Rainy Day Cleanup

I can't even remember the last rainy day we had. I was very happy to have dry weather all the time we had the puppies, and even after they were adopted so I could get caught up on the mowing and some of other yard work. But it's raining today and that's fine, we need a little to settle the dust. I'm not doing anything but work today so for a blog post I'm combining and cleaning up some related pictures from my camera and desktop.

I finally got Trooper to the vet last Friday. He needed blood work because he's been taking previcox for joint and muscle pain relief. Trooper is terrible at the vet although not quite as bad as Vince used to be. Still, no one enjoys his visits, least of all Trooper himself. But we got through it and got the blood test done. I collected a urine sample from him and took it in on Monday. The results of the tests were a bit wonky so I've discontinued the previcox and am just giving him trammadol for pain at the moment. He also tested positive for two tick-borne diseases so he's now getting doxy as well. I mixed up another batch of homemade pill pockets (2 parts flour, 1 part peanut butter, 1 part water), to make the pills more palatable. I also bought and cooked down a batch of chicken feet making a collagen-rich and tasty gel that makes him very excited about food time. Trooper is our old man now; he gets some extra pampering and catering to his needs.

Yes, they are gross.

After Trooper's vet visit Friday afternoon, we took Maya into town to our favorite new brewery, Decipher. It's my favorite new brewery anyway, for two reasons: good beer and dog friendly. They have dog biscuits on the bar made from spent grains used in their brewing process. Maya likes a good brewery and she made new friends.

I took the our two Dane girls out for a hike on Saturday. I hadn't had them out for quite a while and it's been even longer since we were on the trails in the woods. They really enjoyed it. Serena was more confident that Della on the trails which struck me as odd, but I'm not sure I had ever taken Della out on a proper hike. When we first got her we did a couple of walks but they were probably mostly on the roadway at Pleasant Grove and then I stopped walking her altogether once the puppies came on the scene. She's been to the pasture to run, but this was her first actual hike in the woods. They are such a beautiful pair of dogs together.

Disney's adoption and absence was noticed quite keenly by Cinderella. That girl does not like to be alone and was quite vocal about it last night. I made Max stay in the office with her last night. She was crated, he was not. That was fine for last night, but I'm still keeping her inside and she needed someone to play with. The three other girls were happy to oblige this morning because no one got much outdoor time due to the rain.


It was good for Cinderella to learn to play with some dogs other than those she grew up with. She's a Dane, so her basic play style was fine with our girls. A new dog in the mix is good for all of them.

After they all played together for a while I put them in their
crates so I could work.