For the Love of Crucifers

I already knew that Lily was a freak of dog nature in her abiding love of cauliflower, but when she started sniffing around the kitchen while I chopped up cabbage for coleslaw, I thought her devotion might extend to other cruciferous veggies. Sure enough. . . .

Lily of the Garden

Space is pretty limited in Santa Monica; the community gardens have five-year waits. Through a friend, we got hooked up with a program in Santa Monica whereby you can have a garden in the yard of a homeowner who has the space but not the inclination for gardening. . . . In our case, we are gardening part of a double lot, a huge backyard, where the homeowner is also gardening while occasionally dipping into our produce. Lily loves to wander the giant yard, sniffing things out as she goes . . . and racing to me with her helicopter tail going, when I realize I can't see her and get concerned enough to call her. Then she's off again to explore some more.

Play Time

I love play time with Lily. She carefully chooses a toy from the bowl of toys. Often, she races all around by herself, throwing it in the air, chasing it, smooshing it between her back and the couch. But my favorite is when she shakes the toy, over and over again, like she's a headbanger. She really teaches that toy a lesson.

If she wants us to play with her, she brings the toy over and nudges us in the leg with it. She loves tug-of-war like little else.

Comfort

Before bedtime, I took off my wide-leg jeans and threw them over the chair before I got in the shower. Post-shower, this is how I found Lily.

In other Lily news, we started dog training! She already knows a few commands (sit, shake, go to bed, stay, sit by your bowl, let's dance), but we think it'd be good for her (and maybe fun for her) t0 learn more. She is learning "leave it" and "park" really easily. At the dog training class, she was like, "Um, that's DIRT below my belly" when we tried to get her to learn to lie down. But we'll work on that one more at home before the next class. She's very eager to please, so I'm sure she'll get it.

Really, we ended up with the sweetest dog ever. We are so lucky.

Pow! Bam! Pow!

I assured Lily the loud noises were just early July 4th fireworks and not her gangsta past coming back to haunt her, but she's not so sure.

Dog Tired

Summer Cut

Today, Lily got a summer cut. We want to see if her fur grow back in a little less unruly now that she has gotten a good trim. Lily has been giving me doleful looks ever since I laughed when I picked her up from the groomer, though.

Bedtime Treats

Bedtime is when Dan reinforces the various things we have taught Lily by taking her through nearly all of them. After each one, she gets a small piece of a treat. Now, when Dan comes into our room at bedtime, Lily sits and watches him very closely, waiting for her first command.

Everybody Needs A Bestie

This is a picture of Lily taking a deep nap with her bestie, Stanley, after hours of boisterous play. Unfortunately, Stanley and his owner moved away many months ago. Since then, Lily's been missing her buddy. She doesn't like dog parks, and friends' dogs have been too big for Lily to take to them like she had Stanley. We are on the lookout now for our next rescued forever dog to be a new buddy for both us and Lily.

Pillow Princess

Lily is a pillow princess. Her goal is to find the squishiest spot available near me and take a nap there.

Cornchip Paws

As Lily sleeps, her little fluff-covered paws begin to smell like cornchips. When Lily has gotten dirty, she sort-of smells like a fish. So sometimes we affectionately call her 'our little fish taco.' But I love to snuggle her after her nap and just take in the sweet cornchippy-ness of her paws.

Let's Make Peace Tonight

When we got Lily, our cats, Foo and Olivia, hated Lily . . . with a passion, despite the fact that Lily was and is entirely submissive to them. They put up with her fine these days, but Lily was quite startled when Foo plopped down beside her on the floor today. He even decided he wanted to play with her a few minutes later, flipping over to bat at her. But I found myself repeating my mother's, "It's all fun and games until someone gets hurt," and I scooped him up. (Lily would never hurt Foo, by the way, but he would eventually swipe her hurtfully on the nose, at the very least.)

Sun & Sand

Because we live a mile from the beach, we take Lily to the boardwalk pretty regularly. She sometimes stops just to lift her nose and intently sniff the ocean breeze. I wonder what she catches on it that I cannot at all perceive.

Vet Visit

I think this is probably how I look while I'm waiting for news from the doctor, too.

Fortunately, Lily was fine, just in need of a new allergy med for the springtime flea uprising.

Princess & the Pea

After a long day of driving, we spent the night in a hotel last night. It was Lily's first time sleeping in a hotel (a dog-friendly one, fortunately a very nice place). We were exhausted when we pulled off the extra hotel pillows from the bed and piled them on the floor. But really, with our pillow princess in tow, we should have known that she would abandon her dog bed in the night to climb in this pile of pillows. Nothing is truer to Lily's character than finding the softest place around to sleep.

Are We There Yet?

On short car rides, unless I block the pass-through with my arm, Lily will climb back and forth between my lap and the back seat. But on long car rides, she settles down pretty quickly in her bed in the backseat. Today we took her on our longest car ride yet--about six hours, with a doggie (and human) refreshment and pee break in the middle. She handled it all wonderfully.