National Dog Day! Cake and A Picnic!

August 26th was national dog day.  I wanted to take the dogs and do something fun, but it was 95F and humid, so I baked them a cake instead.

And then we had a picnic!

This was my cake recipe: 1 can of green tripe, 1/2 cup of garbanzo bean flour, 2 eggs, 1/4 cup of almond milk.  Mixed it all up and baked it for 40 mins.

Then I 'frosted' it with peanut butter and added some peanut butter chips to the top.  I tried to make it spell D-O-G.  

Then we went outside and the dogs had their cake and ate it too!

Ok there are a lot of pictures, but peanut butter + cute puppies = adorable!

Now You Owe Me....

Mandatory cute puppy pictures!

Now on to the real story.  Dhali is going through a HUGE GINORMOUS EXTREME chewing phase.  He has chewed up so, so, so many toys.  A mountain of toys.  The toy box is getting emptied.  I would not be able to fit all the destroyed toys into one picture.  Right now he is really into squeaky plastic/rubber toys.  He ate the feet off of a bad cuz.  I did not know that it was possible to kill a cuz with too much squeaking.  He haz killed a cuz.  2 hollee rollers, pear ball, ice cream squeaky, green pepper squeaky, 2 wooly dog tugs, green frog's eyes, big blue and orange ball, orange 8 tug, sheep skin tug (expensive piece of junk, ripped apart when we were tugging), his bear baby blanket and more.

However the most expensive thing he has destroyed!!!

This Chris Christensen wooden pin brush. Thirty-five dollars.  $35.  Yes, for a dog brush.  Yes, for a dog brush made out of WOOD.  It works worked so well and I loved it.  Now I have to buy a new one. 

In other news, I have been doing some thinking since last week's puppy class.  Thanks for all the great encouraging comments!  I really appreciated it!  I'm not going to give up.  I realized that I had been lazy with Dhali's training for a few weeks.  I have a hard time choosing what I want to teach him.  There seem to be SO many things that I want him to learn, that I just end up not doing anything, because I can't decided on what we should start with.  I decided to make a dry erase chart with some things I want him to learn.  There are 1000 other things I would like to add to the list, but we have to start somewhere.  It also keeps me honest with how much we have actually trained.  Some times I think we have done so much training, but really we haven't.  Now I have a check list!  

My goal isn't to work on every single thing every single day.  But now I know what we have worked on and when we have worked on it.  We are still doing lots of playing and running around and other tricks.  But now Dhali is back to working for his dinner and I hope we can work on his ADD-ness.  Just a stage, but seriously little guy!  The puppy that wanted to work for an hour, now can only do 3 seconds, before he is running off to do something else.  He can't even concentrate on a kong stuffed with Primal Raw nuggets for more than 30 seconds, before he's off annoying the cat, wanting to go outside or tearing apart another toy.

He still is a little sweet heart though.  He will slow down long enough for a belly rub and petting.  He likes to follow me into the bathroom in the morning and sleep snuggled up next to the shower, while I get ready for work.

Cute little bugger.

I printed out a chart from Word and ran it through the $16 laminater (word? machine for lamination) that I bought on Amazon.

Firsts and Outdoor Sleeping

Just a few cute things that I want to remember.  I'm trying a new thing - cooking once and freezing meals for the month.  Today was shopping and prep work and tomorrow is the cooking day.  Dhali is my little helper.  He likes to sit next to me and try little bits of things.  Tonight he tried - carrot, celery, red pepper, zucchini, kale, cauliflower, cheddar cheese, mozzarella cheese and romano cheese.  He's not as crazy for cheese as Tibby is.   He would rather have cauliflower or zucchini. 

At one point I was getting some plastic wrap out of the cupboard and I left the door open.  He closed it for me!  I think that's the first time he has ever offered something like that :)

Where was Tibby during this food fest?  She was/is sleeping outside on the deck.  Weirdo.  Yes, there is a dog bed on the deck, but it is cold and raining outside.  To each there own, I guess.  And where is Dhali?  Sleeping right next to me.  He likes to be within arm's reach, because I reach over and pet him.  Yes, he likes to be petted!  So nice to be able to pet my dog.  

First Grooming, Food and Photo Bomb!

I haven't been updating very much - bad me!  We are having fun, but there isn't enough time between playing with Dhali and trying to get something done while Dhali barks in his x-pen, because he wants to DO SOMETHING!!  He is very go, go, go.  For example, today I had him outside with me for 2+ hours while I washed the siding and deck.  He 'helped' by chasing the hose, biting the broom, digging holes in mud and running around like a crazy head.  It was HOT, but he just ran and ran.  I also worked on recalls - calling him away from all the fun he was having whereever he was.  A few times I lost him!  So it's good he recalls.  He was exploring underneath the deck, in the bushes, the far side of the house.  He's on leash, but I have my doubts that I could catch him if he didn't want to be caught!

Then I was done, it was still really hot and getting hotter and Dhali had been running and running, soooo time for a nap, right?  Ah, no.  Time for Dhali to scream in the x-pen.  For almost 30 mins.....now he has stopped and it chewing on a bully stick.  But if I move he will start screaming again.  This is why I don't get anything done around the house!   

It is now after 7pm and I started writing this at 1pm......yeah.

The only good photo of Tibby post grooming with a photo bombing Dhali.

So anyway.....Tibby and Dhali went for a grooming on Monday.  It was Dhali's first ever time at the groomer's!  I'm not sure how she did it, but he was groomed.  Magic skills apparently.  Nothing was snipped off that shouldn't have been.  I was a little worried about that when I saw that she had trimmed his wizzel fuzz.  All wizzel was still intact though - whew! 

Rockin' the 'puppy' cut, 'cause he's a puppy!!

5 seconds after this photo he was dirty and full of weed stickers again.  Had to rub off that stinky 'pretty boy' smell.

So it took the pups over 4 hours at the groomer's.  I didn't think it would take that long and I had an appt. out of town, so my Mom picked the pups up for me.  Earlier in the day I had brought home a bag of large breed puppy food and set it in the kitchen.  My Mom didn't know about that and Dhali helped himself.  Hmm, he must be a real dog or something.  Tibby would never, ever have done something like that.  Not lady-like ya know.

Nutrisource Food

The reason I bought the large breed puppy food.  Dhali's food is SO tiny!  I end up dropping more than I put in his mouth.  The lg. breed doesn't look that much bigger, but it isn't flat like the sm/med breed food.  I'm just using the bigger food for recalls.  It's also cut down on the amount of finger biting which is nice.  The only difference between the 2 puppy foods is the amount of protein.  The sm/med has a higher protein % per serving.

On the Throne? I Bark For Your Kong!

I use to have 2 puppy kongs, but Ellie chewed through one of them (in the first 5 mins. that I had her). I think I will have to get a 2nd one kong, but not a puppy one. Dhali is too strong a chewer. He has puppy teeth now and he leaves marks on the kong. When he gets those adult chompers all bets are off! Tibby is dainty when she eats out of the kong, so she can still have the puppy kong.

Tibby correcting Dhali. Telling him to back off. Check out their body language.

"Mmm, yum kongyummyslurplickmmmmm"

Week-end What We Did

Friday we played and played and played, until I was exhausted.

Saturday we went to the farmer's market and to Runnings.  We barely got into Runnings and I got called into work.  So,  I dropped Dhali off at my parent's house.  They weren't at home, so he got to chill in his crate all by himself.  Tibby had a bad day.  I went to work in the afternoon and my Mom spent most of the time with the pups.  When I got home in the evening Tibby was acting very strange/sensitive/nervous.  I didn't know what would have made her like that, so I just put her Thundershirt on her, but it didn't seem to help very much.....and Dhali started to tug on it, so that was a bad idea!  On Sunday, my Mom told me that Tibby had been outside and there was a big explosion/fireworks and Tibby ran inside and hid underneath the bed.  Poor baby :(  Amazing that she could fit underneath the bed!  She hasn't been underneath there in over a year.

Sunday we did a little clicker lesson.  I swapped back and forth between Tibby and Dhali.  It's going to take some adjustment, because Tibby is very slow and Dhali is fast.

So I got home in the evening and there was a note from my Dad - "Tibby and the little one enjoyed the food and water.  They shared the bowl."  This left me slightly confused.  What food?  Then I remembered that I had left out a bowl of dry food for Catty.  It was sitting right in front of the glass door.  My Mom knows that is were I leave cat food if Catty hasn't been inside to eat for a while, but I guess my Dad didn't know!  Poor pups - they had very full bellies and were thirsty.  They drank and drank.  Dhali's belly was HUGE.  I think he probably got most of the food.  I gave them some greek yogurt and they liked that.  Dhali didn't seem to be too affected by his full belly - it didn't slow him down! 

Poops were a little soft, but this morning are back to normal.  Although, I'm giving them a little fast, just to let (especially Dhali's) belly to recover.

Ow!

Spaghetti

"Yum!"

Little wiggle.

Little slurp.

GIANT bite!!

Hint? Hint?

Which is worse?

1. Tibby did this.
2. I let Tibby do this.
3. I took pictures of it.
4. I let Tibby do it many times so I could get pictures of it.

My Mom said maybe we should just get Tibby a high chair, so she can sit with us at the table.

Interesting that she only does it to my Mom.  Maybe it has something to do with my Mom giving her food when she is jumping up on her?

*sigh* All my hard work of raising my girl ruined by one Subway.

"I'm not getting any, am I."