Life with Ferdinand and Roxy

A few days after we got Roxy we knew that it was the right choice.  Ferd and her get along so well and they are basically inseparable...these pictures prove it.

If you can't see it, Ferdinand decided he was going to sit on Roxy while she slept. 

They play tug-of-war.

Ferd loves chasing his toys...

And he taught Roxy how to get in on the fun.  Ferd normally wins the toy back though.

With all their play time, Doakes decided she was gonna hide out in the sun room, behind Roxy's crate.

They wrestle hard.

We had set up two separate areas for them to eat, but they love to share their food.

They love to share the dog bed to chew on toys.

When Roxy needs a nap, Ferd makes sure that she is comfy first.

Then he joins her.  They love sharing the bed to sleep together.  Ferdinand is such a great big brother.

Not too long after we got Roxy, Ferdinand got pretty sick.  He normally sleeps though the night, and on one particular night, Derek woke up to him crying and all he could smell was poop.  He woke me up and when we went to check on him, he was covered in poop.  There was poop everywhere.  It was high on the walls and all over the bathroom.  You could tell that it wasn't just him pooping; he had no control.  Poor guy was really hot feeling and just exhausted.  It was 4:30 in the morning and we had to bath him immediately.  After his bath, he wanted to do nothing but sleep.

Ferdinand passed out on Derek

Ferdinand was not feeling well, so Derek wrapped him up.

While I was working from home, I kept an eye on Ferdinand, he looked so pathetic, but was so happy that I immediately washed Mr. Frog for him.

We weren't sure what made Ferdinand sick, but we assumed that it was either Roxy's dog treat that the foster mom had given us or the fact that we had dog food that had been recalled.  We figured that it was more likely that it was the dog food.  Luckily, we had only served them one helping from the recalled bag and after a few hours Ferdinand was feeling better.  

Towards the end of the day, Ferd and Roxy enjoyed sleeping in the sun.

After a few days I took Ferd and Roxy out they saw our neighbor Matt and went running over to his house.  Ferd looks for Matt every single day.  Matt loves to play with Ferd and Ferd enjoys it immensely.  

Matt was working on filling and fixing his rock wall in his driveway.  Ferdinand decided that he was going to help Matt.

For every brick that Matt put down on the ground, Ferd had to make sure that he had done it correctly.

Ferd checked each brick to make sure it smelled and tasted right.  Anything to help his buddy, Matt.

During their work, every time Matt would grab the shovel, Ferdinand would lose it.  He didn't know what it was about.

He hardly ever barks, but when it came to the shovel, he was a barking fool.

At the end of the day, Ferd walked up to the shed with Matt to put the broom and shovel away.  Matt is Ferds best friend for sure.

After helping Matt out, Ferdinand was covered in mud.  He was an absolute mess.  Roxy needed a bath anyways, so we had tub time.  Thankfully, all of our animals love the bath tub.

Ferd looks like he has lost a ton of weight in this picture, but don't be fooled, he hasn't.  They love being in the tub.

After their bath, I was cleaning up and I walked into the living room to find this.

3 sleepy heads.  

Later that evening, while we were playing, I noticed Ferd had another loose tooth.  This one did not want to come out and I got a little worried because it was discolored.  

Luckily, after a few days, it came out and he seems to already be growing his new tooth.

After having Roxy for a while, we noticed that she couldn't quite jump on the couch and we knew Ferd never would be able to.  While visiting my Grandma, I told her we were going to have to get steps for them, and since Honeybear doesn't use hers, she gave us them.  Ferd and Roxy love them!

Ferd goes up and down like he's had the steps since day one.

He loves watching things from above.

Just like with Ferd, we try to get Roxy used to the car.  When it rains, and if I'm home on time, we will drive down to the end of the street and pick Derek up from the bus stop so he doesn't have to walk in the rain.

They love the car....and they make Derek sit in the back seat.

For treats, we still like to give the dogs the Moo Shoes.  Roxy loves hers so much.

So much, that even in her sleep she doesn't want to let it go.

We took Roxy to the vet to get her check up.  She weighed in at 16 pounds 10 ounces.  The vet said she will be huge.  To my surprise, the vet said that she would guess that Roxy was mixed with Doberman, not Rottweiler.  I was stunned.  But after looking up Coonhound/Doberman mixes, there were pictures that looked exactly liked Roxy.  So, that's what we are going with.

Now, having two dogs is great.  And although Roxy's potty training isn't going as smoothly as we would like, it's going.  But two dogs means twice as much poop.  Needless to say, we have completely run out of the grocery store bags that we use to pick up the poop with.  We also found that we couldn't go more than 2 days without cleaning the yard.  After a dog magazine got sent to us, we found a doggie septic tank system.  We decided that we would give it a shot.

This is the box.

Basically, the system is 20 x 23 and you dig a hole in the ground and the poop goes into the system.  After adding enzymes once a week or two the poop decomposes and is absorbed into the ground.  No more bags...no more mounds of poop in the yard.  

We got the one that is fit for 2 large dogs or 4 small dogs.  We didn't want to chance it smelling and with Roxy going to be a big dog, and Ferd who is a large, but short, dog, we got the bigger one.  

This is the system that will go into the ground.  

We have yet to dig the hole because we haven't picked a good place out yet.  We didn't want to keep it close to the house in case it smelled, and we didn't want to keep it at the far side of the yard because who wants to walk that far with poop. I think Derek and I have figured out a good spot, now it's just the digging that needs done.  

Once we get it in and start using it, we will post how it works on here.  

Ferdinand is a Big Brother!

A few weeks back, Derek and I had gone to Petsmart to get Ferdinand a collar.  While I was picking one out, he went searching for a new toy for Ferd.  Instead, he found a bunch of puppies that Pet Search was fostering and trying to adopt out.  There were about 10 puppies....only a few were black and tan (like a Rottweiler), the rest were all Red.  They told us that they thought they were Coonhound mixes....possibly a Rottweiler mix.  Derek and I had said that if we ever got another dog, it would be a girl.  

Well, we picked one dog up, and it just happened to be a Rottweiler colored female.  We were sold.

Here are the pictures from when we first met our little girl, who we named Roxy.

She was awake for about 30 seconds after I picked her up.

She was out cold

I'm not sure how this was comfortable, but she slept like this for a while.  Gotta love that tongue!

For the last two weeks, Derek and I have gone back and forth on whether or not we were ready for another dog.  We just got Ferdinand set on his routine and we weren't sure we were ready for it.  But every time we thought of how much fun they would have together, we just decided that it was the right thing.

We got a phone call on Friday saying that Roxy had gotten spayed on Thursday and was doing well.  They said we could pick her up on Sunday.  

This morning, we got the house cleaned up and took Ferdinand with us to get Roxy.

Ferdinand was already exhausted, and this is the only way that he would ride in the car today.  He just wanted to be with his daddy.

It was so warm out when we got to Petsmart, all Ferdinand wanted to do was hang out under the big tent that they had the puppies in.  While Derek got the information explained to him, they gave Roxy a set of shots and handed her over.  Derek took Roxy into Petsmart to get some things for her.  While I trailed behind with Ferdinand, we could hardly make it into the store.  Everyone loved Ferdinand.  They all stopped us to pet him and talk about how adorable he is.  

It was funny.  We finally made it in to the store where Derek was signing us up for Puppy Training Classes.  

Here is a few pictures of Roxy and Derek in Petsmart.

Ferdinand was helping Roxy pick out a collar.

Roxy was a little worried that the collar wouldn't match her eyes.  It does!

So, we finally got to the car and Ferdinand was a little hot and jealous.  This is how the car ride ended up.

Ferdinand just wanted to be cool by the AC and Roxy just wanted to sleep with her doggy.

Roxy slept hard in my arms.

We got home and I decided we were going to give her a bath.  She was covered in poop and pee from being with all her brothers and sisters.  We washed her 3 times before we got all of it out of her fur.  It was disgusting.  She was great in the tub though.

Ferdinand and Roxy have gotten along wonderfully so far.  All he wants to do is sit on her and all she wants to do is check the house out.  

We set their food up in the sun room and they both did great eating together.  Although they both didn't want their own food, they wanted to eat out of each other's bowls.

Ferd loved Roxy's bowls.

Roxy loved Ferd's bowls.

She is definitely a lover.

 She already loves her daddy.

Roxy has had a blast outside.  She runs around like a crazy person.  Ferdinand loves chasing after her and they have fun playing together.

Ferdinand and Roxy wrestling around.

Roxy just checking the yard out.

Roxy loves being home with us.

Roxy and Ferd were having fun sniffing each other out.

Here is a video of the two of them playing.

They love playing, but they always want to play right under me.

They told us that when we got Roxy that they had been crate training her.  Since they had told us that, my friend Cori asked if we had wanted her old crate.  We accepted it and Roxy really appreciates it!

She had no issues going right into the crate.

But she just wanted to sleep with Mommy.

So, far, I have two very sleepy puppies.  And I can only hope that they will continue to get along very well.  

I'll keep everyone updated!

Oh, and tomorrow is Ferdinand's 5 month birthday!  It's hard to believe he is that big already!

Ferdinand Visits Morgan and Gets a Visit From the Tooth Fairy!

I took Ferdinand to go meet the Henderson's.  No, not Harry and the Henderson's...but my friend, Stephanie, Matt and Morgan Henderson.  They had been wanting to meet Ferdinand for a while and we just never got around to it.  Anyways, when I got there, Morgan was excited to see Ferdinand, but didn't want him to come up to her.  It was cute.  She jumped right up in my arms and giggled the entire time.  

Ferdinand found more fun, trying to get to Conan, or as Morgan call him, Coco, their cat.

Conan acted like he wanted to play with Ferd.  I'm not sure what he would have done if Ferd got in the house.

Just as it was getting close to when we were going to leave, that's when Morgan decided she wanted to get down and play with Ferdinand...but only after I would hold her upside down and let Ferdinand eat her hair.  

Morgan was trying to get Ferd to eat her hair on the ground.

Once I leashed up Ferdinand, Morgan decided she was going to walk him around her little table.

Morgan was so excited to walk him.

She even took a minute out to pose with him.  What a cutie!

So, that night while Derek and I were playing with Ferdinand at home, I noticed there was blood on the toy.  I looked at his mouth and this is what I saw.

Ferdinand had 4 baby teeth disappear.  

And within the one day, he's already got 2 of the teeth coming back in.  They are pretty big and his bottom ones are starting to stick out when he smiles.  It's too funny.

Speaking of funny pictures, when I was working from home, Doakes decided she was going to hang out with me.  I looked up and this is what I saw.

She was perfectly posed with the letter "D" that Derek had put in there.  Too funny.

P.S.  We will be having some big news in the next few days, so keep an eye out for that.

Ferdinand Attends the McCarthy Bash 4

So, every year my friend Stephanie and her husband Kerry have a get together that they call "The McCarthy Bash."  This year, Derek and I decided that we were going to go and bring Ferdinand along.  They live in Virginia and this would be Ferdinand's longest trip in the car.

Before we left for Virginia, we got a nice gift in the mail from a super nice guy from Australia, Timothie Fielder.  We got hand towels, oven mitts, an apron, hats, flags, a small handbag, a dog toy and more!  All of it, minus the dog toy, were Australian themed, since that's where he's from.  So we wanted to say thanks so much!  Here are some pictures from that.

Derek and I modeling the hats.

Ferdinand wanted to wear the hat too...sort of!

But he enjoyed his toy better than the hat.

If you like my blog about Ferdinand, Timothie just started one about his Rottweiler, Thunder.  Check his site out!

Thunder's Blog

Here are a few random pictures that we took throughout the week.

Sometimes we snuggle on his bed.

Ferdinand stands true to his name

He loves the flowers, especially the ones off the Dogwood tree

If I lay on the floor, this is what happens.

We were doing laundry in the living room and Ferd kept messing with the hamper.  This is the result.



Anyways, before we left, Derek had to mow the grass.  Of course, Ferdinand decided he needed to go out right after Derek had mowed the grass.  Here is the result.

His nice white paws turned a lovely green!

Since he was already messy from the grass, we figured that we would give him his favorite treat.  The carrot!

He's saying, "Mom, cut that carrot up faster and quit taking pictures of me."

He was going to town.

He had to lick every piece off his face!

Also, while Derek and I were getting Ferdinand his food at the Tractor Supply Plus, we ran across the Frontier Brand Moo Shoes Dog Chew Toy.  Basically, they are cow hooves.  We got them for $5 each.  Ferdinand LOVES them!  He will sit for hours chewing on them.  

This is what they look like before Ferd gets a hold of them.

Ferd likes to bring it over to me so I can hold it while he chews on it.

After a very long week, we were ready to get on the road and head to Virginia.  Previously, Ferdinand had been a little crazy in the car.  We decided that before we would do a long trip we needed something that could keep him in the back and keep my car safe.  This forced me to finally clean my car, which was good, and we purchased the Top Paw Travel Hammock from Petsmart.

This is the picture from the Petsmart website to show what it's supposed to look like in your car.

This is how Ferd's set up ended.  We, of course, brought Mr. Frog and his new bed.  

He did pretty well in the back seat.  He slept almost the entire trip, except when we were going up and down the mountains.  I'm pretty sure his ears were popping like mine were.

He's way to comfy laying like this with me.

This is how he spent the majority of the trip.  Just relaxing and watching us from in between the front seats.

When we finally got to Steph and Kerry's on Friday night, Ferdinand and Stout picked up right where they had left off at Easter.  They played for about 3 hours that night.  It was great. 

When we went up to bed, we left him in the room with us.  This is the first time that we had not penned Ferdinand up.  Minus the fact that he cried for a bit because he wanted to play with Stout, he did AWESOME!  He didn't have any accidents and he didn't chew on anything.  It was really great.

Ferdinand woke us up pretty early because he wanted to play with Stout.  He and Stout played just about all day.  At one point, we had to make them take naps, like little kids.  Neither Ferdinand or Stout were happy about that.

All he wanted to do was share his bed with Stout.

Just like how they shared Stout's water.

If they could have stayed like this, we would have let them nap together, but that was just too much fun for them.

Steph was able to snap a great picture of Ferdinand.  Probably while he was waiting for Stout to come back and play with him more.

That face is saying, "Can Stout come out and play?"

While we were at Steph and Kerry's Ferdinand got to meet Casey, Stout's neighbor.  Here are some pictures of the three of them playing.

Ferd checking Casey out.

The three of them wrestling.

Stout was jealous that Ferdinand and Casey were off on their own.

Once they got back inside, Ferdinand was beat.

Stout really wanted Ferd to get up.

Stout and Ferdinand were always good to invite people passing by to come to the party.

This is a great picture.  But what's even better is Stephanie's reflection!

Here are some pictures of our non-furry friends.

Of course, Derek & I

Kerry & I

Steph & I

Typical Steph & I

So, during this whole weekend thing, Ferdinand was doing a lot of air humping. So, of course, the story came up where I let everyone know that Ferdinand has been getting a lot of "red rockets."  In case you don't know what that is, it's a boner.  haha  Anyways, since I made a fuss about it, when the guys went out to buy beer, they bought me a special beer.  This was my reaction.

That's right.  Red Rocket beer.  Thanks a lot, guys.

So, of course, we had to drink it.  It was by far, the worst tasting beer I've ever had in my entire life.  I'm not a big fan of Red Ale, but I will drink it.  I had the luxury of taking the first sip.  After my face looked very similar to the one in this picture, only with less color on my face, I passed it off.  It took about 4 times of passing it around 5 adults to get rid of it.  And with each sip it became so much worse, that I had tears watering up and almost vomited.

Here is the site for the Red Rocket in case anyone wants to give it a whirl.

Red Rocket Beer

After that traumatizing event, we enjoyed the Mardi Gras themed, McCarthy Bash 4.  There was delicious food and an awesome 3 bottle, homemade, Sangria bong.

We did it in the colors of Mardi Gras.  Purple, gold and green.

Every time that Derek and I travel, if we happen to be near family, we always try to make plans to stop in and see them.  We had told my Aunt Wini and Uncle Chris we would be around that weekend, and since my Dad and Uncle Mitch were down for a fishing trip, we thought it would be fun to see them all.

So, we packed up the car on Saturday and drove about 35 minutes to Maryland.  That's were Ferdinand got to meet Cody.

My Aunt and Uncle had a beautiful Rotty mix that passed, named Callie.  This was the first time that we got to meet their new dog, Cody.  She was very sweet and very gentle.  She just wasn't a fan of Ferdinand....at first.

Hunter, my cousin, however, got along wonderfully with him.

The flash made Ferdinand close his eyes, which is exactly like Derek.  ahaha

In the morning, as we were packing up to leave, Elizabeth or EB, as we've always called her, came home from a sleepover.  It was great that she got to see Ferd.

As we were getting ready to leave, that's when Cody finally started to play with Ferdinand.  Figures.

Normally, Cody would avoid Ferdinand.

I think this is just like out of "Romeo and Juliet."

"Romeo, oh, Romeo.  Wherefore art thou, Romeo?"

They are making googly eyes

Ferd loves the sun

This is their first kiss!

Once we got the car packed up, we figured we just let the dogs run.  Basically, we wanted to wear Ferdinand out.  Cody was so fast and so insane when she was out there, she scared the crap out of Ferdinand.  So badly, in fact, he bolted and hid under Wini's van.  It was hysterical.

You may not be able to see him from here, but he is hiding right under the bumper of Wini's van.

Finally, he comes out!

After getting Ferd to come out, we hit the road.  At the end of Chris and Wini's driveway, we ran into someone with a bulldog, her name was Grace.  She was a beautiful and big dog.  Ferdinand loves meeting other bullies.

We got on our way and at one point, Ferdinand wanted me to hold him.  Here was a video of him sleeping.

Or maybe he was sounding like a goose.  Or crying.  Who knows.

Ferdinand loves being in the car so much, he gave me some love.

That's my boy.


All in all, we had a great weekend.  Ferdinand had a blast and so did we.