Tuesday, July 15, 2008

We've Got Balls

We have six glow balls around here somewhere. They're the pups' favorite toys, but Fudge loves to sneak them into the house and hide them. On those rare occasions when I do housework, I'll find them under the bed or behind the sofas. We were down to two bleached out glow balls for six pups. That meant I either had to do housework and locate the others, or place an order with Sit-Stay.

Yesterday the package from Sit-Stay.com arrived. In
it were five brightly colored new glow balls. Rob and I unpacked them and placed them in the back yard. I let Sky out first. He looked like a kid at Christmas. Glow balls are his very favorite toy and he usually sleeps with one. Even if he's playing with another toy, he'll have his glow ball nearby.



Then we let the rest of the pups out. Each of them grabbed a glow ball and the race was on. Rob and I spent twenty minutes throwing balls for them to chase. When they had tired a bit, we brought the older dogs out. Samba and Fudge and Morgan were interested in the new balls, too. Monty and Tsar are too dignified to be caught playing with glow balls and besides they don't want to be asked to 'fetch'.



Everyone had a fun time and I managed to collect all the balls so they didn't get hidden away. For anyone who doesn't know what a glow ball is, they're these thick colorful rubber balls that absorb sunlight, then glow in the dark. As you can see from the picture, they lose their bright colors over time, but they still glow. If you have insomniac pups, as I did, they allow you to have great games of fetch at 3 AM. We always throw the ball a few times at last call.

The only other toy that comes close to generating as much excitement in my dogs is the flying cow frisbee from Bamboo. That is, without a doubt, Samba's favorite. She quivers when she sees it. I have to keep them locked away and they are only used with supervision. Fights could br
eak out over the cow frisbee. It's that popular.

My May posting called "Growing Pains' shows Samba teaching the pups how to play with the frisbee.



It took a couple days, but I finally got a picture of Bailey's new haircut. She has a nice naked butt.Now it's easy to tell her and Lola apart. Bailey really looks good in a lion clip and her hairdresser says she was cooperative . That isn't always the case.



Another thing I like about Sit-Stay.com. They always send a sample of some new treat. Lucy loves the 'Little LuLu' cookies. She liked them so well I ordered some in the peanut butter and blueberry flavor. Blueberry is supposed to be good for brain function and Lucy needed a little help in that area. She has finished off two packages of the cookies. In the new box there was a sample of smoked barbequed chicken flavor Little Lulus. She tried them at bedtime and the review was great.

Lucy was having some real trouble walking last week. She needed to be carried up and down stairs and wouldn't put any weight on one back leg. I am happy to report that she is walking again and doing stairs by herself, although we keep stairs to a minimum. She is increasingly fragile and sleeps most of the time, but when she's awake, she is active and demanding.

On our weekly visit to the Vet, this week was Sky's turn. When Sky was a little puppy, he broke one of his teeth. We had it pulled, but when his adult teeth came in, he chewed on something hard that chipped several of his front teeth. We were concerned about his show career, but the AKC recommended having the teeth fixed to prevent further damage. Our Vet, Dr B, did a great job of repairing the teet
h. He applied a bonding agent that gave Sky back his beautiful smile. The teeth looked like new and no damage was visible.

On Friday evening, Sky put his head in my lap for a pat and I thought I saw something on his tooth. I pried his mouth open and there was a chip on his lower left canine. When Dr B looked at it yesterday, he said it wasn't down to the pulp, good news, but it needed to be fixed ASAP, bad news. Sky will go to the dentist on Friday to get his tooth re-bonded.



Fudge is continuing to excel in his obedience training. I think he actually enjoys it. The others are straggling along at various rates. I haven't spent as much time this week as I should have on lessons. Last night, after a run, I had all the pups together in the garage. They were milling around waiting for their biscuits. In my 'master' voice I said "SIT" to no one in particular. They all looked at me, this is good, but only one immediately sat. Noah.

Noah got off to a slow start on his lessons, but he is now one of the more advanced students. Once he figured out what I wanted, he has been consistent. I saw the little light bulb go on in his brain.

Sky did show off his 'sit' 'down' and 'stay' for the girls at the the vet's office. He's a terrible flirt.



There were two blue butterflies on the butterfly bush. They seemed to be camera shy and kept flying away. I never did get a picture of them, but this fellow hung around for a long time.

2 comments:

Firefly Nights said...

Enjoyed meeting your dogs on my first visit. Will have to try to glow balls. Do they come in smaller sizes, too?

Paula said...

Wow thos glow balls are cool!
I love the knitting you are doing and that dog fabric is really cute!
My Mother-in-law does the cross stitch too and made us each stockings like those one year.
Your are very pretty!