Showing posts with label Abby. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Abby. Show all posts

November 8, 2015

What Does the Dog Think When You're Sick?

I've had a terrible cold for almost a week now - the worst cold I've had in a while. Rita has been very sympathetic. And very interested in my chicken soup lunches. (Actually, maybe she wasn't sympathetic. Maybe she was thinking, "She's in a weakened state. I can probably take her and score that chicken soup!)

June 14, 2015

Monday Mischief: Pom Wonderful - and Pom Confusing

This weekend the hubs came in and said we had 7 pomegranates growing on one of our trees.

This was news to me, for 2 reasons:
1) I didn't know we had a pomegranate tree. We've lived here almost 5 years and never seen any fruit on the trees so we didn't know what they were. Turns out we have two pom trees! Yay! Pom wonderful! 

2) I thought pomegranates were only in season in winter, since we always only get them from our CSA in January. (I Googled it and according to the Pomegranate Council they usually only grow in No. America during late summer and early winter. Maybe our tree is confused since our weather was so hot in winter and has only just lately felt like early winter!) Pom confusing!

We all went outside to check it out. (I apologize that these are blurry!)
"Hmmm. What's this?"

June 9, 2015

A Tribute To A Cancer-Fighting Warrior

I have some sad news to share.

Last week we lost a cancer-fighting hero - Charley, the chocolate Lab.
Photo courtesy of Ellen Venturella-Wilson

March 3, 2015

My Goofy-Foot Girls or What Do Dewclaws Do?

A while back, my blogger buddy Jan wrote a very interesting post about dog's feet called Barking About... Canine Paws & Toes. (You should check it out. Did you know dogs have either "cat", "hare" or "webbed" feet?) Her post made me think of some of the odd things about angel Abby's and Rita's feet.

When we got Rita, we said she seemed to be a mix of Abby and our other angel Bailey. Bailey had no dewclaws in the back, but Abby had both.
Our long little doggie with both back dewclaws

February 3, 2015

Dementia and Show Tunes (and Dogs!), Oh My!

The other day, there was a report stating researchers found that singing show tunes helped improve brain function in patients with Alzheimer's/dementia. The researchers held sing-along sessions with hits from The Wizard of Oz, Oklahoma! and The Sound of Music, and found that those who sang along showed "marked improvement" compared to those who just listened.

The hubs and I really worry about our brains - especially mine, which often doesn't work right. This was fantastic news to me, because I know every word to every song from Oklahoma! (and most of them for TSoM and TWoO and, as a bonus, South Pacific). We not only had the albums when I was a kid, but I played Aunt Eller in the school musical. (I shoulda rounded up a pic, but that would be Throw-back Thur, and today's Less-Wordy Wed.)

To prove to myself I still had it, I typed out the lyrics to Ado Annie's "I Can't Say No" from Oklahoma. (Hit that link if you've never heard it. It's not exactly a beautiful tune, but it's fun.) 

So, here are my typed lyrics... accompanied by repurposed dog photos.

January 18, 2015

Momma's Girl? Daddy's Boy? Does Your Pet Have a Preference?

This is a daddy's girl:

Our beagle Bailey was a major daddy's girl. She would sit in his lap and hug and kiss him for ages. And he would just let her. They were quite the pair. (I literally gave up once after counting 1000 kisses.)

January 9, 2015

Pooch Smooches Takes the Pet Blogger Challenge

Today is the Fifth Annual Pet Blogger Challenge hosted by Go Pet Friendly (check them out if you like to travel with your pets!). It's a way for bloggers to "encourage, motivate and support each other." If you're a pet blogger and haven't joined already, hop on!


Pet Blogger Challenge Jan. 10 

1. How long have you been blogging? And, for anyone stopping by for the first time, please give us a quick description of what your blog is about.

November 9, 2014

Monday Mischief: Puppy Mischief - What To Expect!

I wish I'd known about the Monday Mischief blog hop back when we had Abby. That girl was a master mischief maker!
Cutest puppy ever. 100% filled with mischief.

August 5, 2014

#GiveCancerThePaw: Our Beautiful Angels

Today is our last Give Cancer the Paw blog hop. My co-host Peggy of the Writer's Dog and I invite you to join in and pay tribute to a special pet you've known and loved who has/had cancer. You can write a tribute post, share an old post about a beloved pet, or even just share a photo. Today I'm posting about our beautiful angels.

If you've been around the blog for a while, you know we lost both our beautiful girls, Bailey and Abby to cancer. Bailey had hemangiosarcoma, and Abby had osteosarcoma.

August 3, 2014

Monday Mischief: Rita's First Ice Cream Cone

Since July 31 was National Mutt Day, and August 1st was the day we used to celebrate angel Abby's birthday (she would have been 5 this year; read more about her here), I took Rita to McDonald's for her first ever ice cream cone.

As you can see from the intense stare, she thoroughly enjoyed it.
"OMD. Where has this been all my life?"

July 24, 2014

FitDog Friday: Keep the Dog Hydrated with a "Cleanbottle"

A while back I saw someone having a wee rant on Twitter about seeing lots of folks out walking/jogging carrying water bottles for themselves and not for their pups. 

Now... what made that person assume the water bottles weren't for the dogs? Sure some dogs prefer to drink from a bowl, but there's no reason a dog can't drink from a bottle. 

Angel Abby demonstrates how:

May 27, 2014

Wordless Wednesday: Rita's New Leash & Avoiding a Tired Pun

Rita got a new leash... (not on life. Man, while I was trying to write a title for this post "a new leash on life" is ALL my feeble brain could come up with). She just got a new leash. Period. 

It's a little bit girly, and a little bit bad-ass (cuz it has pink skull & crossbones on it), just like our girl. Here she is sporting it, nice and pooped after a walk.

February 12, 2014

Guest Post from MAF: Help Save Dogs and Kids!

As you know, we lost our angel Abby to osteosarcoma. 
Pamela Anderson had nuthin' on our beach babe.

It was while Abby had cancer that we discovered Morris Animal Foundation when we participated in their K9 Cancer Walk with our girl. We also entered her in the Orvis Cover Dog contest which raises money for MAF. We've been supporters ever since, and attended their gala, and I've pledged to donate a portion of the proceeds from Rescue Me, Maybe to them. 

So, when MAF contacted me about doing a guest post, I was happy to agree! I asked if they'd specifically write about a new project they recently started. Thanks very much to Katie and MAF for sharing this info with Pooch Smooches' readers! 

Take it away, Katie: 
~ ~ ~
Every year, ten thousand American dogs are diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a type of bone cancer. This is a number that Morris Animal Foundation, a nonprofit working to further veterinary science, would like to change. Even more devastating than the sheer number of dogs with this terrible disease is that this type of cancer develops in young dogs—those between two and three years old. Osteosarcoma does not let up, either, as this cancer will commonly come back in dogs that have already had this ailment.
Photo provided by MAF

Owners can often tell that something is wrong when their dogs start to show symptoms of lameness. At this point, it is highly likely that the cancer has spread to other parts of the dog’s body. The current treatments for osteosarcoma include amputation and extremely strong chemotherapy drugs.

In order to combat this terrible disease, Morris’ 5-5-5 Project will fund five osteosarcoma studies. This project as a whole will last five years and will provide the chosen five studies with approximately $5 million. Every year for five years there will be a new osteosarcoma study bringing hope to dogs affected by this illness.

This study even has the potential to help kids, too. Finding the most effective cancer drugs for dogs, could potentially mean finding the most effective treatments for children affected by osteosarcoma. Morris is continuing the fight against cancer with this new project; join us and donate to Morris Animal Foundation. Thank you to all of our donors and those spreading the word about Morris studies!

Author Bio: This is a guest post by Katie F. on behalf of Morris Animal Foundation. Visit morrisanimalfoundation.org/ to learn more about the animal health research that Morris Animal Foundation participates in.

~ ~ ~

With Abby, she was hit even younger by the disease, being only 15-months old when she was diagnosed. As Katie writes, it was the limping that caused us to take her to the vet. With such a young, goofy dog, we figured she'd just overdone it. But when the limp didn't go away, x-rays confirmed osteosarcoma. 

We opted for amputation (obvi, from the above picture!), and also a lotta chemo (both IV and at-home pills) plus holistics treatments. We had another amazing 15 months with her and lost her at age 2 1/2. But she lives on in our hearts, and now in the character of Maybe in Rescue Me, Maybe.

Here's hoping the research funded by MAF can find some answers and bring hope for parents of both dogs and kids who get this horrible disease!

Thanks again MAF for the post and for everything that you do for the animals! #CancerSucks!

Thanks to Heart Like a Dog and 2 Brown Dawgs for hosting the Thursday Barks and Bytes Blog hop. 

January 9, 2014

This Moment - See, Hear and Remember Beautiful

Today we are participating in the {This Moment} See Beautiful blog hop hosted by Sugar the Golden Retriever every 2nd Friday of the month.

And today I not only have a SEE beatiful (and also sea beautiful) treat - I also have a hear beautiful moment for you. 

So, let's start with seeing the sea. This spot is at an overlook on a walk we take about once or twice a week down to the coast. 



I love this spot because of the rocky beach. Most of the beaches here are sandy, or big boulders, so this beach is pretty unique. Listen to this wee video - after you hear the roar of the wave itself, there's another beautiful, soothing sound:

Did you hear the rocks are nestling against each other? (If not, crank up the volume and hit replay.) It sounds like rain. Your moment of zen for the day. (You're welcome!)

Remembering Beautiful
January 10th is not only the {This Moment} See Beautiful hop, it's also the 2nd anniversary of our angel Abby heading for the bridge. So, in her honor, here are a few beautiful moments from her.
Our gorgeous angel Abby


Finally, just to show that you can see beautiful in everyday objects:
Click to "big-ify" if you can't read it.

Thanks to Sugar for hosting the {This Moment} See Beautiful blog hop, and thanks to Miss Lydia, the founder of the See Beautiful movement. And extra thanks to them both for the lovely handmade soap and the bumper sticker they sent me!

Hope you see lots of beautiful today!

January 7, 2014

Wordless Wednesday: An Angel's Twin?

I told y'all about my new car. Well, since it's also Rita's ride, I decided this time I'm (hopefully) going to keep the car a little less dog-ified. (Seriously, no human rode in the back of my last car for years! It was dog hair central back there! Even with the seat cover that I washed... oh... infrequently.) 

So, I ordered a new seat cover and also this time thought I'd try door protectors. I ordered a set from Kurgo.** Here's the cover of the box:

October 10, 2013

Feeling Blue on Mirth Watch Thursday

You guys! You are not going to believe my tale of woe...

You know I love Morris Animal Foundation and Betty White right? (If not, I mentioned it here, plus mentioned my donation pledge to MAF in my book trailer that I posted yesterday.) So, imagine how excited I was when I got a phone message inviting me and the hubs to the MAF's "Gala of Hope," featuring Betty White - we're talking free tickets!

Since we donate to MAF, we get their mailers so had seen that the event was happening on Oct. 19. I had said to the hubs how much I wished we could go, but (a) it's in L.A., about 2 hours from our house (that's with NO traffic), (b) the tickets for the 2 of us would have been $600, (c) it's not the hubs' favorite thing in the world to get dressed up and go somewhere fancy. So the mailer went in the recycle bin.

But they called yesterday and said they wanted us to come for free!! We were chosen because of Abby's entry in the Orvis cover dog photo contest. If you've been following the blog for a long time, you'll remember that I entered this photo of her in the contest way back in Feb. of 2011.

July 30, 2013

Not-So-Wordless Wednesday: What's It About?

When you tell people you're writing a book, they usually ask, "What's it about?" Sometimes when you are in the midst of it, it's hard to answer. "Well, it's about this woman, and there's this dog, and... stuff happens."

As I said last week when I shared the cover for Rescue Me, Maybe (coming in September!), my short answer to "What's it about?" is to say, "It's a love story... for dog lovers." But you need a longer blurb than that (for Amazon, for the back cover, for sharing with bloggers, etc.) so you have to distill your 100,000 words down to a few sentences. I know I'm supposed to be wordless today, but I wanted to share those few sentences with you, plus a few photos of Abby (since the book has a fictionalized version of her in it). It just wouldn't be a Pooch Smooches post without pup pics!

Our gorgeous angel:

July 21, 2013

Monday Mischief: We Do Have SOME Rules Here at The Spa

Things are pretty easy for spoiled pups who live here at our spa. They can get up on the sofa, sleep on the bed (although Rita mostly chooses not to), lick the plates before they go in the dishwasher (again, Rita doesn't always want to, because she's weird...), etc.

But we do have a few rules, and one of them is hard and fast: No sticks in the house!

Our last pup, Abby, (who was FULL of mischief) often flagrantly attempted to violate this rule:
"What, Momma?? I'm just practicing my Groucho Marx imitation."