Christmas Toys

December 27, 2011 By Jodi

We kept Christmas gifts for the dogs at a minimum this year.

Sampson and Delilah eat raw food, have stuffed Kongs for snacks, go to daycare twice a week, get long walks in the woods, have birthday parties, and sleep in the same bed as us. Really how much more do they need?

But just before Christmas Sara got a toy in that I had to get for Delilah, it’s called a “Paw Hide.”

Paw Hide

The toy is hard plastic in the shape of a paw, there are seven compartments with little covers that fit inside. Paw Hide is a nose work toy and encourages your pet to use their nose to find the hidden treats.

The directions suggest to begin with just one treat and slowly work your dog up to more than one. The toy should be placed on the floor with lots of room for your pet to walk around it. While your dog is working their nose, you should be offering words of encouragement.

As you can see from the video, Delilah wasted no time in learning to use her nose.

Sampson’s gift was less exciting, he got a stuffed bird which he didn’t seem interested in. When he realized that Delilah was finding treats from her gift, he got up to check it out.

I figured, what the heck. Let him give it a try, so I loaded it up.

As you can see, he didn’t take to it in quite the same way Delilah did, but he got it!

How did your pups enjoy the holiday, were they spoiled rotten or like me did you keep it to a minimum? What were their favorite gifts?

Delilah 1, Ornaments 0

December 26, 2011 By Jodi

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, ours was pretty good even though we were missing a few family members.

As I noted in an earlier post, I have to keep my tree gated off to keep Delilah from eating the ornaments.

This year she was really good, never even went near the tree until yesterday when I removed the gates for Christmas morning. She was particularly interested in a sand dollar ornament I had picked up in Florida on one of our vacations. I assume it was because her nose smells better than mine and she can smell a faint trace of sea life.

Hubby and I were sitting and relaxing with our Irish Coffees and playing a little Donkey Kong and I guess I may have relaxed a little too much, because all of a sudden I heard Hubby exclaim, “Delilah!”

Yup, she got it.

Once she got it, she stayed away from the tree. Bob on the other hand kept going underneath the tree scratching at the bag of dog treats.

Gates are back up.

Photo Ops

December 24, 2011 By Jodi

My daughter had a friend who is a great photographer, she is not professional but she could be. At last count I think she had three cameras, of which her little point and shoot is always in her back pocket. She never misses an opportunity to take a picture.

Once one of the girls walked out of the bathroom at a wedding with a piece of toilet paper stuck to their shoe, she took a picture. When the toilet paper fell off in the middle of the dance floor, she took a picture of it, then each of the girls, posed with the toilet paper.

One time she and my daughter went on vacation and locked their purses in someone’s trunk, when they went to get it out, the trunk slammed down on her nose, as the blood ran down her face my daughter said, “Hold on X, I’ll take your picture.” They really took the picture, I saw it.

For me the picture taking isn’t as easy, case in point today. I took the dogs for a nice long walk, so they would be good and sleepy this afternoon while I did my Christmas prep.

I was preoccupied with thoughts of what I needed to accomplish when I noticed the dogs intently sniffing about 15 or 20 feet off the trail.

They both ran back to the trail and I caught up with them and that was when I noticed that Delilah had a stick in her mouth. I thought, that’s odd she doesn’t normally carry sticks, as I got closer I realized there was fur on it. I remember thinking, is that chipmunk fur on the stick, how the hell did that get on there. Then I realized what it was. A piece of a deer’s leg.

I wish I’d thought to take her picture with it, she was so proud of her prize, but all I could think of was getting it away from her.

“Drop it, drop it”

She held fast.

“Leave it.”

Nothing.

“Sit!”

She sat.

“Hey pretty, give that to mama and I’ll give you this people cracker.”

Are you on crack? This is a friggin deer leg, a deer leg! I am not giving up this deer leg. I could almost hear her.

I had to pry it out of her mouth, and then I gave her the people cracker.

That’s when I thought to take the picture.

Once I had it, I wasn’t sure what to do with it. I didn’t want to toss it into the woods, because I knew she would just go back and find it.

So I carried it home. I know, pretty freakin disgusting if you ask me, but I did find out what keeps my dogs in a heel position. All I have to do is carry a deer bone with me. 🙂