A collection of doggie pics!

Our "puppy" (he's almost 3, but he'll always be a puppy to us!) Claudius is dog of the month at his doggie daycare! We are so excited!

Now that the weather's nicer, I've been taking a lot more pictures of Claudius. It probably helps that I don't have school anymore, too. :) I thought I'd share some of my favorite recent pics of my little guy.

Here he is freaking out and getting some major air as Marek goes to open the sliding door to the deck. Claudius always starts barking and jumping when we even go near the door, and we finally got a good picture of him jumping wicked high - he's at least a foot and a half off the ground, which is a lot for him!

He also loves to chase sprinklers. Marek got him a sprinkler that we put out in the backyard on nice days. We turn it on and he just goes nuts, growling and jumping at it. It's pretty fun to watch (maybe not so fun to listen to though, because he is very barky).

Another hobby of his is hanging out in the dryer, especially when it has just finished drying the clothes. I am always worried he's going to burn himself if the dryer has just ended, because it's still pretty hot in there. But he really likes to snuggle up in the warm clothes.

I like to fold the clothes right out of the dryer, and a couple weekends ago when I spent the weekend doing an inordinate amount of laundry, Claudius just jumped in and made himself at home. He really made himself at home, and started snoozing immediately, which made it hard for me to fold the clothes. I eventually had to take him out so I could finish, but I promised him I'd dry some of his blankets for him soon so he could hang out in the dryer again. :)

On Memorial Day weekend, Marek was away on an overnight hike with his friends, so I took Claudius on a doggie playdate with our friend Sean and his adorable puggle Bella. We headed up to Weston and took a walk around Cat Rock park. Here's Claudius during the walk. It's a great place to let the dogs hang around off the leash.

There's a swimming hole that we went and checked out, but Claudius wasn't really into it. He doesn't like swimming that much.

Here's Claudius on a bridge, with Bella in the background. I think he was glad to get into the shade for a little while.

Here's another sprinkler picture from a couple days ago. Marek put Claudius's large pen around him so he could chase the sprinkler without his leash getting in the way. He enjoyed it at first, but then kept jumping on the fence and trying to get out, poor thing!

Here's an action shot of him running back up on to the deck. He couldn't get back fast enough!

After a long time barking at and chasing the sprinkler, he needed to shake off, and I got this adorable shot of his ears and tail going all over the place. I've often wondered if it hurts at all when he does this, as he shakes himself pretty hard!

Once we get inside, he does this head mashing thing. I'm not really sure what this is - he does it in the morning when he wakes up, too, and it's part of his morning routine. He stretches, mashes his head, repeats, and finally shakes off and then I know it's time to get up and take him outside.

Here he is staring at me while I was taking his picture. I love his expressive little face and big floppy ears!

And lastly, here he is up close. He was getting tired and managed to sit still so I could get a close-up. I was happy to get a lot of these pictures, because they're things he does frequently, but I've always wanted to get on camera.

Hope you enjoy! :)

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Weekend hiking to kick off better living!

Last week, Marek and I were out of the house almost every night, between hanging out with friends and going out to eat (and not even going out to eat at healthy places - we treated ourselves to Red Robin and Chick-Fil-A's new Spicy Chicken sandwich), so we committed ourselves to taking Claudius on a hike on Saturday.

Saturday ended up being really, really humid, and we finally got on our way in the early afternoon and completed a 5 mile-loop of the Blue Hills. Marek uses a Garmin GPS (for hiking) to track a lot of details about the hike, and here's a map of our hike below.

It was a lot of fun - a lot of ups and downs, but Claudius really seemed to enjoy it. We took a break about halfway through to refuel (pretzels and water for us, and chewy meat snacks and water for Claud). On our way back, it started to rain a little, but luckily we were under the trees for most of the hike, so we made it back safely. Here's me and the little guy during the hike.

This weekend also kicked off our plan to get back on track, eating wise (and for me, life wise!). Life's been really lazy since I graduated, but I'm determined to start being better about a lot of different things, especially eating. We went out this weekend and restocked the fridge with lots of fresh, healthy food, and I'm going back on this eating plan that a dietitian I met with put together for me. I'm making a serious return to running, and am vowing to use my time more wisely.

Lately I've been feeling really scatterbrained and on top of that, super unmotivated. After dinner, I usually just want to go to bed. I don't watch too much TV, and am frequently bored after dinner, so going to bed is just the easiest solution. But I have a huge to-do list (product of being in school for 2.5 years!), and I should be working on that instead of sleeping.

So this week is the start of it all! We'll be starting slow, and hopefully making a lot of positive changes!

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