The Cat (Purple)

     Our neighbors have been feeding a stray cat in our neighborhood for several months now, and their granddaughter has named the cat Purple.  (She's a pre-school aged kiddo, so I'm not about to argue the name.)  On their "best days" Paul has never liked Purple, despite Purple meowing at Paul as if to say, "Friends?"

     A few days ago, I heard Paul going nuts at the window.  Not the usual, "I'm the dog in charge here, so keep moving!" bark he sends to people walking past, but an all out "Get out of my yard, NOW!!!" bark.   I listened to it for a moment, thinking he'd stop in a moment as soon as whatever he was barking at moved on.  When he got more insistent in barking, I jumped up to see, "what the heck is happening?"

   If you look about a 1/3 of the way down the picture, you'll see an orange and white cat in the tree.  Purple seems to enjoy chasing the birds in the tree and trying to get his dinner the old fashioned way.  Check out Paul's nose prints, slobber marks, and steam marks on the bottom 1/3 of the window!  This makes me quite happy we bought the triple ply glass  when we replaced the windows in the house.  

The Looks

     The looks I get when I eat are horrible.  The Hubbs right now has night classes 3 days a week.  So that means 3 days a week, I'm sitting at home eating dinner and getting these looks.

     Never mind that there's water in their water dishes, food in their food bowls, as well as some canned pumpkin, and white rice.  The home made macaroni and cheese in my bowl is much more appealing.  

Pills (How Annie and Paul take them)

     Neither Annie nor Paul is good at taking pills, but I seem to have found a fun way to eat them.  I made home made macaroni and cheese and put the 1 Benadryl into each pill.  

Farewell sweet Cooper

     Among our many friends when we visit the Dog Mall, are Cooper, Foster, and Snowball.  We met their Vrouwtje (Mom Jeanine) and Baasje (Dad Chris) at Stoney Point Fashion Park a few years ago.  Jeanine and Chris would have a table with the computers out.  Cooper and Foster would chill out and greet each person and dog that past; Snowball sitting in her red wagon.  

Photo by Chris and Jeanine

     Last year, they said good by to Snowball after her long battle with cancer.  A few short months later, Cooper was diagnosed with cancer.  They've battled it for over a year with chemo.

     Tonight, Jeanine and Chris said farewell to Cooper.  Have a safe trip to the Rainbow Bridge Cooper, find Snowball and enjoy playing with her.  And always remember, you're a good, sweet boy.

    

Annie Eats her Veggies (sort of)

      Annie and Paul both eat their fair share of grass.  They don't go for the "nicely taken care of" lawns with chemicals added, but the scraggly looking grass on the poorly taken care of lawns (we fit into the 2nd category for a reason.).  Annie was bugging The Hubbs for some of his salad the other night.

    Annie takes the lettuce and carrots, licks the spicy dressing off, and spits the veggies out......onto the Hubbs blue jeans.  *Sigh*

The Dance of the Puppies

     The Hubbs and I spent over an hour yesterday standing in line to vote.  When I got home (tele-comute day, yea!), and the dance the pups did is pictured below.

New Dog Bed Cover: why I don't craft as much as I'd like

     Don't ask me why, but I love making stuff from scratch and figuring it out.  I may not do the same project more than once (because, lets face it, for some of them, once is enough) but I love looking at something and trying to figure out how to make it.
     Someone along the line posted on a blog a no sew tie cover for their dog bed.  I know how to make the no sew blankets, so I thought, "this'll be an easy craft one evening."  I bought the fleece one night on the drive home and arrived home ready to cover Paul's favorite dog bed.

   After I pushed the coffee table out of the way, Paul made himself comfortable on the first layer of the no sew blanket.  I think he thought that was all I was doing this evening: just putting down a blanket for him to sit on.  Then came his dog bed.

     Can anyone else hear him saying, "But Mommy, what are you doing?  It's my bed!" in a winy puppy voice?  I can't help but laugh at how sad and pouty he looks in this picture.

But it's mine Mommy!

Photo by The Hubbs.

     Paul even tried to sit on his bed while I was putting straight pins into the fabric.  Somewhere along the line, Paul got the hint that I wasn't giving up/stopping just because he was sitting on his bed and he left me alone long enough to tie up the sides of his bed.

 

     Paul seems to enjoy the new cover on his bed and has decorated it with slobber already.  You don't have to straight pin this for it to work, but I find it's a bit easier when Paul's "helping" me craft to pin things into place.   Over all, it wasn't a bad project for an evening.