Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

Sampson’s Puzzled – This ‘N That Thursday

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Today we join our friends at 2 Brown Dawgs along with their co-host Ruckus the Eskie for This ‘N That Thursday.  2 Brown Dawgs says it’s a little of this and a little of that and anything in between!

Courtesy of 2 Brown Dawgs Blog

Courtesy of 2 Brown Dawgs Blog

Delilah and I are back in Nosework class again!!  

Tuesday night Delilah and I started Advanced Nosework.  For those unfamiliar with this sport, Donna from Donna and the Dogs has a small series running on her blog that explains this sport.

In our beginner class our hunts/finds were strictly food.  This time around we are introducing birch.  I’ll have a full post on how we’re doing that coming up soon.

In the meantime, here’s Delilah back in the classroom setting.  She’s just like her Mama, she loves to learn!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA Why are you making me wait?  I see the boxes in the middle of the room, let’s work!

 Then there were two.

Two weeks ago as I was taking my grandson home Hubby warned me of a dead deer in the road.  I don’t know about you but seeing any animal lifeless on the side of the road, just about breaks my heart.  It is so sad.

I worry about the deer.  The herd is getting smaller and smaller.  When we first moved to our home seven years ago there was a herd of about eight deer.  The last time I saw deer running in the woods there were three.

Last week the dogs were going ballistic and I looked out the window.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA Looks like the herd is down to two.

Jigsaw Puzzles

Do you like jigsaw puzzles?  I recently got into jigsaw puzzles on my iPad.  Sadly the one I loved didn’t update their app for the new operating system Apple came out with so I’m still in the market.  If any of you have a jigsaw app for your phone or iPad that you love, would you please share it?

In the meantime, I found this picture of Sampson standing on a trail of leaves and thought, that might make a pretty challenging puzzle.  What do you think?

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA Puzzle? You’ve got me puzzled with that thought Mama.

Follow-Up Friday

For those of you participating in tomorrow’s blog hop, my co-hostess is once again, the only Flea you wouldn’t mind hanging around your dog.  Yes, it’s Flea from Jones Natural Chews!

Join us tomorrow as we answer questions, highlight reader’s comments and wrap up our week!

Many thanks to 2 Brown Dawgs and Ruckus the Eskie.

Good Gracious Sebaceous!

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Handsome Sampson

Sampson is a handsome boy.  I mean just look at this face.

photo You cannot see the Sebaceous cyst in this photo.

Besides a myriad of nick names, I sometimes call him Handsome Sampson.  Try saying that three times fast.  Go ahead.  I double dog dare you.

See you can’t.  It’s just like licking your elbow.  Not possible.

Dogs don’t care what they look like

Sampson’s mother is a Golden Retriever while his dad’s breed is unknown.  Since we’ve never had any DNA tests run, we’re guessing Black Lab.  His vet records indicate Golden Lab.  As you can see from this photo, Sampson is beginning to get the white face that you see on so many Goldens and Labs.  When I look at that sweet graying face, it breaks my heart because I know my time left with him is less than the time I’ve already had with him.  But Sampson rarely looks in the mirror and when he does, all he sees is a happy dog.

Good gracious sebaceous!

There’s one other thing Sampson has going on on his face and that’s a Sebaceous cyst.  (Thanks to poor planning on my part, the photo I took of it, is not currently available.  I’ll share it on Friday.)

Sampson of course, is oblivious to the growth on his face. I’ve never noticed him paying much attention to it.  It doesn’t seem like it’s itchy because I haven’t noticed him scratching at it or rubbing his face on the carpet to scratch it.

He doesn’t look in the mirror every day to see what the cyst is looking like, he doesn’t pick at it in hopes of ‘popping’ it or making it smaller and he certainly doesn’t rearrange his fur to try and ‘cover’ it up.

Heart Like a Dog Lesson

I on the other hand seem to always touch this when I’m petting him.  At least once a day I think Oh no, he’s got a tick before realizing I’ve touched the cyst.  It’s well below his eye and in no way affects him.  Yet I still obsess over it.

I also obsess over what people will think of me because I’m carrying a little more weight than I feel comfortable with.  I worry what people will think when they look at my choice of outfits.  I make damn sure to point out the zit on my face before anyone else can.

In a nutshell, I’m vain.  I worry about how I look.  And because of this vanity, I also worry about how my dogs look too.  Which is why when Sampson goes in for his teeth cleaning on December 10th, I’m have that Sebaceous cyst removed.

Why I don’t know, because it’s certainly not bothering Sampson.

Are you like me, worried how others will view you?  Do you find yourself projecting that worry on your dog’s appearance as well?  Are you struggling to find your inner Heart Like a Dog?

Cocobanana

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Many moons ago I worked in a health food store called Natural Rythyms.  They sold vitamins and various other health aids.  There was a small sitting area where you could sit and enjoy a salad from the salad bar, or a sandwich from the limited menu.  They also sold baked goods.

It was a part-time job I took to help with the expense of my daughter’s wedding, so I only worked on Saturdays.  I didn’t wait a lot on customers, I was mostly in the back washing dishes, except for when I was baking muffins. Still I recall those days fondly because I got to spend time with one of my favorite people and I got to bake muffins.

Let me be clear.  I created my own muffins.  And it was all dependent upon what mood I was in and what ingredients were available.  But there was one thing you could be sure of, the muffins had chocolate chips in them.

It’s a wonderful feeling when a customer comes in and says, “Oh, I was hoping you had this muffin today, it’s my favorite.”  One of my muffin creations was Orange Chocolate Chip and it was very tasty.  I would think about it all week long, what type of muffin did I want to bake on Saturday?

So imagine my surprise yesterday as I was thinking of a treat for Tasty Tuesday when my mind began wandering back down the creative trail, but this time to dog treats.

Here’s what I came up with.  I’m calling it Cocobanana.

1 banana
2 tablespoons coconut oil
1/4 cup cooked oatmeal
1 egg
2/3 cup oat flour
1/4 cup shredded unsweetened coconut
 

Before you start gather your ingredients.  The key point is to get the egg out of the fridge and let it sit for a few minutes, this will keep the cold egg from solidifying the coconut oil.

I’m not sure if you know this or not, but coconut oil is solid when the temperature is below 70°, you can buy coconut oil in the liquid form but it’s super pricey so I say, buy the solid and melt it.  My understanding is it’s not good to heat coconut oil in the microwave, so I put my coconut oil in a small glass dish and set that in another dish with hot water.  I changed the water a couple of times until the coconut oil was entirely melted.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

While the coconut oil is melting, break your banana up into about six pieces and add the egg, beat with an electric mixer until blended well.  My banana was a little too fresh so it wasn’t mixing well.  I mashed it with a potato masher and then worked it with the egg.  It’s okay to have small lumps of banana in this.  I then added the already cooked oatmeal and blended that as well, then the coconut oil.  Now mix in the oat flour.

At this point I added the shredded coconut but I used a spatula.  It was a fairly stiff dough, but not unworkable.

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I dropped by 1/2 spoonful onto my baking stone and cooked at 350° for about 25 minutes. I peeked in on them at about the 15 minute marker and they hadn’t moved at all so I pressed them down a bit with a fork.

My original intent was to add Carob chips to them which would have been perfect for both dogs and humans, but since my local grocery store didn’t have the chips, I used M&M’s in four of them.

Thoughts:  The cookies were browned on the bottom and the edges, but the inside was still moist.  Not raw but moist.  Jodi Chick thought the cooked oatmeal might have been too much or the banana might have been too fresh.  I’m going to try this recipe again, with dry oatmeal and an older banana.

Let’s see what Sampson and Delilah think.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA Ooops, she was too fast and my finger got in the way of the camera. I’ll say that means the cookie is good.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA Dammit!  He was too fast too!

Sampson and Delilah give these cookies a four paws up.  I’m not kidding, these suckers are tasty.  Anywhere I moved with that container of cookies, there were two dogs right on my tail!

So when I named the cookies naturally I got the tune of Copacabana stuck in my head.  I tried to work with that.

Her name was ‘Lilah, she is a labby
A purple collar on her neck and she doesn’t give a heck
She’ll work for kibbles, or any nibbles
But while she tries not to be a pest, she puts her Mama to the test
When Mama bakes there is a fest
These treats are sure the best
We call them coco, coco bananas!
 

You’re welcome for the recipe and the ear worm too.

This post is a tad bit long but tell me, have you tried baking for your pets yet?  How do you feel about it?

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