At least the on and off misty rain wasn’t freezing. Today, back in Long Branch, it looks again like spring.
Tag Archives: Memphis and Ellie Mae
Memphis and Ellie Mae clean up real good
Here are the dog with Tuffy P. Thanks to Lorraine, who comes by with her grooming truck and does a fantastic job sprucing up the girls.
Tuffy P with Memphis and Ellie Mae
Flying Solo + messing around on the canjo
I’ve been flying solo this last week, as Tuffy P and her friend Suzanne have been in Baltimore and Washington having an adventure. Me and the dogs and cats have done OK on our own, but I miss Tuffy P and I’m glad she’ll be back this afternoon.
Today I ran some errands in the morning, then spent a couple hours grooming Ellie Mae and Memphis. I prefer grooming them in nicer weather so I can do it outside. You can’t imagine how much underfur I strip off Ellie and Memphis when I brush them down. I filled two plastic grocery store bags jammed with Newf hair. Memphis isn’t a fan of getting groomed. She behaves for it but when she sees the grooming tools come out, she fades into the background in the hopes that Ellie has to go first. Of course after grooming I have to sweep and then sweep again as bit of Newf fur floats around everywhere.
Still lots of time before I pick Tuffy up at the airport, so I sat down and played the oil can banjo for a while.
Let Sleeping Dogs Lie
The Girls
Huddle
Memphis and Ellie Mae make a little friend
Thinker
Playtime
In the parade
Tuffy P volunteered to help out with the Lakeshore parade this year, so the dogs and I walked up to Lakeshore to see her.
There’s Tuffy P in the red, holding up the Long Branch Animal Clinic banner. She called out to us to join the parade, so Ellie Mae, Memphis and I did just that.
South Etobicoke Creek
We were thinking of a day drawing and painting in the landscape today, but it was a littly chilly for that, so we settled on taking the dogs to the South Etobicoke Creek dog park. This off-leash area was closed for quite a long time and reopened in late summer. I understand the reason for the closure was so the city could run some storm sewers down through there. This is the first time we’ve been back since it reopened.
As a result of the work done in the park, the first section of it is not as interesting as it used to be, but beyond that, it remains a really nice naturalized gem in the city with opportunities for the dogs to check out some forest and the creek as well.
Perfect afternoon for a swim
We took the dogs out for a walk this afternoon over to the dog-swimming beach. Now this isn’t a beach designated by the City for dogs to swim or anything like that. It’s just an excellent beach for dogs to swim, and lots of the local dogs and humans have figured that out. Today it was busy because several people had decided to watch the Air Show from the dog beach. Families were bringing picnic lunches down and I saw one family coming down to the beach with an extra-large pizza box. Fortunately for everyone involved, Memphis and Ellie Mae didn’t see the pizza box. Pizza is their very favourite food. In that way I suppose Newfoundland dogs are a lot like humans.
Memphis likes to swim out after a red ball. She’ll go after a tennis ball or a stick but she really likes the rubber red balls. You know, the expensive kind. Memphis will fetch a red-ball from the lake over and over and over again. The trick is to figure out when she’s finally tuckered out one throw before she shows you by watching the expensive red ball being hurled in the lake and then lying down in the sand for a wee rest.
While Memphis likes to swim for quite a while, Ellie Mae prefers to go in for a dip then roll around on the sand enjoying the beach. Sometimes she’ll get up for a second dip. Once swimming is done, her goal is to have the maximum amount of sand stick to her fur for the walk back so she can deposit it on the floor at home later. In the picture above, you can just see the red ball that Memphis is chasing.
Dogs, Dogs, Dogs
By this evening, Ellie’s limp disappeared again. We took the girls out to a dog park for a little socializing. Tuffy P brought the camera.
Do Newfs Shed?
Today Lorraine our most fantastic groomer cleaned up Ellie Mae and Memphis. This involved stripping out loads of underfur, followed by a bath, conditioner and a blow-dry. Most of the hair that comes out when our girls shed is the underfur you see on the ground in these photos. We brush out what we can, but Lorraine gets most of the undercoat out.
