Tag Archives: ignore

Pretty Flowers Can Be Pretty Dangerous For Pets

Spring is here and that means flowers are blooming. Whether it’s perennials blossoming or you or your neighbors are planting some new annuals, you and your pets will probably encounter some flowers at this time of year. In general it’s always best to keep your dogs from eating any type of plants, but now that it’s Spring all the new flowers may smell too interesting for your dogs to ignore. Even if you have no flowers on your own property, you may pass some flowers on a walk in the park or around the neighborhood. So today I’ve put together a list of flowers your pets need to avoid, as they may cause health issues if eaten or even sniffed. Remember to keep your pets from all parts of these plants, as sometimes it’s the stem or leaves that are harmful to pets, not necessarily the flower petals.

Flowering plants that may be harmful to pets:

Lilies of any type
Azaleas
Crocuses
Begonia
Buttercup
Gardenia
Carnations
Chrysanthemum
Clematis
Daffodil
Dahlia
Daisy
Geranium
Gladiola
Hibiscus
Hyacinth
Hydrangea
Iris
Lavender
Morning Glory
Oleander
Peony
Rhododendron
Tulips
Wisteria

Although the flowers above present potential dangers for your pets, it is possible to have beautiful flowers and keep your pets safe if you plan correctly. As you can see from Sadie’s photos, I do have some of the flowers from the list around my home. But I plant flowers only in the front of my house, where Sadie never goes unattended, without a leash. In the backyard Sadie is free to sniff and play all she wants without worry, as there are no potentially harmful plants at all.

To learn more about possible health issues and check about the safety of specific plants, go to the ASPCA’s Animal Poison Control website.

This post is part of the BlogPaws Wordless Wednesday blog hop.

Temper Tantrum

When Sadie’s in a bad mood and wants you to stay away, or when she has a treat and she’s afraid you’ll take it from her, my little pup has a predictable pattern of behavior. In the following photos, you can see the typical steps of a Sadie temper tantrum from start to finish.

It begins with “the look”. Sadie gets a certain look in her eyes that clearly says “stay away”.

If you ignore “the look” and approach Sadie anyway, she begins to growl quietly, showing her teeth a little.

If you still persist and reach out towards her, she snaps. She doesn’t actually bite or even try to grab you, she just tries to snap in your direction to scare you away.

The final stage of the temper tantrum is guilt. Sadie immediately feels sorry for snapping and tries to lick you. It’s hard to be stern and reprimand my little pup for snapping when she insists on licking your face and apologizing.

This post is part of the Thoughtless Thursday blog hop hosted by Ruckus the Eskie, Love Is Being Owned By a Husky, and M.K. Clinton.

This post is also part of the Thursday Barks and Bytes blog hop hosted by 2 Brown Dawgs and Heart Like A Dog.

Please Mom, I Desperately Need a New Toy!

Unfortunately for me, Sadie has figured out where I keep new toys that I haven’t given to her yet. At some point every day I can usually find Sadie sitting in front of the closet door, wishing that it would open and the new toys would jump out. If she sees me go near the closet, she runs over and looks expectantly from me to the closet, waiting for me to get her a toy. If I don’t immediately comply, Sadie grumbles, whines, and even barks at me to open the door and give up the toys. Sometimes I give in, but mostly I just ignore her in the futile hope that she’ll understand that she doesn’t get a new toy every time I go into the closet.

But Sadie’s latest attempt to convince me that she deserved a new toy had me laughing hysterically. I hadn’t heard a peep out of Sadie for like an hour, so I went looking to see what she was up to. I found her sitting in front of THE closet. As soon as she heard me coming around the corner, she jumped up, wagged her tail at me, and squeaked the toy in her mouth. She made some more happy noises, then looked from me to the closet door a few times, as if she was saying “well aren’t you going to open the door?” When I didn’t move toward the door, she started barking at me to get a move on. But her barking came out all cute and muffled by the squeaky ball in her mouth. So basically she was begging me to get her a new toy while squeaking the toy already in her mouth. When I walked in the opposite direction of the closet she started whining and giving me the sad deprived puppy eyes. It’s kind of hard to pull off the sad deprived puppy act when you never stop squeaking the ball already in your mouth.

This post is part of the Monday Mischief Pet Blog hop hosted by Snoopy’s Dog Blog, My Brown Newfies, and Alfie’s Blog.

Get Creative with Jolly Awesome Pet Tags!

It should come as no surprise that I love custom dog-related products, especially those that use photos of Sadie. So when I heard about Jolly Awesome Pet Tags, I knew I had to try them. At JollyAwesomePetTags.com, you can design custom tags for your pets, using your own photos, clip art, text, etc. I spent about an hour having fun designing three custom tags for Sadie and I just love how they turned out!

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New Toys or Old Toys?

So I’ve often heard other pet owners complaining that their pets will love a specific toy to death, no matter how old, dirty, and ragged it becomes. My friend’s cat, for example, will only play with one specific toy mouse. By now it’s falling apart, but whenever my friend tries to replace it with a new version of the same mouse, her cat refuses to play with it. Sadie has the opposite opinion about her toys. She loves getting a new toy, and usually plays with it excitedly for hours that first day. But once the toy is no longer new, Sadie loses interest in it. And by some method I don’t understand, Sadie can tell which toy is new and which is not, even if the toys are identical.

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