September 5, 2013

FitDog Friday: Rita's Favorite Way to Stay Fit

As I've said on the blog many times, our main way to keep Rita fit is just a LOT of walking. But one of her favorite ways to stay fit is to have a play date.

This is Rita's best friend, Dakota:

Normally, Rita goes to the beach with her three times a week. But I've only gone back to the beach a few times since The Worst Walk I Ever Took (quick sum-up if you don't know - Dakota and I were both hit by a strange man with a stick. I'll let that sink in for a minute... I know... right??). Anyway, it's not fear for myself that keeps me from going back - it's fear for Rita. We're planning to go back once everyone's back in school and the beach is quieter. And even then, we won't be going 3 times/week anymore.

So this summer, to get more exercise in, we've been having play dates once/week with Dakota. (And sometimes Reggie too!) They love to wrestle (Dakota has taught Rita some great boxing moves).
And they love to play keep away:
We let them run and play together for a while, and then we go for a nice long walk, with a bit more play when we get back (usually just a prone game of bitey-face cuz they're pooped.)

Does your dog have a best friend? Do they meet up for play dates?

Thanks to SlimDoggy for hosting FitDog Friday!

14 comments:

  1. I have three pals I see every day in the park and lots of other park friends. I enjoy hunting vermin with my pals. Have a fabulous Friday.
    Best wishes Molly

    ReplyDelete
  2. Darby and Pumpkin don't go to the dog park, but they have each other to play with and they do a lot of playing! Too much for Darby sometimes and never enough for Pumpkin!

    ReplyDelete
  3. A good game of bitey-face is the best. Jack and Maggie aren't much for playing, but our dog Sally was a play MASTER. She could play bitey-face with the best of them. She not only had a best friend, she had a pretty serious boy friend and their bitey-face was, well quite embarrassing sometimes. (We wrote about it for Dogster awhile back ("Has your dog ever fallen in Love?"). Go back to the beach...don't let that clown spoil your fun.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Since our three do a pretty great job of providing good fit time play together every day, I am lazy about making play dates for them. But they do have some great friends to get together with. We invited a friend with a Boston Terrier the same age as Huxley over to play this weekend so hopefully that will provide for some good chasing!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Looks like Dakota is looking for a french kiss! Ike loves to play and is trying to teach Kelly how, but she gets a bit anxious. They sometimes play bitey face but not sure if Kelly is really playing or not. haha.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Great action shots of Rita and Dakota playing!
    My two don't have any friends except each other. Li'l Girl and LittleBear played together a lot back when LittleBear felt well enough to. Zoomies, wrestling, bitey-face, all of it. They stopped playing much as he got older and just couldn't do it anymore. It made us wish, wish, wish that he wasn't an only dog for so long.
    After Bear passed and we got Austin... well, Li'l Girl tries to instigate play with him sometimes... and sometimes he will engage, and sometimes he won't. We are seriously considering adding a third to the pack at this point... one close to their ages, and that likes to play. Seeing zoomies makes my heart glad and I need to see more of it again. I'd like to find a pal that will engage in zoomies more with Li'l Girl when she wants it. She REALLY needs that type of indoor exercise. I keep thinking maybe we'll do doggie daycare sometimes so they can make some pals and get more social.

    ReplyDelete
  7. My dogs think they are the cool kids, you know the snobby little clique.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Rita and Dakota look like they're having so much fun! We used to have my sister's beagles over for play dates, but Cricket just ignored them and wanted to play ball (she was kind of a rude hostess...lol)! Her dogs didn't play ball, so mostly they ignored each other. Luckily, having multiple dogs it's not as needed. But I think play dates are great if you only have one dog. When we had only our lab mix, Maggie, she and her brother Bear (my sister's dog) used to get together and play all the time. It was great for them!

    ReplyDelete
  9. In Germany we had lots of friends and lots of friends in our yard, here sometimes we have friends over but the people are so odd with their dogs. No one can believe that it is okay for us to have friends over, kind of sad really.

    ReplyDelete
  10. always nice to have a great friend to play with. love the tongue photo

    ReplyDelete
  11. I thought sure Rita's fave exercise would be bar hopping... ;-) But this is good, too! Jeffie, Rudy and Rosie are each other's best friends, so I guess they have play dates 24/7 :-)

    ReplyDelete
  12. Well, Reggie sort of thought he was Rita's BFF, but he sees now that that position is taken. So now he says they are kissing cousins, rather than best friends.

    ReplyDelete
  13. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  14. If I had to guess, Sampson and Delilah would be each others best friends. We don't do a lot of play dates, but I don't think they mind too much.

    ReplyDelete

We love comments - even just a smiley face or a LOL will make my day. (Yes, my days are pretty easily made.)

PLEASE NOTE: Comment moderation is turned on for posts over 2 weeks old, so if you comment on an older post and don't see it show up right away, that's why.