Yes, I celebrate my dog's birthday...

Every year. And I kind of make a deal about it. Like pupcakes and tiny hats and wrapped gifts. It's not because I wish I had children and I'm trying to fill that place inside of me (shut up) by lavishing my dog with affection and anthropomorphizing her every move. I do it because my dog is pretty awesome. I don't have to be fake maternal with her (because if you ever see me being maternal, I'm faking it). Lulu has happy coming out of her ears. She makes me laugh every day. She gets me out of bed every morning. And today, she's four.

Last month, I attended a super cool event called BlogathonATX (a whole day of blogging and meeting other bloggers and learning from experts...if you don't have something like this in your city, you should start one) and I met Allison from Printcopia, one of the event's sponsors. We had a nice chat about swag and Yelp's fingerless gloves (pretty sure the best goodie bag item ever). After the event, Allison sent me an email and asked if I'd be interested in a promo offer from Printcopia to try one of their new canvas prints (of course I was!).   

Since Lulu's birthday was coming up, I knew I wanted a canvas print of her, but because I have a million thousand photos of my babydog, I thought it was going to be a really difficult decision. Then I discovered that you can browse through your own Instagram and Facebook photos during the canvas print design process. Once I linked my accounts, it was easy to preview what they would look like on canvas. I played around with the design options (wrapping, colored borders, even enhancing the image quality). I finally decided on one, placed my order, and hoped it would come in before Lulu's birthday. It arrived just a couple of days after my order, early last week, and I was so excited that I opened it in front of Lulu and ruined the surprise. (Kidding, I actually know she's a dog and she gets excited about me opening anything. She doesn't even really know that it's a canvas print of her.)

The finished print is really beautiful. I haven't decided where to hang it yet because now I want to order four or five more so I can have a favorite Instagram prints collection. I thought about hanging in my office, but I already have it as the background on my computer and I work at home about the same amount of time as I spend in my office. So it's in my home office for now, waiting for a spot on the wall and a few more prints.

Happy fourth birthday to my sweet girl. I can't imagine not seeing this face every day.