Playing Favorites

I know I know I shouldn't have a favorite but I have to say that Baily is my heart dog :) She came from rescue at just 7 weeks of age (too young but she was dumped). I took her to work with me everyday. She would sleep under my desk and then we would go to the big dog park behind the office. Alaska dog parks are not what people are used to when thinking of a dog park. This was a lake that had a trail around it, soccer fields and open running space but no fences so you got to see all sorts of wildlife. After our loop she would return to sleeping under my desk, in a chair if I had meetings or on a coworkers desk if it was sunny out (I didn't have a window). Sometimes I would find her curled up with 120lb chocolate lab Frodo. Baily is truly my baby, though she loves anyone who will give her attention.

Mesa is the favorite of everyone else. You may think I am exaggerating but its true. Maybe its the big blocky head or the "not all there" mental thing but people love her. It could also be that she doesn't have as many of the spoiled brat habits that Baily does ;) She also has a lot of personality which helps her cause. Mesa never got the joy of going to work with me everyday nor do I think she would have been a good candidate to go into a super stimulated work place so that may have put a bit of a damper on our relationship. Mesa is my sports watching buddy though. Always game to sit on the sofa and watch some football. Don't get me wrong, I love the Mesa Moose but she is my number 2 dog.

I feel kinda guilty admitting this, though when I look back on my blog there is a lot more about Mesa than Baily so maybe I am trying to make up for it!

Tomorrow is the Rose Bowl. We have our tickets and are on our way to cheer on my Buckeyes! Happy New Year to all :)

Wordless Wednesday (almost)

Mesa roasting on an open fire

this is how our night was spent

Camp tires the girls out. Not because of all the activity but because of the stress. All the other dogs barking works the girls up. Our two have never been ones to bark back, whether it be on walks, at the dog park or just in the house when other dogs are barking at them but we can tell it wears on them. Camp has a lot of barking. Strangers also worry Mesa. They did get spoiled however since this place puts cooked chicken on their food. Now Baily is refusing to eat her food. Oh well she needed to loose a pound or two anyways! But no worries, 7am this morning they were wrestling up a storm. Last night was another story

the family is together again

The DH picked the pups up from camp after dropping me off at work. they are at home sleeping soundly :) I can't wait to get home and snuggle with them in the hopes that they make my foot feel better!

Here they are all tuckered out from a hard weekend. I don't think i'll ever have enough pics of them all snuggled up!

it looks like we won't be taking long walks for a while

On my way home from work tonight a lady decided not to look for pedestrians before making a turn. Lucky for me I was paying attention and was able to get 95% of my body out of the way, unlucky for me is that my left foot was the 5%. She didn't notice me until her tire was right on top of my foot and then she proceeded to stare at me while I banged on her hood for 15 seconds (longer than you think when a car is on your foot) before realizing she had hit me. Luckily my foot isn't broken but it is in bad shape so I am on crutches and a cast for at least a month.

The DH is being great about this and already has plans to take the pups out for more fetch and some short walks in order to make sure they get the exercise they need. Right now we are all relaxing together while I enjoy my pain meds.

Wordless Wednesday

A busy couple weeks coming up

since I just started a new job and I don't have enough vacation built up to visit the in laws in Alaska (it's their year for Christmas) we decided to go to Vegas :) We are big fans of Vegas and far be it for us to pass up a free stay!

This means that the girls will be boarded of course. I realized this will be our third Christmas with the girls and the second one they will spend at the kennel. We were home with them the first year but traveled to my parents the second.

But when we return from our 3 day Vegas stay we will have guests so that will make the girls happy! My parents are coming to visit for the Rose Bowl. Being an Ohio State Alum and living in LA I feel it is my duty to be at the game so I bought 4 tickets. Now I still need to get Ohio State cheerleader dresses for the girls but I have yet to find them in the right size. May have to settle for red tutus and bandannas :)

The girls slept all day today and had no interest in a walk so we took it easy tonight. If they get energy tomorrow, the DH will take them to the park for some fetch :) I am also sending out my Dogs With Blogs cards tomorrow so I know they might be late but better late than never!

so I was making breakfast this morning

and I realized that the dogs were nowhere near the kitchen. Then we ate in the living room and yet the dogs did not appear. I guess they got worn out from our 26 miles of walks this week! We went shopping today and picked up a second bed from Costco (17.99 for a 42 inch bed is hard to beat!). I think they approve :)

It's FRIDAY

Woo hoo! It's Friday! The DH got here for good yesterday so this is no longer a one adult house! This morning I got to spend extra time sleeping since he took care of the dogs! Last night I took the dogs to the park for their first time off leash in two weeks! Hooray for the weekend!

Here is our goofy Mesa making noise and enjoying her "bubble gum." She loves to chew on little rubber pieces she has torn out of toys so once in a while we let her do it when she is supervised

Wordless Wednesday

New collars

So I got the girls new collars from Fido's Fashion Collars. Its hard to find large collars (1.5inches or 2 inches thick) that aren't super long and boring looking so I was excited to find this website. The prices are really reasonable and they have some pretty styles. They do cater to big dogs so sorry to my little friends! Here are Mesa and Baily modeling their new looks. Mesa has a 2 inch collar and Baily has a 1.5 inch collar since her neck isn't quite as meaty. The DH gets here for good on Thursday so I can stop using my camera phone since he is bringing the real one!

a little Baily to get you through your Monday

They say to let sleeping dogs lie

but I was enjoying the lack of rain and was having a lazy Sunday, so I decided to pull the dogs out of their sweet puppy dreamland for walk number two. I have been using Daily Mile a lot lately to track the total amount of miles I put out between biking to work, walking the dog and my feeble attempts at going to the gym. This weeks stats: biking- 32.29 miles, gym-9.14  walking-18.88.

That means the hooligans also walked 18.88miles this week which is pretty amazing considering we had rain and didn't walk 4 of the 7 days this week!

So now I will let the pups go back to dreamland while I work on their dogs with blogs Christmas cards!

I'm pretty sure my dogs thinks our walks are just really big buffets

LA is a dirty city. Because we live in an area where there are lots of shops and restaurants there happens to be a lot of food on the ground. Not just bits and pieces but whole meals. Tonight there was an entire large order of fries someone had dropped. The crust from an extra large pizza. Too many bags of chips to count. Half a burger. Many other assorted snacks I can't even begin to figure out. OOO I almost forgot to list my favorite. A 5 gallon drum of chocolate ice cream. Seriously. The top was off. What a waste!

Try as hard as I might to keep the girls away from all the food I spend most of my time looking out for cars since no drivers here think about pedestrians so they are able to sneak some. I almost get hit at least one time each time I venture out. It doesn't matter how careful I am there are more crazy drivers here than you make think possible. I actually almost threw a bag of poo at someone to get their attention tonight because we were crossing during our right of way and they were only watching traffic from the other direction since they needed to make a right hand turn. Luckily they looked up just as their wheels started to role so I didn't have to fling poo to make them look up.

Here is a pic I took of the dogs last Christmas in front of the tree. Can you tell they weren't excited?

Wordless Wednesday

Rain Rain Go Away

So I am feeling better and now it is rainy and just below 50 out. Ugh, terrible weather to ride your bike in and worse weather to try and exercise the dogs in.

Snug as a bug in a rug

Baily took her job helping me relax this weekend very seriously

The worst part of living in a big city

Is that when I get sick there is no easy way to exercise the dogs. If the DH were here he could take care of them but for now its just me. There is one park near us that while not a dog park everyone uses as an off leash area. The downside is there are no lights and now that it is getting dark early we have a limited window to get there. Luckily I ride my bike to work and back so I am normally home with a bit of light to spare but this cold makes it hard to push myself to ride faster.

The closest dog park to us is 1.4 miles each way and has a huge uphill at the end that takes a lot of effort on a good day. Our normal 4-6 miles of walking each day is going to kill me so I may have to bring out the Jeep and drive them to the park. I would so much rather spend the evening cuddled in blankets.

Wordless Wednesday (from last Christmas)

The art of sharing a bed with Baily and Mesa

I would have to say that Baily and Mesa sleep in bed about 40% of the time. With the DH up north, its more like 100% of the time. So we have had to learn how to navigate sharing a king sized bed with two 50lb dogs.

First Baily. One of her nicknames is Snuggle-up-against (like Snuffalufagus). Baily wants as much of her touching/covering you as possible. Her head will be on your chest or on the pillow pressed up against your head. She will sleep like that all night long. The first time she does this it is cute, eventually it gets rather annoying because when you move at night she repositions herself for maximum contact.

Next Mesa. Unless it is unbearably hot, Mesa will not lay down unless she is under the blankets. She nicely curls herself into a ball at the foot of the bed but in the middle of the night (most nights this happens a couple times) she overheats and starts thrashing around until she rids herself of the blankets. 10 minutes later, once she has cooled down, she starts the process all over again. Mesa also makes so much noise when she sleeps. She snores, she sighs, she woofs and makes some noises I can't even begin to describe.

This said, I still enjoy sleeping with the munchkins, most nights. I have also found that letting them sleep in bed means I get to sleep in :)

Runyon Canyon hike

well coming from us, who like to hike in the backwoods, this was more like a challenging walk. We took the girls to Runyon Canyon because the trail is off leash in 90 acres and we can walk to it from our house. We had a good time and will go back again but it has the issue that most off leash dog trails dog: people.

Don't get me wrong, I love interacting with other people on trails but the number of people you meet who scream "Don't let your dogs get near mine because mine isn't friendly" is astonishing. I mean you are in 90 acres of off leash area and you think it is OK to bring an aggressive dog?

Then there are the people who take a rest by sitting on the edge on the trail, on the ground, and get upset when a dog approaches them. Again, you are in 90 acres of off leash area do you think dogs will leave you alone when you sit at play level?

This didn't just happen to my dogs (the upset people) but to everyone with dogs. I did not notice any dogs picking fights with other dogs or being rude to people, they were simply interacting like dogs do. If people have issues with that maybe they should stay away from off leash areas.

You know something interesting happened

when the DH walks in the front door and says "Mesa learned why pigs roll in the mud"






so much for my nice clean house! I had asked the DH to take the monsters to the park yesterday to wear them out a bit. Lesson learned!

Our tradition is to watch football

At first Mesa is interested and Baily doesn't care

and then 10 minutes later the fact that we walked 9.1 miles yesterday kicked in

happy Turkey Day!

Wordless Wednesday

I'm thankful for the kindness of friends

So on this Ohio State- Michigan saturday I am in the office working a 12 hour shift that will be followed by a 48 hour cross country trip and capped off by another 12 hour shift on Tuesday. I will then get a much needed long weekend.

I am so thankful for my friends who will be taking care of the girls for me when I am away. I have to fly out to Kentucky for my Grandfather's funeral. We prefer to have house sitters and with the craziness of this move and knowing that we don't have any travel plans till Christmas we had just barely started to look when this trip came up unexpectedly. A friend who I have know for over 10 years happens to live one block over from me and offered to come stay with the girls while I am gone. She has always had dogs and my two simply adore her so it should be a great match and let my mind ease a bit while I am gone.

Now to just get through this 12 hour day!

On a lighter note, here is a funny pic from last night. I heard Baily whining, and since she is a whiny butt I didn't think much of it. After a couple minutes I went to see what was wrong and I found this:

Baily had walked under the table and not been able to figure out how to get out. She doesn't like to push things out of her way like Mesa would have so she settled for whining until someone came to her rescue.

we do live in LA after all

So after all the walks yesterday the girls went into hiding. They went into the bedroom where there was no noise or light and slept. They never go into a room where there are no people! Here is what I saw:

Today we started the day with a 5.5 mile walk in hopes that the girls would sleep all day :) In the middle of our stretch on Melrose Ave we accidentally walked into a photo shoot. They were very nice about it and while we waited for the light to change they told me it was for a British catalog. Maybe they will use on of the shots with the girls in the background!

So I've been feeling guilty

about the long working hours, especially now that the DH is gone :( so to make it up to the girls today we started the day with a 3.5 mile walk on the main roads so there were lots of good sniffs. After spending my day doing chores, we all ate dinner then took a 3.2 mile walk.

Yup, today we did 6.7 miles of walkies! Tomorrow we may do more if I can get the girls up!

I think I may be sick.. is this even legal?

There is a person selling PIT BULL BONES on ETSY. I have never used the site and I never will. I think I am going to go get sick now...

Almost Wordless Almost Wednesday

Took this one shortly before the move. After 9 straight days (the last four have been 12 hour night shifts) I am ready to relax and enjoy the sunshine.

So I need your help

Today I watched my Buckeyes win with the family. Here are my football watching buddies:

Luckily for me I live in WeHo and the bucks are playing in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena!!! Here is how I need your help. I really want to get the girls OSU cheerleader costumes. I have looked everywhere and no one carries them is big enough sizes! Anyone know where I might be able to find one? Maybe Brutus?

Happy Birthday Mesa :)

So today is Mesa's birthday but since it is also friday the 13th it seems as though I won't get to celebrate with her. I am at work and have a couple more hours to go :( But the DH is down for a long weekend (he is finishing up classes then moving down to join us) so he is helping her celebrate.

Last night we went to our favorite wine bar where they happen to serve marrow bone. So I ate the yummy appetizer and then had them wrap the bone for Mesa. She loved it and was super happy when I left bright and early this am :)

So now that she is three does that mean she is going to start calming down? :-P

Tomorrow is Mesa's birthday!

Or at least what we have decided is Mesa's birthday! She will be 3 :) Any suggestions on how we should celebrate?

Wordless Wednesday

I love living in WeHo

This is the most pit bull friendly place I have ever lived! Every night on our walks we get stopped by people who want to pet the dogs. Tonight alone we got stopped by 5 different groups who wanted to meet the dogs. These groups ranged from 50-something suits enjoying happy hour to bar bouncers to young couples on vacation. Obvious the girls love any chance they get to make new friends and I love being able to show people what a true pit bull is.

my version of training

I think training is one of the most important things you can do for/with your dog but I also understand that for everyone, training is something different.

When we just had Baily we were always in training classes. We even did some competition obedience. Then Mesa came into our lives and we had to take big steps back.We started focusing on what we call everyday training. We taught the dogs they could not get up on the sofa without being invited, we taught them which rooms they can and cannot be in and what seems to impress our friends the most is the fact that our dogs wont touch our plates unless told they can. Without hesitation, I will put my plate of dinner on the ground and walk into the kitchen to grab something. When I come back everything is just how it was.

Recently I have encountered people who think my dogs haven't been trained because they don't know any tricks or because we don't compete in any competitions. I have the greatest respect for any dog who knows a ton of tricks or competes in Rally, Agility or Competition Obedience but that just isn't something that will happen in our lives.

Sorry for the rant but it has been bugging me.

I am gearing up for 9 straight days of work

so in an effort to cheer myself up I have been looking through pics and thought I would share a couple :) Very uneventful weekend for us. Found a new park area that people use to run their dogs when there aren't any families using it to picnic/play. I am thinking of trying to get out there in the morning with the girls before I head to work.

I tried to take the girls running this morning and I remembered why we don't run together. Baily is fine and just trots along but Mesa is more of a go super slow and then all of a sudden get a huge burst of speed kind of runner. Makes it fun for me!

 

A new schedule

So for the first two month down here I will be the only dog caretaker. This means I need to get the girls on a new schedule. Since they obviously aren't morning dogs (see earlier post about Baily) am walks just don't work (trust me I tried before and it resulted me in dragging them around). Also, the closest dog park is 1.5 miles away and there isn't an open area to play chuck it near us so we have to find a new exercise routine.

So here is our current plan: Alarm goes off at 6:30, hit snooze until 6:45 or until Mesa shoves her head in my face which is Mesa speak for wake up. Get ready for work, pull Baily out of bed, feed the dogs breakfast, potty break and then give them frozen stuffed kongs when I leave. Get home after work and listen to the girls scramble off the sofa and run down the stairs to greet me. Go for a long walk or to the park for a bit of play time. Get back , clean, make dinner and then feed the dogs. Dogs sleep while I watch TV. We all crawl into bed around 10pm and then start the day over again.

So far the girls seem to like this new plan. Rather than multiple chuck-it sessions every day, the long walks seem to tire them out more. Mesa has even started sleeping on my shoes. Either she doesn't want me to leave without her or she just doesn't want me to leave!

Wordless Wednesday

The bed situation

So for a while now we have only had one bed for the dogs. When we used to have two beds they always chose to curl up on one. And who doesn't love looking over and seeing their pups all snuggled up.

Lately though I have started to wonder again if we should get a second bed on the off chance that they would like to sleep separatly. I was pondering this thought while doing dishes and I came back into the living room and saw this:

apparently Mesa decided she was done snuggling with Baily for the night and had invited herself onto the sofa while I was just one room away for 10 minutes.

Can you guess what they want?

Baily is not a morning dog

After my shower and getting ready this morning I went in search of the dogs and this is what I found in my bed:

Mesa's new ball

So we walked to the dog park today. When we got there, no other dogs were present. I was so glad I thought to grab my chuck it! There are always loose tennis balls at the park so I grabbed one and started playing fetch with the girls. When Mesa got tired enough to not return the ball, I decided it was time to leave. After leashing up the girls, I realized that Mesa still had the ball in her mouth. Since it was really dirty I just left it figuring she would get bored and drop it at some point.
Close to home, we ran into my friend Alex. The girls had only met her once but Baily immediately remembered and was super excited. Mesa, close to a mile later, still had the ball in her mouth so she simply turned around and wagged her tail. The whole way home we had seen people smile and laugh whenever they saw Mesa happily parading her ball.
After arriving home I figured Mesa would finally part with the gross ball but instead she decided to take a nap with it. Maybe if she sleeps hard enough I can nab it without her noticing and clean the thing? Or better yet I will just wash it with Mesa when she gets a bath tonight!
Here are the girls napping with the ball :)

Wordless Wednesday

We're back...and also why my dogs love California

First off, this is why my dogs love California. No fleece coats. Mesa seems not to really care. Baily HATES it.

So we are in LA. There is a dog park near us that we walk to. The best part about this park is that fequented by a lot of pit bulls

We will see ya'll again in a couple weeks

So as I type this, there are movers packing up the apartment. When I get home tonight there will be nothing left but my husband, the dogs, their crates and an air mattress. On Monday I will get to WeHo. I won't have a computer again for a couple weeks. I plan to use the time to relax but I admit I am a computer addict. I was also just getting into the swing of this blogging thing. I am sure I will have lots of stories and pictures to share when the girls and I return to the web!

I am leaving you all with a couple of my favorites :)

 

 

Brutus' "That's Ridiculous" contest

Here again is a picture of Mesa doing whatever she needs in order to get her ball! She loves to fly :)

Visit Brutus

Wordless Wednesday... captions are welcome

I wish I could live my life more like my dogs

Think about it. The dogs are always happy to see you whether you have been gone for 5 days or 5 minutes. They have the ability to forgive anything. They don't judge you based on what you look like but instead on who you are. Once they get to know you they are a friend for life no matter what.

I guess I am just having one of those days.

Wouldn't the world be a better place if it were run by creatures who never pass up the opportunity for a good snuggle? (in this case Baily snuck in on a sleeping Mesa after they had spent a couple days sleeping apart)