Another Shibamas Song!

The Twelve Days of Shibamas

On the first day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the second day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
two pig ears and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the third day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the fourth day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the fifth day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
five bully sticks, four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the sixth day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
six Kongs for chewing, five bully sticks, four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the seventh day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
seven stuffing-less foxes, six Kongs for chewing, five bully sticks, four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the eighth day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
eight peanut butter biscuits, seven stuffing-less foxes, six Kongs for chewing, five bully sticks, four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the ninth day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
nine squirrels to chase, eight peanut butter biscuits, seven stuffing-less foxes, six Kongs for chewing, five bully sticks, four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the tenth day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
ten Himalayan chews, nine squirrels to chase, eight peanut butter biscuits, seven stuffing-less foxes, six Kongs for chewing, five bully sticks, four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the eleventh day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
eleven warm hot dogs, ten Himalayan chews, nine squirrels to chase, eight peanut butter biscuits, seven stuffing-less foxes, six Kongs for chewing, five bully sticks, four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

On the twelfth day of Shibamas my humans gave to me,
twelve yummy steaks, eleven warm hot dogs, ten Himalayan chews, nine squirrels to chase, eight peanut butter biscuits, seven stuffing-less foxes, six Kongs for chewing, five bully sticks, four stuffed birds, three nice long walks, two pig ears, and a giant chunk of parmesan cheese.

Happy Shibamas, everyone!!

Mommy was singing a new song today.. =)

I wish you a merry Shibamas,
I wish you a merry Shibamas,
I wish you a merry Shibamas and a screaming New Year.

Good nommies I bring
To only your shiba,
Good nommies for Shibamas and a screaming New year.

Now give me some toys and cheese,
Now give me some toys and cheese,
Now give me some toys and cheese or I'll scream off your ears.

Good nommies I bring
To only your shiba,
Good nommies for Shibamas and a screaming New year.

I'll claw you until I get some,
I'll claw you until I get some,
I'll claw you until I get some and I'll scream off your ears.

Good nommies I bring
To only your shiba,
Good nommies for Shibamas and a screaming New year.

I wish you a merry Shibamas,
I wish you a merry Shibamas,
I wish you a merry Shibamas and a screaming New Year.

Good nommies I bring
To only your shiba,
Good nommies for Shibamas and a screaming New year.

I hope you enjoy the song that my mommy has been singing this evening. She made it for me, but I prefer to let her sing and embarrass herself.

Happy holidays everyone! (For those who don't have shibas, maybe if you replace the breed it will work? Oh wait! It works if you replace all the "shiba" to dog)

LANI IS MISSING!!

Cousin Lani is missing as of today at 17:30. Please help us find her.

Here is the link to the craigslist post. http://sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/pet/2738310198.html

Please spread the word and help us find Lani!

She is missing from Escondido, CA.

Lani is a wiener dog and is still a puppy. She loves squeaky toys and she will come if you have a squeaky toy.

Free ID Tags

One of mommy's friends who lives in San Diego shared this with us and told us to spread the word.

The Animal Trust Foundation is a foundation that helps animals find their forever home (or return to their warm comfy home). For people who live in the San Diego county, the foundation has a way of helping owners be reunited with their beloved pets: FREE ID tags. You can get up to 3 per household. The Animal Trust Foundation is a tax deductible non-profit organization. If you want to donate to them, there contact information is here: Contact Information.

ID tags are a quick and painless way for animals to be associated with an owner and the owner can be notified that someone has their family member.

Mommy has picked up a few dogs in the past that were just roaming the neighborhood. Luckily, all the dogs had tags, and all the owners got the message that she left. They all were happily greeted by their mommy or daddy and went back to their warm home. In all instances, no one knew that their pup had escaped.

One gentleman came home and didn't see his fluffy white dog, but did see a message on his answering machine. When he checked it, he heard that mommy had picked up his big fluffy dog on the way to taking me to the vet, and she had his dog. The big white doggy loved car rides. We were both happy with our tongues sticking out, bouncing along to the vet (the road near the vet's is very bumpy, the road takes forever to get fixed). Mommy had the vet check for a microchip, but no microchip. The fluffy dog's tag was faded, but luckily mommy was able to barely make out the phone number to call (I think she called the wrong number the first time). The big white doggy's owner came to our house that evening to pick the doggy up and boy was she happy to see him. Apparently, the gardener accidentally let her out of the yard in the morning, and she was wandering outside for a while with no water (plus it was a warm day). Mommy stopped to give her some water and while she was drinking, mommy was looking around for someone, but no one was around (so mommy opened the car door and let her hop in). The gentleman wanted to give mommy something, but mommy refused to take it. Mommy was just very happy to see someone come pick her up. Mommy even sent her home with a bag of treats that the doggy really liked. Lesson to this story: tag your pets! It's way cheaper than microchipping, and you don't need a special reader to see the information.

Tokyo, you have a bunch of friends in SD, can you help me spread the word, please?

HeadCheese!

This is Mika's mommy, borrowing Mika's blog!

I had to share: I tried headcheese for the first time today! It was deeeelicious!

I went to the local butcher shop earlier this week and bought some sausage, and something caught my attention: headcheese. I had never tried it before, but I saw Andrew Zimmern try it a bunch of times on Bizarre Foods. Now, I love "weird" foods. (I can't watch Bizarre Foods without getting hungry. That must be how Mika feels when he stares at me eat.) The thing that Andrew hates, durian, I absolutely love. I think it is the best smelling, best tasting thing in the world. It might have also helped that I grew up eating it. I love chicken feet, pig ears (not the dog chews. There is a dish that my mom makes that uses pig ears. It's kind of jelly, but at the same time crunchy, but pure yum!), cow hoof (again, not dog chew. There is a local restaurant that makes a cow hoof stew on the weekend. Yum!), and many other exotic foods.

Anyways, I finally got around to opening my package of headcheese today. I said "look Mika! It's headcheese!" Mika gave me the most confused look ever. I think he was looking for cheese, but could smell that it wasn't cheese. For those of you who don't know what headcheese is here is a link to Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_cheese I had told the kid who rung me up at the butcher's that I had never eaten it before and I asked him how do I prepare it. He said I could fry it up, or just eat it as is on top of some bread. I opted for both today. The first slice, I fried up. Now, I'm not sure if there is a trick to keeping the headcheese together while you fry it up, but mine disintegrated on me. Oh well, I dumped the headcheese on my toasted bread and chomped away. Mika was looking very intently at what I was eating. For a good reason too. The headcheese fried was delicious. It almost took on the taste of corned beef. I didn't give any to Mika because I didn't know all the exact ingredients that went in their "spice" blend. The next piece of headcheese I tried as is. Straight out of the bag onto a piece of toast. This way was also delicious! Not as much flavor as when I fried it (but when does anything have more flavor before you fry it?), but the taste of the beef tongue and other misc meats really pushed through for a delectable treat. The kid who run me up warned me about the gelatinous texture of the headcheese if it is not fried first, but you know what? It didn't bother me. It is actually less gelatinous than the pig ear dish my mom makes. The texture was like bologna but the taste was much more.

Next time, Mika. I'll let you try some. There is a zip top bag full of it in the fridge. But now, I need to save room for dinner. I'll give you some turkey when I come home, Mika. ...Stop staring at me like I just took your favorite toy away... I don't have anymore headcheese on my plate.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We're thankful for everyone of you readers and tweeters (is that how you say it?) and everyone who has supported us!

Cousin and I

Mommy, auntie, cousin, and I went for a car ride and trip yesterday. Here are some highlights:

In auntie's car, I got to sit in mommy's lap because of the lack of space.

In Pet People, I farted on mommy's foot/shoe because she wasn't paying attention to me. I was sitting on her foot, and she still didn't pay attention to me, so I let out a loud fart on her shoe to get her attention. It was "stinky" too! BOL!

Everywhere we went that night, everyone but one person knew I was a shiba. That one person thought I was a corgi, but he also didn't know too much about dogs. His friend had to explain what I was to him.

Cousin Lani got petted by lots of guys (she takes a bit longer to warm up to guys, but this time she went up to them!) At first, she was afraid of the donation bell guy, but when auntie said that cousin Lani was afraid of the bell, he stopped ringing it, and cousin Lani went right up to him! Yayy!

On the way to Petco, I gassed everyone in the car.

Cousin Lani and I were sniffing around Petco, and mommy said she can hold cousin Lani's leash. About a minute after the leash transfer, cousin Lani was sniffing around and squatted and started peeing. I stuck my nose and sniffed the pee and right away I lifted my leg and peed on mommy's leg (unbeknownst to mommy). We overwhelmed mommy!!!! Mommy was trying to stop cousin Lani from peeing inside the store so she was totally missing out on me peeing on her pant leg until she looked down and saw me with my leg lifted. By that time, cousin Lani had already finished and I was about done when she pulled my leash to move me away from her leg. Surprisingly, mommy was really calm throughout the incident (besides saying our special stop word, mommy didn't yell at us. Well, you can't say that the stop word was a yell, it was kind of a grunt? I don't know how to explain how mommy says my stop word.). We couldn't have orchestrated this any better! Cousin Lani started peeing, I sniffed and nearly at the same time as I started sniffing, lifted my leg (I learned some tactics from my old Marine family and my current Navy family: the art of working together and doing something unexpected! Truthfully, mommy should have been prepared.).

You know, I needed a way to let all the other dogs know that she was my mommy. That was the most direct way of doing it. Mommy is MINE!

I think that's all of the highlights from hanging out with cousin Lani yesterday. Cousin Lani, do you have more you can think of?

P.S. Mommy and auntie were joking about it all the way home. Mommy does have the mentality of a dog sometimes: what's past is past.. time to joke about it!

Bath Time!

Daddy came home last weekend and mommy decided that I needed a bath. I was already in the bathroom with her, so she had daddy put me in the tub (this tub is too tall for me to jump into) and give me a bath.

Before the bath, I wasn't really shedding. I was a little, but it was my normal amount. After the bath, my fur was coming out in clumps. I decided to blow my coat after the bath. Daddy jokes that the dirt I rolled around in outside was keeping my fur together, and when mommy decided I needed a bath and therefore washed out all of the dirt (the water was brown when they were rinsing me), the fur got loose and came out with the dirt.

It's now time to blow my coat. Thanks mommy for starting me out in your bathroom. =) It definitely helped me claim your bathroom as mine! The day you can remove all of my fur from the bathroom is when it is yours again! =)

Grandpa

My absolute favorite person in the world right now is... GRANDPA!!!! Mommy met up with grandpa this weekend to spend some family time with him. Grandpa gifted her his dehydrator, a batch of his home made beef jerky, AND he didn't forget about me! He also gave mommy a bag of home made doggie treats to give to me! Mommy broke into her jerky today and I tried to use shiba mind control to get some, but mommy have me grandpa's doggie treats instead. (I still prefer the jerky.. yummy beef!) The doggie treats are very nommy. Grandpa even included a home made bone shaped cookie cutter for mommy to make more home made treats for me. (Grandpa is very handy. He makes a ton of things by himself. Grandpa and daddy get along really well. Mommy's lucky. They both love to talk about building things. I wonder if they will make something together (for me!)?)

 I absolutely can't wait until mommy makes more of grandpa's beef jerky. I am going to NOM them ALLLLL!! Good luck, daddy, trying to get some from me! You're going to have to fight me for it!

Time to see if I can shiba mind control mommy to hurry up and go to the butcher's to get some fresh beef!!! ...maybe if I drool on mommy's foot....

Bison

Saturday night, daddy was home and mommy was super happy so she decided to make something special. (That and her doctor told her to eat red meat since she was something called anemic? Whatever that is, she is supposed to eat red meat.. yummmm) Mommy decided to go out and get some bison meat to make tacos. Mommy and daddy had a taco night. When mommy was cooking the bison, before she added the seasoning, she put some aside for me. I saw mommy put some rice and hot water in a bowl, then a heaping spoonful of bison, some kibble, and finally a handful of dried sardines to make my dinner. Mommy decided that it was time to celebrate that daddy was home for the weekend and she wanted me to celebrate with them. It was so yummy that I finished it in no time flat. Thank you mommy and daddy!

Missing

So Daddy has been gone since Sunday. He took a job hours and hours away from me. He said something about making more monies, but I don't get it. What does monies have to do with anything? I do like that mommy is home everyday now (rather than missing for half a week), and I get to spend more time with her, but now I'm missing one of my pack members. My pack isn't complete.

Daddy come home! I'm tired of supervising mommy running on the treadmill with my eyes closed. I like it when I was getting attention from the both of you. Although, mommy did make me good noms the day after daddy left. She made me Honest Kitchen with kibble (and she usually only gives it to me on special occasions, but I put on my saddest face ever and followed mommy around. The shiba mind control worked!).

Mommy said that daddy is supposed to come home this weekend for just the weekend, but that's too little. I command daddy to stay with me and mommy (so I can swim with daddy and play fetch with mommy. Twice the fun!). Well, I hope the monies thing is a good thing because I don't like this one bit. I better be getting something good out of daddy not being here.

Road Trip!

Mommy took me on vacation again! We went to visit her family again. The only bad thing was it was storming so hard when we were leaving that mommy had to drive suuuuuuuuuuuper slow. At least I was happy curled up in bed behind mommy's seat. At one point, I heard mommy say "Look Mika, it's snowing! Ok, not really snowing, but at least you can see the snowflakes in the sky for a little before it melts." Mommy was so excited, I don't know why. She said something about never really being in snow before.

We arrived at her family's house kind of late, but apparently earlier than Uncle TB. He came home really late. I did my shiba 500 in the house, went out back to respond to my p-mail, and finally curled up in mommy's room.

The next day, I woke up bright and early. It was still storming outside, but I love to play in the rain, so I ran around outside for a little bit before mommy called me back inside. Mommy and I relaxed at the house for the day until Uncle TB came home with a couple of friends. They played with me for a little bit. Then came DINNER!!!!! This is what I had for my dinner that night:

Kibble, rice, and baby bok choy. I ate every last bit of it, and then sat next to grandma to watch her eat. I wanted to make sure she didn't have to clean the floors if someone dropped anything. That was my way of thanking her for making the veggies for me.

The next day, mommy had an appointment, so mommy woke me up early, and had me wake up Uncle TB since he needed to drop her off. Mommy let me jump onto Uncle TB's bed and I went straight for his stinky face. It was in dire need of washing. While mommy was gone, I was at home with Uncle TB. I kept him company while he worked and studied. I made him take some breaks to liven up his routine: fetch breaks! Anyways, when everyone got home, I was waiting very patiently for my dinner:
Kibble, peking duck (without the sauce and bun), rice, and some veggies. I already knew what was for dinner because I smelled it when mommy brought it in the house!

The next day mommy got a massage, and I got a puppy massage out of it too! She got a two hand massage, and in between some of the work that was being done, I got my puppy massage. After I learned that one of mommy's friends has special hands with puppy massage, I kept going back to him for more. It was the most relaxing thing in the world! It beat mommy's puppy massage 10 folds! (Shh..! don't tell mommy I said that!) After that massage, mommy got ready and took me to her sister's house. I got to meet my brother, Pine. Pine is still a puppy, he just turned 1 in February. He was very hyper and loved to do things fast. Unfortunately, in the dog world, running up to another dog's face really fast doesn't always get you the best greeting. Pine ran up to my face and I gave him a warning growl. He paused and backed up giving me my room. As the day progressed, Pine learned from my growls that he can't just shove his face into another dog's face. By the end of the day, Pine was calm when he walked up to me and he even was able to lick my muzzle! I growled at him because I don't swing that way (but I was very proud that he was able to learn to be calm when he comes up to another dog). My name may suggest that I may be a girl, but I an 100% sure that I am a boy. Everyone was very proud of Pine that day, including myself. If a pup is willing to be taught, I will teach him. =)

Anyways, fast forward a couple of days, one night mommy was going to be home late so Uncle TB let me sleep in his room. Under his bed, there is an area to store extra bedding and comforters and stuff like that. Half of it was emptied out, and a cave was made for me. I looooooooove sleeping in there. (these pictures were taken before it was half emptied for me)

National Geographic

In the March National Geographic this year, there was a fox on the cover! That got mommy's attention and she looked inside. This is what she found (does anyone think that they mistook foxes for shibas here? =P )

Mommy Says

Mommy said to go in the box... so I did.

I like playing Mommy Says because I get lots of attention afterwards. =) (Whispers: and sometimes grandpa's home made beef jerky.)

Mommy Car Magnet

This is a magnet that all of our mommies need! My mommy found it on a truck in the local Home Depot parking lot.

Trick Dog!

Look! I'm a trick dog now!
Just kidding! Daddy put me on Uncle A's back.

Dog Show

Mommy and Auntie J went to a dog show in February. They went, of course, to cheer on the shiba. A spectator was eating some kettle corn, and this shiba knew..

Here he is licking his chops and going into the ever so nice sit:

Now here he is, in a nice square sit waiting for some popcorn that he never got...

They met a lot of different dogs and had lots of fun. Mommy thought she saw a raccoon at the show too! It turned out that it was a dog with a raccoon looking tail. Super cool!

Gopher and Rat

While mommy and I were playing chase in the back yard (I need to help mommy keep her girly figure somehow), I stopped and gave mommy a clue by sniffing a dead rat... and a gopher.

Mommy took pictures with her phone but doesn't know where the memory card reader is, so she will upload pictures later.

Anypaws, that meant chicken tonight! Yayy!

Gopher: 0
Shiba: 2

Rat count is up to 8.. two more until I get more chicken!

Gopher #3

Guess who was found in the pool today? That's right! A gopher! Chicken time!!!

Shiba: 3
Gopher: 0

Aunt J's Birthday

Happy birthday, Auntie J!

Mommy bought a cake for Auntie J, but since it was chocolate, they wouldn't let Nami and I have a bite.

Instead, mommy made us a special dinner:
-The Honest Kitchen dehydrated food (Nami got the turkey formula, and I got the beef.)
-Kibble (Orijen for me, and Canidae for Nami.)
-Freshly cut apple (from Julian. And it was the last one too. Aren't we lucky?)

Nami's bowl:


My bowl:


It smelled so yummy when mommy made the food, we kept trying to go into the kitchen while the food was rehydrating. Each time we got kicked out. =(

Shiba Playing with Water

Have you seen a shiba play with water? Mika loves water. He entertains himself by playing with the pool fill water.

Lunar New Year

Happy Lunar New Year! Well, a bit on the late side.

Mommy took me to grandma's house for Lunar New Year so I can get good New Year blessings too. Grandma made me a yummy dinner:

It's my kibble mixed with rice, baby bak choy, and carrots (the bak choy and carrots were boiled in chicken broth).

Here are some pictures of me munching on the food.



Lastly, the end result: empty bowl.

Then the day after, for breakfast, I got a slice of bread. Throughout the day grandma gave me some other goodies but don't tell mommy. She doesn't know what exactly.

Nap time

I was doing laundry and Mika decided that our sheets were a comfy spot to take a nap. I covered him with another sheet and he just zzzz...

-Mika's mommy

Training

If you train your shiba enough and are persistent with the training, you can tell him to go into a laundry basket and he won't question you.


-Mika's mommy

"Where is your chew?"

I gave Mika a pig ear today after making him do some tricks in Chinese (I'm trying to teach him Chinese so when I take him home to visit my parents, they don't have to struggle to remember the right commands in English.). So far I've taught him sit, down, go upstairs, right paw, and left paw. I still have to teach him come, but so far, he's getting it. Anyways, after I gave him the chew, he decides it would be a good idea to save it for later, so he "buried" it under his bed. I went to wash my hands then came back and his chew was gone. I sat down next to Mika and whispered "where is your chew?" (I really didn't know where his chew was.) like I was asking someone "where is the remote?". No change of tone in my voice to lead him on to what I was talking about. Mika then looked at me, walked over to where he "buried" the chew, took a corner of the bed in his mouth, pulled the bed so it folded over on itself and revealed the chew. Then he took it out and started munching on it.

He comprehends!!!! Now, I just need to talk to him more in Chinese and hopefully he'll catch onto what I'm talking about.

Nail Clipping

After having a horrible time with trying to use the PediPaws on Mika, I never tried to trim his nails again. I was afraid that he would freak out and try to run away while I was trimming. I just took him into the local pet store groomer and had them trim his dewclaws for $10. (Can you say ouch for my wallet?) I did notice at the groomers, he was real calm when they cut his nails. He just stood there and within one minute (counting getting on the table and off the table), he was ready to be picked up. This gave me hope on trying the regular nail clippers on him.

I was reading reviews about Martha Stewart's new line of dog stuff that was at Petsmart. I decided to give the nail clippers a try. I actually purchased the clippers over a month ago and took it out every once in a while to let Mika sniff it. If he licked it, I gave him a treat (one of the Zuke's mini natural PB flavor ones, real ity bity.). The whole time I was slowly working towards getting the clippers close to his paws and eventually lifting his paws and touching the metal part of the closed clippers to his nails for a few seconds. I don't think Mika had a problem with the nail clippers (because he does so well at the groomers), but just to make sure I didn't freak him out, I slowly introduced him to it.

Just on Monday, I thought, ok, he knows what this is. He is comfortable with me putting it near his paws and me lifting his paws and putting the clippers near it. So, I had him give me his left paw and I real quickly clipped a tiiny sliver off of the dewclaw. Mika just looked at me like "ok, you asked for my paw, what are you going to do next?" He had no clue that I had just clipped a little bit of his dew claw off (not getting near the quick). I dropped his paw and gave him praises and a Zuke's. At this point, someone came home, so he was really excited. I called him back over and did his other paw. This time when I finished clipping his dew claw he pulled his paw away and did some sort of celebratory "someone is home" dance to show me someone was home (he does this all the time to let me know someone is home).

No shiba screams. No pulling away while I was getting the nail in place. It was nice and easy. So nice and easy, I decided to go for a little more off of the left dew claw to make it not so sharp, and it was a success!

$15 for one of these http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=4030486 saves me $10 every couple of months. Yess!! Thank you Martha Stewart for making such a good product that my shiba isn't afraid of.