Abby's Birthday and a Turkey-Hotdog Refresher Course for Mom

Well, it looks like we are doomed to posting once a week for a while - something to do with Mom leaving at o'-dark-thirty, and it being sort of dusk-y when she gets home, making for non-optimal photo time.  Mom has been saying something about how she has never been so excited for the Solstice in her life as she is this year - even if it is only a few minutes a day, she wants to know the days are getting longer.   But, Mom has assured me that she is going to try to post once a week.

Which is a good thing, as well have All Sorts of Exciting Things going on.

First, Abby took Mom to Petco for a refresher class on how to feed turkey-hotdogs as Mom has been slacking in the turkey-hotdog department for a while.  

Abby, being Abby, had to go suck-up to Jessi, first thing, and then go make friends with the two little Westies who were finishing up their class...

After the little dogs left, Abby got her private lesson (of which there are no pictures, because Jessi was really focusing on Mom's turkey-hotdog-delivery technique).  At the end of the private lesson, Mom's technique wasn't totally perfected yet, so Jessi invited Mom to continue to practice in the next class of the day, whose only member was Mogli, a 9 month old Newfoundland.

Abby greeted Mogli modestly, as usual.

Okay, so Abby really doesn't DO modesty....

And then they got back down to the serious business of Mom feeding turkey-hotdogs in such an enticing manner that Abby would run through Petco looking for Mom and her turkey-hotdogs.  First Mom practiced by just standing at the end of an aisle and offering her turkey-hotdogs.  Then Mom was hiding behind things, and Abby proved too be too clever.  So Mom thought she'd be Super Clever....

Let's just say Abby had the last laugh!

However, we think Mom is now crate-trained!  Heehee!

Mom got her revenge, however....  You know how I mentioned that this last Monday was Abby's birthday, but we were holding off on the celebrating until this weekend?  Well, after the Crate Incident yesterday (Mom says she got in there voluntarily, but I think Abby lured her in with some turkey hotdogs!), Mom decided to do the birthday thing today.  Which meant that Abby had to wear The Birthday Hat!

Abby is looking rather pleased with herself because Mom is hold bits of ham just off camera.  But I almost feel sorry for the poor girl - I mean with a birthday in December she's subjected to the elf hat, and the antlers AND the birthday hat all in the same month!  I least with my birthday in July, I get to spread out the, ah, glad tidings!

Mom made cake (well, mini-cakes) for both of us.  Although keeping true to the 'second-child-is-an-afterthought' maxim, Mom didn't actually have a birthday candle for Abby, and had to, ah, improvise!  (And get the card off the candle before it caught fire!)  But the cake was quite tasty!

And Granny and Grandpa had sent us some Most Excellent sweet potato snacks which we checked out - 4 paws up!  Thanks from both of us (because Abby will share, I promise!)!

After the birthday celebrations, Abby and I ran off our cake with a little bitey face. 

And a little frisbee time.

And, a little Sitting In The Snow Looking Regal.  She's a Hippobottomus, what can I say?  Besides, she did get Mom to crawl in that crate, so that's totally deserving of a little lazing about!

And finally, a gratuitous picture of me, because the ratio of Fi:Abby photos is way out of balance!  Heehee!

 *kissey face*
-Fiona and Abby the Hippobottomus

Ho-ho-ho (Or the Things We Do to Amuse Mom)

As you may (or may not) know, Abby and I have the sickies.  We've got 'kennel cough' or the flu, or something - apparently whatever we've got is going around.  When Dad came home from skiing on Thursday, I was coughing and hacking up mucous-y stuff all over the place, and he called Mom (who was on her way to work after her first day of skiing for the season), who turned around and took me to the vet, who diagnosed me with a 'respiratory infection' and put me on antibiotics and vitamin C.  That same evening Abby started coughing and hacking (although not as bad as me), and was also put on antibiotics and vitamin C.  Mom has been told we'll make a full recovery in 'no time'.

Being the sneaky, opportunistic person that she is, Mom took advantage of our sickies to *gasp* dress us up for Christmas photos.   Granny and Grampa thought we'd be 'dashing' in antlers and elf hats so they had sent us one of each, and Mom has been waiting for 'just the right moment' to take photos.  Apparently when we're sickie is 'the right moment'.  Thanks, Mom.  We'll wait for the 'right moment' to leave some surprises for you...

Abby was not amused.

However, there were treat involved...

And when there are treats involved, I can be persuaded to pose.  For a bit, at least.

Don't even THINK about adding a red nose!

This means I'll get lots of goodies from Santa, right?

Mom, you'd look pretty funny with antlers on, too.

This puts me on the 'NICE' list forever, right?

Abby was also coerced into participating in the Christmas photos...

Heehee! That's one happy looking reindog, dontcha think?

Awww.... She makes such a CUTE reindog!

Heh.  Talk about a grumpy-looking elf! Maybe she should stick with the reindog look!

The photo session was a bit tiring (even with Mom taking us out one at a time so we wouldn't attempt to bitey each other, and with Dad collaborating by providing the treats), but it amused Mom, and occasionally we have to do things to amuse her...

Oh, because of our sickies, Mom is thinking about postponing Abby's birthday celebration for a few days.  Abby turns 2 on Monday, but she wants us to enjoy the birthday cake (Mom's got a doggie cake recipe, complete with cream cheese and peanut butter frosting!), so she's thinking about holding off until next weekend.  Besides, a birthday party AND antlers and elf hats might just be too much excitement for one weekend!  Teehee.

*kissey face*
-Fiona and Abby the Hippobottomus

Time to Beat the Servants

*sigh*   Mom really has been slacking on the blog thing (and my toes are way too big for the keys on her keyboard).  First it was "the new job is keeping me busy" (yeah, but you get home at 4pm most days....) and  now it's "but I've got Christmas cards to mail, and I've got to make your annual calendar so it can get shipped in time".  Yeah.  Whatever.

In spite of all of these 'things' Mom has to do, she managed to eek out a little time to drag us to the groomers on Saturday.  

Don't let our newly-shorn smiling faces fool you: Mom was holding up some cheese!

Apparently, Mom thought we were getting a little 'woolly.'

Us? Woolly?   Naw.

We're not woolly; we're just getting ready for winter.

Mom thought that turning on the air conditioning in the bedroom because we were hot was a bit excessive, just because it was 18 degrees outside and she and Dad were already freezing... *sheesh*

So once we got back from being de-shag-ified, we immediately went out to get the 'new dog' smell off.

Abby, doing what she does best; being goofy.

Today, Mom and Dad took us on a bunch of walkies, but instead of helping us catch up on our friends' bloggies, Mom has been combing through the photos from the last year, trying to select the Top 48 for our calendar.  Here are a few possible choices....

Mom is still working on the calendar, she's (clearly) got a million choices!  In the meantime, Abby and I are going to go back to winter tug-of-war.

For those of you who were paying attention last winter, we have several frisbees - one was 'retired' after a vigorous winter of tug-o-war, but we've got 3 more that are still putting up the good fight!


We'll try to get around to bloggies, but Mom wants to ALSO get the Christmas cards mailed out, so have some patience with us!

*kissey face*
-Fiona and Abby the Hippobottomus

More Snow!

Yeah, yeah, we know.... We've been totally slacking on the bloggie thing - both posting and visiting.  If it's any consolation, you can totally blame Mom.  Seriously.  See, Mom gets up at 5:45am to go to work, and Mom is not exactly a Morning Person.  Grandpa is probably snickering at this point, thinking back to all the 5am swim practices he drove Mom to when she was a wee pup; he can testify to Mom's total lack of Morning Person-ness.   Anyhoo, so Mom gets up at o'dark-thirty and heads off to work, and while she comes home at a reasonable time (and if the weather cooperates, she and Dad will take us on a walk before dinner), she's ready for bed at 8pm or something, and that doesn't leave a lot of bloggie time.  We're hoping that Mom will eventually adjust to this morning thing and we'll be back to our regular bloggie post and visits.  But in the meantime, bear with us...

Enough of the blather.  We got snow this weekend!  It was another wet (for us) snow, so Dad had a lot of work to clear the driveway, but Abby and I had lots of fun bitey-ing and zoomie-ing.

Happy snow doggies!

So yeah, we totally did the New Snow Zoomie thing.  (Again, we've got you snowless doggies in our thoughts with each snowy lap!)

Powder hounds!

It doesn't get better than this!

More zoomies, or some bitey-face?

Definitely some bitey-face!

 

Heehee. Bitey-face is ALWAYS awesome in new snow!

And for those of you who are thinking picturesque winter/holiday photos, here is the obligatory Winter Wonderland shot from our back deck.

Apparently this morning was not so much of a Winter Wonderland; when Mom got up to go to work this morning, we had gotten 4-5 inches of snow, and it was snowing hard!  Mom had her first opportunity to experience her commute in snow.  Apparently her little car is just fine in snow, and after years of racing rear-wheel-drive cars in the rain on race tires, she knew enough to not drive like a total idiot in the inclement weather....  But we enjoyed the snow!  However, we are supposed to have good weather until Thanksgiving day - which means lots of walkies AND snow zoomies.  Does it get any better?  I think not!

*kissey face*
-Fiona and Abby the Hippobottomus