You are two today!

Today we drove to Pleasenton and attended a swissy meetup sponsored by the Golden Gate GSMD Club. It was fun! Zen was subdued but she seemed to enjoy being there.

Here’s some photos from the day:

Our suburu was on it’s last legs so we bought a new car. Because we got such a great deal, we decided to upgrade and get a bigger suv; The 2013 Kia Sorento GDI LX with the 3rd row option. Its awesome! Better gas mileage than our 2000 outback and more room to boot!

But it came with one complication which was a higher off-the-ground back end. Not a good combination for a 100 pound dog as it ages. So to save Zen’s knees and hips, we are buying a fold up ramp to carry around in the car, and using a staircase at home. Of course, we actually have to TRAIN her to go up and down a stairs and/or ramp. Thank goodness for tri-tip!!!

I can’t believe a whole year has gone by since our puppy was born. She is now officially a teenager… and a really really great one at that. I’ve been really absent the last 5 months in terms of doing actual posts with content. Mostly i’ve been posting pictures and saving the updates for friends. But I can’t tell you how much we have learned about training and dog ownership during this time. I want to save this discussion for a later post because I find the subject of dog training really fascinating and also controversial. One thing is for sure: what works for one doesn’t always work for another but you can put money down that everyone and their brother has an opinion about how to do it! I also want to talk more about the controversy about pure-bred dogs vs mixed dogs.. as it’s really been a hot topic in the media lately.

But for now, I will post photos of her birthday party. It was a small family affair. I baked a dog cake for it; it’s a peanut butter carrot cake with yogurt frosting. I got the recipe from HERE. The kids really got into her party and could stop talking about it for days beforehand. They had fun wrapping kibble up as presents, and Papa and I got her a fresh bone from the butcher.

She also got another present.. one that is not so nice. The vet called and let us know that some tests came back and she has Giardiasis. But between the probiatic and the wormer we I picked up today.. we are all set.

I made a peanut butter carrot cake with yogurt frosting. And natural milk bones for decoration.

Maiwenn was really excited to make Zen a party hat.

It didn't stand up by itself, so Maiwenn had to hold it up. Zen was a really good sport about the whole thing.

We had to help her blow out the candle.

we weren't sure how the human food would be in her tummy, so we played it safe.

Not too sweet. I used honey for the cake and the frosting was just plain yogurt.

These were the presents. The wrapped ones were from the kids and had kibble. The fresh meat bone from the butcher was from Papa and I.

Zen REALLY wanted that bone.

She waited for the release command before attacking it.

She's such a good girl. We are so lucky to have her.

Big Dog near Big Trees.

In a little over a week, Zen will be one. I can’t believe it’s already been a year. We’ve come so far..

She’s had the runs for the past day.. Here’s probably why.

I haven’t been very good at updating the blog lately. Chalk it up to the loss of my mom and then a very busy schedule with work. But Zen has been steadily growing into the big girl she will eventually become. In a couple of weeks she’ll be 8 months old. We haven’t weighed her in awhile but my guess is that it is somewhere between 55-60 pounds. At the shoulder she stands 24 inches. Height standard for girl dogs is 23.5-27 inches so she is right on target. She’s skinny as she should be at this age, and very leggy.. but I definitely see more substance of bone starting to develop which is kind of neat. Maybe people will stop asking me if she’s a Great Dane mix now…

She graduated her second puppy class a couple of weeks ago but came down with kennel cough the same week so we weren’t actually able to go to graduation. Since then, we’ve been slacking in terms of her training and the Swissy willfulness has definitely raised it’s head because of it. She doesn’t always listen very well, and sometimes is downright rude in how she defies us. (I’ll do a more in depth post about her training later.) But mostly, she’s just a sweet cuddle bunny who is quite happy to sleep most of the day as long as she’s near you.

We’ve been hiking in our back woods alot. I made this little video this week just to show how big she’s getting.

Mainly we are getting ready for Christmas. We decided to put the tree in the back room this year… just so Zen isn’t tempted to eat the ornaments. So far she’s doing ok with it. Santa is even bringing her a present for her stocking. She’s getting a BIG GIRL collar…

At 5 months, zen weighs 48.6 pounds. I need to measure her height but she’s leggy, long backed, and slightly ribby. Overall, she’s doing great! Adolescence has hit and her hearing has gotten selective. She doesn’t always do what we say… and sometimes she gets fearful about new things. But we have been keeping her active and really working on her dog shyness. She made a break thru last weekend and actually started playing with other dogs at her puppy social.

And people? She LOVES everybody.

Zen is 15 weeks old and we have been diligently going to puppy class and socializing her as much as we can. The restrictions have been tough. It’s a huge balancing act to get her out and public with the risks so high in this area for Parvo. But we’ve been doing much more than our vet would like.. and at the same time trying to avoid obvious places where unvaccinated dogs may defecate. If we listened to our Vet, she wouldn’t have even gone to Puppy school until 17 weeks.. which is waaay out of the realm recommended for Swissy puppies.

In Puppy School, Zen has been a lurker. Not cowering by any stretch of the imagination.. but not exactly getting involved either. She seemed much more interested in the people than the other dogs. So i bumped up her dog time by taking her to a puppy social once a week. Its far for me on a Sunday, (all the way in Sunnyvale) but it’s been good for her. I met another Swissy owner there, and she’s been exposed to all kinds of dogs of all shapes and sizes.

Still, she’s hung back and just watched all the fun. So last week, we found out one of the women who attends our class lives “relatively” near us. She owns a 14 week old Viszla pup named Zola. If Zen is the wallflower.. Zola is the popular kid in class. We’ve met up twice this week, and these one on ones have been awesome. Both times, she and Zen just played and rough housed like no tomorrow.

Today we took Zen to Roaring Camp Railroads. It was tricky because as a public place we still can’t walk her around with the fear of Parvo looming. But we brought a couple of car blankets and stretched them out and then carried her to the spot. It worked out well because it was a hot day, a shady spot and there were tons of trains and people to see.

It was a really hot day. So really, she didn’t want to do much except lounge, meet people and watch the trains.

Swissies don’t like the heat and Zen is no exception. But she did like the ice in my snow cone. You can just hear her thinking in this one.. “You must give me the ice.. you must give me the ice..”

Ok. Its too hot. Can we go home?

Back at home, she and the kid are doing a little bonding.