Cast of characters: Bethany Claire

Beth likes dogs. Well, that may be something of an understatement. Beth lives for dogs, especially for that handsome gentleman on the right. His name is Harvard Charles, and she is totally in love with him and has been for 14 years now.

Our Bethy is a veterinarian, and she shares her house with Harvey, Kirby (left), Puffycat and Winkie cat. She also lets her husband Dave sleep there. Even when she was a little girl (see below, age 6), she was crazy about animals. She had so many stuffed animals in her bed at night that we could hardly find her!

Besides her animals, Beth is very attached to her niece Cecilia, and she is counting down the weeks until she can get her hands on Mitch's and Laurie's expected child, due in August. She started a hope chest for the kid before s/he was conceived. It's a lucky child indeed who has an Aunt Beth in her life. Just ask Cecilia.

When Beth started to read our blog entries, she told me that it made her sorta' angry that she had been deprived of all of you in her formative years, giving weight to my regrets that we didn't have a family compound like Daddy said we should. Had we done so, all of you would have benefited from having Beth in your lives, just as much as she would have gained from having you.

Beth is pretty reclusive, preferring snuggling with her pets and doing Sudoku or needlework while watching the telly to being around a lot of people. She's a solitary girl, that one.

Because I'm lucky enough to be her mom, I can also say with pride that she's a perfect daughter -- and a perfect mommy to Harvard Charles, as well as to the rest of her brood. While she's more of a Falter than a Simpkins, we get to claim her, too. How could we not?