Walker

This is Cedar Pond's Forest Walker. Born in October 2007 to Saxon ( a yellow Labrador ) and Mabel ( a black Labrador ) both owned by Kathy B. at Cedar Pond.

This is Walker at 6 weeks old. At the time this photo was taken, I did not know he would become my dog. I had a black Lab named Whimsy who lived with me in a house I rented by myself. The same night this photo was taken, I returned home to find my Whimsy, my best friend, had broken out of her kennel and been hit by a car on the dark highway in front of my house. She was 10 years old. My mom planned on selling Walker along with his other litter mates but after the death of Whimsy, she gave me this little black puppy to comfort me. Here he is on my lap the day I took him home. Beside us on the right is my chocolate Lab Wynona. Beside us on the left is his red stuffed bear. He LOVED that bear! He would carry it everywhere. My husband laughs as he recalls the time Walker, toting his bear around outside was looking for a place to "go" potty. He set down his bear and lifted his leg on the grass that was his intended target not realizing he was peeing on his teddy. He leaned down to pick up his bear again but smelled that there was now urine on it. He looked side to side like he was deciding what to do, then with the tips of his front teeth he picked up the bear by the very edge of it's fur - trying not to get any of the 'wet' parts in his mouth. He has been a wonderful dog. He is a very large black Lab and looks very scary at times so I like having him around for protection. He has never jumped up on anyone and isn't one of those "all over you" kind of dogs but boy does he love to retrieve balls and sticks! He can still out run our young whipper snappers and come back with the tossed object. Above he is with our children, on the far right. Wynona, Halle and Tater are next to him.

There have been times we thought for sure he was on death's door. He's 11 and a half years old which is OLD for such a large Lab. We took this photo of him and Wynona when we thought both old dogs didn't have long to live. We wanted Little J to have a photo with our two old doggy family members. Wynona did pass away a week later at age 13 but Walker is still going strong.A little creaky in the bones, sounds like he's about to have a heart attack every time he runs and has to eat much more slowly but the boy's still got it and was out retrieving just a few days ago. I thought ~ why not do a tribute to our wonderful Walker boy while he's still alive??? He still likes to shred every dog pillow we give him, hog the doghouse and kick the girl dogs out and leave the yard when the gate is open to look for the neighbor's garbage but we will miss him terribly when he does finally go and there will never be another Walker and we're thankful for all of the wonderful years of his friendship.