Lazy Afternoon at Casa Cooper

Yesterday the weather got up into the low 60's!  Woo Hoo! Mack and I knew what that meant-a trip to the dog park!  After lunch, hu-mom packed Mack and me into van and off we went.  We spent a glorious hour sniffing butts, running around and visiting!  Hu-mom doesn't let us stand still.  She is always walking the perimeter of the park so we keep moving since we really don't play anymore.  If she stops, Mack tends to hang out near her and not move. 

We even met a cute little pug mix named Sandy.  She was part pug and part Jack Russel. She had Minnie's coloring, pug body and Jack Russel head, if you can picture it and very smart. 

After our hour was up at the dog park, we came home.  Hu-mom took Mack and me for a short walk, dropped off Mack at home, then hu-mom and I went for a long walk.  We were pooped when we got back.  

Later that night, while the humans were watching AI, this is what we did:

Brodie doing cat-ga (cat yoga)

 He he he, Mack was so tired, he didn't care if he was falling off the top cushions on the couch!

Here I am, sleeping on my favorite pillow and blankie.

Snoring away!  Not me....

It's going to be another beautiful day today, so we hope to repeat what we did yesterday.  Cold weather is back tomorrow and back into the high 40's.  Hu-mom hates cold weather, so our outside activities will be few and far between again....

Have a great day!

Love, Minnie : )

Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Pink Polka Dot Harness and Leash

Last month, I got a new harness and leash from Cody's Creations, an Etsy shop.  I picked out the Pink Dot Harness and matching leash.  Mack's harness and leash are also from Cody's Creations.  He has  Mr. Al pattern which we purchased in Sept 2010.  Hu-mom really likes Cody's Creations harnesses and leashes.  They are machine washable, and very sturdy and have the matching pairs and the patterns are outstanding!  Mine is a little big because I'm still losing weight...

On one trip to PetsMart, hu-mom saw this neat leash holder (see below).  Finding a good spot for the leashes and harnesses was always a problem for her. This was just the thing!  Now when it's time to go, all of our stuff is right by the door!

As I said before, I've been losing weight since I was sick this summer.  Hu-mom took me to get weighed today and I'm only 20 lbs.  I was 30 when I got sick!  Of course, I needed to shed a few extra pounds but 10 is too much.  They think it is the special food I'm on.  So guess what?  I will be fed more of it!!!!  and poor Mack is up to 24 lbs.  Now he needs to lose 1 or 2 lbs before he goes out in his speedo this summer! Don't worry about me not being healthy....I am healthy and full of energy except when hu-mom took these pictures this afternoon. I was in the middle of my nap!

The man on the TV box said we were going to get snow.  We got nadda, not a drop, no rain, no nothing!
Hu-mom was happy. Hu-dad had a nice fire in the fire place anyway, and the 4 of us snuggled on the couch in front of the fire!!  Nothin' is better than that.  Well, except for maybe treats while snuggling in front of the fire place.  One can always hope!

Have a great week,
Minnie  : )

Orijen Dog Food Review and Updates

Our friends Mr Chewy and Brent at MrChewy.com asked us to write an honest review of one of the Orijen products they sell.  They sent us a free bag of the Orijen Six Fish Dry Dog Food that we requested.

As usual, the box of requested food was received extremely quick!  We DO love MrChewy.com!

I'm not going to go into a lot of details about Orijen or Orijen Six Fish dog food.  I have links at the end of this review has are very specific.  The Orijen website is excellent, please visit.

Orijen is made with only the freshest regional ingredients.  Their foods are matched to the digestive systems of both dogs and cats. Orijen brings peace of mind to owners by promoting peak health of their pets in addition to containing natural flavors that pets crave.

Active dogs require a meat-based diet, rich in animal protein and fat. Champion Petfoods uses free-run poultry, wild caught fish and free-range red meats for Orijen. Coupled with these fresh meats are fruits and vegetables, health-boosting herbs and balanced mineral content for the healthiest meal pets can get.
Orijen is grain-free for more controlled blood sugar levels and excludes ineffective nutrients from plant oils as compared to other brands.

Champion works closely with local farmers, fishermen,  food processing innovators and the scientific community to produce the highest quality products. Arriving fresh from the region each day, the meat is never frozen and never exposed to heat or chemicals.  The harvested fruit and vegetables are ripe with vitamins and enzymes and antioxidants. The natural herbs help strengthen organs and tissues while supporting the digestion process of your pet.

All these fresh ingredients are processed  under the Canadian Food Inspection Agency's highest food safety standard. Even the ingredient suppliers are approved by the US Department of Agriculture.


I have a reason for reviewing Orijen Six Fish.  If you have followed our blog, you know that until Minnie was diagnosed with Pancreatitis last summer,  I made their food, the raw diet with raw meaty bones.  The vet said Minnie would be better off on a prescription kibble.  There was no way I wanted Minnie to go through what she had gone through with pancreatitis, so without much hesitation  I decided to make the switch for Minnie to her prescription kibble.  Then the big decision was what food would I feed Mack.  Mack has a BIG allergy problem, from head to tail, which was one of the main reasons I was making their food. I reviewed a lot of written material, talked to a lot of "dog" people including our vet and talked to the folks at our local Whole Pet Central pet food store about what food would be best for Mack and his allergies.  Our local store provided me with some samples, one of which was Orijen.  After a trial period for each food, Mack did the best on Orijen.  Orijen is high in protein, low in carbs and grain free.   We started out with Orijen Senior.  I now mix a combination of Senior and Six Fish.  He LOVES it. His has maintained a healthy weight, which is hard to do in a neutered, senior pug who likes to sleep on the couch and watch TV!  He has been able to completely stop his oral medications for his allergies.  His stools are nicely formed and I wish I could say they don't stink, but they still do....one could always wish.

I have included some reviews of Orijen below along with the website for Champion Pet Foods of Canada that make Orijen Six Fish.  I don't believe that Orijen foods are anymore expensive than most premium pet foods. Mack has been on Orijen for over 6 months now and is doing extremely great!  Our foster, Miss Daisy, also got the Orijen.  For the month she was with us, she did great on it.  We sent her off to her new home with some Orijen for a good start.

If you have any questions about our review of Orijen, please just ask!

Dog Food Adviser Orijen Review

Dog Food Chat

Orijen Six Fish Dry Dog Food










We wanted to bring to your attention one of the great benefits of using MrChewy.com. The Refer Your Friends Donation Program.  See the details below:

So if you decide to use and try MrChewy.com, please use this code:

KATH2016

 Minnie and Mack's account has a total of $20 for donations!  We thank everyone that has participated.

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We want to thank everyone for all the well wishes for our Grandmother.  She was ill again this past week, but has recovered nicely so we haven't been able to visit our favorite blogs too much.

Miss Daisy is doing well with her new family.  They are promising to send us a picture!

Hopefully, things around Casa Cooper will calm down and hu-mom can keep us updated on our blog, too!

We hope everyone enjoys this holiday weekend.  The weather person is promising us some SNOW tomorrow.

Love,  Minnie : )

Happy Valentine's Day

Look!  Mack got mail!!!

It's from Payton his sweetie!!!!

On the inside it says "Sending you Pugs & Kisses"!

Isn't that sweet?

Mack loves his Valentine's Day card. He keeps it in his bed so it will help him dream about Payton.

Mack is waving bye-bye.

Mack has on his Valentine's Day bandana just for Payton.

And look what Minnie received!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Mail from her main squeeze, Frank the Tank who lives in Wales UK.

There are pictures of Frank, the Pugalier (Pug and  Cavalier King Charles Spaniel  parents),  on the card. Can you believe that?  Frank is awfully clever on the 'puter.  On the inside it says:

To My Pawfect Valentine, may your day be filled with love and romance....

Happy Valentine's Day!  That is so romantic!  

Minnie is wearing her Valentine's Day bandana as well, just for Frank!

Minnie and Mack also received a sweet Valentine's Day card from Pearl and Daisy!  Aren't the ladies looking sweet!

We wish all of our Blogville friends a wonderful day full of love and happiness and, of course, lots of treats!

(random Pug, no relationship to anyone we know...)

Love,

Minnie : )

and We Thank the Academy....

As you probably noticed, if you are a follower of our blog, we have been mostly absent in the last few weeks due to the inability of Mack and me to type since we don't have thumbs and having to wait on hu-mom to do it for us. Oh, if only our useless dew claws worked!  Not only would we be blogging, we'd be on Face Book,  tweeting and playing games on Pogo.com, sending emails, among other things.... any way, back to what I was going to say earlier.  Our wonderful blogging friends have bestowed upon us *2* awards in the last few weeks and we haven't posted about them.  So we're going to post the2 different awards given to us recently.  Our blogging friends are so special to us and we've made so many friends in the last 1 1/2 years that we been blogging.  It's really exciting.

Payton gave this award to us.  Along with this honor comes some responsibility…I have to answer the 10 questions below and share 10 random thoughts and/or facts about myself before passing it on to 10 other blogs.  So here it goes:

Question/answer section

1. Name your favorite activity. 

Mack:  Sleeping

Minnie: Eating

2. Name your favorite treat.  

Mack: Anything edible and not poisonous to dogs

Minnie:  Cat food and cat "treats" (those of you with kitty litter boxes know what I mean)

3. What ticks you off?

Mack:  Having the compressed air shot near keep me from barking a warning when a car drives by the house

Minnie:  Someone taking my personal stuff

4. When you’re upset, what do you do?

Mack: My tail goes between my legs

Minnie: Shiver and shake and hide under the bed

5. What makes you indescribably happy?

Mack: When my humans come home, I sing to them!

Minnie:  Playing fetch with the mini tennis balls and my people coming home, I sing along with Mack

6. What do you do when you are excited? 

Mack:  Sing and wiggle the butt

Minnie:  Run around like a crazy woman

7. What is your biggest fear?

Mack:  Missing a meal

Minnie: Loud noises, like thunder, lighting, fireworks, cars backfiring and workmen hammering on the roof for 2 days straight

8. Describe your everyday attitude.

Mack: Laid back, sweet and snuggle bug

Minnie:  Ready to play at any moment, ready to eat at any hour

 Name your favorite toy.

Mack: Destuffed square green or blue stuffie sheep (Thanks, Minnie, for destuffing it)

Minnie:  Mini tennis balls

10. Name your favorite place to sleep or nap. 

Mack:  Back of the couch so I can be on guard duty and let humans know of impending danger

Minnie:  Big bed, under the covers

Random facts/thoughts section 

1. Minnie is living with pancreatitis 
2. Minnie does not like to get up in the AM, would rather sleep in
3. Minnie would be happy to be an only dog
4. Mack loves company
5. Mack loves other dogs
6. Mack is on allergy shots, he is known as the scratching king
7. Minnie loves pink
8. Mack's ears are turning a beautiful silver color
9. Mack's tongue is so short he can barely stick it out of his mouth (compared to most pugs)
10. Mack likes to watch TV, will bark at any animal or anything that resembles an animal

I would like to give this award to the following blogs.

1.  Salinger the pug and his new brother, Toby

2.  Minnie Moo and her brother, Lincoln

3.  Bunk, the crazy pug

4.  Amber the weenie dog

5.  Nola, another weenie dog

6.  Mollie Jo and Bobo

7.  Lexi and her siblings at Blue Bird Farm in VA

8.  Yoda, Brutus and Ellie

9.  The Devil Dog

10.  Vito and brother, Vinny 

We want to thank Payton for giving us this awesome award.  The recipients are under no obligation to post this award, but we want you guys to know that we enjoy your blog!

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From Bunk we received this lovely award!  Thank you Bunk, we love your blog and you are one crazy, black pug puppy!

I am so happy to receive this award because the purpose of this award is to simply to recognize the efforts of fellow bloggers and to let them know that their work is appreciated. 

We pass this lovely award to the following lovely blogs:

1. Buschi and Ebbie

2. Biconpawz 

3. Frankie and his brother, Ernie

4. Honey, the great dane

5. Fred and Hayley

Again, please don't feel obligated to post this award or pass it on. But dear readers, if you are not familiar with these blogs, please check them out. 

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I was tagged by Lola to answers a few questions about myself and Mack.

Here we go:

1. Describe yourself in 7 words.

Minnie:  Sweet, playful, loving, shy, energetic, beautiful, shiny fur

Mack:  Snugly, sleepy, laid back, lumpy, calm, snorty, turning silver in the face

2. What keeps you up at night?

Minnie: Mack's snoring, not much else

Mack:  Hu-mom being up in the middle of the  night on the 'puter

3.  Who would you like to be?

Mack:  Honey, (a male version of) the Great Dane, I am a small doggie with a big dog attitude

Minnie:  Lassie, so I could run free in the meadow and save Timmy from the well

4. What are you wearing right now?

Mack: Naked as a jail bird

Minnie:  A lady never tells!

5. What scares you?

Minnie:  Everything and anything LOUD

Mack:  Not much, I'm a man!  (Maybe going to the V E T)

6. The best and worst of blogging.

Mack: Waiting for hu-mom to post and follow up on our reading and learning of our friends going over the Rainbow Bridge

Minnie:  Same thing as Mack....

7. The last website I visited.

Mack:  A Pug's Tale by Lola

Minnie:  The Adventures of the Tank

8. What is one thing I would change about myself.

Minnie:  I need to be braver!

Mack:  Hmmm,  I guess try to sleep and bark less!

9. Slankets yes or no.  We had no idea what Slankets are/is, we asked Google. (seems they are like the snuggie)

Mack:  Hell, yes, in camo please.

Minnie:  Nice, warm and a thick one in PINK!

10. Tell us something about the dog that tagged you.

Lola is one of the funniest pugs we've met in a long time and her hu-mom is running at a close 2nd!  Visit their blog to find out.

We can tag other blogs, but I think it would be wonderful if everyone reading this would tag themselves and tell us more about themselves!  No need to be tagged by anyone.

Thanks Lola and her mom for sharing this with us.  We are truly honored.

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This has been a really long, long. long post today.  I hope we didn't bore you.

Please visit the blogs we've touched today, they are all wonderful.  There are so many other blogs that we didn't mention but are just as great.  So if we didn't mention you, please know that we love all of  you equally.

Have a wonderful weekend.

Love,

Minnie  : )

Driving Miss Daisy

Miss Daisy

Monday was a happy and sad day for us here at Casa Cooper.  Our 1st foster from Mid Atlantic Pug Rescue, Miss Daisy, was going to her forever home!  After being with us for a month, we all (well, not me, Minnie) fell in love with that little black puggie girl!  The pictures below are of Daisy in the car getting ready for her 6 hour trip from Northern Virginia to Raleigh NC to her new home.  Relatives of ours were visiting for the weekend and agreed to drive Miss Daisy down to Raleigh on their way back to Charlotte NC. 

They left pretty early in the AM and it was cold.  Hu-mom was trying to be strong, so she didn't try real hard to get a good pictures.  But here is Miss Daisy in her traveling outfit, ready to go!

We've heard from her new family and she seems to be fitting right in.  We can't wait to receive some pictures. 

We will be taking a foster break until the humans get back from a trip they're taking in a few weeks.  Then we'll be ready for another foster doggie!

Have a wonderful weekend!
Love, Minnie  : )

The Week In Between...

We had a wonderful Christmas with our family!  Pressies were opened and we even got to taste a new treat or two.  (Since Minnie was sick right before Christmas, Hu-mom is only letting us have 1 treat for now!)

We received gifts from Benny and Lily for Jazzi's Gift Exchange.  Hu-mom made us put the pressies under the tree and wait for Christmas morning to open them.  You won't believe what we received!!!! We each got a bully stick!  I received a cool toy...it was a nest with 3 squirrel babies in it.  I love pulling out the babies and making them squeak, he he he.  Hu-mom said it was an educational toy! Mack received this awesome blankie that is incredibly soft.  It said it is a couch cover.   Well, Mack loves to get on the arm and back of the couch and look out the window (he usually sleeps and doesn't look).  Now there are a few little holes on the arm.  This blankie fits perfectly on the arm and covers up the little holes!  and Mack likes to sit on the soft cover.  We also received a bag of Old Mother Hubbard treats and we are sharing a gift card from Petco!  Thanks Benny and Lily, you guys are awesome.  We will be having some pictures of us opening the pressies, we're just waiting for Aunt Tori to download the pictures and send them to us.  Hu-mom was too busy with the activities of the day to take pictures!

After reading our friends blogs today, it seems like we all did the same thing---rest up from all the Christmas excitement!

Have a great and short week!

Love,  Minnie  : )

Christmas Entertainment

We saw this very cute video on Max the Quilt Cat's blog and wanted to share this with you!

We hope you enjoy it as much as we did.  

Love, Minnie :  )

Christmas Lights and Santa Paws

Hi Blogville friends!  We hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season and not stressing out too much! 

My family loves to drive and see the Christmas lights.  Just down the road from us is the most beautifully decorated house that hu-mom has ever seen.  The pictures below do not do it justice! The backyard is also fully decorated as well. The house is on a corner lot so you can see into the back rooms and there are 4 Christmas trees around the interior that are also decorated in white lights and another one on the deck.  In the window above the foyer are snowmen waving at you. There are also Christmas carols playing. Of course there is a steady stream of traffic driving by to see the beauty. Please click on the pictures to "bigyfy" them.

Then we drive back to our little house with the one string of lights and a wreath on the front door....

Mack and I went to see Santa Paws today.  We even got to sit in his lap!  Everything was going fine until 

Santa jumped and did the girly scream....Mack had stepped on his crotch.  Hu-mom tried not to laugh but she said it was sooo funny.  Sorry, Santa...it was an accident, so please don't put Mack on your naughty list.

The camera at Petsmart wasn't  working very well, so we were in Santa's lap for a very long time.  He was nice and said we were good doggies.  :)  The pictures weren't great but the green papers we paid were going to Petsmart Charities, so we were happy with that!

Then when we finally got down, guess what Mack did?  You got it, he pooped, right there in front of Santa Paws!!!!!!  and not only did he poop, he did the walking poop.  Hu-mom was mortified but the Petsmart folks just laughed it off and hu-mom cleaned it up.  Now I'm really worried that Mack is on the naughty list.  We'll just have to wait and see. I can always share by stuff with him if he doesn't get any.

We hope everyone has a great week!

Love, Minnie : )