birthday boy

Yesterday was my birthday, I turned four!  In doggy years that means I'm 28 but mommy says that - even though that makes me older than her - I'll always be her baby.  I was a little lonely without grandma, grandpa, Aunt Amy and Uncle Sean to celebrate with me, but mommy and daddy still gave me a really great day. 

Mommy made my favorite meat-jelly cupcakes and both Dorothy and me got those yummy smoked bones with the meat still on them!  Then I enjoyed unwrapping my present by tearing open the paper and spreading it all around the living room, that's is always fun!  My present turned out to be the perfect combination of my two favorite things: ropes and balls... a rope ball! I didn't even know something so awesome existed!

 Then, in the early evening, I got the best present I could ever ask for: some alone time with mommy and daddy who took me to the park for a run without Dorothy so I could have some decent ball chasing without her chasing me!  All in all, a great day :)

learning I can swim

Mommy has always been overprotective and doesn't let us swim in the lakes or creeks that we come across during our hikes, like the other dogs do.  She's always been afraid that we'd end up with an ear, skin or some other type of infection - so Dorothy and I usually just watch other dogs jumping in the water, swimming and fetching sticks from the sidelines.  Only very recently (since the weather's become hot) mom's started letting us run across the shallow parts of the creeks where the trails weave in and out of them, but for the longest time, her and daddy would carry us over the water and we didn't get the tiniest bit wet.  

Then something incredible happened... On Wednesday, during one of our afternoon hikes at Bull Creek, I was running across the creek when I accidentally fell into a deep part and got completely immersed in water!  I got myself back to the shallow, crossed the creek and turned around to mommy to see if I was in trouble or not,  but other than being worried for my ears... she was totally ok with it!  I overheard her and daddy saying things like 'well, it is super hot,' 'should be ok since it's running water,' 'at least it'll cool him down' and 'heaps of other dogs get in this water all the time so it should be fine.'

I made super sure it was ok one more time by pretending to fall in again at the next crossing, and when neither parent said anything, I took off down the middle of the creek barking at my splashes and chasing fish.  Dorothy followed but her legs are so short that she could hardly reach the bottom! Luckily she knew how to swim straight away but she didn't like being out there in the water and returned to the bank where mommy and daddy stood, watching me.

D coming to check up

Before long the real began because daddy got a stick and threw it for me to chase!  I was ok in the shallow where I could reach the bottom, but when he threw the stick out further, I didn't know what to do!  I tried jumping up and down, springing myself from the bottom - but this filled my nose with water, so I kept trying different things until eventually, I SWAM!  I didn't even know I knew how to!  It was one of the most exciting things I've ever done - and it was all caught on video:

Not a bad place for a dog to learn how to swim!  Here are some more photos mommy took that afternoon:

I loved my stick!

I wanted to take it home with me

I even had a spectator (see the dragonfly?)

this was when I first got in (when I thought mom would be mad)

And here's a video is of my first attempt to swim - when I was just jumping: 

y is for the toy called 'yellow'

Dorothy and me have a toy called 'yellow.'  It's kind of a kong toy, but the name kong was already given to another toy so mommy and I decided yellow would be a good name for it.  What makes yellow special is that when ever mommy says 'Baxter, go get yellow' I know that means it's time for peanut butter!  Once I grab it and give it to her, she takes yellow and the other kong into the kitchen, fills them both with peanut butter and then hands them to me and Dorothy.

Although I really like fetching yellow for mommy - that's only because I know what it means.  I still prefer to eat my peanut butter out of the proper kong so Dorothy always ends up with yellow in the end.

p is for paper

Ever heard the excuse 'my dog ate my homework?' well in our house it's a possibility.  Me and Dorothy LOVE ripping up paper!  Paper bags, receipts, gift wrap, tissue paper: you name it!  Even the cardboard rolls inside toilet paper and paper towels - we'll rip it all!  Mommy says we're better than a shredder and we're happy to help :) 

Most of the time mommy doesn't mind us ripping up paper that's left laying around, both the parents are pretty good about keeping the important stuff out of reach, but here are some pics of a time when we weren't supposed to rip up mommy's pink tissue paper - it was intended as Aunty Erica's gift wrap... 

heheh, so good, so fun hehehe

O wait... you mean we weren't supposed to pull this
down off the counter?  Ooops! I mean, it was Dorothy!

I've been right here literally the whole time..
nowhere near the tissue paper - it was all her, I promise!
See? Caught her red handed!

 ... And we love birthdays and Christmas because we get to unwrap all our own gifts! Here we are last Christmas, unwrapping our toys from Aunty Amy:

She knows we love unwrapping the paper so Aunty Amy always puts extra
layers around our Christmas toys... she's the greatest! 

... Now, if only we could stop eating the paper once we've shredded it apart... then mommy wouldn't have to put us on periodic paper bans! 

e is for elephant

Mommy and I struggled coming up with a good topic for letter 'E'.  I like to eat eggs... raw, hard boiled or scrambled but that's rather boring.  Besides, who doesn't?  In the end we decided it would be a great idea, and allow me to demonstrate how smart I am, if mommy bought a brand new toy starting with the letter E and we showed you how quickly I learn the names of all my toys!

Firstly, I just want to say, I always know when mommy's brought home a new toy. She thinks it's because I can smell them but she doesn't realize the truth is I've learnt to recognize the way she acts whenever she brings one home!  Hehe.  Here are some photos of me raiding the bag as soon as she got home and fishing out the new toy (Dorothy still doesn't get it):

Then within the next 3 or 4 minutes I learnt his name.  I know the names of all my toys (unlike Dorothy) and whenever mommy or daddy say 'go get (any name of any toy)...' I know exactly which toy they mean so I grab it out of the toy box and bring it straight over! Sometimes mommy gives me a treat but mostly us playing with the toy together is the treat :)

d is for dancing

Dancing with mommy is one of my favorite things to do!  Whenever she starts wiggling her hips or clapping her hands, I'm ready: with or without music.  Often, when mom and I dance, daddy jokes about dressing me in a tuxedo and top hat and sending me off as 'the dancing poodle' saying this will begin my career in stardom but mommy thankfully nips this idea in the bud every time by reminding him of my stage fright.

Dancing is one of those very few, very special things I get to do with mommy on my own.  Thankfully Dorothy's legs are too short and fat for her be up on them long - so dancing is most likely to remain one a private thing for me and mommy to share without the brat sister.

A-Z theme reveal

Hi everyone,

I'm sure some of you doubted my powers of persuasion over mommy but she's conceded - which means I've won and my theme will be: (da da da daaaaaaa)

a month in the life of Baxter!

I'll tell you all about my day-to-day life, not just the major things I usually blog about.  I'll even include videos and show you where I sleep, what I eat, all my favorite things as well as the things that frighten me or that I don't really like.  I've realized that since Dorothy is around me all the time, that makes her part of my life so she'll probably get a mention in a post or two but it's better than the alternative mommy wanted which would have been welcome to Baxter and Dorothy's place.  I think my choice makes it clear who's boss.

I'm really looking forward to sharing a month with you all.  Thanks for all of your support.  I'd better go and start writing my ideas down so I don't get caught without a post one day.

Super fast tail wags, 
Baxter

Christmas toy update

The toys we got for Christmas are in really good nick considering Dorothy and I have already had them for two months.  Each one only has small tears which mommy can easily fix beacuse luckily she knows how to sew pretty well.  

One thing mommy and I have noticed is how much Dorothy has matured: six months ago these toys would have been torn to shreds by the end of the first week.  Now we can enjoy them a lot longer and I'm glad because soft toys have always been my second most favorite kind of toys (after balls of course).