rideys with baxter: no no, thank You!

Hello! It's me, Baxter, your roving rover reporter, reporting to you again from the Wiener Dog Festival while my mom is still scratchy scratchy.  As hard as it is for me to believe, here at the Wiener Dog Festival, I learned that some doxies do not like their tushies sniffed.

And some doxies, well they do not even like their brother's tushie to be sniffed. Even when you have his brother's permission.

Lucky for me, mom provided enough of a distraction that I could get the data I needed, and I even figured out a better way to collect it!

So with my newly invented stink trail survey technique, not only could I do my research in secret, but it also went a lot faster.





In fact, it was so fast, I even had time to share a little stink of my own, and I was in the perfect place where it could be enjoyed by all.

In my next post I will tell you about my very special new friend Emil, and a few more interesting from the Wiener Dog Roast .  This is Baxter your roving rover reporter,  wishing you a Foofieriffic Friday! :)

sunny delight :)

hee hee, okay so maybe tomorrow i will tell you more about my visit to the wiener dog festival cuz here in the nice warm sun i am falling asleeee........... :)

scenes from a pumpkin patch

A wiener dog festival full of happy distractions is hardly the best place to get two little punkins like Baxter and his friend Lulu to cooperate in posing for pictures, but luckily, sometimes all you need is a little kibble to make the perfect recipe for cheese. :)

wiener dog festival 2012

dear diary,
after all the fun i had yesterday, i am pretty certain that the best way to spend a sunday afternoon is at wiener dog festival in the company of friends, especially if they are new friends with moms sitting on the ground whose pockets are full of snackies, or new friends who stink but stink in a way that says, please smell me more, and your new friends actually let you. even if u never did get their names.

yesterday at the festival was also swell because  i got to catch up with old friends, like cricket n pepper, who i did not get to see or smell for very long because,  boo hoo,  they had to leave early and, well, i got there late, and like jewel and quintin, whom i had never really met before but i felt like i met them because i got to model their duds.  quintin and i caught up on everything stink and snackie related...

 
while jewel had a fine time with a nice tummy rub from my dad.

i also met up with my friend lulu, which i can tell you more about tomorrow because with first my uncle skritchy being in town and then with all the fun i had at the festival and all, i sorta forgot about doing my calculus homework til now and apparently i am going to need the toes on all my paws to help with some of the problems teacher assigned us.  so for now i must bid you a fond..

toodleydoo!
b :)

wiener dog festival 2010

Hey, it's me, Baxter, your roving rover reporter reporting to you again today from the wienerdog festival. The weather here is really nice and you know what that means, tons of doxies and their humans showed up! Now, any self respecting doxie knows that there are three things every dog should do at gatherings like this.













1) Smell butts - lots and lots of butts!












2) Ignore everybody who wants to pet you and search the floor for delicious dropped edibles!











3) Bark your head off! Yeah, that was me between barks.








Now accomplishing all three tasks effectively doesn't always leave a lot of time for other things, but if you're super efficient, there are plenty of other things you can do to keep your human happy at the festival. Like parade them around in the costume contest (this year a skunk dog won but there were so many cute costumes I am sure it was hard to choose), take them thru an obstacle course(hardly anybody wanted to go thru the tunnel, can u believe it??), and let them watch you bob for hot dogs! Yep, that's right, hot dogs! I kinda missed that part on account of my overindulging on step 3 a little bit too much, but I heard it was really fun and tasty too! And oh yeah, there's best trick, and longest doxie, and oldest doxie, and doxie who traveled the farthest to get there, and all sorts of stuff. And even raffle baskets - that's where the duds my mom donated, boy with the dragon tattoo and mission missoni, ended up. Mom was so busy chit chatting and not taking pictures that she didn't get to see who won the baskets, but she sure hopes the lucky winners find a happy hound who can wear them!

Now the best part about having been to this festival before is that u can catch up with old buddies and make new ones! Like my neighbor buddy Pretzel, who had lots of fun with the obstacle course, and little Zelda, so much bigger now and so cute in her crayon costume that her mom made her! Zelda almost won musical sit but she was runner up, which is still pretty good in my book, especially with all the commotion goin on. And of course I met up with Cricket n Pepper (ha, mom only got a fuzzy picture of half of that fun pair, and she blames it on me for the barkin!), and Lily and Marshall. And there met up with new buddies Caesar n pumpkin dog (I don't remember her name but her butt smelled wonderful!) and a little blue that I thought might be Charlie but u know the harness was pink so maaaybe not now that I think of it. And tons of other fun doxies and their humans - so many I sorta lost track but I was so glad to meet each and every one of them!



Whew. Well believe it or not I was super tuckered out from the festival, so if you're looking for a good way to tire out your own little wiener dog, I'd say this is totally one super fun way to do it. This is Baxter your roving rover reporter, hoping to see you at your next wiener dog festival! :)

all aboard

Well, hello, it's me, Baxter, your roving rover reporter reporting to you today from the wiener dog festival! Yeah, so why is this train behind me? Well, funny thing about that wiener festival. You see I was feelin kinda barky, and apparently my mom felt I needed a little quiet time so we walked around for a bit and found this really cool train!

But don't u worry, tomorrow I will tell u all about the festival and all the fun buddies I met there - well, the parts I was there for, cuz besides visiting this train, we wandered around and found a really cool vintage clothing store. For humans, though. Too bad, cuz I was really thinkin I could use a leisure suit, cuz I'm such a dog of leisure, you know?

Well, anyways I hope you had a super duper weekend like I did! This is Baxter your roving rover reporter, hope you choo choo chooose to visit me again tomorrow!

tiny adventurer

Even though Baxter loves the company of his buddies, he seems equally content to follow his nose wherever it may take him. While we played hooky from the wiener festival, his wiggling wandering nose took us here, to a wonderful little garden graced by the presence of its mosaic mistress. Another fine lap discovered and conquered by Baxter the Explorer.

chillapalooza 2009

dear diary,
just when i thought i couldn't have more fun this weekend, i had even more! mom and dad bundled me up and we all went to another wiener festival. The best part about this one is that i got to see lot of my buddies - from yesterday and from like forever ago. i butt sniffed my good friends zelda and marshall and cricket and pepper and carlos and wilhelm and brownie. i even ran into cody, a little fella i met a long time ago when he was only a pup but now he's much bigger cuz that was like almost two years ago. even big pepper the 32 pound wirehair was there, though i forgot who he was and i barked at him again - oopsie!

as you might expect, marshall's mom did a great job with the festival and there were all sorts of fun events like bobbing for hot dogs, obstacle course, costume contest, limbo contest, longest/oldest/shortest/best trick/came from farthest away doxie, and of course the raffle baskets that included the harnesses that mom donated. thank goodness i didn't have to model them again. i would have shown you more pictures of everything but you see it was overcast and i was so excited about everything that mom couldn't keep the camera very still to compensate for the extra shutter time and well, a lot of the pictures turned out like we were in the middle of an earthquake. plus me and mom kinda played hooky for part of the festival cuz there were these german shepherds that lurked about and i wasn't happy about that at all. so we wandered around town for a bit and peeked into a fabric store (oh bother, it was closed!). we had fun wandering but we missed out on some of the hot dog bobbing action cuz of our secret trip.

so anyways, here are some pictures that did turn out. i really liked the fella in the skunk costume. he was only 5 months old. i think he was a little overwhelmed with all the attention but he handled himself pretty well considering. that's him standing between his dad's legs. the ten year old gal in the bumblee costume is ann and she is up for adoption. doesn't she have a sweet face? zelda is in the pumpkin hoodie and that there fella in the pirate costume won the costume contest.



now some doxies that showed up didn't even need events be entertained. this nicely dressed fella here had himself a ball just digging a hole. i am pretty sure he could have dome that for hours, just like i could hunt. later on his dad put doggles on him and he looked very rico suave and can u believe didn't mind wearing those goggles one bit? my buddy little pepper was really funny, too, cuz i think she was havin fun chasin pigeons that were as big as she was!

so what can i say, dear diary, except i am one pooped wiener dog. i think i'll spend most of today sleepin in dad's lap, even if it's gonna be sunny out.

toodles!
b.

love is a battlefield

I sometimes wonder what Baxter thinks of all my picture taking. Most of the time, he's pretty easy and goes along with the plan, letting me snap away and even throwing an occasional Tyra glance my way to sweeten the results. Most of the time, I found out, unless he is at a civil war battlefield.

Acres and acres of open land and the scent of freshly mown hay captivated Baxter's senses while we roamed the battlefield park after our time at the doxie festival. Where soldiers once fought, now a little wiener dog happily trundled with nose glued to the ground in search of bunnies.

With so much to smell and so little time to do it in, Baxter threw me a Tyra only once, by the gigantic statue of Stonewall Jackson. Enough, he hoped, to get mom off his back so he could get on with the hunt.

mid-atlantic doxie fest: epilogue

New experiences are always an interesting test for our little kielbasa. Baxter had never been in a wiener dog race before, and we were tempted to see how he would do at this festival's race. Surrounded by fellow doxies, we knew he would be at his bravest, but the enclosed starting box for the wiener dog races could prove to be a sticking point. Would Baxter mind being crammed into a wooden box by a stranger, or would the experience ruin his otherwise happy day? We figured it was best not to find out, and instead, watched the races by the sidelines.

Luckily, a break in the racing schedule gave us the perfect opportunity to let Baxter have his fun. Go, Speed Racer, go!

Later in the day Baxter's nose also ferreted out some irresistible smells that lured him away from snarfable floor food and the company of his fellow wieners. The seductive smell of rabbits called him to this deserted part of the fairgrounds where he patiently waited for somebody, anybody, to unlock the gates so he could get a better whiff of stale bunny. All in all, truly a perfect day for our little wolf.

mid-atlantic doxie fest: commence au festival

Hi, it's me, Baxter, your roving rover reporter. I'm standing here in what appears to be dimly lit building in a place I've never smelled before, surrounded by - guess what - wiener dogs! My mom just told me we are at the eighth annual Mid-Atlantic Dachshund Phestival. How cool is that? Last year this festival attracted over 1200 attendees. Let's see what's going on while the people and hounds start pouring in.






At first glance this festival reminds me of the flea market cuz there are all sorts of cool vendors here selling stuff for your doxie and stuff with doxies on it. These are two of my favorite finds. The black patent doxie is actually a purse that mom admired for its construction, but she said didn't get it because she already has me as her doxie accessory. The aqua blue disc with the retro round doxie on it is a key ring coin purse, though I think it should hold snacks instead of coins.












Now, if you've never been to a doxie festival, let me tell you, there are plenty of things to do here. Today I want to share with you my experience sniffing butts. It was WON-DER-FUL! Everywhere I turned, there was a butt that needed sniffing. No craning my neck, no straining to catch a whiff from way high above with those big scary kinds of dogs. None. All these butts were just at the right height for proper greeting and they greeted me right back. I spent a LOT of time doing that and met up with all sorts of new friends. These were just the fellas whose pictures were halfway clear. I sniffed a lot of butts, oh yeah.




I could have sniffed all day! But, tomorrow let me tell you about the wiener dog races cuz they were fun, too. For today, this is Baxter, your roving rover reporter signing out.

make it: doggie vest harness

Doggie harnesses that fit well on a doxie seem few and far between, so imagine my delight when I discovered yesterday that McCalls offers a harness pattern similar to the ones I've made for Baxter. Finally, I can make the harness in wiener sizes other than kielbasa for all his tinier friends! To inspire would-be sewers, here's a picture of Baxter in one of his harnesses that I turned into a costume for last year's wiener festival. The harness itself is made with hand dyed corduroy , and is further embellished with removable dragonfly wings made on the serger and sewing machine.

Know of any other cool patterns for doxies? Made something cool already? Seen something cool that you'd like to make or wish you could make? Spread the joy and share it here!












update 8/09/2000: Hey thanks to Lindsey for finding another pattern, KwikSew 3517.
Check out what she made, it's super cool!!