Puppy's First Christmas: Meeting Santa

I'm a dog.  Word on the street is that Christmas is a week away.  I'm still getting the hang of this whole Christmas thing - trees in the living room, being told "No" when I try to sneak some cookies off the counter, being told "No" when I try to investigate what has been placed in the "Molly" stocking.  being told "No" when I try to eat the poinsettia - and today I discovered a new side of the impending holiday: Santa Claus.

This afternoon, we went over to PetSmart to get a bag of food, and suddenly I was trapped in a room with Santa Claus.  I heard a rumor that Santa was a jolly old man from the North Pole who delivered treats and toys to all the good puppies.  The person who wanted me on their lap was a woman with glasses wearing a red velvet suit and a horribly fake long, flowing, white beard.  I know this because when I got up on the bench, the first thing I did was lick Santa square on the mouth.  She was forced to adjust her beard and give herself away.

Eventually I settled down enough for the woman to take one good photo.  Tada!

Don't I look beyond thrilled to be meeting Santa?  My face might look bored, but see how Santa is straining to keep me still?  I couldn't contain myself.

It's hard to believe this shot didn't make the Christmas card.

Puppy's First Christmas: Holiday Greetings!

I'm a dog.  I am not adept at video editing.  But even I could make a holiday greeting card using Animoto, because it's just so easy!  But I didn't make this one. Take a gander at this puppy (Ha! Dog humor.) that Alicia put together for our family Christmas card.  Take special note of the adorable puppy who gets a several photo shout out starting at :45.  What a cute pup!



Merry Christmas! Happy Hannukah! Season's Greetings! Happy New Year!

Puppy's First Christmas: Decking the Halls

I'm a dog.  It's not Christmas yet, but it will be soon.  I've been picking up the slack around here and getting everything ready for Christmas.  I want it to be perfect.  After all, a puppy only gets one first Christmas!

I began holiday preparations by having Matt and Alicia drive me over to a nearby church to select a Christmas tree.  Last year, they had their tree on the ground in a stand.  This year, I advised them to get a shorter tree and put it on a table so I wouldn't be tempted to eat either the tree or the ornaments.  Here's the one we selected:

In between chasing children, I picked out the tree!

 Ain't she a beauty?  I think I did a really good job, considering that until recently, I had realized people liked to take chopped down trees and feature them in the living room with decorations.

Helping the "old man" put up the tree.

Once the tree was up, it was time to decorate.  I let Matthew and Alicia handle the placement of the lights and ornaments, but provided valuable assistance sniffing and licking (okay, okay, and trying to chew) several of the ornaments.

All decorated!

My favorite ornament is one that Alicia found special and gave me as an early Christmas present.  It's a pit bull puppy made of dough, and it looks a lot like me!  

When Alicia found it on Etsy, she said she gasped and ordered it immediately.  Aside from the brown spot on her face, this pup is almost my spitting image.  The lady who makes them, Judy Caron, was even nice enough to change the pup's red collar to blue, and write my name on it!

And of course no Christmas would be complete without hanging the stockings "with care" from the card catalog.

Another of my early Christmas presents is this personalized "Snow Dogs" stocking from Company Store.  Alicia found last year's designs on clearance earlier this fall and knew she'd struck gold.  My only complaint is that the white puppy with the green scarf is missing her brown cow spots.  I can't wait to see what I find in my stocking on Christmas morning!

Stay tuned to see if Santa decides whether I've been naughty or nice.  On the one hand, I think he has to side with "nice," since Matt and Alicia are always telling me what a good girl I am, and people are still not tired of telling me how cute I am.  On the other hand, I usually jump up on them and try to lick their faces off right after I receive that compliment, and I have munched on my chair a few times, which hasn't made Matt and Alicia too happy.  I guess we'll see!

(P)Up All Night

I'm a dog.

Last night, I woke up in the middle of the night and wasn't feeling well.  Here's what happened:

4:00am: Wake up with a tummy ache and begin crying.
4:10am: My cries finally reach Matthew and Alicia, who are upstairs sleeping.
4:14am: Since I won't stop crying, Matthew comes downstairs to see what's the matter.
4:16am: After hopping out of my crate and bouncing around the room for about a minute, Matthew can't figure out what's wrong.  I'm trying to ask him to take me outside, but he thinks I want to play.  He tells me it's bedtime, and puts me back in my crate.
4:17am: I begin crying again.
4:17am: Matthew and Alicia begin telling me, "No" from upstairs.
4:20am: I can no longer bear my tummy ache, and explosively poop all over my bed, crate and puppy self.
4:21am: Matthew starts down the stairs and is overwhelmed by the smell of poop.  He rushes to my crate and gets me out to the kitchen, calling for Alicia.
4:22am: Alicia comes downstairs and sees me covered in poop.  She helps Matthew wipe me down.  They keep apologizing profusely for not understanding that I was begging them to take me out so that I wouldn't mess myself and my bed.
4:25am: Matthew takes me outside, where I get the last bit of diarrhea out of my bum and eat a lot of grass.
4:25am: Alicia begins the terrifyingly stinky task of cleaning everything up.  She picks up poop bits off the carpet with her fingers (as paper towels weren't delicate enough and would've smeared it in).  She wipes down the crate with paper towels.  She pulls the bed out and unzips the cover.  She wipes the poop juice off the inner bed.  She brings the poopy cover up to the bathtub and rinses all the poop down the drain.
4:40am: Matthew and I return from outside.  We go right upstairs and into the bathtub to get me fully bathed. The whole time, he tells me what a good girl I am.  I still don't want to take a bath.
4:55am: Alicia gets a bucket of hot soapy water and wipes down the entire crate.
5:00am: Matthew and Alicia towel me off, telling me over and over again how sorry they are and how much they love me.
5:10am: I'm dry and sleepy and I still feel sick.  I curl up on my chair to go to sleep.
5:13am: Alicia offers to sleep downstairs with me, since she has to get up at 6:30 anyway.
5:15am: Matthew snuggles onto the couch to sleep in the living room with me and make sure I'm okay.
5:15am: Alicia snuggles back into bed, hoping to get some sleep.
6:30am: Matthew comes upstairs, Alicia wakes up and starts getting ready for work.
7:00am: Alicia wakes me up and takes me on a walk.  I'm sleepy, but happy.  I feel better.
7:15am: Back from the walk, I hop right back on my chair and go to sleep.
11:00am: I rouse myself from sleep to get a drink of water and snack on a little peanut butter.  I'm planning to sleep the rest of the day.

And I did.

I'm feeling much better now.  I've had a scoop of kibble, some hot dog, some cheese and some green beans. If I'm not eating or out on a walk, I'm asleep.

Happy Howl-a-ween!

I'm a dog.  Today is my first Halloween. I woke up this morning ready to put on my costume and go out trick-or-treating.  Then Alicia informed me that trick-or-treating doesn't happen until later in the day.  And that dogs are not allowed to eat candy.  And that kind of spooked the holiday spirit right out of me.

She did inform me, however, that we could go on some nice long walks in costume!  My best dog friend Chili loaned me his squirrel costume, which no longer fits him.  Since I love squirrels (or rather, I love to chase them), Alicia thought this would be a perfect fit.

Unfortunately, the costume was a bit too big.

And I wanted to eat it.

So we switched to Costume Plan B: Molly Moo!

I already came equipped with the white fur and large brown spots, so this costume was a natural fit.

Just add a cow bell and some horns, and voila!

Instant cow.

Moo!

Crazy-eyed cow.

Me and Katniss Everdeen from the Hunger Games!

Happy Halloween!

I. Love. Chair

I'm a dog.  After months of convincing (read: me hopping up when Matt or Alicia would go upstairs and positioning myself to look really cute when they came back downstairs), I was finally given permission to be up on the furniture.  Or at least the armchair in the living room, which Alicia got for $5 back in college.  It has a fairly hideous large floral print which was only recently covered over with a bland also fairly hideous slipcover.

Permission was granted last week after I slept there soundly while Matt and Alicia were out at a cocktail party and Auntie Sarah "puppysat" me while snoozing on the couch.  They thought it was just too cute to continue denying me this simple pleasure.

My first "legal" chair sit. Still not sure if I'm about to be told "No!"

Since then, I've become quite comfortable on my chair, choosing to sleep on it most of the day.  At first, I didn't even want to play or eat.  I just wanted to lay on my chair.  Now that I'm sure they won't take it away, I've gotten back to playing, and also to really making it my own.  They took away the pillow and covered the chair with a free fleece blanket Matt got at a baseball game.  I've covered that blanket with fur.

This was taken yesterday afternoon.  See how comfortable
I've become in such a short time?

I can tell you were laughing at me in that last picture.

As you can see, I was getting quite comfortable. So comfortable, in fact, that I decided I would make a few of my own changes to the chair last night while Alicia and Matt went out to dinner.

That cushion was just too cushiony. 

So I unzipped the slipcover and chewed off some stuffing.

Matt and Alicia seem disappointed in my changes.  They came in, gasped, and just started cleaning up.  I was laying on the floor, showing them my belly, but they were too focused on the cushion to notice.  I went over to lick their faces while they cleaned up, but they didn't seem to like that either.  Oh well.  I was just trying to make some positive change and embrace my new-found freedom of chair and no crate when they leave for short stretches.

They managed to put everything back together, so to the outside observer, everything looks the same, but I heard them mention something about me needing to be in the crate when they go out from now on.  Oops!  At least I'm still allowed on the chair.

The Salty Dog

I'm a dog.  It seems I started to write this post a while ago and never got around to hitting "Publish."  Oops.  The good news is that the delay has enabled my head to heal and thus enabled Alicia to take some salty photos of yours truly, which are included at the end...

At the end of August, Matt and Alicia went on vacation to Hilton Head Island in South Carolina.  They didn't invite me to join them.  That wasn't very nice.  I love car rides, and they were in the car for 9 hours! Unfair.  In the end though, it was a good thing they didn't bring me.  It seems they don't welcome my kind in South Beach (the neighborhood of the Sea Pines Plantation where they stayed).

That second to last rule just would not work for me.

Oh, but look, a dog cafe!

What's this? No dogs? At the dog cafe?

Hmm...maybe I could bill myself as providing the service of cuteness?

While they were away, I went on my own playcation to Gerri's house.  While I can only imagine they spent the entire time missing me and wishing they'd brought me with them, I just played and played and played all day.  And I play rough.

When I got home after 10 straight days of playing I was a happy dog, but it looked like I'd been through a war.  You see, I like to chew and jump on other dogs, and I like it when they do that to me.  And I let them bite as hard as they want, because I want them to like me.  Gerri didn't know this and after the first day, the damage was done.  Thus, my head and neck were a bit chewed up.

Before you look at these pictures and feel bad for me, just know I wasn't hurt and that I had so much fun and was so happy with my chewed head.  I've gone back to Gerri's for play group and now that Gerri knows how hard I play, she makes me take breaks so that this doesn't happen anymore.

On a related note, Matt and Alicia were kind enough to bring me back a souvenir from their trip.  They didn't take any photos of me wearing it when I first got back though, because my head looked a bit, well, chewed.  But now I'm all fixed up (and have been for a while), so it's time to get salty...

Look at me! I'm a Salty Dog!

Still cute.

Getting bored of this photo shoot.

I'm done.  I'm going to sleep.

Good Dog: It's a Miracle!

I'm a dog.  I'm a lucky dog.  I was transferred from the animal shelter in Prince George's County, MD (pit bulls are illegal and are scheduled for euthanization upon arrival) to a shelter in Alexandria, VA.  I was going to be killed just because of my breed, but I got lucky.

This beagle was also going to be euthanized, because no one had adopted him from a shelter in Alabama.  They put him in the gas chamber with a bunch of other dogs, but miraculously, he survived!

Can you believe it?  What a lucky dog.  And a cutie too.  Thanks to 11th Hour Rescue, he's now safe in NJ with a foster family, and I sure hope he finds a good home.

I Know You Are, But What Am I?

I'm a dog.  Until last weekend I wasn't too sure about exactly what kind of a dog.  But now I'm feeling fairly confident.  The folks at the AWLA knew I was a pit bull terrier mix.  They weren't sure what was in the "mix."  Luckily, whilst walking in DC last weekend on our way to congratulate Ben and Amanda as they finished their metric century bike ride, we came across two puppies who were my spitting image!

They were two-month-old pups out on a walk with their owner.  When Matt and Alicia saw her and her dogs and she saw Matt and Alicia with me, everyone stopped in their tracks.  I was taken back to my earliest days.  The other owner saw a vision of what she could expect in a couple of months.  Everyone was in shock.

Then the humans got to talking.  It turns out those precious pups have a mom who is a Pit Bull Terrier and a dad who is an American Bulldog.  That makes them American Pit Bulldog Terriers.  And I'm probably one as well!  It just makes so much sense.  So much of me is Pit Bull-ish.  The thickness of my coat, my almond-shaped eyes, size and stature, how muscly I am, not to mention my triangular Pit Bull smile all point to Pit Bull.  But I'm also mostly white, which isn't so common with Pit Bulls.  And my snout is kind of rounded, which is also wrong.  And what about my big brown markings? A simple Google Image search for "American Bulldog" reveals image upon image of white dogs with beautiful markings.

So, what happens when you mix this:

[via here]

With this?:

[via here]

It seems to me you would get this: 

Am I right?

Bark! Who Goes There?

I'm a dog.  A guard dog.

When the weather's nice and Matt and Alicia leave the front door open wide with just the screen between me and the great outdoors, I like nothing more that to sit there and take in all the happenings.  You wouldn't believe how much action there is outside our front door!

Sometimes, squirrels run by and jump from limb to limb in the trees.  I do put on my best sit and watch them. I also occasionally bark at them if it looks like they're having too much fun and not including me.

I see you, squirrel!

I also like to watch the leaves fall from the trees.

But my most favorite of all is when people (and dogs!) come walking right in front of our house! I get up from my sit and wag my tail, hoping they're coming to pet me.  Sometimes they do.  Other times they just walk on by.

Oh, hello there!

Come over here and love me!

I think I've found a new favorite hobby.  Watch out rides in the car, you're in danger of being replaced.

Puppy's Got a Brand New Bone

I'm a dog.  Every day I get bigger and bigger.  It seems every time Alicia and Matt turn around, something that used to fit no longer does.  For example, I used to ride in the car in my car crate.  Now that I'm too big for the crate, they just lay a blanket (or my bed) down on the seat, and I ride along.

Today Matt decided it was finally time to put away my puppy Nylabone and get me something bigger.

Here's me and my Nylabone in the early days...

An older (and wiser?) me enjoying my good ol' puppy bone.
The new bone will wait...

Hmm...perhaps that puppy bone is finished and it's time to move on...

Claiming my new big girl bone!

So long little Nylabone!

Awesome Animal Videos: Pug Plays Piano

I'm a dog.  I haven't posted in a while.  I've wanted to, but Alicia says she doesn't have the time to translate.  I beg your forgiveness and offer you this video of a pug playing the piano, in hopes that it will fill the dog-shaped hole that is in your heart while you wait for my next post...

I Scream! You Scream!

I'm a dog.  We all scream for ice cream!

I didn't know it, but Alicia had been saving up a special treat for me.  Back in July she stopped over at Dairy Godmother to treat her camp staff to a little Wisconsin-style frozen custard.  While she was there, she picked up one of their Pumpkin Puppy Pops.

So what is a Puppy Pop?  Puppy Pops are frozen, yogurt-based treats for dogs, which are wheat-free and made with all natural ingredients.

Now that it's September and summer is over, Alicia is back to the daily grind, working as a school librarian.  This means she doesn't have as much time to spend with me.  This also means she was feeling guilty and remembered that she had a special treat to give me.  I can't believe Alicia had been holding onto this thing for so long without giving me a taste!

The peace/guilt offering.

Yum! Yum! Yum!

It keeps trying to run away from me.

That's better.  Alicia popped it out of the plastic
cup and into my bowl, where it couldn't go too far.

Mmm...That was good.  Thank you! I'll have another.

I sure hope she feels guilty again sometime soon.  Like maybe later today.

Do You Want to Go "OUT?"

I'm a dog.  Some dogs, like my Aunt Annabelle, get excited when they hear the word "walk" or see their leash come off the hook.  Me?  There's nothing that gets me more excited than the word "out."  My ears perk right up and I start dancing around the room.  I head over to the landing and show off my best sit.

Exhibit A: Before "out."
Note: Slicked back ears. Looking straight ahead.

Exhibit B: After "out."
Note: Ears perked up to ensure I heard correctly;
head tilted to emphasize point.

A Tisket A Tasket, A Molly in a Basket

I'm a dog. I had such a long, tiring day today.  Between a morning walk at 6:45am, doggy playgroup all day and meeting up with Chili and Tonka to play this evening, I was spent.  I couldn't even make it all the way across the room to my crate, so I just curled up in the blanket basket.

Who needs a crate and a fluffy bed when you can snuggle in for a snore in a basket of blankets?

Dip, Doggie, Dip! Dip, Doggie, Dip! Now Slide! Slide! Slide!

I'm a dog.  As of today, I'm a dog who went in a swimming pool!  But I'm already getting ahead of myself.  Let me back up.

Today I went to my first ever dog party that I was invited to attend.  While I attended another dog party once, I wasn't invited to it and just kind of crashed it towards the end and took some treats.  But I digress.  Today was the annual Parkfairfax Doggie Dip.  Or maybe it's the Parkfairfax Doggy Dip.  I'm not sure.  The party was scheduled from 12-2 and was located just down the street from our house at the Lyons Lane pool.  Even though Alicia has been trying to get me psyched up about it all week long, I had no idea what she was talking about and was unsure where she was taking me, as the pool is not on any of our regular walk routes.

I was a bit nervous as we turned the corner and I spied a bunch of dogs and people hanging out at the pool.  I stopped in my tracks and sat down and then crouched, surveying the scene for anything suspect.

As we walked down the sidewalk, my tail got to wagging and I was excited.  Then we got inside and Alicia took off my leash.  I guess she was expecting me to run and jump into the pool, or at least run over to meet some of the dogs.  Instead, I took note of the pool (pool = wet = bad) and made a beeline over to the corner farthest away from the water and went about one of my favorite activities: sniffing.

A few came over to say hello, but I was too nervous and overwhelmed to pay them much mind.  I was looking for an escape route.  There was no way that I was getting anywhere near that pool.  Soon enough I found some large stacks of deck chairs and climbed atop them.  From this position I could keep an eye on the pool water and make sure it didn't make any sudden moves, like the ocean water did back in June.

While it was definitely safer up there on the stacks of chairs, it was still fairly precarious.  My paws kept slipping through the slats and I got stuck almost every time I took a step.  

Alicia wasn't sure this was the best place for me (wrong!), so she scooped me up and carried me over to the pool steps, where a bunch of dogs - (mostly golden retrievers and labs, one enormous great dane and a couple other dogs) were milling around, hopping in and out of the pool with balls and rubber duckies in their mouths.

Norman, a golden retriever puppy who I happened to meet and play with last night while out on a walk, was over at the edge of the pool, so I went over to say hello.  He'd already been in and was making plans to go back in very soon.  In fact, he just up and jumped into the pool without so much as a goodbye.  It seemed like the party was in the pool, but I still wasn't sure.  I walked along the edge of the pool, crouching down every once in a while to test the water - by lapping it up, of course - but wouldn't go in.  I went to the stairs and dipped in a paw.  Sure enough, the water was wet! No thank you.

So I walked around some more.  Dogs were shaking themselves off and making me wet.  There were puddles everywhere.  All the balls were in the pool.  It just made sense to hop in and see what all the fuss was about.

You'll notice I'm wearing a leash in the pool.  That isn't standard practice.  I had my leash off before, but when it looked like I might want to jump in, Alicia got nervous and leashed me up.  And thank goodness she did.  Turns out, I don't know how to swim!  There I was trying to keep my head above water, and there was Alicia reeling me in.

I finally got to the side and she left me to pull myself out on my own while she snapped a picture.  Good thing I'm all muscle!  There was no way I was staying in that pool any longer than necessary, so I gave it my all and hoisted myself out.

After shaking off the excess water I decided that perhaps it would be best if I just watched from the sidelines and left the swimming to the professionals (aka golden retrievers).  While they were doing what they do best, I did what I do best: watching, sniffing and running around with other dogs.

Lifeguard Molly, on the alert.  Just don't drown.  I can't save you.

Checking on the little dogs in the baby pool.

Horsing around on the pool deck.

I was having a great time.  I was running around, jumping on dogs, chewing on dogs, getting into play stance and bouncing around.  The world was good.  Then I got into a great chase with another dog right along the edge of the pool.  My leash was off and I was running fast, cutting corners and having a blast.

NOT jumping in the pool.  Just cutting corners way too close.

And then what do you know, but I wind up falling in the pool.  Yikes!  Last time, I chose to jump in the water.  Which was a mistake.  This time, I fell in and was terrified.  I was frantically trying to paddle with my front paws while my hind legs and butt just sunk.  Alicia quickly grabbed me by the collar and lifted me to safety.  Thank goodness!  This time, it was a bit scarier, so she didn't have a chance to snap any photos.

After that, I kept playing, though a bit further from the pool.  Alicia tried to bring me over to the baby pool, where they were allowing us big dogs who can't swim a chance to take a mini dip in water that only came up to our ankles.  But I didn't trust it.  Water is sneaky and there was no way I was getting in that pool.  Even if it was less than six inches of water in one area and Alicia was already standing in the water, trying to get me in.  No sir.

I took a few more sniffs around the pool and tried to drink a little bit more pool water, and that was that.  Overall, a great time.  If it hadn't have been for all that water, I'd rank it the best pool party ever!  So many dogs to play with and chase.  Lots of people petting me and calling me cute.  What could be better?

And now, if you'll excuse me, I'm beat.  Time for a nice long nap in my crate.