post), I snapped this quick picture too.

I’m telling you, I’m having far too much fun with this book.
It has made my week.

I can’t thank you enough for this, Jade. It was so kind of you to think of me and to give me such a sweet gift. And don’t worry, I will find a safe place to display it without the bubble wrap. 😉

Jade easily could’ve sold this treasure in her Etsy shop, but instead she offered it to me as a gift. How sweet is that?
So to give her just a small token of my appreciation, I’m going to leave links to her Etsy shops, her new blog, and her Facebook and Twitter accounts below.
Feel free to go and check her out if you’d like!

Jade’s vintage Etsy shop: Junk In Da Trunk Girls
Jade’s handmade Etsy shop: Jadarie Handmade
Jade’s Blog: Junkn Jadarie
Jade’s Twitter
Jade’s Facebook

Thank you, Jade!

P.S. Has anyone else been driven crazy by my new font?
I totally adored it yesterday, but today I’m thinking, “It doesn’t even look like I wrote this.”
Like my old font was my actual handwriting or something, hah!
So if you notice my font changing and changing back and changing again, I’m sorry, but it’s bugging me.