{13june2011: joe stains}

As many of you know by now, the blogging world lost an entertaining guy, Joe Stains late last month and in his honor June 2nd was declared Cheeseburgers for Joe Stains Friday!
We've seen a lot of our dog blog friends have participated, and we did too (I'm just late posting about it - wanted to wrap up the epic hike posts first)!

{Joe Stains, this burger's for you}

We'll miss you Joe!

A cheeseburger wasn't the only treat Darwin got that weekend. I wasn't sure if were going to make it to a fast food place (Jason's not big on fast food) so on Saturday Darwin got to share some of my BBQ pulled chicken sandwich! It was a beautiful sunny and warm weekend in Seattle, so we picked up some BBQ and went to the park for a picnic and a walk. I let Darwin have the top bun of my sandwich and some less barbequed pieces of chicken.

{BBQ sandwich for Joe Stains Saturday?}

And the last treat of the weekend was Chinese Tea Eggs inspired by the one and only Honey (and Hsin-Yi). I wanted to make them as soon as I saw Honey's post, but was even more motivated after seeing the Splorin' Wolfies, Maggie and Guinness make some. So after fast food lunch on Sunday (Jason actually wanted to stop by Burger King after the dog park) and cheeseburgers for Joe Stains, I started boiling my eggs.

After following all the steps, this is what I was left with:

And Darwin got to try one out.

{Chinese Tea Egg for Joe Stains Sunday!}

(I don't know why but all my eggs ended up with one flat side, maybe I cracked the shells before they were boiled enough?)

Darwin (and I) loved them. I was worried at first that the tea would make them sweet, but the soy sauce made them perfectly salty. 

Joe Stains we'll miss your humor and big personality, but will always think of you when we eat cheeseburgers!

{10feb2011: more food!}

Let's continue on the birthday celebration kick!
I really started celebrating Darwin's birthday on Saturday.  It started with a special breakfast.

Kibble topped with a small bit of rice, a fried egg, and a strawberry!
Jason and I went out that night with friends and as a treat Darwin got a leftover slider from her bff, Juneau.
{there's something delicious for me in this paper towel!!!}

She managed to slip the hamburger patty out of the slider while I was snapping away so her second treat was the buns!

Sunday was Great Dane day at Marymoor (many weekends of Marymoor to catch up on) and then we hurried home for a bath and the Superbowl! Darwin also got a pig ear as a pre-birthday treat.

(Who knew pig ears were so crunchy!)


On Tuesday night, we still had tomatoes left over from her birthday dinner so I spruced up her regular dinner (raw veggies and ground meat, a scoop of kibble, and her supplements).

{15sept2010: wordless Wednesday}

celery treat edition:

and don't worry she didn't get all of those... just 2 or 3.    

{03feb2010: wordless Wednesday}

How to keep a great dane busy (for a little while) version:

{20oct2009: brain game}

I decided last night to entertain Darwin with a brain game that Honey showed off a few days ago.  We didn't have enough tennis balls so I made due with what ever toys we had that would fit in the cupcake pan.
Round one I filled as many cups as I had toys with Darwin's favorite treat, Merrick Lamb Training Treats.   It took about 4.5 minutes for her to get all of them.  Round two I filled half the cups with treats, and she was much quicker at 2 minutes.  Round three I filled up 3 cups with treats, and she found them all in a little over a minute.
Come to round four.  I filled up some cups with kibble, some with cookies, and some with lamb.

I covered them up with the toys:

And then let her go at it. 

She was so funny.  She would not eat the kibble at all.  In fact at one point she spit out the kibble that went in her mouth.  She only at the "treats".