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Grooming Midnight outside worked well

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I was just sitting outside on our front porch with my dog Midnight. She’s shedding so I got out the grooming tools – ezgroom brush and Furminator, and I sat and brushed her coat.

She behaved the best I’ve ever seen her behave while being groomed. She mostly just sat there enjoying being brushed as she looked around at the neighborhood and tried to eat a few ants that were passing by her feet.

We haven’t been grooming her as much as we should so I’m surprised how good she was. She must have really enjoyed the attention because two people walked by with dogs and all she did was watch them walk by. Usually she jumps up and tries to run at the dogs so that she can play with them.

I usually don’t like being out at the front of the house with her at this time of day because we have several school in the area and all the kids walking by as return home from school usually drives Midnight nuts. She just wants to play with all the kids. Still, she was pretty good when most of the children walked by.

One lady went by with a baby in a stroller. The baby was wearing the cutest baby clothes. Perfect for a lovely late spring day. Luckily our dog doesn’t pay much attention to babies when they are quite. If they are laughing or crying that’s another story!

Does your dog enjoy being groomed?

Next step? Maybe an outdoor bathing session?





Toronto area dog owners Woofstock is this weekend

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Are you going to Woofstock?

Woofstock is the largest festival for dogs in North America and it’s this weekend!

It’s been held here in Toronto on Saturday June 7th and Sunday June 8th between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. each day. The festival is taking place at the St. Lawrence Market Neighborhood.

I have to admit that I’d never heard of Woofstock until a month or so ago. Of course I never owned a dog until last November so perhaps that’s how such a big festival in the city I live in escaped me.

The festival has been going on since 2003 and last year it was so big that CNN beamed the event around the world for the whole weekend.

Chris and I are definitely going to go downtown and check out Woofstock tomorrow and perhaps on Sunday as well. Midnight loves meeting other dogs and she loves people too so this will blow her mind.

There are all kinds of events and contests planned for each day. Perhaps we’ll enter Midnight in one of the contests. She’s cute and she’s smart it might be worth a try.

Check out the Woofstock website for a complete list of events, sponsors, booths and learn how to enter your dog in one of the contests if you’re interested.

Zootoo – a social network for pet owners

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zootoologo.jpg I just signed up with a social network for pet owners. It’s called Zootoo.com and it’s a place where pet owners can create a journal to discuss their pets, connect with other pet lovers, discuss pet news or even launch pet groups or announce pet related events.

I’ve joined a few pet and or dog related forums and groups since we got Midnight last November and I’ve enjoyed connecting with other pet owners.

One thing that I like about Zootoo is that there are lots of groups specific to type or breed of pet as well as groups that have been created for pet lovers in specific areas. I joined a couple of the dog and Labrador Retriever groups right away.

Sometime over the weekend I’ll add to my personal page by posting photos of Midnight as well as pictures of my two box turtles. Then I might go around and look for other members that own Labs or box turtles and connect with them.

The only, minor, problem that I had with the site was registering. I’m in Canada and registration requires that you list a zip code. I’m fairly sure after reading the terms of service that membership is open to most people with the exception of a few countries so it would be nice if they fixed this requirement. As a result of having to put down the only US zip code that I know by heart (90210) it looks like I’m from Beverly Hills California so group suggestions etc don’t work well for me.

If you have pets and want to start a page about your pets and connect with other pet lovers check out Zootoo.com.

My dog is so hyper!

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Our Lab puppy is now 9 months old and she’s growing like a weed!

I was just telling the folks over at my other blog that she’s now 60 lb and it’s becoming harder and harder to take her for a walk because she tugs on the leash so hard that she’s almost pulling us off our feet. In other words she’s a real drag – or we are! We use a comfort wrap harness when we walk her and it helps to some degree, but she’s so strong!

Normally in the evenings she calms down and while she still plays a lot she also takes naps, especially as the evening drags on. Last night though … she just wouldn’t calm down. It was like she was on a pep pill or something.

She was running back and forth from room to room, jumping up on the couch beside my husband dropping her toy bones on him to get him to play and so on.

At one point she came racing into the room and jumped on our leather recycling chair and almost tipped it over backwards! If I hadn’t caught it both she and the chair would have crashed to the ground. She did manage to whack the home theater speaker while she was running around and just about knocked it off it’s speaker mount too.

We’ve talked to other Lab owners and most say their pups were pretty hyper too, but we get the feeling when we talk to them that our Midnight is a lot more hyper than their’s were … or maybe time has faded the memory of that hectic time now that their dogs have calmed down.

I just hope that Midnight starts to calm down a bit soon – at least while we’re out walking with her. Someone told us the other day that she’ll calm a bit when we get her spayed. We haven’t done that yet but plan to sometime in the next month or two. Does anyone know if it’s true that she’ll calm when she’s spayed?

If anyone has any tips as to how to get her to be a bit more co-operative when we take her out for walks I’d appreciate some advice. Thanks!

Losing weight

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I just thought I’d give you an update on my continuing weight loss. As regular readers know I’ve been off work on medical leave for more than two years due to Crohn’s Disease.

Over the past two years I’ve managed to gain a few pounds due mainly to inactivity thanks to my abdominal pain. Last November we got a Lab puppy to keep me company and as a way to motivate me to get more active. Dogs need to get outside, even if you don’t feel like taking them out, right?

Well, between Midnight keeping me busy and now Spring gardening tasks etc I’ve noticed that I’ve started to lose some weight. I hadn’t gained a lot of weight, but enough that I wasn’t looking forward to summer shorts and skimpier clothes if you know what I mean!

So I’m happy to say that the weight seems to be dropping off without the help of a strict diet or dieting aids like Slimquick. I’ve just become more active.

Of course I do watch what I eat. I have to since I have Crohns as I have trouble digesting quite a few foods. However I do try to eat low fat foods, lean proteins and limit the sweets.

Have you been trying to lose weight? What have you done and have you been successful?

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