Introducing Ted

The kids and Jules finally wore me down and I agreed to get a dog.  A friend of mine has a beautiful labrador from a breeder in the Hunter Valley so I got in touch and asked what she had available.  I felt that a slightly older dog would be better as I wouldn't be so house bound and she happened to have a 7 month old male.  When I arrived to pick him up I was slightly horrified to see how enormous he was - more polar bear than labrador and already weighing a whopping 30kg!  

 Me and the 3 T's

 Ed 'n Ted

Ted's first swim

For the first week I was worried that we'd made a terrible mistake.  Ted was completely agoraphobic and would not leave the house.  Having grown up in the country he was terrified by all the City sounds and sights - cars, buses, helicopters, building works etc.  I managed one successful walk with Edgar but a week later Ted refused to leave the front yard so at that stage I got fed up and threw him in the back of the car and took him up to Tania Park.  He loved meeting all the other dogs and being out and about so since then I've been putting him in the car and taking him to the park every day.  I still need to lift him into the boot as he's too scared to jump in but I'm hoping that I'll eventually wear him down.  In the meantime I am developing some impressive biceps.  He is generally a very calm dog although I think we should have named him Chewy because he is chewing everything he can including rugs, furniture, thongs, paper, plastic bottles etc etc.  He's destroyed Tess and Jules' thongs and he's eaten 5 socks so far - luckily he's big enough that they go straight through him.  

The kids are both amazing with him and have been so good at taking him for walks in the afternoon, feeding him and playing with him.  I reckon their screen time has reduced by about 80% since the arrival of Ted so I feel like I'm a winner.