For the past year I cook the Dachshunds chicken and pumpkin dog food.  It is extremely healthy for them and has enough fiber to help with the anal glads which Odie has a problem with.

It is a real simple recipe where I place two frozen chicken breasts purchased in bulk from Costco and add in a half-pound of frozen squash and cook on high for about 15 minutes.

The food comes out steaming hot and takes about 5 minutes for it to cool of before the dogs can eat it.  So I prepare it and leave it out on the counter top to cool but Chloe starts barking and Odie starts whining and Molly eventually chimes in.

It’s not too bad of a dish if you add some salt and pepper for yourself.

Oleander

We have many Oleander bushes/trees around the house and we’re always cleaning up after flowers and leafs that continually fall off.  When we play outside with the dogs, we throw the ball in the opposite direction of the Oleanders towards the Sago Palm.  Some symptoms that your dog may have eating parts of an Oleander are:

• Severe vomiting
• Abnormal heart rate
• Weakness
• Shock
• Death

Sago Palm

Our single Sago Palm lies at the end path where the ball lands.  I didn’t even know that this plant was dangerous to our Dachshunds.  Sago Palm toxicity may include:

• Vomiting
• Bloody stools
• Liver failure
• Stomach lining damage
• Death

Tulip and Daffodil Bulbs

The Dachshund is a good digger with strong front legs that were breed to root out Badgers in Germany.  I often worried that our dogs would dig a hole and get out under the fence.  But they never have and have not “rooted” in our Tulip and Daffodil patch.   Lucky for us, these bulbs are toxic to dogs and may cause:

• Vomiting
• Diarrhea
• Abdominal pain
• Abnormal heart rate
• Changes in respiration

Azalea

Odie and Molly always eat the grass/weeds around one of our many Azalea bushes.  Who knows if they’re eating part of the Azalea while chomping down on a leaf?  At least they don’t have these symptoms:

• Vomiting
• Diarrhea
• Neurological signs
• Heart arrhythmias

We often wonder why our dogs occasionally get sick.  Perhaps our yard is not “pet safe” as we thought it was.  You may want to check around your house to see just how safe it is for your pet.  Please visit http://petpoisonhelpline.com or talk to your Vet for more information.

Their usuual schedule is right when we wake up — or when they wake us up — right before we go off to work and the many times during the evening when we’re home.

But what about when it’s raining. Schedules are all messed up and dachshunds are afraid of getting wet and simply run outside to get muddy paws and not do the business they’re suppose to.   I end up wet ’cause I have to go outside with them to make sure that they actually did something.  Multiply that x3 and I get the wettest because you know they have to go out one-by-one…

So how do you know when it’s time to let your dogs out when it’s raining?  It’s so simple, you just check the WunderMap Radar Weather Map for the 3doxies and you just wait until it’s not raining over your house.

Today it was 5:18AM when there was a large pocket of blue-gray skys with a slight mist that the radar was not picking up.  We had to move fast and Miss Sleepy Head Chloe was not going to get out of bed.  No way.  Odie who was up 1/2 hour early did the in and out thing since he was just at the tail end of the rain.   He managed to hold it until the front passed by.

I cannot vouch for Molly but she can hold on for a while… and for the looks of it, she’ll have to wait for a least another hour to potty until this next front passes by…

What makes a really good bed for dogs to sleep in?

Dogs naturally sleep in a curled position with their nose tucked between their legs for warmth and security, so a round bed should provide the most comfort for them.  They also like to lay with their back next to something for the additional snuggly warmth and security.

This is why Odie loves to sleep under the covers of our bed curled up in a ball behind the back of our legs.  It is truly wonderful for him, but literally a pain in the back for us.   We had to banish Chloe from our bed because she sleeps on top of the covers next to the edge and I’ve pushed her off the side more than once with my restless sleeping habits.

Keeping this in mind, which beds – besides our bed – do our dogs like?

Donut Dog Beds

If you don’t know what a Donut Dog Bed is, it’s simply a big round pillow shaped like a donut.  The donut forms a circular pillow rim with an attached bottom.  The “donut hole” is a rounded pillow that lies in the center of donut.

We purchased one of these for Odie after he injured his back and was recovering from his paralysis.  The low soft rim was easy for him to get in and out of even when he had little use of his hind legs. We keep it nearby the fireplace and all three our dogs routinely sleep in it during the day.

Lounger Dog Beds

The Lounger Dog Bed is an oval with sides that are about 8” high.  We place a blanket on top of it and they curl up under the covers.  Some Loungers come with pillows but our Dachshunds have no preference and will sleep on top and under the pillow depending on how silly they are.

As part of our 2010 “get the dogs out of our bed” resolution, we bought two new loungers from Costco.  For about $20 each, the Kirkland Signature brand is one of the better dog beds that we’ve found.   Molly loves her new comfy bed and prefers it to sleeping on the couch.

Dirty Clothes Laundry Basket

Yes, Chloe loves to sleep in the dirty clothes laundry basket.  We use a grey laundry basket to carry our dirty clothes downstairs to the laundry room which Chloe promptly hops into and falls asleep.  She’s been doing this since she was a puppy, but now that she’s older, she has trouble getting into it and starts whimpering for someone to pick her up and put her into “bed.”

We placed one of Lounger Beds next to the laundry basket and now she uses it as a foot stool to hop into her bed.  So much for retraining her…

The main problem is Odie. Getting him to sleep in his new bed will become a chore.  Even if we remove the stairs from the bed to help our dogs get up into it, he can still jump up where Molly and Chloe cannot.   I’m sure there’s going to be a lot of crying, but that’s how they ended up in our bed in the first place.

Over the ten years that we’ve had our dogs, we’ve tried just about every vacuum on the market and the only two that have survived the test of time are the Oreck and Dyson Vacuum cleaners.  The amount of money we wasted on the cheaper (well known named) brands easily would have paid for our more expensive vacuums we own today.

We fell in love with our Dyson canister from the moment we got it home.  It has incredible suction and keeps the dirt and dust inside the canister instead of spreading though out the house as you vacuum.  The only problem is that the air driven bush does not work well for pet hair on our medium pile carpet.  The power cord was too short making it difficult to cover some of the rooms in our house.  Eventually we gave it away to my mother who lives in a small apartment and suffers with COPD making it a perfect vacuum for her.

We didn’t know how dirty our carpets were until we cleaned them with the Oreck XL.  The hypo-allergenic filtration system keeps the dust and dirt in the bag so it doesn’t go spewing back out into the room.  The bags hold an incredible amount of dirt so you don’t have to empty it so often like you do in bagless systems.

The light-weight design is perfect for the stairs, but again, it is designed to work on low pile carpeting.   You can get a really good workout on your biceps and triceps with this vacuum.  Even though this is probably the best vacuum for dog hair – and we continue to use it to clean our stairs — the upper body strength it takes to clean our caused us switch back to Dyson.

The Dyson Animal upright is what we use to clean our carpets every week.  The short comings of the canister were eliminated with a 25’ power cord and a motorized brush that even picks up the baby-fine fur that Molly sheds.  The large wheels make vacuuming nearly effortless and are the main reason we can vacuum our house in less than fifteen minutes.

The main problem is with Dyson is that it is a bagless system and you have to empty the canister outside.  (Remember to stand up wind when you drop the contents into the trash.)   But other than that, it is a really good vacuum for our carpet.

So which vacuum is best for cleaning pet hair?  The Dyson Animal and Oreck XL are the best vacuums that we’ve ever owned for cleaning up after our Dachshunds.  Unlike cheaper vacuums, the exceptional quality of these brands will last for many years even though the prices are substantially higher.  But do you really want to sacrifice when buying the best vacuum for pet hair?

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Of course, we are biased towards the Dachshund since we have three of them.  Plus we sorta miss our dogs when were away from home and always find one that looks like Chole or Odie to keep us company during the trip.  I’ve never seen one that looks like Molly since she is by far prettier than most long red haired Dachshund figurines (even with her knots and tangles in her fur).

From the looks of it, the great recession hit the local economy real hard and most stores were having sales on everything.  The typical comment a store owner would state was “20% off store-wide sale.”

Unfortunately at Rasmussen’s, where we picked up “Roxie,” they were not having a sale. But she was cute an my wife liked her.  (Now Roxie is in my office instead of my wife’s full curio cabinet.)

At Berengaria, they didn’t have the normal Dachshund gifts and only had Pug and Chiwawa things to buy.  We’ve purchase the most unusual and unique Doxie things from there and I recommend stopping by just to see what they have or even if it is to say “hello.”

It’s hard to tell when the next time we’re heading up there but you never know, Christmas is just around the corner and there is always someone in my family that likes Dachshund figurines.

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It’s really simple; just group your three Dachshunds together, take a family picture of the puppies, upload the photo and order the cards.

Simple. About as simple as herding cats.

Chloe likes to sleep all day; Odie likes to play all day; Molly likes to hide behind my desk where she come out for air.

I can trick them all together for that once-in-a-lifetime Christmas pose by blowing through a squeaker from one of their dog balls, but all I get is a bunch of scattered brained Dachshunds looking for a stupid ball.

They know it’s coming from my mouth and they think I’m chewing on their ball.  But when I get down to shoot picture, they lick the camera or worse, my mouth.

Not a pretty sight or a picture that I can print for the Christmas Cards I’m planning to send out.

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Last night, she had the remaining evidence hanging from the corner of her mouth stuck by a thread between her teeth.  Now I would like to teach her good hygiene by having her brush her floss teeth, but doing it with a dryer sheet is overkill.  Three-quarters of the sheet went somewhere…

Since she didn’t barf it out, I guess it’s coming out the other end.  I gave her extra pumpkin with her chicken last night for extra fiber in her diet to help ease it out.

I’m not looking forward to the next few days cause I’m sure that something is going to get plugged — and dryer sheets make a really good dachshund butt plug — which I have to extract with one swift yank.  It’s unpleasant for both of us, but I’m sure that Molly gets the worst of it.

Will she ever learn not to eat things?  Will we ever learn to quickly pick them up and remove them from the laundry?  The answer to this is of course is no.  I guess we’ll have to live with our Dachshund dryer sheet butt plugs for now.

I always bought a pair of dog balls when we only had Chloe and Odie, but now with the third one, I usually end up getting three balls.  Of course, they all want the same ball regardless if there are two or three new balls to play with, so now I only get one for them to fight over.

Since these toys do not last very long, I buy the cheapest ball from PetSmart.  The 99 cent plastic ball is very durable and lasts longer than more expensive latex balls.   Plus, Molly does not rip the plastic balls to shreds.

We have to be really careful with latex balls since Molly will eat the pieces of rubber that she chewed off to get to the squeaky center.

This means that we have to supervise her when she is playing with latex dog balls.  No more than a few minutes or so and the ball goes back up on the shelf until it’s playtime again.

This makes the ball last about a week while the plastic ones are ignored lying on the carpet.

I’m somewhat surprised that they don’t like to play with tennis balls.  Tennis balls are a little harder to handle with a smaller mouth and don’t have that squeaky factor.

Occasionally, they get a rubber dog ball to play with but those don’t last very long with Dachshunds.  A couple of chews and they split down the middle or a huge chunk of rubber vanishes or is left behind on the carpet to clean up.

Now if I can train our dogs on how to use a dog ball launcher like “Jerry the Dachshund,” I could get more work done.  But where’s the fun in that?

The pleasant ride down Olsen Road, left onto Moorpark and through windy Norwegian Grade to get some fresh country air.  (I know MJB is wondering how I safely navigate the Grade with a dog on my lap with its head out the window.  Let’s just say it takes a lot of practice and slow driving.)  You never would expect that an accident would occur in the peaceful suburbs of Thousand Oaks.

Chloe, our “riding dog,” truly is accustomed to and an expert at sitting on your left leg while taking in the 40 MPH breeze with her dog goggles on.  The countless rides she enjoyed to her favorite Fast Food — always friendly to the Mc Donald’s cashier — may have to end because she just won’t ride buckled up.

We have a dog seat belt harness — somewhere — purchase because Odie was constantly jumping back and forth from the passenger seat to my lap when he was going to his weekly obedience training at PetSmart.  Somehow he would manage to wiggle out of it by the time we were speeding along on the freeway making it impossible to readjust the belt before hopping onto me.

Odie is somewhat better now that he’s more obedient, but he still hates riding in the passenger seat.  Molly simply likes to ride in the back seat running back and forth from window to window barking at every stranger.  These two Dachshunds are not riding dogs.

But all you have to say is “are you a riding dog?” and she gets more excited than, well, you know what.   I know that a seat belt may save her life someday, but I don’t think she will understand why.

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