August 2011 Blog Posts (113)

Booster shots for Bailey today...weighing in at 20 lbs

Well 3 weeks down, and I can definitely see Zoey's getting bigger (and bolder!).  The fiesty-ness continues and I am using "NO BITE" with the waterbottle, but she is still a little vampiress!  LOL.  She LOVES to be outside & dig in the grass (my dad is NOT a fan - she's ruining his lawn) and loves bark, leaves, twigs...basically anything that falls off a tree, bush or flower.  Her new thing this week is to take food out of her dish and play with it like a hockey puck on the tile.  My mom…

I admire the way our girl wakes up, from sound asleep to ecstatic to be alive, eyes sparkling.  She’s always happy to see me but lately she seems distracted, a tad rushed with her morning greeting. After a few deep stretches she’s off, leading the way to the kitchen.  She used to be eager for breakfast, but now her attention is on the back door.  She slips through, makes her way through the damp grass and disappears around the hedge behind our pool, out of sight.  I’ve followed her before,…

We live in the country and have a couple of patches of grass, but since they're not fenced in, we feel uncomfortable letting Sedona run off-leash.  Now that we have a granddaughter (with the possibility a one or two more grandchildren in the future), I began to lobby for a fenced-in play area where Sedona could run free and we could eventually put in a play structure.  Well - it's done.  We opted for artificial grass (no watering, no mowing, smoother surface for running, etc.).  One end has…

From time to time, I work with a dog trainer that I really like with Fudge and Vern. She rarely has group classes, so I asked her to recommend someone that did and we started the classes on Saturday. My husband’s level of enthusiasm was underwhelming at best when he found out he was going to share in the fun, since I had enrolled both Fudge and Vern.  My trainer told me the guy running the classes was a very big man. Keep in mind that my trainer is a little wisp of a woman and I probably…

Riley is finally home!! She has been home for about 24 hours now and for the most part doing great! Right now she is sleeping in her crate, while I get a rest : )

Riley is 7 weeks old, ( I know a week younger than the breeder should have given her to us) so she is still very small. Last evening was filled with lots of playing, introducing her to our cat George (which was mostly a stare down) and cuddling. Riley went to bed at 11, woke up at 3 whining and then back to bed till…

Peri had a huge day yesterday!  She spent the day at daycare, which we don't do as often anymore.  While she was there, she got her hair done at the beauty parlor. I know it is short, but doesn't she look cute?

Peri says "Hey mom, cut it out dood!"

She also came home to her "Aunt" Lucy (my parents' cairn terrier) in her house. She likes…

I have had Kona groomed by a gaggle of professional groomers with mixed results. The last adventure in using a professional groomer was a disaster as I described in an earlier blog. I have now invested in grooming tools and today cut Kona's hair for the second time. I clipped his body with a 3 3/4 skip toothed blade, trimmed his neck with a 4F blade, did his privates and ears with a 10 blade. I scissored his legs and head. Below are photos of this experience. If they come out sideways I am…

To all of Rusty's supporters:



I have uploaded a new video of Rusty to Youtube: http://youtu.be/t4ol2gn1czk



He is doing more swimming & jumping this year which I focused on; I think two surfin' videos are enough.  Jan spotted a small video camera (1/2 the size of a pack of cigarettes) on QVC that will go underwater and shoot 720 HD videos, for less than $60.  I am still…

Chester is on the verge of mastering Leave it- DH has been busy with the homework lessons. We were warned that the last week involves hamburger on the floor as a Leave it test.

We started the class showing off Leave it. He is doing good (in low distraction areas)..

There were only 3 dogs in the class this week- Including Chester. The Springer (Gracie) and the Britteny (Porter).

Porter is the most aggressive of the dogs (And the oldest). It is good to have a mix…

Yesterday, someone (perhaps an "internet troll", perhaps a genuine person) posted a discussion about breeding her well-loved lab with a poodle so she could "have another one [lab]".  The irresponsible, careless nature of her actions clearly struck a chord with DK'ers around the world, as this kind of behavior is the antithesis of what Doodle Kisses represents.  I could literally feel everyone's hackles being raised - yet nearly all of your responses centered around one clear message: while…

So after not having any business travel for a few years, I finally convinced my DH to let me finally get a dog and we got Cubbie.  After Cubbie arrived I did a little more business travel but nothing terrible so I convinced my DH that is would be a really good idea to adopt a dog, enter Ollie. Well, since we have had Ollie (coming up on 2 months now) I have had to go out of town twice now.  So here I am sitting in a hotel in PA spending time on doodle kisses just to get my doodle fix since…

WARNING: DON’T READ IF YOU HAVE A WEAK STOMACH! 

I decided to tune up my lawn mower today. Got the blade off and took it to a shop to have it sharpened. Being oh so careful with my now very sharp blade, I came home and held it above my head as I walked in the door to keep jumpin’ jack Zeus safe. I slowly walked to the back door, grabbed my tools, went outside, gently set the blade in place on the lawn mower, and started wrenching it back on.…

Murphy had surgery yesterday to remove the bump on his nose. She took a biopsy and we are waiting on results.

I am so proud of the boy.  The vet was able to do it under local! The vet tech, one of our favorite people, held his head while he was in a sitting position (this is Murphy...so that head was about 40 inches off the floor). They deadened his nose with lidocaine and waited to see if she needed to sedate him with anything else. She said the only issue they had was with…

I met a family yesterday whose back yard backed onto a park we frequent.  The mother peeked over the fence and asked if Gavin would be interested in playing with her 1 year old Newfoundland dog.  Ahhhh, yaaaa!  So she opened her gate and the two ran back and forth between their yard and the park.  Her beautiful pup was chasing Gavin who was enjoying being in the lead for a change.  Gavin dashed into the back yard, with Marley the Newf hot on his tail.  Gavin decided to take a short cut…

Oh my, how I remember being where many of you are.  The long nights, the potty trips outside every 20 minutes, the endless zoomies, the nipping, the need to exercise an hour a day, etc...the list goes on and on! 

Typical morning 2009:

That first year, our morning ritual included getting up an HOUR earlier to ensure Peri had her walk. Then we had to make sure that one of us played with Peri while the other one showered for work. It was constant…

http://smilebox.com/playBlog/4d6a59794e6a59304f546b3d0d0a&blogview=true

Please watch baby Rooney's Smilebox

One year ago today as I stepped off a plane in NYC - my breeder called to say that she had delivered 3 out of 5 puppies and so far there was no male.  She said she'd call me back shortly and let me know if my…

We signed up Chester for a Puppy Socialization class through our vet. The Instructor is a RVT at the Vets.

She is great - It is all about Puppies developing good manners through positive reinforcement. There are 3 other puppies in the class-  A Springer, a Brittany Spaniel, and a Boxer mix.(the Springer is the only Female)

The class is broken up into off leash playtime, a lesson or 2 , a pee break, another lesson- or 2 and playtime. We get printouts of the lessons and…

When last we left all our DK friends and family, Penny had undergone a very rough time with her cancer treatment (we almost lost her in July) and we made the decision to end all treatments.  Our whole goal was to provide quality of life for Penny, no matter how much time she had left.

As expected, her fever disappeared after about a week, and she started eating and drinking again.  She was still very low energy and just laid around the house, but it IS summer in Arizona,…