Wordless Wednesday: Workin' It

Rita is really good at looking like she hasn't eaten in three days when you are smacking out on something she wants a bite of. (Note how she sucks in her cheeks.)

I Met My Furry Muse!

If you've been around the blog a while, you might remember I posted this picture last year of our family friends' Labradoodle, Annie, the real life inspiration for Marie, the fuzzy heroine of my third novel, House Trained.

Photo credit: Annie's mom

The Sweet One and the ... Intense One

There are two border collies in our 'hood whose yard we often walk by on the weekends.

There's a sweet one...

Rita: Nutty About Chew

I wanted to share a couple of cute pics and a funny video from Christmas and figured I better get on it! Christmas already seems so long ago. (Although our neighbors are still turning their Christmas lights on every night...)

Anyway, here's Rita opening her gifts. Do you wrap presents and let your pup(s) open them?

See Beautiful: Beauty's All Around on a Hike

Belated Happy New Year!

I must admit - I've lost my blogging mojo (hopefully I'll find it since I'm in the middle of a big spring-cleaning binge), but I promised last month when I shared our Sedona/javelina adventures that I'd share some of the other pics I took if I remembered the See Beautiful hop.

And I actually remembered!

It's hard not to "see beautiful" when you're out on a hike with this scenery:

But I thought I'd share some of the other beauty on the trail - all the different trees and plants.

Less-Wordy Wednesday: A Prickly Heart & A Pup

In Monday's post I mentioned we went hiking last week in red-rock country (Sedona to be exact). On one of our hikes, I noticed a heart-shaped cactus...

Darling Pigs & Dirty Paws

We took Rita on a little hiking vacation last week.

On one hike, we saw three javelina, which, according to Wikipedia, are also called peccaries or "skunk pigs". They were super cute, and Rita was pretty excited about the bit of piggy mischief!

A Bear, a "Book Gram," and #12DaysofKolsNotes

A while back, I wrote about the one bear in my mom's collection that was "Rita's" - she would run and snag it every time we went to Mom's because she knew she was allowed to play with it.

Wordless Wednesday: She Just Wakes Up This Way

Why do people say someone's a "dog" if they think that person's unattractive? Makes no sense. Dogs are gorgeous!

I mean, siriusly. No makeup, no hair product. No weird sheet creases across her face. She just wakes up this beautiful!

A Moveable Feast With a Side of Mischief

I hope all of you in the States had a great Thanksgiving! Ours was very nice, if a bit complicated logistically.

Because my mom is in rehab (following a hospital visit, not for drug abuse!) about 75 minutes away and could only get sprung for 4 hours, we had to have a "moveable feast," which included Rita of course... and some mischief on her part.

Monday Mischief: Grooming on the Go

Rita is apparently blowing her summer undercoat out at the moment. She normally sheds a good bit all year long, but now it's just nutty. There are little clumps of fur coming out on her haunches and butt.

It's not her favorite thing to get brushed, so the dog-daddy has been trying to sneak a little brushing in here and there each time she stops on a walk to sniff or eat grass.

"Stop brushing me and let me graze!"

Wordless Wed. - When You Ask the Dogs If They're Ready

READY??

They look ready to me!

Thanks to BlogPaws for hosting Wordless Wednesday! Thank you for letting me be wordy! You can check out all the blogs in the hop here.

Works On The Dog-Daddy Every Time!

Pretty much all Rita has to do to get a treat out of the hubs is to stand there with her head in the pantry where we store the treats.

Okay, The Dog Snuggles Sometimes

Last week, I said Rita's not huge on cuddling, but my sis reminded me of this other sweet photo of Rita and Reg almost having a cuddle a previous time that Reg stayed with us:

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!)

Speaking of Nuttiness... Cuddles & Close Ups

In my last post, I wrote about "nuttiness triggers." Today we have more nuttiness! I finally got around to pulling pics off my big camera, and I found these pics of Reggie's recent stay that I'd forgotten about.

Rita was minding her own biz in her usual spot on the couch in my office. 

An Impromptu Take-Your-Dog-to-Work Day

Recently the Dog-Daddy had to go in to the office to pick up a report on the weekend, so we took Rita along with us for a little Take-Your-Dog-to-Work Day. Since she doesn't always like strange men, it's best to go on a day when no one else will be there, rather than on the real TYDtW Day!

She had a good time checking out where the heck Daddy goes for such long stretches of time every weekday!

We're Walking Here... Or Not

As I mentioned last Monday, we're dog-sitting our nephew, Reggie the corgi, at the moment.

Here's a pic of Rita and Reg on our walk the other day. Of a twenty minute walk, about 13 seconds of it looked nice and organized like they are in this photo.

Muchas Pooches Equals Muchas Mischief

We are dog-sitting Reggie right now. (If you're new around here, Reg is my sister's corgi). When Rita and Reg get together there's always plenty of mischief! Here's a recap of some of it from this past week. Sorry about the quality of some of the pics. My phone doesn't take the best pics in bad lighting. Or maybe it's operator error!

First of all, I never met a dog who resists going on a walk. If he sees me coming with the leash, he takes off running. He seems to like it once we're out, but I have to corner him to get the leash on him. Funny boy.

Balancing to Build Up the Dog's Confidence

I wanted to try to do a pictorial of our vaca with Rita to Cambria in Central CA today, but I didn't have time to get organized, so instead I'm sharing a subset of Rita balancing on things while we were on vaca!

I'm always impressed by Mr. N., the adorable Tenacious Little Terrier and the Adventures of Zoe & Phoenix and all the other talented dogs out there who can hop up on trees and whatnot and pose for photos. Since Rita has a lot of fears, I figured we'd try some hoping-up-and-posing pics, too, to build up her confidence - but we started small!

Here she is on a bench. (I know: easy-peasy. But they had all these cool benches made of logs and driftwood so it was mostly for the photo op and to practice her "go to your bed" command. That was the command I used to get her up on all these things. If I pat something - sofa, her bed, bench, whatever - and say "go to your bed" she'll get on it.)