doh! no camera

Didn't have the camera with us this weekend but the good times still happened. Zeke and Sadie made new friends at Wassamasaw Dog Park with Buddy (named after Buddy the Elf) and Cali. They had a great time playing Friday evening. The goal of the rest of the weekend was to try and stay cool so that meant play time was mostly restricted to early in the morning and late in the evening. Planning on heading to the lake next weekend to visit some family.

Riverdogs Dog Day

Dogs and baseball, what's not to love! Zeke just had to have his picture made like a real Riverdog player.
Charlie T. Riverdog the mascot stopped by to say hello or woof or whatever they said.
A little lab meet and greet at the cooling off pools.
Our neighbor one row behind us. Her family brought good treats!

Next dog day is the 27th of June.

playing at the boat landing

We were out exploring the tri-county area this weekend and ended up at the boat landing in Russellville. Found an area that had a sandy slope and was open (i.e. lower gator potential), so we took the opportunity to cool off and fetch the bumper.

Saturday in the (dog) park

This morning we loaded up and headed for Wannamaker Dog Park. And man did we luck out, got to meet two really cool labs.
This is Cocoa, a 4 month old chocolate lab baby girl. She had no fear of running with the big dogs and loved to splash in the water bowl.
Cocoa did not like having her picture taken, but the lab paparazzi was determined to get a photo of her interacting with her older male doppelganger Zeke.
Then we met Doug the black lab, who was from Lowcountry Lab Rescue just like Sadie. But how he found his mom was such a great story: he was at the beach with his foster and got free and ran right up to this stranger, his foster parent came up apologized and asked if she wanted to adopt him. They got the opportunity to play some more and every time Doug got called back he came straight to her and sat at her feet. So he new who needed to be his new mom!
We just had to get an alumni shot to post on the LLR facebook page.

Memorial Day Weekend

This past weekend was way fun! Dad was off for the holiday and we all had a big time!
Monday we all went to Marrington for a walk and then McAlister's for lunch. Zeke wanted to show off his new scarf.
Sunday we went to Wannamaker and spent some time at the dog park (Zeke met Dozer, see above) and Zeke went running with mom while she roller-bladed. Sadie and Dad hung out at the park and she got to play with a great dane.
Saturday we took a hike in the national forest. And covered another 3 miles on our quest to hike the Swamp Fox passage this year! At the halfway creek campsite there was a water station that the kids enjoyed. Sadie in particular thought it was very refreshing.

School is back in session

Zeke started his Intermediate class last night. We were supposed to have it with Michael teaching (the trainer from our beginner class) but he had a bad accident with a ladder and is out of commission for awhile. Here's hoping to a speedy recovery for you, Michael!
Here is Betty Blue a shepherd mix and her momma.
Week one is working "sit" with distractions and "wait". Zeke is pretty good with wait... distractions are another thing all together.

There is the potential for a couple more chocolate labs to join up with the class. Which would of course be awesome.

back in the saddle

After a long week of taking it easy*** post surgery, Zeke is back at it today, we stopped by our favorite pond and had some swimming time. Going nut-less hasn't slowed down Zeke in the least.

***taking it easy with a lab is a very relative term, one day after surgery Zeke thought he was at full speed and wanted to return to standard duty. So we tried to gradually work him back up to normal activity.

The Big Snip

Zeke was dropped off this morning to be neutered.

Updated: Zeke's surgery went fine. He is now resting as comfortably as possible on the couch watching Dr Who

checked out.

This 5 month old little girl has found the best place to lay on a hot day at the dog park. We had to take care of some business very near Wannamaker Dog Park so Zeke stopped in for a few minutes.

dog parks, lunch and swimming

Today Zeke went to Wannamaker dog park and played with Darwin the Airedale and his sister Abbey, but he didn't get to go in the water area (AKA mud hole) with them. Shortly after we got there a guy brought in his corgi sized dog who had every dog in the big dog section chasing after her, but she was super quick and agile no one could catch her. It was like her game, eventually everyone gave up and then her and her dad left. Kinda random, but funny to watch.

Then we picked up BBQ to go from Willie Jewel's and had lunch with dad. Zeke found out he likes corn fritters, what's not to love really. After that we had a quick swim to cool off and headed back home for nap time!

Givhans Ferry State Park

Zeke went to Givhans State Park today, we hadn't been there in a while and thought a mid-week trip would be nice. It was really quiet there today, usually on the weekends the place is pretty packed. But today we saw no one on the walking trail.
Then we went to the river access and Zeke splashed around on the sandbar and fetched his favorite bumper.

Happy Mother's Day!

Awww, the sweet boy got his mom beautiful flowers for mother's day. Then we spent the day at the park. (whoa, sorry the glowy eyes are kinda creepy)

whoa 2 years!

Just checked the history, Zeke made his first post two years ago today! Happy blog-o-versary!

Cinco de Mayo, FAIL!

The big plan for Cinco De Mayo 2010 was to head to Margaritas' Mexican restaurant because they had added all kinds of extra outdoor seating. We get there and snag a table. Then the manager (or whomever was in charge) came out and told us we couldn't have Zeke and Sadie there. The patrons sitting around us in their sombreros rallied to our defense, but to no avail. We did ask why we couldn't be there when at last 3 other restaurants in walking distance had tables outside and would let patrons have awesome dogs there and the response was to the effect of people will complain 'because the wind blows the smell'**.

SO, we left and went to a happier spot. Our good friends at Montreux also know how to make some awesome nachos and I'm pretty sure the margaritas were better too.

Next year, I think we will just try to have a Cinco De Mayo block party so we don't have to worry about the lack of dog friendly Mexican eating establishments.

**Note: I may have misunderstood this second part of the explanation.

more on the Swamp Fox passage

We finally made it back out to the Palmetto Trail after a couple weeks hiatus. We had been jumping around getting some trips in different sections and this weekend we hiked the actual first three miles of the Swamp Fox Passage. Here is Zeke at the US 17 trail head.
We actually started at a different parking area and hiked out to the trail head and then back. The days are starting to get much warmer and the bugs are out in full force, so the OFF! was a necessity.
Zeke on the Steed Creek bridge. Which was a surprise, we are used to seeing just plain wooden walkovers and here was this cool steel bridge over black water.