Hard Work Pays Off!

Woooo, it's me - Dave, Guide Dog for the Color Blind. Many of you know just HOW hard I work in Mom's quilt studio (and other aspects of her life) - choosing things that are JUST the right color and shade for her projects. (I got to choose the ceramic tiles that are the Library/Media Room floor and the brick pavers for our cool pathway in the backyard, too!) Anyroo... here is a picture of me from last week, during a particularly exhausting work day!

See how hard I work? Woo. And ... you'll note I got my fluffy work space back from somepuppy who tried to claim it as her own before!!!

Anywoo, Mom had been working on a present for a friend of hers and it was two place mats that were folk-art type representations of the Texas state flag. I thought they looked really cool (I am from Texas, you know!), but Mom wasn't real happy with them and didn't want to send them to her friend. She said they didn't measure up in some intangible way. (?) Mom gets some weird ideas sometimes.

We went on a REAL long walk yesterday afternoon, then Zim and I did mega-zoomies downstairs - so I wasn't really paying attention to what Mom was working on. After dinner, I was guarding the bed from intruders - and guess what Mom brought me?!?!

Woo! It's the Texas flag place mats ... but sewn together and made into a pillow!

For me, Mom? Really?

Not only cool.... but VERY comfy. I couldn't believe it -- just for ME!

Thanks, Mom!

I love my new pillow! AND my mom!

Luv,
Dave

Spay Day!

Ha roo, everypup! It's me - Zim!

Did you read our pal Indy's blog the other day? He reminded all of us that today is Spay Day! He pointed out some of the health benefits to spaying or neutering your pets - please surf on over and read his post! You'll also see, in the comments, a great little poem Holly wrote. Our resident poet, Dave, really liked it, so here it is:

To spay is the way, and to Neuter is to be cuter!!

Ha roo roo roo!

The website Just One Litter reminds us of some pretty scary stats. It's not just for our health, it's for pet over-population:

In six years one female dog and her offspring can be the source of 67,000 puppies.
In just seven years, one female cat and her young can produce 420,000 kittens.
There is theoretically no limit to the number of offspring male dogs and cats can produce.
Every day in the United States, tens of thousands of puppies and kittens are born. Compare this to the 11,000 human births each day, and you can see that there can never be enough homes for all these pets.

Makes you think, doesn't it? Please encourage your owners and others to spay and neuter their pets!

Play bows,

Zim

PS: For some cool graphics you can post on your blog, click here!

FIDOs and Some Cats Aren't All Bad!

Hi everypuppy! It's me again - Amber!

Thank you so very much for all your kind comments about my trip to the vet's the other day! The bipeds are all so very nice there and we got really good news this time - so everyone was happy. Except that I didn't get to have my breakfast before we went so I was a tad unhappy about that. Mom did a lot of making it up to me, though, so I'm OK about it now.

Before I get into my other discoveries on campus, as you may know, the F.I.D.O. Awards were presented last night - and Storm won "Best Performance By a Dog" for her "Stormy Talks" video! We're so very thrilled for Stormy - she and we would like to thank everypup for viewing the vids and voting! Here are the other results:

Best Soundtrack - Mr Boom-Chucksie by Charlie the Big Dog
Best Edited Video - Do ya think I'm Sexy ? by Bogart
Best Special Effects - Chucksie Bux v's the Cement Truck - by Charlie the Big Dog
Most Creative Video - "Do they know it's Christmas" by Pappy (Dave and Zim are in that video!)
Funniest Video - Classic Tug of War - by Joey & Tanner
Cutest Video - Zoomies by Charlie & Opy
Best Performance by a Dog - Stormy Talks - by Stormy of the Army of Four
Video Of The Year - again, the winner is: "Do they know it's Christmas" by Pappy

Congrats to everypuppy!

OK... so ... back when Dave went to the vet's for one of his check ups, he told me about having to take a detour because of construction and that they got lost on campus (we love our mom, but she has a worse sense of direction than we do - Sibes know how to go, go, GO ... but have no homing instincts to speak of) AND they saw something interesting. There are cat things ALL over campus - like this: EVERYWHERE! I don't know if it's the C(un)IA marking their territory ... and if so, there's a lot of evil-doing on campus or if it's something else! Anyroo, as we all know by now - it's OK to make friends with cats (though some of us don't really have the desire) but you shouldn't trust them. But Dave said he saw something that led him to believe some cats might be OK. Hmm. I had Mom turn so I could see what Dave did. Check this out!

Dave took that picture back in the Summer, but I had to see it to believe it! It would appear not ALL of the cats are evil. We need to find these ones and get them to work with us! I'll report back any successes!

Love to everypuppy!
Amber

PS: We'd also like to congratulate Boo for winning the Awesome Blog Award! Way to go! We are the Featured Blog for March and are just so very honored! Thank roo to Marvin for the nomination and to those of you who voted!!!

Sunday Salute - Rookie

This week, our Sunday Salute is to the pup we refer to as our great uncle - Rookie!

We promised our friends Jazz and Dixie some pictures of one of the beagles in Mom's life, and thought it would make a good Salute. After all, growing up with beagles in her life is one of the things that made Mom into the puppy-lover she is today!

Mom's first beagle was Sam, and the pix we found of him are really fuzzy - we think they're from when cameras were first invented or something. Ha roo roo roo. We did find some cute ones of Rookie, though! Here he is, as a wee baby in 1973:

That's Mom holding him; she was just a puppy herself! She cleverly cropped herself out of the picture before allowing us to use the picture of Rookie. Hmm. Anyroo, he was born in Rockville, Maryland, and first lived with Mom and her family in Northern Virginia.

Here's Rookie a few years later, in Hampton, Virginia, when they moved there! He looks very pensive, doesn't he?

Here's one of Mom's favorite pix of him - and her! - at "Dog Beach" on Ft. Monroe, Virginia.

Mom was in college by then and loved to come home to her family (who by then lived at Ft. Monroe) and spend special "alone time" with Rookie. Can you believe they have a beach there called "Dog Beach"? How cool is that!?!? (Oh... and that's an aircraft carrier heading home to Norfolk, VA, in the background!) Mom was home for Christmas Break for that picture.

And here's one more shot of Rookie; here, he is playing backgammon at Ft. Knox, Kentucky, with Jackie Blue - the Siberian who owned Mom's brother and his wife! (Jackie Blue was the first Sibe Mom knew and loved!)

We're not sure who won the game, but obviously Jackie is blowing on the dice for luck! Or trying to eat them. Whatever works.

Rookie (and Sam and Jackie Blue and all the pups in our mom's puppyhood) - for teaching Mom how wonderful pups are and helping train her - we salute you!

The Army of Four

Amber's Vet Trip Pix

Ha roo, everypuppy! It's me - Amber! I hope everypup is having a really happy Saturday!

As you might remember from a post Dave made last week, I had a vet appointment last Thursday. It was really, really long and the bipeds there were all just as nice as can be to me, but it was a very long day! Anyroo, I had to go back yesterday to repeat one of the tests and I must have done very well on it because there was lots of hugging and smiling going on and today Mom still keeps hugging me. It was an exhausting day again, mostly because I had to keep "vocalizing". I sang what Stormy calls The Sad Songs of Siberia. It's important that we let our feelings be known to all!

I did some exploring this time and took the camera, so you could see the cool set-up. The waiting room is really huge, but there was nothing too interesting there, so I didn't take any pictures. Here's the exam room I was in, though.

See the computer? I guess it's so pups can log in and check their email - - or maybe I should have posted to the blog!??! It was too high up for me to reach, though, so it must be for Great Danes or somepuppieselse who are tall. I'd have liked to log on and at least read some of your blogs, but I couldn't reach. Still... it's nice that it's there so the Great Danes and stuff can check their mail.

And here I am, smiling. Sort of.

I looked across the hall and saw an interesting sign on one of the other exam rooms. (They all have reinforced glass windows, so we can see out and don't feel closed in or anything!) I tried to get a picture of the sign, but couldn't hold the camera still enough. Then I saw the very same sign on the counter in MY room! Here it is:

Wow! I wonder why? What are the cats doing in there? And does this secret "Cats Only" thing have anything to do with the C(un)IA? Doesn't that just make you wonder!?!? I asked Stormy about it later and she said she thought it had more to do with limiting the spread of diseases or something like that -- but you never know!

The really cool part was on the way home. Yes, mostly because we were on the way home ... but check out what I saw when we got to the traffic light by the fire station!

Can you see through the windshield? It's people on horses! Here's a zoom-in!

Oh, it was exciting - they were all over the place! There is a big rodeo going on at campus and the horses and the people are everywhere! It was very exciting!

Then we got home and everypuppy was happy to see me and I was happy to see everypuppy and we all went on a big, long family walk. And that's my trip to the vet's!

Love to everypuppy!
Amber

Yogurt!

Ha roo, everypup! It's me - Zim! Did you see Fu Fu's blog yesterday? He got some really cool treats called yogurt drops. Mmm, they looked good! Then I surfed over to Charlie the Big Dog's blog and saw a VERY cool video of him and the bee-roo-tiful Miss Opy getting yogurt!!! It reminded me that we LOVE yogurt, but haven't had any in quite a while. I thought if I posted pix of all of us, that Mom might get the picture (so to speak) and give us some!

Here I am: And here's the Deeve:
Here's Ammy:
And here's Storm:
That one of Storm is one of Mom's favs. She's bound to take the hint after seeing that one!!!

Wish us luck! Play bows, pups!
Zim

Little Siberian Husky In Training

Ha roo, Storms here! Have you read our friends Butchy and Snicker's blog lately? They have a new friend named Toto who is a Yorkshire Terrier! When we lived at Ft. Riley, I gave birth to a Yorkie! I promised them a picture - so here I am with him:

He was a cool little guy and could jump all over me, go through my mouth, do whatever he wanted to and it was OK with me. He lived behind us and I had to stop and see him whenever he came outside! This was shortly after Mom and Dad adopted me; they knew then how strong my maternal instincts are! In addition to giving birth to him, I also gave birth to a Westhighland Terrier that Summer and a mixed breed girl named Polly.

The Yorkies and his parents (and Yorkie sister) moved to Texas - but they came to visit us here about six years later. After all that time of his biped Mom calling him a "Little Siberian Husky In Training" (or a Little S... well, do the acronym yourself... we run a family-friendly blog here...) I couldn't WAIT to see what he grew up to look like! Would he be a black and white like me and Dave? Or a red and white like Am and Zim? Hmm... here we are:

He didn't look like a Siberian at ALL! I had to admit he was a Yorkie and wouldn't really grow up to look like me, despite being a Little Siberian Husky In Training for so long. At least I gave birth to REAL Siberians (Amber, when she was 4 months old, and Zim, when he was a year and a half old) and then there's Dave. Ha roo.

The rest of the Ao4 were very accepting of my former puppy and his sister when they came to visit. We were VERY well-behaved! Here's everypup after a nice, long walk. The Yorkies were carried - for some reason, they couldn't keep up. Go figure. They also didn't seem quite as calm as we were afterwards. What to make of this?

Left to right, that's Zim, Dave, the Yorkies, Amber and me. Bipeds have been fuzzed out because we didn't ask permission to post the picture. But honestly ... who's going to look at the bipeds anyway?

Hope you enjoyed seeing my former puppy!

Tail wags,
Storm

Cable Woos - I Mean Woes

Woo, it's me - Dave - with an important announcement.

Stormy has a saying that starts with, "A smile and a positive attitude make up for a lot of short-comings ..." so we really try to stay positive around here - and I sure don't want to be the one to start something. In keeping with Storm's prescribed approach, we'd like to thank our cable/internet provider who shall remain un-named by me for the peace and quiet around here today. You see, we had no cable or internet from 0745 'til about 1530 or so.

We will do our best to catch up on everyone's news and promise to make a more exciting post tomorrow. We've missed wooooo!

Luv,
Dave

PS: For the record, her saying ends with "...but sometimes you have to shake the kitty." That could explain the second call Mom made to the un-named cable provider. Woo.

Your Petcast!

Hey pupperoos! Storm here! I wanted to let you know about a cool new service available to all of us!

Do your bipeds ever want to know what is the best time to take you on a nice, long walk?

Or maybe it's a day for snoozing a bit...

Or a day you'll find a nice treat in the yard!

Well, the bipeds at the Weather Channel are obviously trying to make up for their inability to accurately predict snowfall - or lacking thereof - and have come up with a "petcast". Go to that link, enter in your dogonal information, and it will give you advice about the best time to take a walk in your area, the comfort index (based on who you are!), and if there are any mosquitoes out yet! Pretty cool. Not as accurate as our snowcaster, but a pretty fun tool!

Have a great day, everypup - and may your walkies be fun!

Tail wags,
Storm

DWB Awards

Ha roo, pups! It's me - Zim! I've got a bunch of administrative stuff to put out today, so bear with me!

The next round of the Dogs With Blogs Awesome Blog Awards is on now! You can vote by clicking here. We encourage you to check all the following blogs and vote for your favorite! Good luck to everypup - the nominees are:

The Army of Four
Bruce
Boo
Pappy
Fu-Fu

We are honored to be among the nominees and wish to thank our friend Marvin for the nomination. We know that all of our fellow dog bloggers put a lot of hard work into their weblogs, so please check them out, drop them a comment or two, and go vote for your blog of choice!

The other big "goings on" going on at DWB is the FIDO Awards (Films of Independent Dog Owners). We're all really proud that our video of "Stormy Talks" is up in a couple categories - Best Performance by a Dog and Video of the Year! (Thank roo to Charlie and Opy's bipeds for the nominations!) AND the video Pappy put together "Do They Know It's Christmas?" (Dave and I are in it!) has also been nominated! All the vids can be viewed on DWB-TV. Please stop by the Bone Zone at DWB and cast your votes for your favorite videos! Here's a cool picture link to get to the voting:

Good luck, everypuppy!

I'll leave you with this:

It's my "my legs are too long" pose. Honestly, where am I supposed to put these things? Ha roo roo roo. When Amber does this pose, she looks even more like Bambi than I do. Yes... I know what you were thinking. :)

Play bows,
Zim

Sunday Salute - Joe Stains and Marvin!

Today's Sunday Salute is a surprise for our friends Joe Stains and Marvin! Ha roooo! Joe was the winner of the DWB Awesome Blog Award for this month - and Marvin won the Featured Blog!

Joe always has a cool adventure to tell us about or a funny story or a tale of something going on with him and the Doof--- uh, we mean with him and Tanner. Last week, Joe had to go stay at his grandparents' house for a few days and couldn't blog from there. We missed his stories very much! While he was gone, Mom got an email with pix of all kinds of cute pups in it and we saw this and thought of Joe and... Tanner! We were going to post it as a "we miss Joey Stains" post, but he came back early!!! YEA! He must have known we missed him. Anyroo, here it is now:

Do you think Joe is the one in the lower left-paw corner and he's putting his paw over Tanner's mouth? Ha roo roo roo! It was too adorable not to share! A cup of Boston ... Terriers!

And Marvin had computer problems and then Jeannie wasn't feeling good so he couldn't post for quite a while and we missed him terribly! Marvin writes such wonderful, profound poetry, shares beautiful pictures of his adventures in Scotland, and always makes us feel good after we read his blog! This is one of our favorite pictures of him:

We think that tartan is the "clan Marvin" design. Ha roo!

Joey and Marvin - thanks for all the work you put into your blogs! We love reading about your adventures! We salute you!

The Army of Four

My Reward!

Hi everypuppy! It's me, Amber! Like Davy told you, I was a very good girl at the vet's Thursday. I knew I'd get a reward, I just wasn't sure what it would be. Then Stormy looked out of one of our cool look-out windows yesterday afternoon and said, "It's here!"

Check it out, pups! It's here!

I wasn't sure what she was rooing about, but then Mom and Dad bundled up and hooked us up and out we went! Here's Dave:

Woo. I thought Dad just shovelled the driveway. Look at all the snow!

It was BEE-ROO-TIFUL! And it was still coming down! Here's Zimmie, catching snowflakes on his nose. Silly boy!

Oooh, this is fun! Got one! Try it, Am!

But I was ready to GO, GO, GO!

Let's GO!

We had a great walk in the snow. What a nice reward after my hard day!!! I just LOVE it!

I hope everypuppyelse who wanted more snow got more snow!

Love,
Amber

Lazy Day

Woo, everypup. Dave here.

Amber and Mom were at the vet's all DAY yesterday for Am's first "Senior Care" check up. I know ... it's hard for all of us to think of little Ammy as a "senior", but she IS 8 years old now. She was poked and prodded and x-rayed and all kinds of stuff. She was a little vocal about having to hold still and all (except for me, most Sibes have a hard time holding still) but she was really a good girl, according to Mom. She got to see lots of the nice people there - all the bipeds who work there are always really nice to us and I (dogonally speaking) make it a point to give every ONE of them a hug when I go. Am's not the "give a hug" type, but she IS sweet. Her vet student wrote, "Amber was a joy to work with!" on her record. Woo.

She's sleeping right now, but here's a cool picture of her:

We think Hamish and Indy and Tin Tin might especially like it. Woo.

It was a hard day for me, Storm and Zim, too, though not as hard as Am's! Dad was here with us, but we were worried about Am the whole time - where did she go? We sniffed her over REAL good when she got back and knew where she'd been. Woo. We cut her some slack and let her nap - after the three of us put on a show for her, doing zoomies through the living room and bedroom. It was our little way of saying, "Welcome home; we missed woo!" Mom seemed to appreciate it, too, 'cuz she was all excited during our performance.

We were all very sleepy last night and hit the sack early. That would have been a swell plan, except that the smoke detector/alarm thing right by the bedroom door started going CRAZY at about 2230 and oh, it hurt our ears! Mom! Dad! Please make it STOP! It was horrible! Dad fixed it (we aren't sure what set it off, but the house is fine) but we got ALL worried! So this morning is a slow morning.

I'm here by the computer, if you need me.

Luv,
Dave

Update on the C(un)IA

Hi everypuppy, it's me - Amber! I hope everyone had a lovely Valentine's Day. We did - we totally enjoyed everypup's greetings and wishing everypup else a love-filled day!

Before I get to today's post, I'd like to point out that not only did we get a few flurries this morning (about 1/2 an inch worth!) but it's colder here than in Siberia. I think our Weather-Control Devices in the sidebar area might finally be working! Rooooo!

Mom took me out front to go potty yesterday afternoon, and I keyed on something. Everypup and the bipeds know that when I focus, there is SOMETHING out there. Remember my squirrel-spotting ability? I see everything. So like I said, I saw something yesterday, sat, stared, and refused to move.

Here I am, not moving:

I can't move. I see something.

Mom got behind me to look between my radar ears to see if she could see what I did.

Amber Alert!

It's there, by the wall. Can you see it? Let me zero in on it a bit:

CAT! From the Cat (un)Intelligence Agency -- the C(un)IA, no doubt! Just when we thought they'd gone into deep cover!

I hope our friend Chelsea reads this; she asked about our progress just the other day! How serendipitous!

I stared at it until Mom said she couldn't feel her fingers anymore - bipeds seem to be uncomfortable when the temps are in single digits (Fahrenheit) with even lower wind-chills. Myself, I was quite comfy. Anyroo, the cat saw me and took off. He knows the Ao4 is on the job!

Have a happy day, everypup. And keep on the look-out for cats!

Love,
Amber

Haik-woo #34 and Valentine's Day

Woo. Dave here. I'd like to send the following post out to a very special friend of mine. It's a little poem I like to call Haik-woo #34. I hope you all enjoy it... especially that very special friend. Woo.

(New Ao4 Digest readers can read what constitutes a Haik-woo at this link.)

Happy Valentine's Day, everydoggie.

Luv,
Dave

Hide-Out Hang Outs

Ha roo, everypup! It's me - Storms! Before I get to today's post, let me say that Amber was right once again and we got SNOW! It's heavy, wet snow and our temps plummeted overnight. The wind-chill is now about 4 below, F. PERFECTLY beautiful out there! Makes me wonder why our morning road march was cut short.

Anyroo...... glad everyone likes Zim's seat in the balcony. You'll note he didn't say he hides from me up there, just the bipeds, Dave and Amber. And why might that be the case? Well... who do you think taught him about going up there?

Ha roo!

That's right. Another class at the Stormy Zoluschka Kryschtal School of Siberian Studies. This one is Cool Places to Hang Out, and this is the lesson on Hide-Outs.

Dave will usually only go half-way up and stop on the landing. That's pretty much the same with Amber. It's a good place to hang out, too, and has a fairly good view. The biped who built the house referred to the balcony as a "cat walk", and I think Am is afraid someone's up there waiting to head-butt her. She only goes all the way to the top if it's really important. Here's Dave, on the landing:

Speaking of whom... did you see the poem Holly commissioned Marvin to write? Mighty sweet. And here's Am in a picture from a couple years ago:

Dreaming sweet dreams, no doubt!

Until next time, tail wags, everypup!
Storms

More Entertainment From the Balcony

Ha roo, it's me - the Z-man! Everypup seemed to appreciate my That's Entertainment post from the other day. Hiding up there isn't just a great way to get the bipeds all excited, it's fun to mess with Amber and Dave, too. They used to not know about my secret look-out up there and I'd go hide from them. Check this out:

Can you see me? (Hint: check the lower left-paw corner.) I'm just sure they were wondering where I was - ha roo roo roo! Here's a shot where you can see me looking right at them:

Ha rooo! Up here, you guys!

I just never get tired of that game. I also go up there just to daydream. Um... I mean to think profound thoughts.

What does everypup think I'm thinking about?

Mom also likes to display quilts up there sometimes. Guess what?!!? The Super Bowl quilt top is finished! (She still has to quilt it, but at least all the blocks are together!) Here's a shot of it:

It will measure 70 x 70 inches and will be a "snuggle up to watch TV quilt" for Dad! Cool!

Have a great day, everypup. The weather bipeds say we're going to get snow. I can't wait to see what Amber says!

Play bows,
Zim