Milou

Meet our new baby boy, Milou (pronounced Mee-loo). He's named after Tintin's dog who in the French speaking part of Belgium is called Milou, and also because it contains 'lou', in memory of Louis.

We drove to Chichester to see the pups, but we couldn't see them until 3pm, so decided to make a day of it. We've never been to that area before so we took the folding bikes in the car and headed to Chichester Marina. We took the picnic basket and cycled around the marina until we found a spot where we could sit at the side of the water and have our picnic watching the boats.

We then had a walk along the beach before going to see the puppies, and were met by six white bundles of fluff - all boys! There were two litters to choose from, born a few weeks apart, so we met both mums and the daddy of both litters. It was very difficult to choose and we were there over 2 hours, but we finally managed to get it down to two. Milou seemed to choose us, he kept coming back to us and we got lots of kisses and tail wags, so he was definitely the one. If I could, I'd have bought both, but I was lucky to be even choosing one.

He's nearly 5 months old, so is well on his way to being house trained and has a lovely temperament. Because of his age, we could have brought him back with us today, but as we're heading to the South of France in another week, it seemed kinder to leave him where he is, and we'll pick him up as soon as we're back. It also gives us time to prepare for his arrival.

He reminds us of Louis, but he's a much smaller dog, and he certainly won't replace him. Louis will always be with us in our hearts and our memories, but we miss having a four legged friend, and can't wait for Milou to join us.

I took quite a few photos which you can see here - he'll soon get used to the camera!