It's a dog's life

When they say "It's a dog's life" is that a good thing or a bad thing? As it pertains to my dogs it is definitely a good thing. This afternoon I went into the bedroom and found Pasqual, our nine year old pit bull, sound asleep in our bed. Not ON our bed, definitely IN our bed. He was all squished into the pillows and tangled in the covers. We rescued Pasqual from one of our local shelters eight years ago. Who knows what that first year of his life was like - but I'd be willing to bet he's just fine with how it is now!

New work...

Now that all of the insanity of the holidays is behind me I have been able to start thinking about new work. New shapes and texture ideas have been floating around in my head for awhile. This ring is one of the ideas I have been playing with. It's chock full of mustard seeds that float over a black back ground. The surface has a matte finish which gives it more depth. More to come...

Meet Joker.

Okay, before I start gushing over how freakin' cute this puppy is, let me say *fingers crossed* Margery, Caroline, and Jolene are all adopted. I don't want to jinx anything because the families have not completely confirmed on two of them, but I feel good about them. Sooooo, what do we do, we run right out and get another foster! Well, that's not exactly how it happened. I'll get into that in a minute. First, meet Joker. This picture was taken after his hour long ride from the shelter, transfer to my car, a good long bath, a couple of runs around the yard - and then lights out! And who could blame him - he's got a teddy bear and the cutest dog bed ever!

Last week I got an e-mail from one of our Blue Dog fosters who volunteers out at one of our local, rural shelters. I don't know how she does it because they have an 85% kill rate. They just get no traffic out there and in the rural areas, for some reason dogs just don't get spayed and neutered like they should. So she send me an e-mail with this FACE! And says "he's deaf". Well that did it. Everyone knows I love a pit bull AND I have a huge soft spot for deaf dogs because my Great Dane, Preacher, is deaf. I send Tom the picture knowing he's a big fat sucker like me when it comes to the above mentioned things. So, long story short, Suzy (the BDR foster who suckered me!) was nice enough to drive him into town from the shelter and we picked him up.

Obviously he's as cute as button! But he's smart as a whip too! In one day I have taught him a hand signal for sit and he is doing great with going out to the bathroom. He's already met our attack cat Berklie. I knew they had met when I heard Joker come screaming from the bedroom and looked to see Berklie hot on his tails. So I am pretty sure he's gonna be fine with cats! I've said it before, but there's not much better than seeing a dog fresh from a cement kennel cuddled up on a dog bed taking the best nap of his life! Check him out in action http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8V3-YDVJ0s

Seriously Cute!

So, it's a long story, but the people who are adopting Margery, our cutie-pie foster dog have had to wait a few weeks before they could bring her home. So the whole family came over the other day to visit with her. The girls loved all of my dogs when they met Margery the fist time, wanted to meet each and every one of them. So this time when they came over the youngest daughter, Olivia, brought along a Valentine's Day card that she had made for all of my dogs. This was the inside of the card. Seriously, how cute is that?!?!?

my cuddle bug

I just had to share this moment with you because it NEVER happens. My Big Man is not actually a cuddle bug at all. Don't get me wrong, he loves attention and he loves to be pet, pat, scratched, etc. But he sees little point in just touching without any of the scratching, etc. So tonight when he couldn't seem to get settled I invited him up with me. I thought maybe he'd humor me for two or three minutes but once I tired of scratching his head he'd be outta there. After about 15 minutes though he fell asleep and stayed, all 130 pounds of him, right in my lap...I say lap, but when you're talking about a Great Dane "lap" really means chin to toes...anyway, he stayed for about an hour. It was so sweet.

At 10 years old he's really not much different than he was at 10 months old when we adopted him from Great Dane Rescue in Dallas. He had the same need for a good 20 hours of sleep a day, the same annoyed look when you sit too close on the couch with out continuous petting, the same bizarre inability to drink from a bowl of water unless it is filled to the brim. He's funny, sweet, and oh so precious to me.

Last week my friend Emily asked me to make a very special, but heart breaking piece for her to give to a friend. The friend gave birth to a baby girl who died two days later. Reading her e-mail just broke my heart. I can not begin to imagine how hard that must be. I don't have children, but it must be one of the most difficult things a human can experience. I hope that this necklace, with her precious baby's foot print, can give her the smallest bit of comfort.

Thanks to all of you who came out to my trunk show last night! It was lots of fun. I love getting out and meeting people face to face. I am working on lots of new goodies right now and I got to show some of them off last night. I'll be posting photos of new things here as soon as I can.

Oh, and a quick update on all thos cute foster dgos I've posted recently - ALL three are going on home visits!! yay! It is so rewarding to find loving homes for once homeless dogs. So keep your fingers crossed that all of thier home visits work out for the best.

Happy Friday everyone!

Come See Me!

Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, JOLEEEENE!

Meet the newest addition to our foster menagerie! Jolene. We can't help but sing the Dolly Parton song every time we call her. This little angel ended up at the local shelter, picked up as a stray. Her time was up. For those of you who think you can't find a pure bred dog at the shelter - here's proof that that is just NOT true. The day we picked out little Jolene there were probably six other dachshunds, a handful of chihuahuas, a llahso apso, several labs, a husky puppy, a chow, a couple of jack russells, a boxer - all pure bred dogs! And of course tons of gorgeous mixed breed dogs. So, if you're thinking of adding a four legged furry friend to your family, trot on down to your local shelter. There's not a lot that feels better than actually saving a life! And for more info on Jolene you can visit http://www.bluedogrescue.com/

Sweet Caroline

I know, I know, I just posted a new foster dog! But try as we might, we couldn't make it out of the shelter with just one. As we were leaving last week with Margery in came this little raggamuffin. Someone had found her running along the highway. According to the shelter she is six years old, but I think she's younger than that. She was just as stoic as she could be when I picked her up today, but by the time we were almost home she was giving me kisses. And then, well you can see in the video, a couple of hours later and a good bath and she was right at home. Right this minute she is curled up in the middle of a dog bed that would hold dog 10 times her size! I imagine it's more comfortable than the concrete floor she slept on last night.

If you ever want to foster I can tell you, it is a very rewarding experience. Sure it can be sad when they get adopted - but it's a small price to pay for the joy you get that first night you bring them home from the shelter. Check out Blue Dog Rescue if you live in the Austin area. If not, do a google search of rescue groups in your area. You won't be sorry.

Margery - our newest foster dog.

Awwww, who could resist this face?!?!? This is Margery. We picked her up from the shelter yesterday. Her time was up. Can you imagine? And the worst part was she was far from the only one whose time was up. But lucky for this little girl we just fell in love. She's about 15 pounds and is three years old. We took her out of her kennel to interact with her, took her into a larger, fenced in area. There was a chicken in there (yes, they have chickens at the shelter) and she didn't even care. She quickly began looking for a place to go to the bathroom so Yay! she seems to be house trained! And then she was all wiggles and kisses and rolling over for belly rubs. Just what we want to see when "interviewing" for a new foster! Right now she is curled up on a nice soft dog bed in front of the fire - I can't help but smile and think how much better life is today than it was yesterday.

Silly happy.

It is the stangest thing. I have had the tv on a lot over the past few days watching the inauguration and post inauguration stuff. Since Tuesday everytime I see Obama on tv I feel like I need to pinch myself. I almost feel like I live in a new country - like we have somehow transformed or- OH, I know, like on LOST when the Island vanishes! It's like we've popped up as some kind of new and improved country. I know that makes no sense, but like I said, I have just been silly.

And I know this has been said a million times, but it's so great that people feel this way - but I am so proud to be an American right now! And when I heard that with two million people in DC watching the inauguration and there was not one single arrest - it just made me, well, silly - I welled up with tears. I think this man embodies hope. He just IS hope.

I'm so happy.

Beautiful, beautiful day.

Words cannot describe the enormity of this day.

Sometimes I am very creative.

What was it that they used to say on the A-Team? "I love it when an idea comes together."? I think it was "plan", not "idea", but for the sake of this post I am going to go with "idea". So anyway, I've had all of my necklaces hanging on this hook thing in the bathroom. It was fine. It wasn't all that asthetically pleasing and any thing longer than 16-18 inches hung behind this cabinet thing-a-ma-bob. So I wanted another solution. And I also wanted a way to be able to appreciate my necklaces even when I wasn't wearing them. I have collected some cool stuff over the years, meeting other artists, trips, etc. So I found this new hook thing where the hooks move along the bar that is afixed to the wall. Then I took a frame that i already had and painted it pink (my bedroom and bathroom is kinda pink and brown). And Voila! I've framed my necklaces. They are on constant display, perfect art for my bathroom.

I've got a few pieces that I've made (my favorite tooth necklace made from my dog's canine), a felted wool necklace that my mother-in-law made for me, my hand fabricated silver skull from a wonderful etsy artist, a couple of beaded necklaces that my dad sent me from Santa Fe, and a couple of Kari Stringer necklaces (love her!).

I love it. It seems like such a smart solution for a things I enjoy looking at every day.

Meet RayShee!

Well, technically it's Horatio. But he only gets called that when he's in trouble. Usually it's RayShee or RaySheePoo. He's a pure bred Chug. That's a chihuahua pug mix for those of you that are not "in-the-know"! Horatio is our number 11. We rescued him from our local animal shelter which has about a 50% kill rate. We had just adopted out our most recent foster dog and were down at the shelter "interviewing" to fill the vacancy. It was between this little guy and an older, white chihuahua mix. Horatio was one year old, cute, but a little, umm, how do you say, romantic with the ladies. He hadn't been neutered. I was leaning towards the white one but my husband liked this one. So we loaded him up in the car and took him home.
Shortly after coming home he went to the vet, was declared healthy and was neutered. He still thinks the ladies are very pretty but he's chilled out a lot. And he's cute, right? Well after a whole year of dragging him to adoption days and talking him up to potential adopters - nothing. No one wanted him. And after a whole year - we really did want him. We love him. He's so full of personality. We lucked out but somebody else out there missed out on a truly great dog. I could go on and on with cute "mom" stories about him but I'll just tell you this one: So in the evenings Tom and I have a bit of a routine. We fix dinner, maybe build a fire, and plop down in the living room to watch a little tv and hang with the dogs. When it's time for bed Horatio starts getting antsy. And once we ask: "What time is it?" He starts in with the full on wookie sounding language of his. He proceeds to "tell" all of us that it is high time to get our butts to bed. He LOVES bed time!

And once he hits the sheets, that's it! He is out. He crawls under the nearest pillow or the comforter and he's not gonna get up til the morning. But unfortunately, he is just excited about "time to get up" which he yells from the rooftops! Not nearly as endearing.