Does This Sweater Make Me Look Fat?

When we first got Boykins, Quan and I laid down a few ground rules:
1. We are not her "parents." Her dad is in Michigan, and her mom is in Pennsylvania. We are her owners. Or her friends. She is our dog.
2. No outfits. I can't say it any better than this. [Warning: that link goes to a Web site with lots of dirty words in it.]
3. No baby talk to the dog. Duh.

We've done a good job on all three, but as the weather has started to turn cooler, I'm starting to rethink #2. But I'm rethinking it in terms of one good outer layer, not in terms of some cutesy-pants outfit that would make me embarrassed to be seen with my own dog. For the record, Quan is opposed on any level, although I do think he understands my point. I mean, Boykins is a short-haired dog with very little body fat. How is she going to stay warm on really cold days?

I brought a couple of cheapo sweaters home from Petco last week. We tried both on Boykins, who was a wonderfully accommodating girl during the whole procedure. The first sweater was too big. It wasn't very funny, either. However, as you'll see below, the second sweater, which borders on being too embarrasing to wear outside, is filled with hilarity. (I was laughing so hard in these photos, I could barely breathe, and I had tears rolling down my cheeks. Clearly, Boykins is much more evolved than I.)


This neck-hole sure is tight...


So patient...so very patient...


"You say you love me, but then you do stuff like this..."


"Ptooey. This makes me look stupid!"

Li'l Help?

As we have learned, Boykins has favorite toys, and with those favorite toys are favorite ways to chew them. For example, she prefers to take her Nylabone up onto a chair in the office and gnaw away while one of us is at the computer...

One of the best toys we've gotten is this overstuffed hand-puppet/oven mitt that has a squeaker embedded in it. It looks a lot like a hippo. A big, squeaky hippo oven mitt.


The hippo-mitt.

You may wonder why this toy is so great. Well, it's because it allows us to rough-house a bit with Boykins without her accidentally biting us too hard. She's very good at not biting us, but when we get her riled up, it's harder for her to keep that in check. This toy makes it a non-issue. And she loves this thing.


Grrrr...

As with most things she loves, Boykins loves this thing with all her might, which means that she ends up causing it a little bit of damage. Sorta like that favorite pair of shoes you might have...You wear them so often they're soon just wrecked and you really shouldn't wear them, but you do, because they rock.

Such tough toy love has resulted in the hippo mitt losing an ear. The loss of the ear meant a hole in the hippo where stuffing could come out. To paraphrase, "Stuffing is not healthy for Boykins and other living things [to eat]." So I've done a rag-tag attempt at fixing this hole with some regular stitching. Let's see how long it holds up. (My professional opinion, based on my own ability to sew - or lack thereof, and Boykins' ability to destroy toys: less than a day once we give it back to her.)


Hippo-mitt, looking a bit lopsided...


We can rebuild it.

Stair Master

Boykins has really grown since we got her in July...Not only is she weighing in at about 20 pounds (she was about 10 when we got her), she's a lot taller. It's hard to imagine her as small as she was even in July, since she still seems like a little dog to us. But when we look back at pictures (here and off the blog), it's clear she's not just bigger, she's taller.

One of the benefits of all this growing: she no longer needs us to carry her up and down the stairs in our condo. (The door to our condo is at street level, but when you come in, you're immediately faced with a set of stairs that lead to our actual living space. For a small puppy like Boykins, this was a pretty intimidating climb (or descent).

We knew she could do small sets of stairs, since she could do the four that lead from our front porch to the sidewalk. In fact she was doing those pretty early on. But the large set of stairs inside was another story entirely. No amount of encouragement would help. We even tried lining the steps with cookies and she still just looked at us like, "Are you guys crazy?!"

Eventually, she was willing to go DOWN the stairs on her own. With tha huge noggin and all that forward momentum, I guess it was just easier. She hardly had to work, just let gravity pull her down.

Boykins Down the Stairs.

About a month ago, early in the evening, I called to her from the living room, but she didn't come to me. (She almost always does.) I then called to Quan to ask if she was with him in the computer room. "I thought she was with you," came the reply. This prompted both of us to get up off our lazy butts and start looking for her. She was nowhere to be found. How could we lose Boykins in our tiny condo?! After a few seconds of frantic searching, I turned on the lights over the stairs to the front door. There she was, sitting quietly at the bottom of the stairs, waiting to go out.


Can I get a little help?

With the downstairs trip under control, the real challenge came with the upstairs trip. About a month ago, we decided to give it a serious go. With me standing behind her, and Quan setting treats out on the stairs in front of her, she managed to go all the way up. It took a while, since she pondered each move very carefully and was unsure of herself. But she did it, and has continued to get better and better with practice.

Boykins Up the Stairs.

At this point, she's really becoming quite a pro! And since she's still growing, it's nice that we don't have to lug a 20-pound sack of taters down the stairs for each walk.