From the moment we met Bailey at the Oregon Humane Society in 2009, we knew he was our dog. We almost didn't get him as he had a waiting list of people wanting to adopt him. Fortunately for us, he had some broken teeth that OHS was going to take care of for free. However, if we wanted him right then and there we could commit to taking care of the teeth ourselves at our expense. It was a no brainer for us. We were leaving with him.

At the time, OHS named him "Dude" and appropriately so. We often would resort to saying "DUDE!" every time he would jump up to the table, or counter, or anywhere else that had food for him to grab. This was his worst habit. Something we never could fully train out of him. However, we could tell he *wanted* to be good... he just couldn't tear his food instincts away. We also found our his other downfall pretty quickly. He was very attached to us, his pack. He had separation anxiety pretty bad and we learned quickly after some ruined doors that we had to leave him in the crate when we left. No matter how many times we came back, he would ALWAYS bark when we left and returned as if we were going to leave him forever. I always wish we had a window into his first 2.5 years of life to see why he was this way, but we just loved him anyways.

He was mischievous, that was for sure. Nose to the ground on walks and god forbid if he ever got off leash! He would tear off into the brush, and gave us a few scares when we were camping or at the beach. Typical Beagle behavior from what we were told. So, we kept him on leash and did our best to satisfy his instincts. However annoying he could be, he displayed the good things ten fold. One of the most loving and playful dogs I ever had. He surprised us even towards the end when our son was born. He would sit there and let the kiddo pull on his ears with not much of a fuss (except for maybe a glare my way to ask for help). Always at our feet, at our sides, cuddling on the bed and following us around. Very friendly with other dogs and always wanting to play, no matter how tired he got. He made cleaning our hardwood floor very easy. Most of the time the floor never even touched the ground!

We came home from a weekend trip in September 2018 and he wasn't eating well. This was a huge warning sign to us, but we figured it was just him not feeling well. I took him to the Vet a couple of days later to get some tests done and the results came back with Lymphoma. We were devastated. We thought we had more time as he was only 11.5 years old. The next week things progressed VERY fast and at 2:05am on Tues, Sept 18th, 2018 we had someone come put him to rest.

He was our buddy. Our family. He celebrated many life milestones and we will never forget him. Thank you for being our dog. <3
-Jon & Allison & Theo