What could be better than sharing nap time with a friend?  We hope you have a fabulous weekend and have lots of opportunities to snuggle with your best friend, too.

Here’s a dirty little secret.  Ray will be eight months old tomorrow and he just learned to go down the stairs by himself this past weekend.  Granted, he rarely needs to use stairs and ours are slippery, being hardwood and as a nice little snub to building codes, our late 70’s stairs have an open portion with no railings.  Be that as it may, our amazing trainer Lori  got him up and down those stairs in record time.  Now is that the dirty little secret part?  Well, part two of that is since he is bathed in the upstairs bathroom, I carry him back downstairs.  Asia says it is pathetic that he is actually used to being carried.

I never really saw that as too much of a problem since I never thought he would get too big to be carried.  After all, his mom Sparkles was not even forty pounds when she was adopted.  I guestimated that Ray might top out in the mid fifties, which I could still carry if needed.

Ray on “gotcha” day.

How big might he get? It should be fairly easy to track.  Every month on the first he gets his heartworm preventative and I like to take him in to the vet with me so he can get some socialization and also heft his little pink piggy but onto the scale.  Last month and this week I didn’t have a chance to take him in with me so we used the unscientific method of me holding him while on the scale and subtracting my weight.  Ray seems to grow at about ten pounds per month and as of yesterday he was sixty-two pounds of lap dog.

I don’t get them often, but recently I got a migrane that, I swear, I could feel entering my head as if it were a ghost entering Whoopi Goldberg.  I struggled through it for a couple of hours and wrestled with the excruciating thought of driving home or should I just lie down under my desk for a few days.
Driving home won out and I found that the perfect nurse was waiting for me.

Yes, here we are again with the water talk.  Just know that it has nothing to do with how thrilled we all are to have a pool and everything to do with how silly Ray is about water.  Really.
Well, the first new development is that we finally received the solar cover reel and got it assembled so the first time Ray saw the solar cover on the pool he seemed to think that was a hard surface.  Fortunately he hasn’t tried to step on it except from the actual steps, so I’m careful to keep that area peeled back to expose the water.

What you are seeing here is Ray submerging his entire face in order to retrieve one of his favorite tug toys.

These are three separate attempts to retrieve it.

The fact that he actually blows bubbles out his nose while “diving” is astounding to me.  I’m thinking he could clean up in a doggy bobbing for apples contest.
Now if we can just get him interested in swimming.  

I mentioned before that Ray likes bathtime, but that isn’t a completely accurate statement.  Because he associates bathtime with peanutbutter, he is ok with baths, but he doens’t love baths.  I was doing really well with getting him bathed every Sunday until he developed some stomach issues and I had to keep tweeking his diet to resolve this.  That meant, cutting waaaay down on the peanut butter.  Luckily for all of us, the stomach is better and we were able to resume bath night.  Much to Kevin’s amazement, here is how bath time goes:  I close all doors upstairs except the bathroom in an effort to to steer the prancing Pit Bull away from the stash of kitty toys.  I prepare a nice portion of peanut butter and say to Ray, “Bath time!  Let’s take a bath!”  Whereupon he runs upstairs, and hops into the tub.  True story. 

But along similar lines, Ray is still not so keen on the pool.  He enjoys playing near it and he loves those jets, but getting in is still not at the top of his bucket list.  Much to the dismay of the various neighbors and friends who’ve come to enjoy the pool, I have no intention of forcing the issue or even of speeding it along when it comes to Ray swimming.  I’ve taken him in to the bottom of the steps once and he promptly swam out but nothing more. 

This morning was so nice and cool, though, that we spent some extra time outside and Ray had some fun with his outdoor toys.  As he began flinging them in the air and chasing them, one landed smack in the pool.

And as I watched to see what would happen, I nearly missed the retreval.

Well, technically, I did miss capturing it, but I did get to see it.  Two full paws in the water and the toy was snagged back to the safety of dry land. 

Enjoy your weekend!

As I noted before, Miko is the inspector of the house and likes to participate in all things handy-man related.  Last night was no exception as I was trying to put together a swing thing for the baby.  In retrospect it was a simple matter of assembly however the instruction manual was one of those with pictures but not a lot of clarification.  I was lucky that Miko was willing to supervise.

Sometimes you just need an extra set of eyes and a little room to spread out in as evidenced by the fact that the kitchen table was not big enough and Ray was of little value as an assembly assistant.

How do your critters help around the house?

Boo, Miko and Jae have not had much face time here lately, so in light of Friday the Thirteenth, here is a pic of our three feline friends, including our lucky black cat.

At first I wasn’t sure about this job thing.  I had to check out this ice cubie and then I wooo-wooo’ed at it a couple of times.  I licked it and it tased like an ice cubie, so I felt braver and checked it out…

I like to crunch, crunch ice cubies in my fat mouth but this one was much harder to crunch.

Then the more I scraped and crunched, I began to realize Squeaky Pig was in there!  Squeaky Pig is my favorite toy!



Don’t worry, Piggy, I’ll save you!  

As I was working away at my new job, a nice big crack appeared.  I decided the big ice cubie was like Kong-Kong, I picked it up and smashed it on the ground over and over…and it worked! I had a chunk of ice cubie that could chomp and crunch on.

I really have the best job in the world.  I saw some of my other favorite toys and treats going into the bowl, so I am hoping that I get to do my job again tonight!

Do you have a job too?

I haven’t posted for several days and I’m not sure if today is a good day to do so.  In fact, I’m pretty sure it isn’t.  It’s an emotional time as thousands around the world are mourning for Lennox and his family.  It’s an emotional time in our household as well.

After so many weeks of moving in a great direction, we had a set back this week.  It’s frustrating, it’s confusing and it’s heartbreaking.

If I had adopted a 10 pound, fluffy lap dog (as opposed to a 55 pound, short haired, blocky-headed lap dog) I might not have taken that dog to obedience class.  I might have over looked the jumping as a puppy behavior that she would grow out of.  If she lay down in the middle of a walk or grabbed her own leash, I might just laugh and scoop her up to carry her in.  I might have laughed if she ran around the house with underwear stolen from the laundry or when she chased one of the cats.  I might have…

I’m lucky.  I adopted a Pit Bull Type dog and I have gone to classes and I am continuing our education.  I am trying to be vigilant with enforcing proper behaviors.  And I will continue to do so for the love of my puppy.