April at last!!

golly everybody, it's been awhile since I've seen you all! I've been 'grounded' for a while. That is Mom's term. Mine is 'political prisoner'. We are having a difference of opinion on when playtime is. I don't see a problem with going out in the middle of the night to play, but Mom does. I guess so does Dad, he said I had to stay in my crate (actually Winston's crate) for a few nights so I would not wake everyone up to go out and play. Nothing like moonlight for some good hunting and stuff, that's what I say! At least Mom put my own special pillow in there. And Mom wouldn't let me surf the net so I couldn't post anything on my blog. I've had lots of deep thoughts, but no where to write them down. Boo hoo. Well I think we are back on track. Last night Mom got up at 1:30 and let me out of my crate. She let us all outside. I found out later that she was dreaming it was time to get up, and thought the alarm had gone off. It wasn't til later that she realized it was only 1:30, not 4:45. Good thing she hadn't pushed the coffee button!!
It is now officially April and here is an action photo of me with my little green friend late this afternoon. Finally most of the snow is gone. There is still some snow in our yard though. It is windy today, and sunny, but it only feels like maybe the high 30's because of the wind. I don't want to bring my new yellow frisbee outside yet, it might get muddy, so I am hanging out with my Green Buddy. He wintered outside and it doesn't seem to have hurt him any. Green reminds me of 'going green', that's what all the humans call it. My family does some green stuff, like compost and grow a veggie garden (yum, I love ripe tomatoes right off the vine!), and they have the efficient washer and furnace and use cloth bags to shop.Dad is sick of Mom doing all her recycling but she still pulls stuff out of the garbage and says "now this is still perfectly good, why is it in the trash!). He's afraid that when she gets old she will be surrounded by stacks of newspapers and will have a million puppies. I don't think that will happen. She found a cool website for eco-water bottles and eco-bags, maybe later I will post it if I can find it again. I didn't see anything for dogs on it but I will look it over more carefully. Those plastic bottles that you buy water in at the store and 7-11 aren't very good for the environment and Mom recently learned that the chemicals in them can leach into your water if you refill the bottles, so now she is on a quest for the perfect water bottle that is safe, ecologically sound,is also good for iced coffee, and doesn't cost two paws and a tail. I'll keep you posted on how she does!!

We are getting along much better now, she and I. So maybe in a day or two I will post some soap pictures for her. She has been making soap, of course. And she made a nice hand balm for someone at work with itchy dry spots. She uses it herself on her own hands, and she put some on Bear's paw pads during the winter because they got all dried out. She is working on an insect repellent now. I hope she doesn't use it on us. Last summer she thought she would try the 'natural' flea and tick repellent on Bear instead of the Frontline that we all like. It comes in a package like the Frontline and it's a liquid that you put on the middle of the shoulders, so it spreads out on the skin, just like the frontline. Well, it's made of mint and other stuff. Poor Bear, even Mom couldn't stand to be near him for about a week. She said he gave her a headache because he smelled so bad, sort of like how it would smell if a big truck loaded with peppermint syrup flipped over in the hot sun...yech!. And Bear could hardly stand being near himself. I guess that's the theory of it. It smells so bad that even the fleas don't want to be on you. Anyway, she said this bug balm is probably for humans and will smell better. We shall see. It's not ethical to experiment on animals so I guess she'll have to experiment on people. I don't care, just so long as they don't smell so bad they keep me awake at night.

Hey, I think I just heard my Dad pull into the driveway. He's home in the daylight from his new job at Baystate Medical Center, where he is the EMS Coordinator. I don't know what that means. But it's all good if he's home in time to play with me! So bye for now and I promise to write more often. Love, Me.