Buddha’s Spa Day

You know what’s really hard?  Giving a Guinea Pig a bath…  I know I’ve commented on it before, but I think it merits repeating.

Giving a Guinea Pig a bath is very hard.

And anyone who attempts it and survives should be awarded a medal.

<.<

>.>

Thanks to school and work and just general laziness I suppose, the fuzzy upstairs pets have been a little on the neglected side in terms of cleaning out bedding and trimming nails and such.  I like to try to clean everyone’s home out every week or week and a half, but alas, as stated above, it didn’t quite happen that way.  It’s actually been more like two weeks and it’s definitely shown.  So today, since I’m still on break and wasn’t scheduled to work at either of my jobs, I took the time to clean my room and everyone else’s too.

Evie and Uno rejoiced at the opportunity to take a spin in their exercise balls around the room, Faith watching them protectively from her new orthopedic bed:

Dog Not Included

It even has that stupid little tag in the corner that I’m itching to cut off.  So stupid– Like a dog is going to look at that and exclaim excitement over the type of foam.  I digress.

She got it for Christmas and loves it, I think she’s starting to prefer sleeping on that compared to jumping on my bed.  Good and bad for me I guess, as I’m glad she’s comfortable, but sometimes miss her being on the bed with me.

So while those two puttered around in their balls, I cleaned up, cursing Uno and her aim, for so effectively getting her bedding on EVERYTHING on my cabinet.  I do not understand why she does it and how she gets it over the netting I have around her two story condo, but it never fails.  Finally got those two cleaned up and moved on to my favorite little Guinea Pig and realized what a mess she was.  I felt really bad too, thanks to me her fur was in a state and her toenails needed clipping in the worst way.  So I cleaned up her house and then bundled her into the sink for bath time:

You. Are a horrible person....

She wasn’t happy.  And I wasn’t thrilled to see how brown the water got just from setting her in it.

Is that shampoo? It better stay there.

I SAID LEAVE IT IN THE BOTTLE! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?!?!

After what seemed like ages, I finally felt she was clean and squeegeed out the rest of the water, wrapping her up in a towel.  Her hootin’ and hollerin’ all the way.

Stop taking pictures and get me OUT OF HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!

I took her downstairs wrapped up in her little “robe” where I did a bang up job of making my mom think she had died (holy cow) and then got her ridiculously long nails trimmed.

I REALLY WISH THIS WAS YOUR FACE!!!!

This was all too much for her and by the time I got back up to our room, the only way to calm her was to give her an orange.  All that work and she got orange all over her face.  Oy.

And to wrap it all up– You know what else is hard?

Giving a Guinea Pig a haircut.

It’s harder than it looks, nerve-wracking and really just reaffirms how much of a hair stylist I’m not.

You call this a cut and curl? Please. I want my money back.

At least she can see now, before she looked like a calico sheepdog.  She still has plenty of fur, don’t get me wrong.  I just trimmed her around the eyes, screamed once when she bobbed her head when I was perilously close to her ears and scolded twice when she nibbled the hand with the scissors.  She didn’t take me very seriously.  I’m sure it’ll all grow back in about two seconds, but at least I made the effort.

All I know is that I need to sleep now, because this whoooole ordeal exhausted me.  I do know for sure that one of her favorite movies is Superman, because she didn’t take her eyes off the TV the whole time I was drying her.

I understand Buddha.  Christopher Reeve was a hunk and one of the best versions of Superman ever.

Time for Superman III just for laughs?  I think soooo.

Until then!

~Jaina G.P.S. (AKA: Guinea Pig Stylist)

Luka D. Thief

Yes ladies and gentlemen, Luka– is a thief.

Me?!

This evening, little fuzzy bratface decided he was going to help himself to my dinner.  I set my plate down– He pulled my hot beef sandwich off.  And then made a break for it.

Had to tackle him to get it back, because if I wasn’t going to enjoy it, neither was he.  I am honestly perplexed by how perplexed he was that he was banished to his kennel.  Seriously– You don’t steal a girl’s dinner and get away with it.

I’ll give him props for confidence, but there’s no denying his boldness is a bit over the top.

Then again... Make him mad...

DEMON!!

He's such a brat...

In other news: (since it’s not surprising Luka’s a thieving lunatic)

I’m trying to grow a mini Bonsai!  We were at Barnes & Noble on Sunday and when I was checking out I noticed one of those little gift set things they have the front.  Totally a splurge and probably a horrible idea, but I want to try anyway.  These little seeds are supposed to grow into a form of mini Bonsai with berries!  The set comes with a wee little scissors and a teeny pot, so I’m excited to see what happens.

Of course, I tend to kill things, so nothing might happen, or something might happen and then blackened, wilting death may happen, but I guess that’s a risk.  I just think it might be fun and if I can keep it alive, it might be therapeutic to trim it.  I’ll try to update what’s going on with it.  Currently, the seeds are in the refrigerator for the next seven days… They must like the cold.  Anyway, by the end of the week, maybe I’ll start growing something.

We’ll see.

Until then,

~Jaina

Luka’s First Christmas and Other Assortedness

Well, we had another Christmas come and go today.  It was also Luka’s very fist Christmas extravaganza and let me tell you– He handled it like he knew what it was all along.

We started the celebration yesterday, by making Snickerdoodles and Banana Bread, both of which turned out quite nicely.  Surprisingly enough, Luka actually acted like a little gentleman and didn’t need to be kicked out but once– simply because he has a tendency to lay down right behind you.  Good for knowing where he is, bad for not tripping on your face.

Can you... Just. Dwop whatever dat is pwease?

He was very interested in what we were doing and was also pleased with the scents that were being emitted by our oven.

 

Lemme jus check de wecipe, 2 cups sugew, 16 cups cookees...

He was very helpful.  Not.

 

Yes, I was.

He really wasn’t.

He was also helping me wrap presents.  Sort of.

 

I was on twash dutee!

He really was.  Not.

 

Faith was just waiting for anything at all...

And then the big day came–

 

All of these were our presents, but there were probably twice as many dog presents earlier.

Yeah, Faith is going in for the kill...

Faith waits for no one apparently and went immediately for the smelliest present she could find.

 

And then try to open them before anyone else can have some.

But Luka learned quickly...

 

And learned effectively...

And voila-- Happy Puppy...

Verrrrry Happy.

Faith-- Meet Faith...

You can’t really tell in the photo, but the toy does look like Faith, in a tug toy kind of way.

 

HALP! SHE HAZ DE PWESENTS!

So he got a monkey.

Sharing???

Nahhhh.

It was a good Christmas– The puppies were happy, the other assorted animals were happy and all of the presents I gave seemed to go over well.  I love Christmas and I’m always sad to see it go– but, there’s always next year to look forward to and more shopping to stress over :0)  I can listen to Christmas music for little while longer and then it’s off to whatever holiday comes next… Easter?  President’s Day?  Who knows.

Anyway, all of us here at the Doggy Bloggy wish you the best of the rest of this beautiful holiday and the happiest of New Years (I actually have plans!  Wha-whut-whut?!).  Also, whatever weather occurs, we hope it isn’t overwhelming, as winter weather often is!

Off for leftover turkey!

 

Merry Christmas!!!

~Jaina & Faith & Luka and all the rest!

 

We Wish you a Merry Christmas…

AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Merry Christmas one and all.  Faith, the gang and I hope everyone has a pleasant and spirited holiday and that 2011 starts out wonderfully.

I’ll post photos later about our own celebration and what and alllll the toys the fuzzy faces got.  Because, frankly– They got way more than the rest of us.

Until then!

Jaina

Oh For Cryin’ Out Loud

You people.

New Camera, New Snow, New Post

So, today was my birthday!  I turned 23 at 6:37 pm this evening– and no, I don’t feel any older.  It was a lazy day, I got to sleep in for the first time in a long time, it was lovely.  I got to snuggle with my Faithy and do my own thing before my mother got done with work and we went to lunch at Olive Garden.  It was surprisingly good!  My parents got me some lovely presents and then we all came home and napped, because frankly, the weather has been dreary and we’ve all been working too hard.  I had a final symphony concert to play in for my college tonight, so that took a little bit of time, but it was a good day overall and we made it through the weather, since we’re also currently under a blizzard warning.

I guess we’re going to be getting around 6 inches between now and 6pm tomorrow.  I’ll believe it when I see it.

The other thing that happened this past week was I got my new camera!  I’ve been wanting a Nikon D90 since forever and my Mom was able to find a deal for me to buy the package I wanted, so now I have one!  I haven’t had a whole lot of time to play with it, since the class I’m in right now, is particularly homework heavy.  But, today was my birthday and I had my homework done, so nuhhhhh!

Thanks to that, I went outside and shot some pictures:

Very first photo I took with my new camera!! He looks thrilled.

Third picture I took... Still not happy.

Action Shot!

Butt shot

He had snow on his face.  Of course, it was only after all of these photos that I realized I have a movement setting on my camera, so I could have caught a few photos of him bounding after Faith around the yard.  Maybe some other time.  Would have been nice to see before we got a million inches of snow, but at least I’ll be able to catch his reaction to feet of snow, rather than the powdering we got a few days ago.  And maybe he’ll do more than this:

One of these days she’s just going to eat him.

Well, gotta go eat my cheesecake, I am the birthday girl after all!
Until then,

~Jaina

Bed Hog

Who is this?

Bed Hog

Yes, a bed hog.  This particular bed hog, has always been a bed hog, however, it appears her hogginess has only gotten worse.

Who, me?

Yes, you.  The last three nights, I have noticed I’ve been waking up with my face perilously close to the edge of the bed and a good kick from behind would land be squarely on my nose.  Took me a few minutes to realize what that might be, until I turned and noticed a familiar blonde face.

This one.

Positioned behind me, in such a way that she had over half the bed and I was lucky to get a corner.  No wonder my back has been hurting!

I live with a pig! And she’s doing it again!

From the floor,

Jaina

Snow

So it snowed.

A little.

Which, I suppose I should be thankful for now, since we’re under a weather watch for Mother Nature to explode on us today.  Since we’re having our extended family Christmas today, I’m hoping that holds off, same kind of weather happened last year and we had to turn back after it took almost an hour to travel what would normally take thirty minutes.  Kept us from seeing our family.

Anyway, Luka will be coming with us again, as he’s still too little to wait in his kennel all day– He was so good last time, I don’t know if he has enough goodness left to make it through today. All my cousins are excited to see him again, especially the little ones.

I wanted to catch his first reaction to snow on camera, but I apparently neglected to plug in my  camera battery from the last time I used it and my new phone won’t let me record video without a memory card.  So, I was out of luck on that and forced to take photos with my phone’s camera, which actually, isn’t too bad for a camera.

I haven’t heard anything about the Nikon I ordered through Best Buy (I’m watching you BB, you’ve messed with the WRONG hobbiest!) so I wasn’t able to use that either, obviously.  I’m hoping it comes soon so we can take some photos of Luka for the Christmas card.  We make our own and we try to be funny.  In the past we’ve used Ozzie, Yuri and Faith photos that made them look guilty and implied they had eaten Santa’s cookies.  Which really doesn’t need to be implied.  But, you know.

Anyway:

Iz wet!

Faith has seen snow many times and really isn’t a fan, but she thought she’d stick around for photos.

As Luka falls off the deck...

She may have laughed a little at that…

 

Don't EVEN look at me little Toad Boy!

It’s hard to tell if she likes him– Some days, she seems very sweet with him (at their vet appointment, she got very concerned when the vet tech took him away to show him to the other vet techs, like “Where are you taking my punching bag!?!”) and others, she looks like she just wants to eat him.  I don’t know.  Sometimes I feel like that too.

But then he does this:

And then I love him.

Well, we gotta get going, but I thought I’d share some of his first snow pictures, even if they are from a phone!

Until then,

Jaina, Faith & Luka

 

Original of that last photo-- Wish my leg hadn't been in there...