We have Grass!

We have been living so long with mud that mom can not believe it is finally here!

Here are some of the cool pictures...

Before


Delivery of the Grass


Bella loves laying in grass!


These are my two skin nephews. They had a great time playing in the mud as you can see by Jack's mouth. This is Andrew and Jack.


This is me being a very good boy around the babies. I love babies and normally have to be told to not lick them so much but I was trying to get my toy back! I did wait very patiently for them to give it back and did not go take it from them. It is not nice to take stuff from babies.


Jack kept trying to crawl up to me and touch me. I let him a little but mostly just kept backing up. He did use my mouth to hold on to and pull up to a standing position once. I just let him and then gave him a big lick. He laughed and fell over. I love babies but I really just wanted my toy back. Mom went and got it for me after this because I was being so good.


The finished yard! It looks like a park it is so beautiful!


Mom is so happy to have a finished yard but now we have to go an help her water. Thanks for coming to look at our pictures! There will be lots more fun pictures to come!

Boxer love
Boxen

p.s. Mom said to tell you that she and Andrew's mama were very close while I was playing with the babies. She knows I am a good boy around babies but it is always a good idea to have an adult near because I am very big and can hurt them without meaning to. In this case two adults, one for each baby. Please be careful around babies and children if you are a doggy so that we can help teach them to be nice to doggies and not be scared of us. Parents please teach your children to be nice to doggies and watch your children because not all doggies are nice and know to be careful. My good friend Honey is very good at this. Go and see her in action here...

http://bighoneydog.com/2010/04/07/mangominster-parcel-newcarpet-kidsocialising

Wordless Wednesday

Playtime with the boys!



p.s. guess who's yard that is in the background? More on that tomorrow!

Have you noticed my clipped ear?

Hi everyone it's Beau!

I thought I would come and tell everyone what my life has been like this first year. I am one year old now so this is a most important story. I was born to a feral mama cat that took care of me for eight long weeks. When I was still a kitten I lived on the streets and had to search for all my own food. One day someone put some wonderful smelling food out for me but it ended up being a trap! I was most scared but they were really nice to me. They fed me and gave me a bath and then let me take a long nap. When I woke up I had been neutered. They told me this was important so that I did not have any kittens of my own. I was fine with this because I am just a young boy cat and not ready for a family.

Anyhoo they nice people at KittyCo here in Dallas were the ones that neutered me. They have a most alarming way of telling which cats have been neutered and which have not. You see they need to be able to tell from a distance sometimes because some kitties will not let you get close to them. So they cut the tip off of our left ear. I know how horrible! But it is a great idea to them and it does work I suppose. He is my picture, you can see my left ear is missing the tip. Mom says this makes me look scrappy and she loves it, dad thinks it's weird. I really don't notice it at all now.



So after the ladies at KittyCo got to know me they liked me a lot and called the Lost Paws Rescue Group. A very nice lady named Kathy took me in to live with her. She named me Rowdy because I LOVE to PLAY!!! She started looking for just the perfect home for me.

Unfortunately mom lost her most important friend just before she adopted me. I hear about Andy all the time and how much mom misses her. She must have been a special kitty, here is her picture. Isn't she most beautiful? I wish I could have met her, even though mom says she would not have liked me because I am too playful. She liked things calm.



This is when mom came into the picture. She started looking for kitties because she needed to have a kitty in her home or she would just be sad about Andy everyday instead of remembering how much fun she was. One day she called my foster mama to ask about two kitties. They were meezer cats, or Siamese. MooGoo and Kashmere. Mom loved meezer cats but Kathy didn't think the meezer kitties would like Boxen and Bella. She did have two cats that she did think might like her dogs. Enter Rowdy and Waldo.

One day mom and dad came to visit Waldo and Me at Petsmart where we were staying. They came into the room and played and played with us through the bars. She and dad wanted to come and meet us. They left that night and Said they would see us that weekend but I had heard that a lot and didn't believe them. Guess what they came back! They took us home that weekend and let us have an upstairs room to ourselfs for a week. Then it was time to meet Boxen and Bella.

the introductions went well cause Boxen and Bella know how to act around kitties. They know we don't like to play rough or be boxed with huge Boxer paws. Unfortunately My foster brother Waldo never really liked it at mom's house. He was way too stressed out. So mom took him back to Kathy. I hope he has a new forever home and is as happy as I am.



Anyhoo that is my story. I am so glad to be here with mom and dad, and even Boxen and Bella. I really love this home!

The End, or the Beginning really
Beau

After 36 square yards of dirt and one day grading...

So this is some of the middle of the project pictures, as promised. It already looks lots better.

Here is the before...


here is the after...


Before...


After...


Not quite from the same angle but blame mom she took the pictures.

Here is a better picture...


And if you look closely at the back of the yard you will see the big bobcat machine that moved all that dirt! oh and Boxen chasing his ball...



And here is the last picture for now...me posing on the most beautiful new dirt!
Aren't I beautiful!



Stay tuned...the sprinkler pipe goes in this weekend and next weekend...GRASS!

Boxer's out...
Bella

Why mom is so busy and not helping us blog...

Hi everyone! I am so happy to be able to show you these pictures today! We are in the middle of a very big yard project. Today I am going to show you some before pictures of what our yard looked like before and then show you other pictures over the next few days! Exciting huh!

These are some of the first pictures taken at our house.

This concrete patio was taken out and the bushes cut down. Mom didn't want to cut the bushes down but they got injured by one of the big machines and had to come out. The patio was just extra concrete and there is already enough of that back there as you will see in a minute.





This is the area around the pool. See there is already lots of concrete.




This is the side yard...


This is what the yard does when it rains even just a little bit. there is lots of firewood left from us cutting down 16 trees and lots of concrete left from us breaking up that patio.



This is what happened to the nice concrete patio area...mom sometimes says she wished she would have left it there...


yucky right! Wait till you see tomorrows pictures...

Snow in Texas

Hi everyone! It's Boxen here. I wanted to tell you about a very strange but wonderful thing that happened here this past month. We got lots of snow!

Here in Dallas Texas it does not snow, ever really, so when we got lots of snow it was really cool. Bella as usual does not like anything wet to touch her unless it is the pool so she hid on the back patio under the very small roof.

Isn't she pitiful!


I on the other hand love the wet stuff and especially snow!




But those pictures were very early when mom just got home. The next day was the fun one! Look how much snow we got!

The diving board had twelve inches on it!


The trees were all heavy and making loud cracking noises from all the weight!

The night before the electricity guys came and trimmed some of the branches out of the way and made a big mess! Can you see it in the background?


Anyway We had a great time playing after Bella quit being a wuss. LOL


Dad even played catch with me a little!



Anyway there were many pictures that did not turn out because our camera is not the best for snow. I hope that you enjoy the ones we have though.

Boxer snuggles
Boxen

GRASS!!!

Well hi everyone! Sorry for the late posting mom has been really busy. Guess what?!?

We are getting Grass in the back yard!!! WooHoo!

Let me explain. When I was a puppy I lived at another house with mom and dad that had wonderful grass that I could lay all day in the sun and be perfectly happy. Then we moved to the new bigger house and guess what? There was not a lick of grass in the back yard! Oh the Horrors! The people that had the house before mom and dad really didn't take care of it. Mom and Dad ended up spending a lot of monies on fixing stuff that they had done incorrectly and not told us about. They had to replace the sewer in the frint yard, fix the crack in the pool, fix the improperly run pipe for the a/c fic the leaking toilet upstairs, you get the point. There were lots of minies spent that forst year so there was not any monies for grass. But now they have saved enough monies and it is SPRING and time to put it in.

This is the plan:

1. Mom has a really cool job designing buildings for people so she measured the back yard and drew up a plan.

2. Dad had a friend of his come over and tell us how much dirt to buy so that they can grade the yard. If I had to grade the yard I would give it an F because it fails to have grass. haha

3. Dad had 24 cubic yards of dirt delivered so that they can grade the yard. (Mom told me that grading meant leveling the yard so that the water drains off right, I still give it an F)

4. Next they are going to come over next Saturday and play with a Bobcat! I got really excited because I have never seen a Bobcat but mom says it is a machine not a real cat. Darn! The Bobcat is going to make our yard nice and level.

5. Next they are going to dig and put down pipes for a sprinkler system. I love this too as Boxen and I love to play in the sprinkler system. It is about time mom lets us have what we want!

6. After all of this they are going to have 3500 square feet of grass delivered. This is a lot of grass. It is 1000 square feet bigger than our house! They have it delivered on big square board things and then have to unload all of it and put it in it's place. I will watch this and tell them where to put it all.

7. Then it is time to water, water, water! The grass needs a lot of water to get started.
I will show everyone pictures in our new post. I want mom to help me find some pictures of the house when they first bought it. and show you now and then show you the finished yard. I am so excited and mom is too! Dad just says he is ready to not have to hear mom complain about the ugly yard anymore.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Boxer Snuggles
Bella

Wordless Wednesday!

Bella representing at the Dallas Irish festival. She was a great representitave for NORCAL Boxer Rescue and loved all the attention she got!

Transfer from the old Blog #2

This is one of my favorite blogs from Andy. She left us at the begining of this year so I am very glad to have this blog from her.

Hello everyone!

I thought I would sneak on here while the stinky ones are sleeping. I am Andrea, the most important one in this house. Mom rescued me about nine years ago from the Houston SPCA. She came in one day looking for a little kitty, that had already been declawed, to live with her in the box house. She was going to school and needed someone to keep er company. My family had moved and taken me to the SPCA where there were lots of kittys needing homes and she picked me because I was the most beautiful. I am a small kitty weighing in at about 5.5 lbs. My former owners declawed me to stop me from scratching the furniture. Mom says if I had been her kitty from the start I would still have my claws. She does not believe that declawing should be allowed and neither do I. I think I am about eleven years old, at least that is what mom says but no one really knows.

I lived with mom for a long time before she started spending a lot of time with Dad. Then we moved and there was a DOG! Gross! Boxen isn't too bad really. A couple of swats to the nose and he learned to leave me alone. Then they brought the puppy home. Boy was she trouble. She was always tearing stuff up and mom and dad had the hardest time teaching her to go potty outside. They finally hung the bell from the door and she learned to ring it to go potty. Silly dogs, I don't know why they don't just use a box like me. It is always clean and feels nice on your feet when you walk in it. Anyway...Bella has not quite learned that when I swat her it does not mean I want to play, it means leave me alone! She chases me and tries to bat at me but she means well. I will teach her one day. They do keep mom safe when dad is gone so I guess they can stay.

I guess I will tell you some stuff about me. I love the sunshine, and love it even more if the window is open and I can lay in the sunshine and smell the outside. I love the laser pointer and will chase it all over the bed. I really love mom and will follow her all over the house, I even get to snuggle with her at night when we sleep. I guess the last thing is I love to eat! I eat as much as mom will feed me. Mom had me checked out and I just have a really fast metabolism, so she can feed me all I want and I will never be overweight.

I will try to sneak on here as often as I can. I have to wait for them to go to sleep though, but they sleep a lot so that will be ok. I can't wait to get to know everyone on the blogs! I will attach some pictures of me so that you can see how pretty I am.

Whisker kisses
Andrea

Transfer #1 Mom's favorite posts from our old blog

This is a transfer from our old blog, Mom made us change the name so she is moving some of her favorite posts from that blog to this one for some of our new friends to see. I hope you enjoy!

Hi everyone it's Bella! Sorry it has been so long, Dad's sisters are in the middle of having their skin babys and we have been really busy. The good news is mom has taken a lot of pictures so we will have a lot to post about now!

As most of you know mom got me this really cool lifejacket to wear while I am in the pool. It turns out I really do need it. I have been romoted to official lifeguard of our pool! There are lots of times when my services are needed. There are lots of tests I had to pass to become the official lifeguard. Here are a few of them...

#1 Mom and dad do a lot of swimming and they love to jump off the loud board at the deep end. This is very dangerous and needs to be very closely monitered. As you can see here my Mom's brother is about to jump...very dangerous. It is my job to watch them as they jump and make sure I do not need to come in and get them.



There is also a slide at this pool! I particularly hate it when mom goes off this slide but I don't really like anyone using it. Here are some pictures mom got of me doing my duty and protecting Dad's cousin. This is very important as well.





Lastly it is very important that I not be afraid to get into the pool. For a long time I did not like to jump into the pool but I have learned that my lifejacket will not let me sink. Here are some action pictures that mom got of me jumping into the pool. They look just like a real lifeguard don't they?












(look I am almost underwater in this one!)



Hope you all understand now how important of a job this is. I am really proud of all my hard work. It is really a lot of fun though.



Kisses to everyone!
Bella

Soft Claws

Hi everyone it's Beau again!

Mom wanted me to tell you guys more about Soft Claws. It is this really cool thing someone invinted as an alternative to declawing. Mom does not think declawing should be allowed because of the pain and discomfort it causes us kitties. Andrea, the kitty before me, was declawed as a kitten. Bt the time mom got her a few years later she was already having pain in her paw bones. She would cry when mom touched her paws. Later near the end of her life she did not like to walk around or play much. Mom thinks her paw bones might have had some arthritis but it never seemed to really hurt her so mom didn't worry too much.

Soft Paws are a soft plastic cover that go over cat's claws. First you trim the claw, only the clear part not the part with the blood. That would hurt if you trimmed that. (If you are not sure about trimming cat's claws then get some advice from someone who knows what they are doing, like your vet.) Then you put a small amount of cat safe glue in the plastic cover and slip it onto the claw. This glue comes with the Soft Paw Package. We can still retract our claws with the Soft Claws on our claws. When the claw grows out then it sheds it's outer layer and the Soft Claw cover comes off with it. The whole thing starts over then.

This is what the Soft Claws look like and some of the colors they come in. They come in colors so that it is easier to see when they have come off. They make these for doggies too but mom has never heard of anyone using them on doggies so she does not know how well they work. They work great on us kitties though. I love to scratch the carpet and with these I can still make the scratching motion but it does not hurt the carpet. Isn't that great!



Here is what the green Soft Claws look like on me.


I was really good about letting mom put these on me but some kitties are not. If you need to then wait until your kitty is really sleepy and put them on a few at a time. Give him a yummy treat between so that he will associate yummy treats to having his Soft Paws put on and he will eventually love it! I still get a yummy treat even though I don't mind much.

I hope that this post will help someday to have a kitty not declawed. If we help prevent this in one kitty mom will be happy but she is hoping for more kitties to not have this happen. Please spread the word of Soft Paws as an alternative to declawing. Mom and I would really love it and I know Andrea would have too.

Kitty kisses
Beau

Rowdy's new name

Hi everyone! Mom told me I needed to come and say hi and tell everyone what my new name was. It's Beau! Mom used to have a friend in High School Named Beau. He was a really nice guy. When she was telling some story to dad one day she said the name and Dad loved it. He wanted to use it on a skin kid in the future but Mom wait that would be a little weird. So they gave the name to me. Isn't that cool!

Anyway I am loving it here with Mom and Dad, Bella and Boxen. Waldo was too scared here so he went back to our foster mom. I miss him a little but now I don't have to share mom I get her all to myself! I have spent most of my life sharing food, toys, and all my other stuff with other nice kitties so it is kinda cool to not have to share anything. I do share my toys with Bella sometimes. She likes to jump at my feather on a stick toy so I let he play sometimes. She is a lot bigger than me so I kinda have to, but she is nice to the toy so I don't mind.

Mom also wanted me to tell you guys about something called Soft Claws. It is this really cool thing someone invented as an alternative to declawing. Mom does not think declawing should be allowed because of the pain and discomfort it causes us kitties. Andrea, the kitty before me, was declawed as a kitten. By the time mom got her a few years later she was already having pain in her paw bones. She would cry when mom touched her paws. Later near the end of her life she did not like to walk around or play much. Mom thinks her paw bones might have had some arthritis but it never seemed to really hurt her so mom didn't worry too much. I will do a post soon saying more about them but for now back to me!

Some of my favorite things to do around here are:

Helping mom in her craft room.


Helping mom on the computer.


And trying to tell mom that the flashy thing is annoying.


See I am trying to tell her in her ear in this picture because she didn't get it the first few times.


Other than that I love to play with my new toys, and I love all the Windows that I can see out of. My absolute favorite thing to do is to practice my 10 feet dash on top of mom and dad when they are sleeping at night though. That is so much fun!

I hope that you all like my blog post. Mom is going to make my adoption official Saturday so you will be seeing a lot more of me.

Kitty Kisses
Beau