Some day it will be warm again, I have faith!

So, how are we spending our winter?

oh y'know... desperately waiting for decent weather to return. Desperately. Look at this desperate face...


Soaking any bits of light that come through the window.


To the point where it gets a little pathetic. Irresistably cute. But pathetic.


Plotting to steal the cat food for sport. Props for devouring it all and not getting caught. Hmm...


These feet, they need to run... But they dont want to touch anything too cold.


sigh.

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By the way, if anyone is curious, Anton is feeling much better! His nail is even starting to grow back. All is on its way back to normal.

Happy holidays, folks

I'm a little late and my blog has been a little dusty lately, but I just wanted to say that I hope everyone is having a good bunch of holidays this season :)

Happy birthday boys!

Once again, I must apologize for my month-long absence. It has been a rather difficult month for me, with a lot of things going on. Also its been unforgivingly cold outside! I never liked November anyway.

But there is one excellent thing happening in November - Marco and Perry celebrate their second birthday on November 25th! Can you believe it? The skinny boys are two :)



And you know what that means - we need a flood of baby pictures!







They've changed so much. I wish i had a chance to meet them when they were all small and squishy. I met the boys for the first time when they were just a hair younger than six months old and they were almost full grown already. BTW if you want to know who's who in the baby pictures - Perry is the only red puppy and Marco is the only black and white baby with no blaze on his face. He just has a white nose tip, while his other two black and white siblings had a full white stripe.

Just for kicks, here's what the boys looked like when i brought them home! Here they are at the breeder's house at 6 months old...



And here are my stunning gentlemen now...


Happy birthday skinny boys!

I can hardly believe how pretty they are

Well I've had a rather difficult two weeks. I had a physics test, followed by two anthropology papers and a microbiology test. I haven't done any new painting. In fact I haven't really accomplished much of anything except some studying.

Except some photography! On Sunday, it was a lovely lovey day and we took the boys to Riis park. Its off season and the park was nearly empty, so we let them have the whole field to themselves to stretch those skinny legs. I convinced my stepdad to bring his falcy SLR camera - its a Nikon D70 - and he let me play with it. I got a couple of pictures that are absolutely phenomenal. Makes me want to borrow that camera a bit more permanently...

Goodbye Piggies

According to my statistics, the most common search words that bring people to my blog involve some kind of variation of "cup" and "dog". I guess my title is a little misleading - we don't talk tea very often. And the only cups involved are my own. And I never realized how much people liked cups with dogs on them.

Well today we had a cup-related tradegy! My favorite pink piggie mug is unfortunately no longer with us. As I was carrying my mug to the kitchen hoping to refill it with some Lady Grey, Perry was rambunctiously hopping around the bed. And he ran right up to me and smacked the mug out of my hands. Alas the handle came right off and the mug cracked. Oh and whatever bit of tea I had in there spilled too.

Perry took it very hard. In fact after I was done cleaning up the spill, I had to convince him that I still love him.

Meanwhile Marco was like "I am sooooooo not involved in any of this! Not my fault this time, can't blame me!"

So until I find something equally as adorable as the piggie mug, I guess I'll settle on the blue doggie mug. I must say I'm not crazy about it. Those pink piggies made tea taste better.

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My boss gave me permission to set up a shell display at the grooming shop. Rather than donating one of my current shells to the display, I figured I'd make one especially for it. So I painted the Saturday dog staff - Jovani the poodle and Perry and Marco. During the week different employees bring different dogs, but these guys are there on the weekend. Plus I figure it would be pretty cool for people to see the shell and then to turn around and to see Jovani and the IGs right in front of them. Its also a self-advertisement for the custom portraits :P


Its not really "finalized" right now. I want to add more detail to their faces. I'm not super thrilled with how it came out, but it was really a quick portrait.

Here's a vague reference photo of the three of them together. This was a few months ago, so Jovani looks more mature (and he was a little overgrown in this photo, and usually sports neater hair).

Happy G-day, skinny!

Dogs, Art and a cup of tea has been invited to join the DogTime Blog Network. I'm flattered and excited at the same time. i now have a DogTime badge to display!




In other news, I still haven't gotten around to any painting yet. Man, shame on me. But I'm gonna try tonight. I've got a few really spiff shells penciled out and i can't wait to bring them to life.

It also seems like I'll be reformatting my computer very soon because it is just not working properly anymore. I'm trying to find a way to back up 7 gigs of pictures and stuff. I'm thinking I better back it all up fast before there's that final crash where everything dies. Always have a backup plan folks! I've got a year and a half of pictures of my dogs and several years of my cats and fish... and a few other "memory worthy" occasions. I'd be crushed if they were to disappear. So lets make sure it doesn't happen!

and lastly, September 15th was Marco's gotcha day! Everyone congratulate him, the crazy boy has been with me for a year! He is incredibly different from his shy, gentle littermate Perry. Marc wiggles his whole body when he's happy, jumps in your lap whether you want it or not, thinks its funny to piss off the cats, and makes sure to lick every piece of kibble in his bowl before actually eating any. I've never met another dog with so much personality. Happy (belated) gotcha day, skinny boy!

Cool green

I've got progress on my remodeled room! Again, its mostly why i haven't been posting lately. I've been without a room for over three weeks during the remodel. Hard to find a muse when I'm stuck in the kitchen with my parents walking back and forth. But now the remodel is pretty much complete, only left to obtain the rest of the furniture and to "move back in" :)

That's what I've got so far - polished wood floors, lovely green paint, a new bed, a chair, and a computer desk that isn't in the shot. BTW see if you can find Anton in the picture ;) The blanket is going to change, too, this is my old faithful grey-green comforter. The wall colour is not exactly what i was going for (I was thinking something of a richer shade of green) but I like it a lot and in the afternoon this room practically lights up from all the sun I get. The only drawback is that in incandescent light the paint looks more of a cucumber shade rather than citrusy. But anyway I'm thrilled.

Now i need to move the fishtank back in, get a book case, and I'm thinking of getting a flat TV sort of thing. I was gonna move my old clunky tv back rather than upgrade, since i rarely watch it. But honestly i looooooove how much free space i have right now, so i am thinking of spending a bit more and getting an LCD tv after all, and mounting it on the wall. Decisions!
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I turned 21 on July 22nd. You know you're getting old when you start getting sophisticated gifts! ;)

My boyfreind got me this lovely wishbone necklace from EmilyEJewelry, in white gold. He was a good boy and picked something out of my favorites like I told him to, lol. I LOVE it though :) Its really simple and fancy at the same time. I haven't taken it off since he gave it to me, except to take that picture.
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This wasn't a birthday gift, but it coincidentally arrived almost in time for my birthday :P Its a custom pin of Perry and Marco! My friend Emily from Dreameyce Studio made it herself. I absolutely love it! She captured a great quirky look. Its just not like anything else that I've seen, very different. Made with skill and great detail :) Thank you Emily - its marvelous!
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One last thing...

Is this not the most magnificent face?

Taste test and a golden smile

1June 9 200
Originally uploaded by Emily / DreamEyce

Here is Traum and Galaxy with their shell portrait! Traum loved it right away ;) Then he was a little disappointed when he was told it wasn't food...

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I managed to get yet another shell up and ready!


And I must say... I'm very happy with this one. Golden Retrievers have such charming smiles, don't they? I'm the first to say that "a golden is not my sort of dog" - when when you see them smile, you can see why people just can't resist them!
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And just for fun, here's some Marco and Perry bliss because its been a while since we last saw them!




We've been having a heatwave, so the beach has been a lifesaver, both for a breeze and coller temperatures and unlimited zoomies :)

Off to Trenton

We're off to our third show tomorrow, wish us luck!



There are gonna be 16 Italian Greyhounds to compete with!

In other news I have started to get back to painting a bit. I've got two shells done... and i want to do touch ups on them. Will have new ones posted soon, expect some terriers!

Adoption successful + feature

First of all, I reached the milestone i mentioned. I passed 100 hearts and now have 102 at the moment. How cool. It makes me feel good when people think my stuff is awesome :P

Second, my Scottie Shell got featured!



It was mentioned in Scottish Terrier and Dog News - a blog so spiffy I added a link to it on "other awesome blogs". Thank you, DogLady (ab.com)

Not only did the Scottie shell get featured, but it got adopted! It'll be going to its new home soon, with Dayna! I'm hoping to see a picture of the Scottie shell in his news digs soon too (hint hint ;).

Since we're talking about features and stuff, I thought I'd add another cool one that i stumbled upon...



Dog Art Today - a blog dedicated to beautiful dog art. It's updated daily and features a whole gamut of dog-inspired creations. Great stuff!

As a bonus, here's picture of Anton and Marco sunning themselves.