Merry Christmas!

My Auntie Jen (she's my bestie Koda's mom) posted a picture of us and her Christmas tree on Facebook. My mom copied it for me to use to send all my fans a Christmas wish for cozy times with family and lots of good food and long walks, and hooray that not many of the humans have to go to work.
My mom gave me a huge walk, even though it rained and rained. I got to sneak up on a bunch of wood ducks. I didn't even bark and they all rose as one and flew away from me onto Summer Lake where I couldn't get them.

Mom says I'm a dog, so this is what Christmas means to me. But, she says that for the humans it's a much bigger thing. See, the humans are made in God's image, but they messed up long ago. God sent Jesus so that He could bear the punishment for all that messing up (sins) that is so hurtful to God. So Christmas is for them to celebrate that their sins are forgiven when they believe that Jesus is their Savior, and they can be with Him forever when they die.

Us animals just get to enjoy the holiday. I'm glad so many humans are happy today.

Love,

Toko

Snow Day!

I woke up. I went out. Oh!

 Is it manna for puppies? I like it. It feels good on my sore teeth.

 Sniffin' is different.

 Mom likes this one because she says it shows off my ears.

 Mom says I'm in a nice free stack. She says Grandma Kim will know what that means.

 Snow on ma noze.

 So many tracks. All mine. Well, some are Mom's.

 Portrait of a fine young dog. (I let Mom write that.)

Other news:
Sunday was puppy romp. Here's me and Lily gettin' it on! She really knows how to play good. I love my sis. Mom says I had no trouble getting along this time. I don't think I remember having any trouble. Humans are funny about troubles.

Monday was Intermediate training with trainer Marj at Tualatin PetSmart. Kinda hard, compared to trainer Sara's beginner class. I have to learn to heel. Really heel. Well, it does pay pretty well in treats, so I guess I'll do it. There were new dogs. I liked trainer Sara's dog Liam best. He's big, like Marley at the beginner class.

Tonight I got to play with my neighbor Bones off lead! He finally got playful. Yay! Could have played all night but Mom and Bones' human, Mark, got cold. Well, yeah, all they did was stand around. . . .
Oh, and this afternoon I took a long walk with an older lady dog named Rose. She reminded me of a slow old sheep and I put a few herding moves on her.
Mom says I'm doing great with socialization. More human stuff. Whatever.

Happy Tails n Treats from

Toko

Toko is Four Months Old

I woke up. Mommy said I was four months old today.

 

I thought I would have a nice chew in my 'torpedo' position.

I went out.

I smelled some stuff,

And I ran around.

 Then I went to puppy class.  The other dog in the picture is my friend, Marley. He's big.

Trainer Sara gave out treats. I was polite.

Oh, and we stopped at the Banfield Pet scale. I weigh 20.8 pounds.

When we got home I played with my toys. This is Squeek. Squeek is a squeak toy.

This is my pink sock.

Mommy says I look like an otter.

Then everyone had a nap on the couch. Mommy, me and Annicat.

 Annie tried to wake me up.

And I woke up, a little.

But we all went back to sleep, even Mommy, so no more pictures.

Well, we did finally wake up and it was dark. Mommy played fetch with me and I watched some of Buddy the Elf and fell asleep again and Mommy put me in my crate for the night. 

Nice birthday. Isn't it cool that I get one once a month?

Happy tails everyone (I'm so glad I have one!) from Toko

Toko and Annicat! Together at Last!

A Tale of Ears

We don't know why there was such a drought of blog posts. Maybe Toko was embarrassed about his ears. On sunny Tuesday, November 6, here he is with puppy ears.

 At twelve weeks old on November 7 I woke up to find a puppy who looked like he was about to take off in search of the flying nun. I was very excited and thought those ears would be straight up within days.

But shucks, folks, her he is, two weeks later, on Thanksgiving Day, still with 'flying nun' ears.

The next day we went to Grandma Kim's. She put tape on my ears. Ugh. (Really, it wasn't that bad.)

But! It worked! After wearing that silly head-dress for just three days mommy ripped it all off of me (yeah, I yipped a lot, but it it came off fast!) and WOW! Real Corgi ears!

It's been a week and they are still up. (We thought they might melt or something).

Other Toko news:
Puppy training classes started -
Only there were no other puppies, so we went to big dog beginner training.
There is a wonderful older rescue lab/newfoundland mix named Marley who is a big teddy bear.
And there is a hyper Brittany Spaniel named Jett who is learning to be less hyper.

Puppy Romp -
We went to the first one of these on Sunday. Oodles of puppies, including sister Lily. Lily is quite the alpha pup. Toko ended up in a group for quiet pups while Lily ran around herding everything she could find with four legs. Next week Lily will be on a road trip with her parents and Toko can try puppy romp on his own. He really isn't a quiet puppy, but he was intimidated by his sister and all the riotous pups. The quiet pups just sniffed one another. Even that was good for Toko, since he didn't bark at any of them. It was a very peaceful puppy gathering, not much of a romp.

Toko, the Very Social Animal, Takes Over the Blog

Lunch at the office.                   How good am I?

This was Thursday, November 1. I have just turned 11 weeks old.

Friday, Nov 2, mom took me to see grandma Kim, back at the place where I was born. I got to see my sister Chickadee. We had so much fun playing. I wish I could have stayed all day. Mom's camera isn't any good at taking pictures of puppies playing. Mom says Grandma Kim gave me a shot, but I didn't notice.

Me and Chickadee having a fabulous romp. Yeah. It really is me and Chickadee. Remember what I said about mom's camera.

Saturday I got to spend a long time at Auntie Jen's with Auntie Amanda visiting with Calais who is a human girl age 2 & 1/2, and Sonja who is a human baby. And Koda!! Who is a dog! This visit he loosened up and played with me. We got to play and sleep and play and eat and sleep and go out and play and sleep . . . The humans watched football on the tv. Not much fun for us dogs. Live football was fun last week, but that's over now. No one took any pictures.

Sunday was very busy. Mom brought me into church between services. I met a ton of people and lots of great kids. Then we visited Martha and JR. They are neighbors. JR is 9. He played laser chase with me. I know, it's a cat game, but I thought it was fun. Then we went in the car again, and I had to stay in the crate until Auntie Jen said to mom, 'Bring your dog in!" It was a human party - a baby shower. Lots of lovely people, and crumbs to eat. And Koda was there. I got a really fun cardboard box to play with. I didn't get to eat much of it though. Mom saw to that.

Today was Monday. The sun came out, so mom did a foto shoot with me in the yard.

 I used to think this yard was pretty big, but it's shrinking. Or I am growing. Or something.

Here I am, just being me.

Mom says this is my pedestal. Whatever.

I like sitting on it.

Now I'm happy, sleeping on mom's feet, after eating a huge dinner. Amazing, isn't it, how I can sleep and write at the same time. Mom wishes she could do that.

Happy Tails,

Toko

Tell the Stories While They're Hot, (and While the Dog Sleeps)

Today he asked to go out!
He stood in front of the door and barked. A nice sedate woof.
First I thought the cat was coming up the stairs, as the head of the stairs down to the bedrooms where she likes to go is at the same place the door to outside is.
First I ignored the bark - or said something about the cat not being available just now, but then I saw him start his sniffing routine. Ooooh! I get it! (Brilliant dog!) and out we hustled.

Then, as we started this quiet time, (he is asleep on my feet) he decided I must be protected from birds. So he barked a time or two at the crows and bluejays that were flying around. Then he lay in front of the glass doors, carefully watching. Then he decided all was well and came over to my feet to sleep.

Oh, and on our 'pack walk' around the condo campus he insisted we stop at the mailboxes so I could get my mail. I didn't want to - I'm not all that interested in the mail, but I had been doing it just to put variety in the pack walk. Now he thinks it's a 'must do', and I dutifully opened the box, looked at the stupid mail, put it back in the box and got on with our walk.

What a dog!