It's been awhile since I blogged, and it's almost Christmas. We've got the tree up, we've been snowed and iced in for several days, so the 4-legged members of our pack have donned their winter finery to perform their daily ablutions.
Perhaps you remember the smallest member of the pack, Shepherd, or as we sometimes call him "Sheppie."
Shep is not as into playing dress-up as Freckles, so it took a couple of minutes of going out to make yellow snow for him to appreciate his new red turtle neck sweater. Frankly, he'd much rather use the human's bathroom for depositing residue of a different type, which is fine with us, as our bathroom has a white floor and a light blue bath mat, so we are not surprised by "dog bombs." Shep informs me, however, that he did not appreciate his new young master, my grandson Ethan, shouting, "Oh my God, my dog is wearing a sock!" then proceeding to sing, "Don we now our gay apparel." I can tell you, because all three of our dogs are exceedingly smart, but none of them can read yet - Shep's Christmas present is a Chihuahua-sized tug-o-war rope.
You may remember Gizmo from earlier posts. She and I are the senior citizens of the pack. Gizmo has a bad cataract on one eye, is developing one on the other eye, is too old for surgery, and - like many children and senior citizens - has selective hearing. She loves her new pink snow parka. She's had lots of fun leaving nuggets of coal in the snow for the bad little children. She has very thick fur, so she doesn't mind the cold or the snow. However, her vision problems get worse when the sun comes out after a heavy snow - she's snow-blinded. The first day it snowed, then iced, our back door screen was frozen shut. First Ethan had to de-ice the back screen, then let the dogs out. Thinking his job was done, in a few minutes he called them back in. At first we thought Gizzie was just being hard headed, but no - she was snow blinded and couldn't see the back door. Ethan had to get his boots back on, go around to the back yard, and carry her around and into the front door. Neither of them were particularly happy campers for a bit. In the picture below, she appears to be content, and she is. She's yawning after her outing in the snow, preparing for her long winter nap. Her Christmas present is a big, comfy, poly-filled bed, covered in grey plaid flannel, which I haven't made yet.
I want to introduce you to my only granddogger, Kai Lei. She lives in balmy Hawaii with her beautiful mommie, Katryn. You also met Agent K in the previous post - though her lovely auburn hair is now sun-streaked blonde. Surf on, girl!
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Kai is a part Pit, part Dalmatian, part Lab, part ?, born in my home town, Altus, Oklahoma. Her favorite toy is in the picture. It talks and asks if you want to hear the most annoying sound in the universe, and then makes a hideous, high-pitched, whiny screech like the one from the movie "Dumb and Dumber." It makes her bark and growl she finds it so annoying.
Now for Freckle Face, aka Freckles. Having returned from his tromp in the snow (yes, that's snow he tracked all over the living room floor), he is a little miffed, because none of us would go out and play ball with him in the snow. He loves snow, leaping through it, tunneling through it, and attempting to sniff out the wily squirrels who live in our big maple tree in the back yard. He's chewed his three tennis balls to shreds. He's down to one tennis ball which has a funky curve when thrown, as it only has "hide" on one side. His Christmas present is two, brand spanking new tennis balls in fluorescent colors, so he won't lose them in the snow or the grass.
