Happy Friday!

Happy Friday everyone! And a short work week too!
Mama and I have been watching a lot of TV these days
in High Def, which if you don't have, you should get!
We love the National Geographic channel, and we
absolutely love The Dog Whisperer, Cesar Millan!
He's a really talented and gifted dog psychologist
and he's got great tips on how to deal with behavioral
issues, like aggression (guilty!!).
Check out his blog that I've linked to.

Since tuning into The Dog Whisperer show,
both Kunou and I have been better behaved.
Mama's been working to make us more balanced.
We sometimes forget our lessons,
but I'm sure it will stick in time with more practice.

I think Kunou struggles a little harder than I do
during the lessons. He doesn't always listen...

unless there is a treat involved.

We are going for long walks around the neighbourhood
everyday in the afternoon with Mama. She likes it
when we are tired and sleepy at home.
I agree, a tired dog is a happy dog, calm and submissive!!

Super Storms!

I always thought the weather in Toronto was a bit crazy:
we used to live downtown and the lightening was so bright,
but the thunder that came after was
even louder than I can imagine!
Calgary has strange weather too.
One minute it will be hot and sunny,
the next minute it's dark and raining
with lightening bolts and thunder!
I'd say the weather in Calgary is a bit bipolar.
We're having a super storm, so the weatherman on the news says.
Mama was trying to capture the lightening on film,
but I don't think her timing was very good.
She did manage to catch a passing airplane though.

In the afternoons I get to play outside,
if it's not raining or hailing. I had never seen hail
before I came to Calgary. It hurts when it falls out of the sky!

Kunou will sit next to me, if and only if, he gets a cookie.
He's kind of sneaky too, when I eat my cookie,
(inevitably some will fall out of my mouth) Kunou is
on my crumbs like a fly on poo. Without fail, Kunou picks
up my leftovers. Seriously, if this is the only way he'll
be my friend, so be it.

Oatmeal and Peanut Butter Cookie Recipe

This is also for Auntie CET, my recipe for:

Oatmeal Peanut Butter Cookies
3 cups whole-wheat flour
½ cup uncooked rolled oats
2 tsp baking powder
1¾ cups lactose free milk, at room temperature
1 tbls molasses
1¼ cups chunky peanut butter

1. Preheat the oven to 375F. Lightly grease two cookie sheets with veggie shortening or line with parchment.
2. In a large bowl, using a fork or wire whisk, combine the flour, rolled oats, and baking powder.
3. In a medium bowl, using a wire whisk, beat 1¼ cup of milk, molasses, and peanut butter together until smooth.
4. Gradually blend the peanut butter mixture into the dry ingredients until the mixture pulls away from the sides of the bowl and forms a soft dough. If the mixture seems a little dry add the remaining milk one tbls at a time.
5.Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and roll out to ¼ inch think. Use 1½-inch cookie cutter to cut out as many cookies as you can. Rework the scraps as you go, the dough will become stiff as it is reworked.
6. Place the cookies on the baking sheets and bake on the middle rack for 20 to 25 minutes or until the cookies appear very dry and the edges are golden brown. Remove the cookies from the oven and allow to cool to room temperature. Turn the oven off.
7. Once the cookies have cooled to room temperature, put them all onto one baking sheet and return them to the cooling oven. Leave them undisturbed for 8 to 16 hours.

The original recipe from Mr. Gregg Gillespie called for creamy peanut butter, but I like chunky better. It also called for chicken broth but you all know my meat dilemma. So Mama substituted it with milk. Be careful if you want to use store bought veggie broth as it may contain onions (see the previous post).

So that's it! I hope Auntie CET and her friends who will be potential bulldog parents will enjoy these recipes. I would love to meet these potential bulldog parents, and I'm sure they'd have fun meeting me too! I'm always up for making new friends (people friends that is). Let's have a date!

Whole-wheat Parmesan & Carrot Cookie Recipe

This is for Auntie CET who wanted to know my recipe for:

Whole-wheat Parmesan & Carrot Dog Cookies
1½ cups whole-wheat flour

1½ cups unbleached all-purpose flour
½ cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 large carrot, trimmed, pared and finely grated
¼ tsp garlic powder
2 large eggs
½ cup lactose free skim or 1% milk, or sufficient for processing

1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Lightly grease (with veggie shortening) two cookie sheets, or parchment line.
2. In a large bowl combine flours, Parmesan, carrots and garlic powder
3. In a small bowl beat the eggs until foamy and then add the milk
4. Add the liquid mixture to the dry ingredients in portions, blending as you go, until the mixture pulls away from the sides of the bowl forming a soft dough. If the mixture seems a little dry add a little more milk, a tablespoon at a time.
5. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface, and roll out to ¼-inch thick. Using a 1½-inch round cookie cutter to cut as many cookies as you can. Rework the scraps as you go, the dough will become stiff as it's reworked.
6. Place the cookies on the prepared cookie sheets and bake on the middle rack for 20 t0 25 minutes or until the cookies appear very dry and the edges are golden brown. Remove the trays from the oven and cool to room temperature. Turn off the oven.
7. When the cookies are cool, put them all on a single cookie sheet and return them to the cooling oven. Leave them undisturbed for 8 to 16 hours.
8. Enjoy!!!

The original recipe comes from Mr. Gregg Gillespie who used ½ pound of cooked ground beef, 2 tbls of cheese, ½ tsp of garlic powder, and beef broth instead of milk. As you all know well, I can't have meat, so Mama put extra cheese in and replaced the broth with milk. Also I heard that dogs can't really have too much garlic, so Mama reduced the amount of garlic powder. You can use veggie broth, but watch out for the store bought ones because they tend to contain onions, and dogs are deathly allergic to onions. You can always make your own veggie broth too! Leaving the cooled cookies in the cooling oven will help extra moisture evaporate from the cookies and it makes them drier so that you don't have to keep them in an air-tight container. And drier cookies make for extra crunch that will help clean teeth too! But I still recommend storing the cookies in an air-tight container, it preserves the taste!

Cookies For Moi

I told you in my last blog post that Milkbone cookies
have meat in them. And meat = stones for me.
So this time around, I got some special treatment.
Mama made vegetarian cookies for me!

Are they done yet?
They smell so delectable...

Oooh fresh baked! I love this smell!
You can't see, but there's another tray of cookies
under the top one. I love quantity when it's quality!

There are two kinds of cookies:
The heart-shaped ones are whole wheat, carrot and parmesan,
and the circle ones are oatmeal and peanut butter.
I asked Mama to make little cookies to give to
Remington across the hall. Who says I can't be nice?

This cookie doesn't know it yet,
but I'm going to devour it after I
help it escape from Mama's fingers.

I'm Still Here!

My apologies for not blogging more often,
truthfully speaking, I am lazy.

So I went to have an ultrasound done last week
just to see where my bladder's at these days
with the stones and all. And you know what?
They're still there.

And it turns out that I may
be deficient in L-carnitine because of my
mainly vegetarian diet. Did you know that
Milkbone cookies contain meat? Meat is a no-no in my diet.
Meat has purines = stones in my bladder.

It sure isn't easy trying to get my paws on L-carnitine,
with it being a controlled substance in Canada.
Did you know you can buy off the shelf in the States?
Can't do that here! So if you're going to the States,
you know what you can bring back for me right?
No, seriously, hook me up!

Here are 5 other things that you probably don't know about me:

1. I like to put my head on your lap if you're sitting at a desk working, you'll think I'm cuter

2. I love shredding paper to bits!

3. If you let me, I would love to share your pillow, but I do steal the blankets

4. I'm very good at giving high-fives, only if there is food involved

5. I like humping girls, it's not so much a sexy thing, more of a dominance thing

Yay!

Sorry I haven't posted in such a long time,
I've been busy hiding under my blanket.
Gramma and Uncle Al are coming to visit me!
Well they probably aren't coming just to see me,
but I'm excited to see them.
Mama's been baking cookies these day,
nothing that I can eat, but maybe you'll be getting
a cookie gift from us for Christmas?
You should hope so, Mama's cookies are yum!
I'm asking Santa for a new bladder for Christmas,
what do you want in your stocking this year?

Avalanche Saturday

Papa opened up the front closet door and everything inside spilled out.

Looks like that shelf wasn't up to snuff.

What a mess. I'm glad I don't have to clean it up!

But look what I found in this disaster, a cookie!!
Must be my lucky day! I should buy me a lottery ticket!

Happy April Fool's Day!

This morning I woke Mama up really early for April Fool's Day! I licked her toes which were peaking out from under the blankets and kept snorting for 5 minutes until she finally got up (Mama sure is lazy sometimes!). It was really funny because Mama loves to sleep in when she can! But it wasn't all a joke, because I really had to go potty.

Mama got back at me with her own April Fool's Joke. She gave me a cookie and left me the cookie box. I tried to get the rest of the cookies out, but the box was empty! It seems more like revenge than a joke to me. But I'll stop pouting since I got a cookie anyway.