vets, meds, and baths

so, there is this nice place down the street that mister damien and lady jami like to take me to that they call a veterinarian. i really enjoy it there because they always give me treats and everyone loves me! daddy takes me every week and puts me on a scale so they can tell how much i grow, check out my chart! sometimes when we go i meet a nice lady called dr. shane. she checks my eyes and my ears and then they take me away and pinch me. mister damien says that the pinch is a shot, and that it helps me get big and strong. dr. shane asked daddy and mommy to give me medicine because i had an upset tummy. so every morning and every night they give me my medicine, it tastes so good!

we have also been working on 'hygiene'. i don't really know what that means, but mister damien and lady jami do a number of different things to me for it. first, when i get really dirty they throw me in this large tub and splash water all over me. then they cover me in this smelly goo and then wash it off, it smells so girly! after that they attack me with a couple of large pieces of cloth called towels. mister damien also has to pour this tingly water in my ears sometimes for this hygiene, as well as cut my nails. this week i went to the groomer for the first time, i guess they are considered professionals with the hygiene... they did all of the things mister damien and jami do, but they did them faster and better. when daddy came to pick me up i was wearing a bandana around my neck, it was so embarassing!

click here for more:

http://picasaweb.google.com/fischer.damien/VetsMedsAndBaths#

home schooling

every morning mister damien wakes up with me and he says we are going 'outside'. we run out the door and into the magic room that makes my legs wobbly, the door closes automatically and then when it opens we are in a new place! then we turn out of the magic room and jump up into a little park where i 'go potty'. i have been learning my way through the building we live in, so i run mister damien through the doors and back to the magic room when we are finished.

i know what is coming next, i love eating breakfast! before daddy feeds me we practice my tricks. i am really good at my 'sit' and i am getting better at 'down'. i get really excited when i hear daddy preparing my food, sometimes i even run into the kitchen and let him know i am hungry. lately we have been playing a game when i eat; mister damien and lady jami will take my food into another room and tell me to 'come', then i run through the house searching for them. it has really helped me learn faster...

after i eat my breakfast i drink some water while daddy and mommy drink their coffee, and then we get to go outside to the big park and play. lady jami always has treats in her pocket, and when we are outside we mix in some learning with playing. 'fetch' is really fun, but i don't quite understand 'give' yet. when mommy or daddy point their palm at me and say 'stay' i know i am not supposed to go anywhere, but i get worried when they move too far away!

when we get back out of the magic room i run down the hallway so fast that my collar pulls on my neck and sometimes i pull so hard that i choke. i am starting to realize that if i stay by mister damien's leg and walk at his pace i don't feel any pressure on my throat. by this time i am really tired and i love to take a nap in my bed while daddy taps on his machine in the den. sometimes mister damien and lady jami both need to leave, and when they do i have to 'a su lugar'. i guess that is spanish for 'go to your place', which means i need to go in my crate for awhile.

even though we work really hard together, it's not all about training... if you would like to see more picture of me training hard and playing harder, check these out!

http://picasaweb.google.com/fischer.damien/HomeSchooling#

new friends

today i want to tell everyone about the new friends that i have made. the first other dog i met was riley, she is a schnauzer that lives down the street in playa vista. she is so quick and agile i have a hard time keeping up with her. it was really fun because we are about the same size, but i have been growing so fast that i will doubt that will last very long...

lady jami brought me to work with her and i got to meet my first child! at first i didn't know if little lauren was another puppy or if she was a little person. when she started talking to her mommy lucy it was obvious that she was a little girl. i liked her so much, we were friends right away! lauren kept smiling and hugging me, so i gave her lots of kisses. hopefully lauren and i will get a chance to hang out again soon.

next i met an entire group of new friends when we went down to san clemente for thanksgiving. mister damien brought me to his friend kristy's where i got to play with a giant golden doodle named thatcher, a wise old golden retriever named jenson and a little girl named chloe. we played in the cul de sac for awhile and then thatcher and i went and played in kristy's new house. thatcher and i had a lot of fun, but after awhile i think he was more interested with his blue rubber ball than me. much to my suprise he jumped into daddy's car when we were leaving and tried to come home with us!

later that night i finally got to meet lola, she belongs to mister damien's friends grace and mar. lola was really energetic but it was so late and i had such a long day that all i wanted to do was nap. i was really bummed about that because she was the first dog i ever smelled! it seems she spent the night at my home a couple of weeks before i came to live here, i knew i recognized her right away! mommy and daddy said they would take me out to meet with lola and her parents soon. i cannot wait!

my most recent friend is an apricot labradoodle that is called kingston. mister damien recognized him while i was playing in the park in front of the house so kingston's mom brought him over. he was so gentle with me, we had a blast rolling around in the grass! lady jami got back from running errands while we were playing and she was so excited she ran out of the car with a camera to take pictures... i can't wait to grow up so that i am big like kingston, then i will be more of a match!

come look at more pictures of my new friends!

http://picasaweb.google.com/fischer.damien/HelixSNewFriends?authkey=NCQ7KSIF1EQ#

thanksgiving!

mister damien and lady jami were bustling about very early this morning, and i knew we were heading out on a journey when they started packing my backpack. they threw a couple of my favorite toys, my food and my medicine into the pack and then we trotted out to the elevator and into the escape. i love driving! i curled up at mommy's feet and we were on our way. mommy and daddy bickered for a minute about some sounds the car makes, mommy wanted to listen to 'jingles' and daddy kept refusing to let her. i knew mommy won when she smiled and started singing "all i want for christmas".


we drove south on the infamous 405 freeway until daddy got angry about the sea of red lights in front of him. we got off of this freeway and drove on a really pretty street they called the PCH. this was really fun because they pulled the glass off the side of the car and i could smell everything we were driving past! i could smell the sand and salt so i had a feeling we were close to a beach like the one i was at a couple days ago.


we stopped in front of a pretty house with two blue cars in front, daddy and mommy jumped out of the escape and said hi to a giant man named pete. daddy said pete is his stepdad, does that mean they walk up him? they had a nice front yard with thick green grass and these really fun wood chips! sitting in the middle was this big yellow thing that smelled so tasty, i had to discover what it was... first i crept up on it and took a big sniff. the smell was so strong that i jumped back. what is this thing? i barked at it and it didn't even move, then i jumped on it and it started rolling down the yard. are you alive? finally i got the courage to walk back up to the yellow thing and take a bite. when i broke through the skin it tasted sweet and bitter. mommy and daddy were watching me and that is when they said "it's a lemon little helix, do you like it?!" i kept licking myself and i could only taste that lemon, wow, it tasted so strong!


then the giant man pete invited us into his home and i started another adventure. a pretty lady they called g-ma was holding a big dog on a rope. this was the first time that i met a german shepherd dog, her name is maya and she belongs to g-ma and pete. maya really loves mister damien so i think she decided i was ok as well. while i was playing with maya i could hear another big dog in the house, he sounded very protective. g-ma and pete said that this dog, deimus, was all talk and no bite but mister damien and lady jami were a bit worried about him so i didn't meet him today. there was so much to explore and smell in the house that i quickly forgot about the other dog. after we discovered everything in the house, g-ma let me out into a big park that they called the back yard. my new friend maya the german shepherd dog followed me out and we ran around the park for a while. after that i was so tired that i was falling asleep on the cool tile in g-ma's kitchen. mommy walked up with my blue bed and i was so excited that i crawled in and took a long nap.


we had one last adventure to go on today... daddy and mommy loaded me back in to the escape and we drove back to the beach. we made a pit stop at a nice place called kalani's where mommy got her coffee. when they let me out of the car we were at another park with a pretty view of the ocean. i ran around with my orange toy and smelled everything! mister damien and lady jami got some treats and we started working on my tricks. i am learning 'come', 'sit', 'down' and 'fetch'. i am not very good yet but daddy said i am still young and i am progressing well.

if you want to visit with us more on thanksgiving go here:


http://picasaweb.google.com/fischer.damien/HelixFirstThanksgiving112708To112908#

day at the beach

mister damien took me on a car ride today and we picked jady jami up from work. i was so excited to see her that i fell off the seat onto the floor!


jami was excited because it was so pretty out and they had decided to take me to a place they called beach. the beach was most excellent, mom and dad said we are lucky to have a beach that is kept clean so we could play on it. daddy brought one of my favoritest toys so we could fetch. mom was carrying the flashy thing that captures our adventures. the sand was so warm, i kept digging my nose in it. i was really hungry so i decided to try the sand out. it was pretty good, but it seemed daddy wasn't happy with me eating it. he scooped me up and held me upside down to get the sand out of my face!

here are a few more pictures of us at the beach:
http://picasaweb.google.com/fischer.damien/DayAtTheBeach#

a couple of firsts

so today the nice lady at the manor set me out on my first journey; we went to the airport in my crate and i hopped on the 9am to 'lax'. the flight was a little rocky and i think i messed my crate, it was pretty scary! once i got to 'lax' some men said they had to process me and transfer me to a cargo area. i knew i was almost at my new home and i was so excited!

here's a picture of me when I arrived! lady jami, i have decided to call her 'mommy', put my new collar on and we went for a stroll in the grass outside the pickup area. mister damien took the afternoon away from work to get me, so we went to get smoothies with jami before she had to go back to work. it seems mommy and daddy, i decided mister damien was 'daddy', were as excited to see me as i was to see them. we had a couple photo shoots during the evening, and then this thing called jetlag caught me... i zonked out near a leg and next thing i knew it was morning and i was waking up in my cozy crate.

the day after we met my new parents took me to meet a really nice lady named dr. karen shane, she is going to be my new vet. it's her job to give my parents and i tips on how to help me grow

up to be happy and healthy. while we were waiting they gave me this really tasty stick thingy, yum! i couldn't keep my paws off of it, i think i chewed the whole thing up right there in the office. after dr. shane checked me out one of her helpers put some stuff in one of my ears and then gave me some yucky tasting medicine stuff. after that mommy and daddy took me home and we hung out for the rest of the day.

i woke myself up crying! i missed my brothers and sisters and i was having nightmares about the airplane, i felt bad for keeping mommy and daddy up all night... i am going to try and sleep better tonight.

go over here to see some pictures of our first days together: http://picasaweb.google.com/fischer.damien/HelixThePup#

from the start

im a chocolate australian labradoodle and this is my story:

i started life known only as 'new puppy'. mom gave birth to me and my 8 brothers and sisters on the 17th of september. here is a picture of us before we could even open our eyes, it was quite a struggle competing with all of them for food everyday!

see that little guy front and center, between the 2 white puppies, that's me!

the first 9 weeks of my life flew by. we kept mom up all the time, and the humans that took care of me were so kind. they said we were at manor lakes somewhere in the state of washington.

when i was 8 weeks old i found out who my new adopted parents were, damien and jami. i heard i was very lucky because they live in a place people called so-cal. they said there was something called the sun there, i cant wait to meet it.

on november 21st my life was totally changed, i boarded an airplane in tacoma and headed out to 'lax'.

if you want so see more of the family album, check us out!
http://picasaweb.google.com/fischer.damien/HelixFamilyPhotos#