I have just a few odds and ends to share today! First of all, I want to say a huge Happy Gotcha Day to Luke (one day late). It was one year ago on December 22nd that we went and picked him up from the transport. You can ready that story by clicking here if you’d like. We’re not making a big deal about his gotcha day, since we celebrated his birthday, but on this first anniversary I wanted to mention it. My hubby and I went for our Christmas with his family last weekend, and stopped at the place where we picked Luke up on our way. It was fun to stop there and see there was another transport in progress! You can see in the below photo just how much Luke has grown up in that year – and we are so, so happy that he is a part of our family.
Christmas has been a great season for giveaways, and we’ve been lucky again lately! We recently won this great green mini interactive feeder by Northmate from our friend Dolly the Doxie. I have to admit I’ve always been kind of skeptical about this kind of feeder. However, since Cricket is so much smaller than the other dogs, and gets a lot less food she was always done eating before them (we had a slow feed bowl but it didn’t work that great). Then we had to referee to be sure she didn’t try to get into Luke or Sheba’s food. Luke wouldn’t put up with it, and a skirmish would break out, and Sheba would just let Cricket push her out. So we thought it was worth a try, and we’re so happy we did!
It slows her way down, so now she is not done eating before the other two, in fact sometimes she’s last! We still have to watch everyone, but things are much better now. Thanks so much, Dolly! We’ll be sharing more of our other winnings soon, when the holidays are over and we have more time for getting photos.
You might remember a couple of months ago we shared the fun book Pastry for Poodles. The second book in the series is now out, Barbeque for Bulldogs by Chef Butch Waddles. This is another fun book full of yummy recipes for and by dogs, from the Real Dogs Cook series by John Morris. The recipes include “Butch’s Died-and-Gone-to-Heaven Backyard Ribs” and “Perfect-Complement Cole Slaw”. Butch is an award winning chef who knows that “good barbeque takes time”! If you’d like to order this fun book for yourself you can find it on amazon.com.
We also recently received a bag of Primal Freeze-Dried Beef Liver Munchies from Chewy.com. Freeze dried treats are of high value for Luke when training. We’ve tried some of their other treats but not these. These are single ingredient treats, so no preservatives, grain, gluten, salt, or sugar. They are made in the USA with USA beef raised without antibiotics or added hormones. Since we do a lot of training and Luke is on a diet, I break them into pieces (some break more easily than others).
You might know that Luke is on restricted exercise because of luxating patella, and we’re trying to limit his jumping on and off his favorite couch. I got some stairs and we’ve been working on training him to use them (he literally learned in 5 minutes). These treats are great for that training, and I took some short video so Luke could show off how he’s doing!
Thanks to Chewy.com for giving us these treats to try. As always, Chewy amazes me with their speedy shipping and excellent customer service. We buy all of our dog food from them using their autoship service and it works out great for us.
Can you believe there are only two days left in the #Advent4Dogs 24 days of giveaways? Have you been entering? The good news is that you have until January 1st to enter each giveaway if you haven’t done so yet. Today’s giveaway hosted by Kol’s Notes, Dogthusiast, Heart Like a Dog, NEPA Pets, and us is for Robusto bowls from Loving Pets. Click here to see more about these beautiful bowls and enter for your chance to win.
Really glad to hear how the green mini is working out with your pack. Mom is pretty upset with me because with Taffy I now wolf my food down and then try to eat hers. So mom has to be referee too, making sure Taffy is finished before I can clean up after her. Love Dolly
All three of our dogs have slow feeder bowls of some sort. Sheba was the only one who wouldn’t woof her food down, but then the other dogs would finish first and all try to push her out of her bowl so she started woofing it and then it didn’t stay down. So we had to start standing guard (for a while we even fed her in a different room). I think it’s pretty typical when you have more than one dog, at least that’s our experience.
Happy Gotcha day Luke, he was such a little squirt grew up into a handsome man.
Thank you. He just grew up too fast though!!
Hugs to Luke, I really feel as if I know him now 🙂
Take care…
Oh, I think you do….because he just loves hugs!! 🙂
Happy Gotcha Day, Luke!!
Thank you, Rebekah!
Oh…….my…….dog! Luke! It has been so long since ive seen a puppy pic of you! SO SO adorable!!! happy Gotcha Day Pal!!!
ღ husky hugz ღ frum our pack at Love is being owned by a husky!
Thank you so much, Jenna! I know, he grew up so fast, didn’t he?? too fast!
Luke is getting good with the stairs. Happy Gotcha Day to him!
Thanks, he really is a quick learner! Of course, putting it into everyday practice takes a lot longer.
Happy Gotcha Day to Luke!
Thank you!!
Those interactive feeders look great, but we haven’t tried one.
Must be you girls don’t inhale your food like this crew does! LOL
Happy Gotcha Day, Luke! That feeder looks pretty neat! Mauja and Atka would never eat their food if I gave it to them that way. Far too much effort for a minimal reward 😉 Convincing Atka to get the high value treat out of the Kong was such a ridiculously long process!
Luke says thank you! Those feeders probably work best with dogs that are highly food motivated (and maybe a bit determined and stubborn too)….which beagles definitely are! It would probably work for Luke too, but Sheba probably wouldn’t think it was worth the work.
Lucky you! Happy Gotcha Day to Luke! What a cutie 🙂
Thank you!!
What a fun bunch of stuff you won. And happy Gotcha day to Luke.
Thank you!