Alex and her family had been wanting a puppy for years but had wanted to wait till the proper time came. When they eventually accepted Ollie into their family, they were happy to finally have a dog and treated him as if he were one of the kids, rather as the family pet.
“Ollie has always been handled as if he were one of my parents’ children.” “We usually joke that he’s their favorite,” Alex, Ollie’s sister (who requested that her last name be withheld), told The Dodo. “We received Ollie at the same time my sister moved away to university, so he is truly my parents’ new kid.” He’s everyone’s favorite member of the family.
Our friends even laugh at us for how obsessed we all are with Ollie — we even go on dog-friendly holidays every year just so we don’t have to leave him behind.”
When Alex graduated college last year, her graduation ceremony was unfortunately canceled due to the pandemic, so her parents planned her a graduation at home instead — which actually worked out better anyway because it meant Ollie could be there too. After posing for photos, Alex and her family realized that she and her sister both had graduation photos, but the third child of the family, Ollie, did not.
And since they never want to leave Ollie out of anything they do, they decided to take some.
“We’ve always claimed he’s a professional good guy, so we figured we’d make it official with his own dog-ploma,” Alex explained. “He’s a typical retriever that enjoys carrying things, so he was overjoyed when we gave him his own scroll to hold for the shot.” As usual, he received a lot of praise after a quick photo with the camera. We took his headgear off, but he refused to return his scroll.”
The session was a lot of fun and hilarious, but as time passed, Alex forgot about Ollie’s graduation photo — until she returned home one day and discovered it hanging on the wall next to her own.
“I forgot about the photo until my mum and dad had my own graduation photos printed,” Alex said. “They decided that they didn’t want to leave Ollie out and had his photos printed as well without telling me. It gave my sister and I a big laugh when we saw Ollie’s graduation photo on the wall next to ours.”
Ollie is perhaps the most important member of his family, thus it’s only natural that his graduation portrait be displayed for all to see. His parents also printed additional copies for other family members, and everyone has had a great time with it.
“We sneaked it into my Nan’s house with all of her other grandchildren’s graduation photographs,” Alex explained. “She thought it was amusing and she really likes it.” It’s now her favorite photo, which she proudly displays to anybody who comes to see her.”
Nobody is startled anymore when they come around and see Ollie’s graduation portrait proudly placed on the wall. They’ve come to know Alex and her family as the dog-obsessed folks — and the family wouldn’t have it any other way.
“They’ve seen it all — Ollie’s on our Christmas cards, our clothing, our phone cases … literally everything,” Alex said. “All of our friends and family know to expect this kind of thing from us by now.”
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