Best Toy Ever (for cats)

This is a collie blog, it features pictures and stories of, and reviews done by, collies.  But every once in a while the kitties take over, as they like to voice their opinions too.  This month the pawesome folks at Chewy.com sent us something for the kitties to review.

It's called Cat Amazing - Best Cat Toy Ever, I'm not kidding, it's a toy called the "Best Toy Ever!" With a name like that, we had to give it a try.  Our cats deserve the best, don't yours?

So it comes in a flat envelope, and there is some assembly required.  But nothing complicated, you won't need any tools for instance.  You just have to fold the cardboard pieces, which all fit together, easy peasy.

Once assembled, you toss in a few cat treats, add some curious felines, and they'll take it from there!  As you can see, my cat and my daughter's two cats, knew exactly what to do.  There was no training required, they figured it out within seconds.

So is it the Best Cat Toy Ever?  I'm not sure.  But they did enjoy it, it was easy to assemble, and it definitely helps alleviate boredom.  With the change in seasons, I have noticed the cats are more active.  Spring brings out their playful side, and has them acting like kittens again.  Which makes me glad we have this toy to entertain them.

Pumpkin thinks it's great fun, inside or outside!

If you are interested in picking up one of these Cat Amazing - Best Cat Toy Ever for your feline friend, just click on the link.  Your cat will be purring in gratitude!

Mistaken Identity

While reading through posts on a Facebook group for Smooth collies, one in particular caught my eye.  Reading the post and the comments, I found myself both laughing and shaking my head.  The author of the post was recounting a recent experience from a shopping trip with her collie.  They had stopped at one of those large pet supply stores, a well known chain store that allows you to shop for pet food, toys and treats with your best friend.  While standing at the counter, waiting to pay for her purchases, the cashier kept staring at her collie.  Finally, the cashier asked, "What kind of mixture is he?"  She explained that her "girl" was a pure bred smooth collie and a champion.  And even after explaining this to the cashier, he looked at her doubtfully and asked her if she was sure, as her dog "really looked like a mix."  

I'm a smooth collie!

The other members of the group responded in the comments by sharing their experiences, and most had similar conversations when approached by strangers.  While I understand that not everyone is going to recognize all dog breeds, I find it funny that these random strangers will argue and try to convince us we were duped!  One collie owner even commented that a worker at a local humane society told her there was no such breed as a smooth collie!

We have had our own experiences, and the most common question we are asked is "why did you shave your collie?"  We also get asked if our collies are shepherd mixes or collie/greyhound mixes?  When we explain that they are smooth collies, all the same great qualities of the rough collie but with less hair, people are amazed that they "never heard of them and how beautiful."  This is one of the reasons we attend so many AKC Meet the Breeds events, it gives us a chance to educate the public on what great dogs the collies are and how they come in two varieties and four colors.  You can learn more about collie coats by reading our previous post, just click here.

I'm a rough collie!

So we were curious, how many of our readers have had their dogs mislabeled?  Did the other person argue with you or insist you were wrong when you told them the correct name of your breed?      

The Coming of Abby, part 2

After receiving the text, the next few hours dragged by slowly.  But finally, the conference ended and I ran home to pick up my daughter and then we headed over to my sister's house to meet the new arrivals.  To say I was excited does not do justice to what I was feeling that day, we had been waiting a very long time for our girl to arrive, and she was here!  Angel had given birth to two little girls, and at this point we didn't know which one would be ours, but they were both smooth collies and both were sable and white.

Already in love, we visited as often as we could, probably more than we were welcome!  But we couldn't stay away, one of these two sweet,beautiful sisters would be ours and we didn't want to miss a thing.  Collie puppies, like most dogs, grow very quickly.  They start out blind and deaf, and so very tiny.  When they are about a week and a half old, their eyes open, they start to hear, and their personalities begin to develop.

They grow and change so rapidly, the expression "if you blink, you'll miss it" could definitely be applied to puppies.  Puppyhood passes by in just months, unlike our own childhoods which last years.  So we took lots of pictures and watched the puppies grow and change.  The two sisters were named Abby and CC, and as the title of the post implies, Abby was to become ours.

Duck, duck, goose!

This time of year, with the warmer Spring weather, we want to be outside as much as possible.  So when Chewy.com sent us another product to review, we had to head outdoors.  We were sent a package of Stella & Chewy's Superblends, Meal Mixers in the Duck, Duck, Goose variety.

The Stella & Chewy's Meal Mixers are a freeze-dried kibble topper that enables us to add some extra tasty, nutrition to our collies' meals.  Because it is made with freeze-dried raw meat and nutrient-rich superfoods, you could also feed the Meal Mixers as a complete dinner.  Stella & Chewy only use 100% certified organic fruits and veggies, along with cage-free poultry. Their meat is hormone and antibiotic free, so you can feel confident that you are feeding your dogs a safe and healthy food.   

Since it was a nice Spring day, we headed to the park for a game of duck, duck, collie, collie, Goose!

Check out the Key Benefits:

• Easy way to add real raw nutrition and superfoods to any diet. Each bag comes with a scoop!
• Made in Stella & Chewy's own USA kitchen with cage-free poultry and 100% organic-certified fruits and vegetables, including superfoods blueberries, strawberries, and bananas.
• Never contains grains, gluten, fillers, artificial preservatives, or colorings.
• Enhanced with probiotics to aid in healthy digestion, which is perfect for pets with sensitive stomachs.
• Pet parents and vets report raw feeding supports an improved appetite, digestion, immune system, teeth and gum health, skin and coat, and can help relieve allergies.

I love that Stella & Chewy give us an easy way to add the benefits of a raw diet to our collies meals!   We love this product so much, we actually bought other varieties, and the collies love them all! You can actually see the fruits and veggies in each scoop!

Ingredients:

1. Duck With Ground Bone, Turkey, Turkey Liver, Goose, Turkey Gizzard, Organic Bananas, Organic Wild Blueberries, Organic Strawberries, Pumpkin Seed, Potassium Chloride, Organic Cranberries, Organic Spinach, Organic Broccoli, Organic Beets, Sodium Phosphate Monobasic, Organic Carrots, Organic Squash, Organic Apples, Choline Chloride, Dried Pediococcus Acidilactici Fermentation Product, Dried Lactobacillus Acidophilus Fermentation Product, Dried Bifidobacterium Longum Fermentation Product, Tocopherols (Preservative), Calcium Carbonate, Zinc Proteinate, Zinc Sulfate, Iron Sulfate, Iron Proteinate, Vitamin E Supplement, Niacin, Copper Sulfate, Copper Proteinate, Manganese Sulfate, Sodium Selenite, Manganese Proteinate, Thiamin Mononitrate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Folic Acid, Calcium Iodate, Vitamin B12 Supplement.

• Duck, turkey, goose 
• Organic superfoods like blueberries, bananas and strawberries
• Organic Squash, spinach, carrots, broccoli,cranberries and apples!

This food ensures our dogs are eating a healthier diet than we do!  Which is a good thing, as they love to help out.  Ryder in particular loves to help with the Spring gardening, and Stella & Chewy's Superblends give him the energy he needs to accomplish all his hard work!

If you haven't tried Stella & Chewy's yet, we highly recommend it.  The collies love the taste so much, they start drooling as soon as they see me adding it to their dinner.  We were sent a free bag in exchange for our honest opinion, and we only review products we feel safe giving our own collies.  So head over to Chewy.com and check out all the different Stella & Chewy's products they carry.  Your dogs will thank you!

(We apologize for the delay in posting this review, we were offline for a couple weeks.)

Wordless Wednesday - Collies in Springtime

Spring is here, and that means people and their dogs will be getting ready to travel!

 Some will travel to distant locations.

 And some will stick closer to home.

 But we are sure that you will discover pretty spots, and hope that everyone has fun!

We will stick closer to home, but plan on exploring many of the beautiful sites here in New England, with our collies by our side!

Flowers for Dory

We have participated in the Blogville Holiday gift exchange 3 times.  And each time we have been paired with a blog we had never read before.  Through the gift exchange we have met some wonderful new Blogville friends.  The second time we joined, we were paired up with Dory and her family.  We had never read their blog before, but we have been following them ever since.  Sadly, after taking a blogging break, we returned to discover that little Dory had passed away.  I am not sure what happened, but we share in her family's, as well as the pet blogging community's, heartbreak over the loss of little Dory.  She was a cheerful, happy little dog, who posed for pictures with lovely flowers every Friday and made us all smile.

Today, we are joining the "Flowers for Dory" bloghop, hopefully all these beautiful flowers, scattered all over Blogville, will make Dory's Mom smile.

Also, if you read our post yesterday, you would have seen that we are trying something new.  We share pictures and reviews with you all, but I wanted to share what made each of our collies so unique and special to us.  But I didn't want it to be just another post, on just another blog.  So I decided to write their stories, and see where the posts take us.  So please let us know if you enjoy reading our stories, chapter one begins here.

The coming of Abby - Chapter 1, part 1

The facility was elegant with beautiful grounds.  The front was expertly landscaped, with fall flowers and decorative shrubs, the rear of the building overlooked the ocean with a narrow stretch of beach.  Inside the banquet facility the crystal chandeliers sparkled and the linens were draped expertly over the tables.  The buffet was set up with fresh fruit, croissants, assorted pastries, coffee and juice.  The conference was scheduled to begin at 8:30 AM, and I had arrived early.  I wandered around the room, choosing my table and greeting my fellow attendees.

As the day progressed, I glanced at my cell phone too many times to count.  I was anxiously waiting for news from my sister, waiting to see if "she" had arrived.  I knew my sister's collie had gone into labor, and we had been promised a puppy from the litter.  If there was a little girl, and if she was show quality, she would be ours.  As a child, I had fallen in love with collies by watching the old Lassie movies which were broadcast on Sunday afternoons, and by the fictional stories written by Albert Payson Terhune.  I shared this love with my Uncle, who raised and bred collies and who had given my sister her first collie.  And now a special collie was about to enter my life, at least that was my hope, as I waited for a text from my sister.

With the arrival of her first collie puppy, my sister fell in love with this remarkable breed, and caught the dog show bug.  As she began entering shows, she found a mentor, and learned as much as she could about collies, their standard and their history.  And when she was ready, she began a breeding program of her own.  She experienced a great deal of success and with her encouragement my daughter began competing at dog shows as well.  Before long, a collie we named Lad, finally joined our family.  We raised him, loved him, trained him, and finally started entering him at dog shows.  We were mentored by a few experienced collie breeders, and I read every book and article about collies that I could find.  We were hooked, and now we were waiting for the arrival of our new collie pup, a little female this time. 

My daughter with Lad, 6 weeks old

As I sat listening to the different speakers at the conference, my mind kept wandering back to the puppy.  Would there be a female in the litter?  What color would she be?  Would she be a rough or a smooth coated collie?  Would she be as beautiful as we hoped?  It was very hard to focus on the speakers as they discussed various healthcare topics and how to code for different diseases.  And then it happened, a text from my sister! 

  

Wordless Wednesday - Our Winter in Spring

We think she is prettier than any Spring flower!

A dog treat with heart and soul!

Maizie here, Happy Easter everyone!  While Mom is relaxing after Easter dinner, I thought I would sneak jump on the collie blog and share our latest review.  Now if you are a long time reader of our blog, then you know we do reviews for our besties over at Chewy.com.  They send us new stuff to try, and we write a post to tell all of you what we think.  We are not given any of those green papers for doing these reviews, it's impawtant that you know these opinions are completely our own, honest to goodness, cross our paws!

So what am I reviewing today?  Good question!  Today I want to tell you all about Chicken Soup For The Soul Savory Snacks.  Our Mom received a bag of these treats from Natalie at Chewy.com, so she put it in our Easter Basket!  Chicken Soup for the Soul, doesn't that sound yummy and comforting?  Well, I am here to tell you that these treats sure are delish!  We tried the lamb variety, but they have chicken and beef too.  Being collies, we have a special relationship with sheep, and it is Easter, so of course our Mom chose lamb!  BOL!

So, I bet you are wondering what makes these treats so great?  Well, they are soft and chewy, smell really good and they are obviously made with love, as each treat is heart shaped!  Check out the key benefits:

• All-natural dog treats made with real lamb as the first ingredient, so you know your pup is getting the best
• Heart-shaped treats let you bond with your pup over a delicious snack
• Full-flavored, soft and meaty bites that you can share with every furry friend in your family
• Free of any corn, wheat, soy, or by-products
• No artificial colors, flavors or preservatives

How about the nutritional info?  I had to check with my Mom on the ingredient list, and she said that while it wasn't a treat with limited ingredients, she liked that Lamb was the main ingredient.

Ingredients:
Lamb, Brown Rice, Oat Groats, Cane Molasses, Chicken Meal, Potato Starch, Glycerin, Water Sufficient For Processing, Poultry Fat (Preserved With Mixed Tocopherols), Pork Gelatin, Citric Acid (A Preservative), Natural Flavor, Brewers Dried Yeast, Monoglycerides, Salt, Natural Smoke Flavor, Potassium Sorbate (A Preservative), Caramel Color, Parsley, Mixed Tocopherols (A Preservative), Rosemary Extract.

I personally think that these treats will be a big hit with your dogs, I sure enjoyed them!  And my baby sister, Winter, really loved them too, they were just the right size for her smaller puppy teeth.  And with the great prices at Chewy.com, you can get a bag or two for your best friends too!  All you have to do is click right here!

Thanks Maizie for letting me do the review with you!  

These treats are puppy approved - by Winter

It's Springtime, and the collies are ready to do a Primal Food review!

We had to take a blogging break last month, so the collies are a little late posting our reviews, but that just means they get to try multiple new products this month!  The collies are always happy to do reviews for our wonderful friends at Chewy.com, and the first is a product from a company we love and trust.

We were sent a package of Primal Beef Liver Munchies dog treats.  These freeze-dried dog treats are human-grade, and made with high quality ingredients.  The beef is raised in the United States without antibiotics or added hormones.  And the only ingredient in Primal Beef Liver Munchies is "beef liver," so there are no harmful chemicals or preservatives in these treats.   

And with only one ingredient, these treats are safe for dogs of all ages!  Our puppies loved them, and so did our adults, they are a perfect reward when training for dog shows or teaching a new puppy some fun tricks.  We love that Primal doesn't add any sugar to their treats, so we don't have to worry about expanding our collies waistlines.  

Check out these Key Benefits:

• Human-grade treats for both dogs and cats are crunchy and have an irresistible flavor
• Made with a single source protein and without preservatives, added salt, or added sugar, they are the kind of snack dogs and cats can rally behind
• Produced using beef raised in the United States for a high protein and healthy delicacy
• Treats get their concentrated meaty flavor and high-density nourishment from the low-temperature freeze-drying technique
• As a single source protein, Beef Liver Munchies offer a healthy snack for cats and a nutritious training and obedience reward for dogs

And Chewy.com has these treats at a great price, and many different varieties, so the collies all think you should click on this link and check out Primal Treats today!  (CLICK ME) 

The collies received these goodies free of charge from Chewy.com in exchange for their honest review.

The joy of owning a collie

i wrote this a while back, back when Lad was still a puppy...i thought it was appropriate to share it on his birthday... Last night was my first experience attending puppy kindergarten with our collie puppy.  His name is Lad and he is a sixteen week old bundle of energy.  He is very intelligent and very beautiful.  He was given to my daughter and I by my sister who breeds collies.  Her collies are show dogs, bred for their beauty, intelligence and spirit.

Lad is an unusual puppy in that he loves to watch TV.  Not just any television program will do for this puppy, he is discriminating in his choice of television programs.  He only enjoys Animal Planet's television show "Animal Cops".  When that show is on he stares at the screen, his little head tilting right and left trying to decipher what is happening to the dogs on the show.  He doesn't pay any attention when the show covers other animals, only dogs will do for this puppy.  On one episode last week a puppy was in distress and crying.  Lad ran up to the screen and placed both paws on the entertainment center and began barking furiously.  I think he believed he was looking out a window at this poor puppy who he believed was being harmed.

Back to puppy kindergarten though, it was bad.  No, more correctly, Lad was bad.  My daughter said to me, “why else do you think his name rhymes with bad?"  All week we had worked with him on the first assignment for class.  We got him to look at us when we called his name.  We taught him to look deeply into our eyes when we gave him the command "look".  We taught him to stand when given the command "stand".  We were so proud of his accomplishments.  If he had something that didn't belong to him we taught him to immediately release the item when we gave him the command "drop it".  We were working on teaching him to enter his crate when told "Lad, in your crate".  We had almost met success in our attempt to teach him "come".  He was fully housebroken by fourteen weeks.

Yes, we were proud, never had there been such a smart puppy!  What is the saying,” Pride goeth before the fall"?  We brought him to class, greatly anticipating his demonstration of his newly learned skills.  We were confidant in our belief that he would outshine all the other puppies with his remarkable intelligence.  Lad chose instead to pretend that he didn't know us.

I am serious, when presented with a room full of adorable puppies he developed a strong case of amnesia.  He couldn't remember a single command.  All he did was bark his high pitched puppy bark at every puppy in the room.  This was his way of inviting them to come play with him.  No one could even hear the instructors as they gamely tried to give the lesson.  There was nothing I could do to silence him in his excitement of being around the other puppies.

I felt like an embarrassed mother whose toddler has just thrown himself on the floor in a temper tantrum of monumental proportion.  Everyone was looking at my formerly angelic puppy and laughing.  It didn't help that all the other puppies were sitting and quietly looking at their owners, perfectly behaved.  Doing just what they should have been doing, but not Lad.  I missed most of what the instructors said during the lesson last night.  It took all of my concentration to try and quiet my over-excited puppy.

Then it was time for puppy play-time.  This is the part of the class where all the puppies get to run free and play with each other.  I prayed that this would cure Lad of his earlier misbehavior.  I told myself that now he would be able to work off his eager, almost obsessive need to play with these other puppies.  That after playtime was over he would return to his normal self and actually act as if he knew me and the few commands he had been taught.

That isn't what happened.  Instead Lad picked out a particularly cute little golden retriever puppy as his
 "playmate".  He then proceeded to mount this male puppy during the entire playtime.  Wherever this puppy ran, Lad was right behind him, and I mean right behind him.  He gave the poor thing no relief from his excited and unwanted affections.  The instructors told us not to separate the puppies during their playtime.  That it was just normal puppy excitement and if one puppy had enough attention from another puppy he would let the puppy know it.

So instead I stood there, what could I do?  "Is your puppy a male too?" I was asked.  "Yes, he sure likes your puppy.” I replied, face as red as possible.  "What kind of dog is he" asked the owners of the perfectly behaved Golden retriever puppy.  "He is a smooth collie."

Once playtime was over we again formed a circle around them.  The instructors once again began to give the night's lesson.  Lad again began his noisy barking.  In a last effort to be heard the instructor turned to me, "can you please turn your puppy around so he faces you and try to get his attention?"  I immediately turned Lad around and positioned him so that his back was to all the other puppies.  This began a wrestling match between he and I.  Me holding him in a sitting position facing me, him trying to wiggle around so he could view the other puppies.  Every time he opened his mouth to bark I quickly gave him another cookie, desperate in my hope that with a full mouth he would have to be quiet.

Class soon ended, but to me it seemed the last ten minutes were the longest of my life!  I heard the parting instructions, "be sure to bring your puppies favorite toys next week, we are going to teach them to share!"  Oh, wonderful, I think to myself, that should be fun!

We get home and exhausted I collapse on the couch.  Still having the cookies used as bait for Lad, I called him over to me.  He, of course, came running just as we had worked on.  "Lad, stand!", he of course stood perfectly still. "Lad, Look!", Lad of course looked adoringly into my eyes.

Ah, the joys of owning a collie!

Where we've been...

Hi everyone!  Sorry we disappeared for a little while, we've been a bit busy, and our next post will explain why.  But we have two reviews to share with you, about two awesome products from Chewy.com, and some other posts we have been working on...so stay tuned!