3 out of 4 isn't bad, right?

Well, Buster's home!!  He came home yesterday--halfway through my last piano lesson of the day, when I promptly became INCREDIBLY distracted for the last half of the lesson.  But, my student seemed to understand, and was pretty interested in our now-three-legged dog, himself, so hopefully there won't be any complaints on that score.

 Steve bought Buster two new dog beds (we'd been planning on getting them anyways, and this seemed like as good an excuse as any), and the boys and I made posters.

 Okay, I made the posters.  The boys helped.  But I was excited--Buster had been gone for three days at this point, and we'd all missed him!!

 Steve went to get him at the hospital, and Buster was MUCH more pleased to see him this time--especially when he realized he was coming home with him, rather than being left by himself in a strange place again.
When the vet originally gave us the timeline for when Buster would be home, he had planned on having him only stay for one night, possibly two, if the surgery didn't go well.  The surgery went great, according to the vet, and he came out of it all right--but then, well, we all know how devious Buster gets when he's left on his own, and he decided that he did NOT want to leave those staples alone.  So, after re-stapling the wound shut (trying not to be too graphic here), the Vet put a cone on him, which Buster promptly got off--over and over again.
He sent Buster home yesterday with firm instructions that when we weren't watching to make sure he wasn't biting or licking at his staples, we would absolutely NEED to have that cone on him.
But Buster?  He doesn't like cones.  Not at all.
So, last night, at around 10:45 or so, when he had been thrashing around our room in a panic for about half an hour or so, we devised another plan: pants.  I got an extra pair of scrubs we had lying around, cut a hole in it for his tail, then rolled up one leg, tied the drawstring as tight as we could, and tied a knot in the other leg.  And you know what?  It's actually worked--for today and last night, at least.  He's sniffed at the wound, but gone no further.

And the cone?

 It made a fun play toy for Jack and Clark. 

So, our three-legged dog is home, and seems to be happy.  He's not out of the woods yet--the vet said that if there were internal bleeding or injuries, we'll know within a week or two.  But he's acting like himself (we even had a short tug-of-war with a toy this morning), so we're feeling good about it. 
I'm just glad our family is complete again.