Sophie the Giraffe

This is Sophie. She is the world's best chew toy for babies of the human variety. She is made of natural non-toxic rubber and every baby that I know LOVES their Sophie, including my human baby.

Problem is Sophie makes a "happy noise" when squeezed. This happy noise is a squeaker and it drives my puppies crazy, especially Joannie. Ever since we took Sophie out of the box, they have been mad about her - stealing her out of the diaper bag and any time she is dropped on the floor. Then they run downstairs and out the dog door and Sophie ends up muddy. Sophie cleans up well in the dishwasher, I should add. So now when I hear that familiar sound, I say to the baby "They've got Sophie, we must save her!" and outside we run to rescue Sophie. However, the puppies are very gentle with Sophie and don't want to kill her like they do other toys that they have stolen from baby - there was two bunnies that Grandma bought for her for Easter and they have since been stolen and had their eyes and stuffing ripped out. So I'm thinking that they would like their own Sophie. I might have to order another one. I'll keep you posted on how well Sophie does as a dog chew toy.

Zipper

This is Zipper, the puppies' brother who lives with my sister Laura. He is a spoiled boy and with no competition for food, he has become a picky picky eater. When he came by a few weeks ago for a visit we tried out some treats with him. He LOVED the Lickers (cow tongue), and the turkey jerky, but wasn't too fond of the sweet potato chips. He had a good time with his siblings and slept for a long time afterwards.

My Bad Dogs Part II

Tonight at 11:00 our nice neighbour who feeds Shawdy bread knocked on our door to tell us that Shawdy had escaped again and she was in the middle of the road, probably barking at cars. It was very nice of him to come and tell us, he was worried about her getting hurt.

We searched the "compound" to see where she had been "testing the fence for weaknesses" (like the raptors in Jurassic Park) and sure enough there was a few bent areas and one big hole where she had pushed up the chain link from the fence post and escaped. Her collar was lying there at the scene. I don't know why she would try to escape tonight - her Auntie Laura took her for a huge walk in the forest today.


I suspect that she got a whiff of a campfire at the park - brought back memories to our old house on the lake when our neighbour Larry would have fires weekly and burn his garbage, including Shawdy's favorite - chicken bones. She would always come back from her adventures smelling like campfire, so we knew where she had been. Tonight she had a big soot mark on her head, and the other dogs were very interested in smelling her feet. She is so naughty, I don't know what to do with her. Is an electric fence the next step? She is so sneaky, always has been.

My BAD dogs

Shawdy has her issues. She always has. We got her when she was 2. We knew she was an escape artist, a piggy (we call her Shawdy-pottamus), a licker (Shawdy Licks-a-lot), and has a bad habit of killing and eating small animals. So lately she has been digging holes under the fence, and stretching the chain link fence big enough to escape. She waits until I am busy with the baby or baking, and then poof! She's gone. Gone for hours. I don't even bother looking for her anymore. So I always wondered what she was up to. I figured she was just hunting and gathering. A few days ago we took the baby up the street to look at a yard sale and thought we'd bring Shawds since she never gets "alone time" with us. We were stopped by a neighbour who proceeded to tell us how he knows Shawdy - that she visits him often and he feeds her bread. Great. Then another neighbour said that he'd seen her too. So naughty. Then on the weekend we went to the cottage with just Shawds and Thomas. Shawdy was sooo good. Thomas went missing and turned up an hour or two later in someone's van. He had started following a couple of joggers and went on a 4km run with them. They took him home and drove him back to where they first saw him, with the door open, hoping he would jump out when he saw his house. So naughty. It's time for boot camp for these dogs. And I call myself a dog trainer!

Hired Help?

Note the drool.

Shawds is always trying to help me make dog food. She loves green beans! Her duty is usually clean up. She also tries to help me load the dishwasher.