Bridget MacKeith

As it’s Riley’s Special Day, we decided to up our game from the usual preferred Labrador takeaway option, Deliverpoo - sheep 💩 delivered to your door by obliging local farmers 😁 - and go to the Surf ‘n’ Turf specialists Disgousto.

He deserves the best 😍

Look away now if you’re faint-hearted 😬

Happy FIRST birthday to our funny, shiny, silky smooth, lovely boy, Riley, with a heart of gold and the absolute serious intention of doing the right thing right up to the point where he totally forgets.

We love you, Riley!

🖤😍🖤

…plus 2!

Thinking of Xmas? I mean, it IS October, so you really should be 🤭

I have illustrated these cards, available in a pack of 6, for the Labrador UK Action Group, the lovely charity who re-homed Riley with us 😍🖤

Please look them up on Facebook and follow the link if you’d like to buy any ☺️😍

Thank you! ☺️🤗

Today has been brought to you by the words:
Boring, dull and stagnant.

Luckily Riley is a highly intelligent dog who has stepped in in the medical and bakery fields and saved the day.

The Dogtor will see you now.

Just to prove my crude animation skills are still intact 😆

🤣

Thank you! I think it’s that classic change-of-season bug. Loads of people seem to have it - so I’m not special 😠😁

Riley’s First Autumn 🧡💛🤎

Anyway, it’s Gareth’s birthday today! We’ve got building work happening at the moment so our bath’s outside, giving us a hot tub in the garden. Or a tub, anyway.

Everything else will be a damp squib while I moan all day about feeling rough 😰

Home alone & ill all weekend, so spent my time wisely, watching Ferris Bueller’s Day Off & then, following Charlie Sheen’s ‘smouldering cameo’ stumbled across the new documentary about him, which was funny & sad 😕

Riley showed maturity beyond his months because he must have been bored to death 😇

A fine day out in Cardiff. There was wine; food; bouncing (not me 😵‍💫); and the best face-off between two excellent bands who were just loving life and giving us the best time: McFly and Busted.

😍

A fine day out in Cardiff. There was wine; food; bouncing (not me 😵‍💫); and the best face-off between two excellent bands who were just loving life and giving us the best time: McFly and Busted.

😍

Oh that’s so lovely, Sarah! Thank you! 😍 I feel like I’m fiddling while Rome burns, but fiddling is what’s keeping me sane (ish) 😵‍💫 I’ve also just noticed that autocorrect has changed our friend’s name to Adam instead of Sam, so I can sit here and worry about that now 😆

Lucky Lady 🤢

Repeat after me: I am in control, I am in control. And don’t let him see the fear in our eyes, then it will all be fine 🤣

I’m not sure what phase this is we’ve entered, not having had a puppy before - well, not a clever one, anyway - sorry Ringo 🤭 - but I think we’re in it?!

Always in the centre of the action. Always useful 😬

Martha gave me a trip to a local vineyard - Velfrey Vineyard - for a birthday present way back in June. Somehow we managed to put it off until summer finished overnight and the rain arrived 🙄

It was REALLY interesting and the good news is certain hazards were avoided 🤣 Gareth sniffed; I swigged 🤭

Martha is meeting some lovely people along the Camino way, including this couple from Mexico. They’ve been so kind, as have many others.

People may not realise that one of the hazards of engaging with her is that they could end up as an illustration 🤣

Here comes Martha, our daughter, making her way along the Camino de Santiago, collecting friends and tales as she goes!

Keep at it, Marf! You’re doing a great job!

We had an EXTREMELY cosy time in an RV for a couple of nights 😵‍💫 4 squeezed into one, while our other 2 friends pitched next door 😃

I drew this before we went but it turned out to be prophetic as we left early because of the rain, and a creeping fear that we’d get stuck in the mud!

I took my Mum’s 1962 wedding dress on a day out to the Goodwood Revival.

Here are my illustrated highlights, plus an actual photo for a change 😊

Well, there you go! You’re definitely in! 🤗

You can be one of us then 😁🤗

Riley. Turns out he’s actually half-Labrador, half clown.

I love how he misjudges landings, rushes out every evening to find his toad friend, grins in a silly way when you tickle him in a certain spot; &, given he’s Welsh, after the summer we’ve had, is surprised at the sound of rain 😂

And ON our night out I made a lovely new friend who, like me, as a redhead, struggles when she is described as blonde.
It’s a funny thing to have been teased, insulted & offered amateur medical opinions (!) all your life and then have people argue that you’re NOT a redhead, now the colour has faded.

Recently whenever been going out for longer than we would wish to leave Riley alone, we’ve asked our friend Sam if he’d mind coming to keep him company. Just so happens Adam is a talented pianist & composer so now not only does my mum’s piano get an excellent workout, but Riley has a new skill!

Gargle with gravel and then repeat after me:

‘COMING TO A BEACH NEAR YOU….’

We were already calling him this, but then I heard that a lady had said, on seeing him at a distance, ‘Oh! Is that the dog who takes things?’
His reputation goes ahead of him; and destruction follows behind 🤦🏼‍♀️

Happy New Home to my friend Rose 😍 She took a while to say what she’d like to wear in the pic during which time Gareth came up with the bright idea of putting her in her ballet stuff 🤗 I adapted that to a Swan Lake tutu while he, with one bright idea in 30 years, now considers himself an expert 🙄