Learning German

Lola from The Circus Dog blog gave us an award that we are more than happy to accept!

Liebster means “dearest” in German, and the award is intended to help up-and-coming blogs get the attention they deserve. As with any award, there is a bit of ceremony involved. In order to accept the award, we must do the following:


1. Copy and paste the award on our blog.
2. Link back to the blogger who gave us the award
3. Pick our five favorite blogs with less than 200 followers, and leave a comment on their blog to let them know they have received the award.
4. Hope that the five blogs chosen will keep spreading the love and pass it on to five more blogs


So…on with the ceremony!  First, thank you to Lola for giving us this award and for sticking with us through the 8 weeks of crate rest!


Now, we’d like to pass this award on to:


1.  Swimtaxi234–one of my personal favorite blogs.  They write about their kids, their two miniature Schnauzers, Remus and Riley (how can you not love a dog named Riley??), homeschooling, their travels, swim meets, etc.  They keep so busy it almost makes my head spin!


2.  Stumpy’s Daily Dose ‘o’ Dirtville–Stumpy is a Cattle Dog/Chihuahua mix that lives in the middle of nowhere, Dirtville, and has some pretty cool adventures.  Her blog was one of the first ones we followed, if not the first one, and we love reading about their RV trips and feral dogs they rescue.


3.  Rottrover–Bart and Ruby are two Rottweilers living the good life out in California!  There were some Rottweiler therapy dogs in Riley’s therapy dog class when she was a puppy and Bart and Ruby remind us of them!


4.  Da Weenies of Florida–Amber DaWeenie and her brother Max (Da Odder Weenie) crack us up on a nearly daily basis.  They live in Florida with like 87 other pack members and their Mom takes good care of them.


and last, but not least…
5.  Buzz, the Diabetic Dog–I feel for dogs (and their owners) that have health issues.  Riley has bad joints, but thankfully we don’t always have to deal with her joint problems on a daily basis.  Buzz has diabetes, and his mom has to deal with his high and low blood sugars on a daily basis.  Thankfully, he seems to have gotten a bit better in the year since he was diagnosed with diabetes.  Buzz and his sister, Bella, are super cute terrier-type mixes.


Be sure to check these blogs out if you want to see some of our favorite blogs!

Here’s (big headed) Riley and Chloe enjoying some couch time and FREEDOM!!

Freedom!!

I am pleased to announce that Riley is free of the crate for the majority of her time!  She got the go-ahead from her surgeon this morning to be out of her crate while I’m home and just be crated when we’re away.  She still has to go potty on the leash, but she can roam around the house and jump on the furniture.

Dr. Dassler said that her leg looked great on her X-rays and that she’s healed up enough that he doesn’t worry about her undoing anything they did in surgery (which is good since she and Chloe have been going nutso playing…) and that her bone is healed up enough that he could actually remove the plate and screws in her leg and she’d be fine.  No worries, she’s not getting her plate and screws removed…he was just making a point.

Look how much fur has grown back in on her hind leg!

He said she’s sitting well with it (usually they tend to splay their injured leg out to the side, but she’s sitting with hers underneath her like a normal dog) and she’s walking on it very well.  She’s free to climb the stairs and can jump on the couch, she just isn’t allowed to chase squirrels or birds for another month or so.

She’ll be getting three 5-minute walks a day for the next 5 days, then three 10-minute walks for 5 more days, then 15-minute, then 20-minute until we work up to 30 minute walks.  No more physical therapy–the walks will be enough therapy.  Then after 30 days, she can be off-leash in the backyard.

Oh, it also says on the paper they gave me that I “have done an excellent job with all of Riley’s nursing needs.”  Thank goodness.  Phew!  🙂  I forgot to ask for a copy of her X-rays…in fact, I didn’t even see her X-rays, he just told us all about how well she had recovered.

Let the party begin!!

Last Day of Crate Rest!!!!!!!!!!

Today is (hopefully) Riley’s last full day of crate rest!  Hooray!  I can’t believe we’ve made it 8 weeks post-op!  Her follow-up appointment with X-rays is tomorrow morning at 9:00.  I’m hoping they’ll be able to take the X-rays without sedating her (if they have to sedate her, I have to leave her there for most of the day…), but who am I kidding…they’ll probably sedate her because she acts like she’s had a lobotomy or something when she goes to the vet!!  🙂  So say a little prayer that she doesn’t act too silly tomorrow and can have her X-rays done without sedation.  I mean, really, how hard is it to keep a young cattle dog still for a few seconds???  😉

With all this surgery/crate rest this year, I didn’t have time to sign Riley up for the dog Christmas Card Exchange that we did last year.  And I definitely didn’t have time to send out cards!  (Even though I got a nice professional shot of her in her Christmas bandana back in June…).  So we were surprised to get two Christmas cards from our bloggie friends in the mail yesterday!  We got one from our good friend Hound Girl and one from our friend Miss Barbara at If I Didn’t Have a Sense of Humor.  If you are living under a rock and haven’t read either of their blogs, check them out!  Hound Girl has Riley’s twin from another mother, Haylie, who also has hip dysplasia and is toy-obsessed and her brother, Fred, a Bloodhound, is training to be a Therapy Dog.  And Miss Barbara’s blog is just plain funny.  Enough said.

Haylie and Fred’s card.

Trixie, Minnie, and Jeep must have helped Miss Barbara out with her cards because Riley was most interested in sniffing their card!

Hopefully tomorrow I’ll be able to post a crate-less picture of Riley!!  I just can’t wait to snuggle with her again and love on her.  I open the door to her crate and stick myself halfway in there to love on her right now, but it’ll be nice to do it without all the metal bars around!  🙂