Insomnia, You are a cruel mistress...

If you are the type to read titles/subject lines/the fine print on contracts, you may have gathered that I can't sleep. Not only can I not sleep, I am gripped with that insane, eyes-wide open horror of insomnia. I took a little nap today in which I felt that I didn't sleep at all, but ninety minutes passed so finally I gave up and went downstairs (the fact that Scout was napping on top of me most of the time and finally collapsed his legs underneath him and put his neck across mine to say, in no uncertain terms, "I'd like to merge my soul with yours... please..." may have contributed to my lack of sleep) where upon I called a friend who said, "Oh, you will never be able to sleep tonight now." Jinxed? Freudian? Anyway, it's three a.m. and I've:

#1. Eaten an obscene amount of cheese & crackers and Greek yogurt

#2. Watched three (3) episodes of "White Collar" and then saved them on the TiVo for the husband

#3. Followed Jeremy Davidson's (the actor not the footballer) career online and even watched a short independent film he starred in

#4. Had horrendous heartburn

#5. Culled all of the blogs I've missed for the past two weeks and sent the "best of" to my best friend who, even on Pacific time, is already asleep (P.S. You're welcome...)

#6. Saved the life of a (bridge &) tunnel spider who was streaking across my living room at the witching hour

#7. Woken up the spaniels (and vizsla) no less than ten times... without guilt, because they ruined my nap

#8. Ate four dark-chocolate organic peanut butter cups from Trader Joe's that I've been hoarding for my husband when he gets home

#9. Calculated how much wallpaper it will take to paper my closet, with the options of all paper, paper and paint, my own tears because I haven't slept in so long, etc.

#10. Prayed, begged, and cajoled for sleep. Twice. Then I read the first two parts of Gulliver's Travels.

I am about to try once more, but let me tell you... I feel about as happy as Atticus in the picture that opened this post. It's hard out here for a finch... Hasta la vista...

Dog Bed, Schmaug-med...

Who needs a dog bed when you have luggage you haven't unpacked yet?  Dogs and kids, always keeping you on your toes and helping you see the world in a whole new way that you never imagined... Thank you.

Sometimes Nature is just a little too... Natural...

Wellington looking a bit nervous...

It's been a long and busy week here at High Cotton Home and I was happy to see the weekend come... but it was as busy as every other day this week! Saturday was spent helping out with a transport for English Springer Spaniel Rescue Society of two adult dogs, Wellington and Jessie, and two ADORABLE puppies! The puppies have retinal dysplasia and they will be blind by the time they are a year old so they need to hurry up and get to their new homes so they can find their way around before they loose their sight completely.

Jessie, my over-the-shoulder "backseat driver!

The two tri-colored spaniels were just so stinkin' cute that I had to take one out and cuddle with him for the last twenty miles... and then cuddle with his brother... I almost hid the little brown one in the trunk and claimed, "Second pup? What second pup? I don't know what you are talking about!!" when I got to the next stop on the transport. But I was a good kid... and didn't steal a puppy! ;P

  

Wouldn't you be tempted to steal one too?

For some reason I had a crazy case of insomnia of Saturday night so I read a book until 4am, napped a little, and then got up when it was light out and started working on homework for school this coming week. I can't believe it's the fall semester already... CRAZY! It's still so hot out and yet it's "fall!" But it is my favorite time of year, so I can't wait for the cool autumn chill to kick into high gear, even if we are in Florida! But Sunday I woke up and Cali was really feeling sick; hiding, shaking, just looking terrible. I couldn't figure out what was going on with her, but I went outside to investigate if she had eaten something she shouldn't have.

It was stormy and ominous outside so I was trying to do a little detective work, turn the compost pile and get back in the house as soon as possible. I found some mushrooms so I was certain I had solved the mystery but then I saw this hole next to the garden and I noticed a cord dangling down into the hole. Now here's where I admit that, though I documented all of this in photos, I had the camera on the wrong setting and once I figured out what was going on I was too shaken to check the photos and they were all lost. So I see this weird, banded cord hanging down and I think, "Cali... if you ate the in-ground plumbing, I may just feed you to the gators..." but I pulled on the cord and something was just not right. "Wait, a minute... this kinda looks like..." I peaked over the edge of the garden and I had been PULLING ON THE TAIL OF A DEAD SNAKE!!

I literally almost threw up (and I'm someone who likes non-venomous snakes... really... I used to take the snakes in the Biology lab home over Christmas breaks in high school) but no one else was home and I had to do it. The snake was all intertwined with bird-proof netting and I didn't want to touch him really (when I tried to pull him loose, a scale flew off and hit me in the arm and I just couldn't take it...) so I decided to cut him out, along with a nearby stake and the watermelon tendrils that were there. After I got him out, I pulled a little C.S.I. Panhandle and determined that I thought he had probably died because he was being chased by Cali, got all caught up in the netting and then as she dug and chomped on his tail (which is why it had a blunt end and looked like a cut cord), it was all over for our intrepid little garden visitor. I felt kinda bad for him, but the whole situation still made me want to vomit. Honestly, sometimes nature is just a little too... natural. 

"Guilt is absent when the act is justified.”

Scout feels the need to be in literally EVERY photo....

I have had two rescue dogs and I have raised two purebreds from puppies... the rescue dogs are infinitely easier and better dogs from the get go, hands-down. But in one aspect, my purebreds take the cake. My rescues have no conscience. None. Not even a glimmer.

Not even the least bit chagrined...

This morning I woke up looking for my flip-flops (cheap ones that my mom knits padded straps for out of organic, bamboo yarn.... HEAVENLY)... rather, looking for the one that wasn't sitting by the back door where I'd left them. And I finally found the missing mate, who ended up being on top of the dog bed, missing part of its top and bottom due to someones teeth. 

The victim...

Now, because I've never lost a shoe to a dog before (and I've had my other dogs for two and four years respectively) and since I have a new rescue in the house who likes to destroy little cloth animals, my powers of deduction tell me it was Cali. Beyond that, my two spaniels have what my best friend likes to call "An over-developed sense of guilt" which means they will confess to just about anything... both of them will confess to pooping in a hotel room when it was clearly only one dog... the pantry door fell off its hinges and both spaniels confessed even though they were both clear across the room and had nothing to do with it. I worry that I am a bad mom that comes down on them too hard, but I think that it's probably just a symptom of the breed... Springer Spaniels are worriers, through and through. Anyway, Cali gave me a blank look when I asked about the shoe as did the spaniels, so either my new rescue has no conscience as well... or I have a phantom chewer...the mystery deepens...

Pay No attention to That Dog Behind the Curtain

Always the economical home remodeler I try to do everything on a budget... and by that I mean I try to do everything I want/need to for our home while still keeping us afloat, eating food, paying bills, saving money... etc, etc. My husband and I jokingly watched "The Money Pit" when we bought this house, laughing at Tom Hank's antics and the wild adventures of his fictional home ownership.

The living room while the home belonged to the previous owner...

 a little crowded, no?

Now, two years into being home owners, we've: replaced the same ceiling twice; found out that half of our second floor was leaning on a non-load bearing wall and causing our home to slowly implode; ruptured a well pump; nearly had a jacuzzi tub fall through the ceiling from our master bath into our living room because all of the floor joists had been cut by a previous owner (why, Geoffrey? WHY!?!); walked on bare concrete and tack board for three months due to a carpet mix-up; overflowed two backed up air conditioners flooding an entire closet below (which I tried to fix with ingenuity and pots & pans but botched horribly in my husband's absence) and generally suffered a host of other home related maladies and disasters. It's not a joke people. The money pit is real.

Knocking out the archway. You can start to see where we are going with the project.

   Anyway, in the few rooms that I feel are getting close to finally being "done" after two years, my living room has been limping towards completion for about nine months now. It started out as two rooms, a formal sitting room and a family room, and we knocked a huge archway out; stenciled the walls; and put down new carpeting. The windows were a problem because, now that we had a great room, you could see from the street directly through the house especially once we had some awesome recessed lighting put up to light up the place. I had thought I would be remodeling the dining room first, but due to a massive water leak, the living room moved up the priority list.

Walls painted (soon to be stenciled) & carpet waiting to go down...

     I'd bought goldenrod curtains on clearance from JCPenney's for a shockingly good deal, but due to only having two windows in the dining room I'd only bought four panels and the new living room had three windows. Undeterred, I created one "giant window" flanked by one panel on either side for one set of windows and devoted the other two panels to the remaining window.

The curtains in between stages, after we added the extra silk at the top.

Oh, and did I mention the curtain were way too short for the living room and the curtain rod hole was much to narrow for my "$60 marked down to $9.99 plus a 20% Off coupon" wooden rods from Bed, Bath & Beyond, so I had to get Mama to add a 4-inch tube of chocolate silk to the top of each one? Yeah... miserable...

The finished product...

    Now, to the problem of sheers. I bought sheers from JCPenney; they were awful, so I returned them. I bought clearance sheers from West Elm, they ran out mid-shipment and I only received four instead of the six I needed; returned as well. And then I lusted after these sheers from West Elm for months... months... and finally last month I thought, "Every budget, and every wife, has their breaking point" so I logged on (thankfully they were running a special for $10 off each panel... it's the little things) and finally more than $200 later I am pleased. I know it's not true economy but sometimes, you can only be so thrifty and still keep your sanity.

"Ugghh... these curtains are really cramping my style..."-Atticus

   The only downside to the new curtains is that Atticus, our oldest spaniel, likes to use the front window as a vantage point to lay down and observe passersby with the sill as a chin-rest. These new curtains really put a crimp in his style and he was none too pleased.... "Can a dog catch a break around here?" he says... nope, sorry... Mama needs her sanity... and her privacy... but I still love you, Atticus. A lot.

"You're killing me, Smalls..."

Beach of Brotherly Love...

I don't believe an accident of birth makes people sisters or brothers. It makes them siblings, gives them mutuality of parentage. Sisterhood and brotherhood is a condition people have to work at. ~Maya Angelou

Two of our dogs, Atticus and Scout, are brothers though they are several years and many litters apart. Just like human siblings, they are very similar and yet they are each so unique. But when they play together, they are pure magic and they never cease to make me laugh with their matching "smiles" and sweet loving eyes. Our recent photo shoot at the beach left me nostalgic for their puppy days after watching them play together, so I thought I might share some of their brotherly love with you all...

Look at those faces! And their matching stances!

Who wouldn't love a Springer Spaniel?

Frolick!

Catch me if you can!

There are those loving eyes...

Our little snorkler... I think he's going after tiny fish? Or crabs?

Either way, it makes me laugh...

What a Pill!: Pets and Medication

With our tragic hospital stay with Sadie and Cali's recent snake bite, we have had a recent rash of experience with all sorts of pet medical care from morphine drips (the medicine makes their tongues stick out of their mouths a little bit which is super cute in addition to being the sure "tell" that the drugs have kicked in) to catherers and IV's... we are well versed! But once you get home, or in less serious medical situations when your pets just need to take a little something to put them on the mend, there are always tons of pills to swallow and if your pet is anything like mine, they won't take them! We've tried pills wrapped in bacon, in cheese, handed off with a treat, shoved down a throat and stroked to make them swallow... we've done it all. And now, after years of gagging spaniels and later finding expensive pills spit out in the corner of the living room (they are magicians at hiding them in their jowels!) we have a fool-proof solution! It seems simple, but it took me this long to find a method that worked so I am sharing it here!

This trick will work with peanut butter or cheese whiz, but the fake cheese is just too processed for me to give it to anyone in good conscience, even the pups! It was hard enough for me to buy Skippy and not organic, natural peanut butter! We marked the jar "DOG" and just keep it with their other goodies in the closet, but having a brand that doesn't have to be refrigerated is key since spreadability is so important for this task.

I used EVO (a grain-free brand) treats but as they were bought out by Proctor & Gamble last month, I can't recommend their brand any longer until we can be sure that they haven't changed their formula since the buyout. This would probably work with any treat, but the little hole in the center makes it easier to shove large pills down into the gap. I slather the top of the treat in peanut butter, bury the pills, and put a new coat of PB on top. We generally only give treats for going in their crates, so this is perfect for twice a day dosing before bed and then before you head out the door in the morning. My only suggestion is that if you have more than one dog, you'll have to slather everyone's treat in peanut butter too to avoid jealousy issues! Other than that, it works like a charm! I am sure this would work for cats too... maybe some pate on a treat? Any cat moms out there have good suggestions on what might work for your little angels?

SNAKES IN A YARD!!: Natural Snake Prevention & Deterrence

Our recoving patient...

“A funny thing to do is, if you're out hiking and your friend gets bitten by a poisonous snake, tell him you're going to go for help, then go about ten feet and pretend that *you* got bit by a snake. Then start an argument with him about who's going to go get help. A lot of guys will start crying. That's why it makes you feel good when you tell them it was just a joke.”

-Jack Handy

We had a bit of a scare this week here at High Cotton Home; our new dog Cali, still fresh from the shelter, was bitten by a poisonous snake in our own backyard on Tuesday night! I saw her at the back door, hobbling on three legs, her paw already hugely swollen and dripping a weird mixture of brown juice (venom?) mixed with blood. She was also extremely lethargic and going into shock. Only two veterinary hospitals within 100 miles carry anti-venom, so I packed Cali into the car and broke land-speed records driving over an hour to the nearest hospital. They did an awesome job getting her on a morphine drip, fluids and the anti-venom right away and (after two days in the hospital and quite a chunk of moola) she is recovering well. The venom caused blood problems including hemorrhaging all over her body so she still has a large pool of blood in her chest and her injured paw is swollen and has quite a bit of damage. Parts of her leg will likely undergo necrosis and come off in the coming weeks leaving her paw looking a bit odd for the rest of her life, but she is going to pull through!

One of the little frogs on a brick outside the door...

also known as a tasty, pygmy rattler meal!

Luckily, we were able to come up with the money for the anti-venom($846 a vial!) in time for treatment but many families aren't as lucky and they can only cross their fingers and hope for the best with IV fluids and prayers to save their animals when they are bitten. The bite characteristics for Cali belong to a family of venomous snakes here in the south that include rattlesnakes, pygmy rattlesnakes, copperheads and cottonmouth snakes. Speculation from the local professional (i.e. my vet and the new yard man) is that it was a pygmy rattlesnake that got Cali because they are very aggressive when surprised (my little soft-footed hunter at work!) and like to eat frogs (like the little tree frogs in abundance on our windows every night).

   Though our home backs up to a wetlands so wildlife is inevitable, we had taken no steps to guard against poisonous snakes, mostly because the only snakes I'd ever seen on our property had been non-venomous. This close-call has made me vow to change my ways and, because of our organic lifestyle, I wanted to see about deterring snakes in the most natural ways possible. Here are a few tips:

#1. Clear out all Bushes, Weeds, Shrubs and Tall Grass: I have to admit that the picture above is my overgrown backyard at the beginning of the summer and it has only gotten worse since as the warm days and afternoon rain showers. Plus, with my husband out of town for a bit, the grass isn't getting cut as often either (I love my electric mower, but mine is not cordless so trying to mow has proved to be a little be tougher than the "just like vacuuming the yard!" that I had thought it would be).  Since the bite, I have hired someone to clear out all the brush, cut back the bushes, and generally clear out the entire front and back yard for under $200. I had put it off because of the heat and because I thought that it would take me weekend after weekend to clear it out just to start over the whole process again! I don't know if that is true or not, but for less than 1/4 of the cost of one vial of anti-venom, I could have prevented this problem months ago! Please, let my dumb mistake prevent heartache in yours!

#2. Clear out piles in your yard: Piles of rocks, hay, wood, old branches, fallen trees... all of these scream "COME REST IN MY COOL SHADE" to a snake. This will be a difficult task if you xeriscape your yard, but that would cut down on rodents/critters (see tip #3) so hopefully the two factors will balance one another out. Be sure when you clear the piles and move them to a safe location (if necessary as in the case of winter wood) away from the house or get rid of them (if they are just rock or junk piles) that you wear protective clothing. I didn't have any good, snake proof gaiters to wear for my snake-finding expedition but I did have some pretty cute, knee-high rain boots that I wore and I carried a huge shovel to poke and push the piles around significantly before reaching my hand to grab any of the items for relocation. Assume there are snakes in the pile and act cautiously about reaching your hand into any dark spaces and not only will you avoid snake bites, but spiders, scorpions or any other delightfully nasty creature that your region may harbor.

#3. Make Your Yard Critter Free: Mice, rats, frogs, toads, lizards... all of these little creatures can inhabit out backyards if we make the conditions right for them. Fruit trees, veggie gardens, under porches, garages and overgrown bushes all attract rodents, who are closely followed by their natural predators including snakes. We found a 3-ft rat snake in the tree out back last month and when we first moved in (before we'd built our fence) I saw an 8-ft indigo snake in our yard that I thought was going to eat Atticus before I caught my breath and realized how cool what I was seeing was! But I should have realized, that where non-venomous snakes find a meal, venomous snakes will too. Now, I have to admit our yard is frog paradise because we don't use pesticides (because frogs are natural, environmental indicators pesticides kill them easily as in most of our neighbors yards) and we have a hot tub that houses so many of the little critters that I can't in good conscience turn it on because I'm afraid of boiling the little suckers! I won't start using pesticides, but I will clean out and treat my hot tub (natural items only, no chemicals) to try to make the yard a little less friendly for them. They also enjoy my compost pile when I neglect to turn it (and it draws flies) so I will need to up my work out there, even though you know I hate to put work into the compost pile!

These are the simplest solutions that I am employing immediately, but I am going to continue looking into the efficacy of spreadable deterrents and installing small gauge chicken-wire along the bottom of the fence to prevent snakes of any sort from making it into our yard in the first place. I will keep you posted and review my successes!

Settling in...

Sunday brought us into our second week with our new rescue dog, 

Cali(fornia), and I wanted to share her progress with you all. She and the boys are really getting along well (which basically means, Scout has started harassing her endlessly and she finally feels comfortable enough to give him a barking rebuff when she's had enough). Cali is still on antibiotics for a post-shelter cough that she just can't seem to shake, but she is beginning to trust us more and she's started taking her meds with just peanut butter instead of the huge battle we faced last week!

Just before escape attempt #1.

She looks like she's excited to go to the beach... it's all a facade!

Okay, so she doesn't look too terribly excited to be

going swimming with Dad after she was caught...

Cali perked up a bit when she realized that nothing bad was going to happen in the water. She still hated swimming (every time I took her out to waist-deep water, she swam hard and fast for the shore... that girl could win the Canine Olympics for speed and strength in the water!) but she would put up with the shallows as long as the waves stayed small enough.

And she rode in the back of the truck with Mama

and her brothers without any fuss at all...

Cali even managed to cut loose a little on the ride home

and enjoy the wind in her hair ears.

I know we are all still adjusting to each other, but we are all happy to say,

We're so glad you've joined our family, Cali!

Our New Addition...

It has been almost six weeks since Sadie passed and, though we are not fully past her death yet, we had room in our home and in our hearts for another dog and so, just a few weeks after her death, we went looking. We wanted a dog who, like Sadie, had been passed over and wasn't adoptable because she was ugly, old, or just generally a sweet dog who inexplicably wasn't going home with anyone.

We tried met-ups with several pups and nobody got along well with our boys (including one dachshund mix who literally chased Scout around the room snapping and barking until he dropped his treat and hid. Scout - 45lbs, dachshund mix - 11 lbs.... hilarious...)

I had seen a Vizsla-Pointer mix at a local pet welfare and I'd waited a couple of weeks to visit her and finally went on my own on July 1st. I just loved her, but it takes a few visits to really get to know a dog. The next week brought another visit, this time with my husband, and on the 13th we took the dogs to meet her... and she came home with us! Formerly known as "Kali," we changed it to "Cali" so that she could be a California girl like her mama, me! Also, I am convinced that changing the letters up in common names only leads girls to grow up to be strippers and I want more than that for my little pup!

She's supposedly six years old, but she's got a bit of gray around her muzzle already. We are at least her third home after three shelter stays from Sacramento to the deep South (and she's been at pet welfare for six months already with no interest in her at all!) based on the history that we were given, but her history doesn't start until she was 3 1/2 and being a Vizsla-Pointer mix she was bound to have a ton of energy as a pup and I'm sure she was probably turned into a shelter at least once after her puppy cuteness wore off. She's still got a lot of spunk in her (especially after a few minutes inside in the air conditioning) and she's kept me busy asking to go outside every half hour so that she can run wind sprints up and down the yard until I get too worried about leaving a geriatric patient out in the 108F heat index! Watching her play with Scout is a hoot (she bounces like an South Central lowrider... perhaps she's more of a California girl than I thought!) and other than the fact that you can tell that she thinks we are going to send her back to a shelter at any minute (yesterday's vet visit was... interesting...) things are going great. YEA for our expanding pack!

Update: Want to see how Cali is settling in at our home? Here is an update from a few weeks later...

"I wouldn't feed this meal to a dog!!"

"He who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals."
-Immanuel Kant

It's 5pm, do you know what your dog is eating? A post at Re-Nest started my wheels turning about what we are feeding our pets (and what those of you out there in TV Land might be feeding yours) so I thought I would share our experiences with you. My family eats an organic, "Paleo" diet as much as possible (all things in moderation, of course!) so we decided to have our dogs go "Paleo" as well and buy grain-free dog food. 

Why Grain-Free?
Grain-free foods and treats contain ingredients and nutrient levels which most closely resemble the ancestral diet of dogs and cats; high in animal based proteins and a healthy balance of fats and low carbohydrates(derived from vegetables and non-grain sources). The protein content in grain-free dry foods is high but not so high that can damage a dog's system (there are claims that raw-meat only diets can damage a dog's pancreas and more) and the rest of the food is composed of fresh fruits and vegetables (not corn gluten, which is the corn by-product that most dog food is made of). It only makes sense that animals descended from wolves and wild cats would be healthier eating a meat-based product instead of a corn-based one, but in our corn-based American society these days, who is really surprised that we are feeding our pets corn too?


How did you chose your food? 
   There are tons of options of dog food options out there from a Raw Food diet (this all-natural, rehydratable"just add meat & water" one looks pretty neat!) to your average bag of kibble at the grocery store but here was our criteria when we chose our dog food:

1. Quality of the product: We wanted a high-quality product that provided the best nutrients specifically formulated for active dogs.

2. Ease of Use: I think that raw food diets (especially one that incorporate vegetables and other necessary nutrients and enzymes) is probably the best thing for my pet, but do I have time to be baking breakfast and dinner for a pack of dogs twice a day? Um, No... I wanted to be able to buy the product, put it in a huge Tupperware to keep it fresh and then scoop it out twice a day at mealtimes. Dry food without preparation was a must.

3. Price: Buying raw meat for our pets, especially organic meat, is often cost prohibitive for many families, ours included. I do believe that feeding creatures, be they children or pets, quality food now saves on medical bills later but sometimes the price tag right now is just too high. Bagged, grain-free foods can be found at reasonable prices at a variety of retailers, even in the boonies where we live, or can be bought in bulk online.

So what do your dogs eat?
    We are actually in a food transition right now. We have fed our dogs EVO for the past two years and absolutely LOVED it! Unfortunately, Proctor & Gamble just bought out EVO and, as they did with IAMS after the Eukanuba buy out, they plan to "adjust the formula" in the food after the buyout is complete in June 2010. By law, P&G has six months to inform the consumer that the formula has been changed, so your dog could be eating grain & other junk for six months (while you are paying full price!) and you would never know!
     In light of the buyout, we are in the process of switching over to another grain-free dog food. We have tried "Taste of the Wild" and "Orijen" foods (both in their red meat/bison formulas) and we have decided to go with "Taste of the Wild" because it is significantly cheaper. I bought three huge bags of EVO this month before the formula changed, so once the pups run out of that I will put them completely on "Taste of the Wild." and see how it goes... Another review to come! Here is a site that lists all of the grain-free dog foods and their contents if you would like to compare foods and chose for yourself.

What differences did you notice after transitioning to grain-free food?
     We transitioned right after bringing a new dog, formerly a stray, into our home (Sadie, our little princess that you've seen on the site before). Her ribs were showing she was so thin, her coat was awful and she was generally unhealthy when we brought her home. Our oldest dog, Atticus, was a little chunky thanks to too many extra treats from his Mama (oops!). After several months on grain-free food, all of our dogs had healthy, thick, coats (we received a flood of  compliments on the two boys coats today while volunteering at the local pet shelter! And those dog people know a good coat when they see one!), much improved overall muscle tone for all of the dogs and their previous health problems (chronic yeast ear infections in both spaniels) disappeared! We haven't had to take the dogs to the vet other than for accidents and their annual shots since switching to grain-free! And the dogs weights all evened out to be "perfect specimens" without having to feed any of the dogs more or less food than the recommendations on the bag.
   Additionally, because the food is so nutritionally dense, you are able to feed your pet a smaller quantity of food. Those of you out there (like Re-Nest's author) who are feeding your 50 lb dogs four cups of traditional, corn-gluten dog food daily will be able to cut back to two cups of grain-free food, in our experience. The grain-free foods are more expensive, but the smaller quantity needed allows us to make a smaller bag of grain-free last as long as the grain-based food we were purchasing previously.

What do I do with all of my old corn-based dog food?
Don't know what to do with all of that old dog food? Corn Gluten is also a great natural, broad-leaf weed preventative for your lawn. It is part of a long term maintenance program, so check out "corn gluten" on an organic/natural gardening page, but you can sprinkle the old dog food straight on your yard and it will disintegrate after a few waterings or good rains!

Our Sweet Princess

We are taking a break for a few weeks here at High Cotton Home.

     Our sweet Sadie was cut down in the prime of her life this week and loosing our little family member has taken such a toil on us. Our sweet princess pranced away to be with the angels on Friday morning, June 4th, and our lives will never be the same again.

     We need some time as a family to regroup and to honor our baby girl's memory, and so we are taking a break for awhile from the blog... I can't imagine taking the dogs to the beach without her right now, or even having one of our fun Saturday mornings full of breakfasts and music and dancing and love...

Our angel is home with us now and she will forever be a part of our family. God can borrow our sweet Sadie Sue for a little while, but he has to play with her at the ocean all day and return her to us when we reach those pearly gates... I can't wait to have my baby girl back in my arms again. We are a pack of five and loosing one of our pack is incomprehensible for each and every one of us. From our family to yours, hug your babies a little closer today, and to our sweet Sadie Sue... you are such a good girl, princess... Thank you so much for holding on as long as you did to let Mama & Daddy say goodbye. We know you did it to save our family, and we know you are prancing in heaven, so happy that we finally figured it all out.

We adore you, angel... kisses on your little black piece-of-coal-in-the-snow nose...

We love you a bushel and a peck and a hug around the neck.

- Mama, Daddy & your brothers

These photos are the Sadie I remember...

Fast as lighting...

I just know she is about to bark right here...

"Throw the Frisbee, Dad! Come on, throw it!"

Bark, bark, bark, bark, bark...

Leap tall bushes in a single bound

(she lept this literally from a stand-still... she was amazing).

Love you, Mama...

Always the one who would swim out the farthest,

our smart & brave Sadie was the first to come back with the prize.

Farewell, my sweet baby girl...