Australia

Shin and I went to Australia for 9 days just before Christmas while Jazz and Dixie had their own little holiday at Dog Inc. The day we arrived we got the BBQ in my grandmother's back yard going and cooked up flathead fillets, steak and sausages. I miss being able to have barbies in the back yard!

The next day we headed out of Melbourne to Healesville Wildlife Sanctuary and the Yarra Valley Winery area. While at the sanctuary we saw various Australian animals and then sampled some good Australian wines on the way home.

While out and about we noticed a lot of other dogs and contantly thought of our Jazz and Dixie back in Japan. This beautiful dog was tied up outside a hairdresser and was very gentle.

We also headed out of Melbourne to the Hepburn Spa area famous for all its mineral spas. We stayed with my mum and grandma in a self contained apartment. We ate well while we were there!

We also tried our hands at fishing at a local trout farm where we caught trout that were later served to us at lunch.

We then travelled to Brisbane where we spent the last few days of our holiday. It was quite hot in Brisbane after Melbourne's very changeable weather. We had a great time although it all seemed to go by so quickly. However it was good to come home to Jazz and Dixie who were so glad to welcome us home.

While we were away...

While we were in Australia on holiday Jazz and Dixie had their own little holiday at Dog Inc where it looks like they got right into the festive spirit!

Jazz did her usual getting between the covers trick to keep warm.

There were many friends for Jazz and Dixie to play and socialise with so they didn't even have time to miss us!
We battled our way through 3 hours of traffic jams from the airport to make it just in time to pick up Jazz and Dixie from Dog Inc. The girls were so excited to see us we got almost got licked to death! Thank you to everyone at Dog Inc for looking after my girls so well. They looked very happy and fit and I could enjoy my holiday knowing they were well looked after as usual. We are off on a little weekend getaway with the girls tomorrow so I will post some pics from Australia and our holiday next week. Hope everyone had a great Christmas.

Happy Holidays Everyone!

We are leaving for Australia tomorrow and won't be back till after Christmas so we wanted to take this oportunity to wish everyone a happy and safe holiday. Jazz and Dixie would also like to say a huge thank you for all the Christmas cards we have received from so many blogging buddies from all around the world. It has been very exciting finding mail in the mail box everyday. The postman must be starting to wonder who Jazz and Dixie are! We are renting and not allowed to attach anything to the walls so I am making do with the projector screen and speaker tops!

Weekend Getaway

Yesterday we visited a place called Mother Farm complete with all your usual farm animals. Living in Tokyo its not everyday we see these animals and its the first time Jazz and Dixie have seen some of them including this very big pig!!

Included in this farm compond there were also some dog runs for Jazz and Dixie to enjoy. The weather was great and it was nice to be out in the fresh air with the girls.

Jazz had her first ever encounter with a rabbit which is quite funny considering she is a beagle! She was very curious and strained to get her head through the fence to get a better look at the cute little bunnies. Dixie on the other hand was very busy following scents of other animals and people.

And then came the pièce de résistance - soft serve icecream - made from the milk from the farm. The girls, especially Jazz were beside themselves with excitement. I had to fight to hold onto the cone and get a lick myself!

Our accomodation and a little more about our holiday can be seen here at my Holidays in Japan blog. We all had a great weekend away!

Our First Car!

After years of hiring cars to take the girls places we finally decided to buy our own car. Its a first car for all of us and today was a very exciting day. Jazz and Dixie were a little scared at first of their new seating arrangements. Usually we put their crates on the back seat and they sleep quietly there. However the car came with a pet carrier option that attaches to the seats so we got one for Jazz and one for Dixie so they can be safely transported side by side to dog runs and weekend adventures. We got the car in late afternoon but raced home to pick up Jazz and Dixie to take them to Yoyoji Park just as the sun was setting. They got to run around like crazy in the dog run until we got too cold! Now that we have a car equiped for the girls we can get out of Tokyo on the weekends and discover new dog runs and other dog friendly places!

Crunchy Cucumbers and Christmas Cards

Jazz and Dixie love cucumbers and are quick to share a few bites with me. I love the crunching sound they make when they eat them.

We have started to receive some of the DWB Christmas Cards and would like to say thanks thus far to Lorenza, Noah and his Sisters, Amber Mae and her sisters, Simba, Homer,Bolo, Faya and Dyos, Lenny and Arabella for their wonderful cards. It has been so exciting opening the mail box each day.

Puppy Pancakes

While out shopping today we stopped in at a pet shop to pick up some basics and came across a packet mix for dog hotcakes! Knowing how much Jazz and Dixie love our regular pancakes I thought I would try these ones for dogs!! It even came with honey and milk topping and a recipe book so you can make variations on the hotcake and cupcake mixes.

Jazz and Dixie watched as I made them and could barely contain themselves when it came to eating them!! I decorated them with some dog food as an added extra.

An Award

We received a very nice award from our new beagle friends at Dughallmor Beagles
Thank you so much for this award - we love your blog too and wish we could run as free as you guys do along the beach!

This lovely award is created by Crystal @ Memoirs of a Mommy in honor of Noah and the donor of his sweet little heart who ENCOURAGES us to SHARE THE LOVE! Thanks Crystal! [Click on Memoirs of a Mommy to learn and read this special love story!] The rules for this award are to pass it along to some people whose blogs you love. They make you laugh, smile, leave encouraging comments on your blog. You would like to share some love with them because they have uplifted, inspired, encouraged or prayed for you. Please include this paragraph with the link to Memoirs of a Mommy so that everyone knows where this award originated from.

We would like to pass it on to Noah, AO4, Cassidy and Harry, and Pippa.

Special Visitors and New Lens.

Yesterday we had very special visitors all the way from Oz! Noah's pinkies, as he calls them, spent two weeks travelling around in Japan and we caught up with them yesterday. They came over to meet Jazz and Dixie who where very excited to have guests. Jazz and Dixie received cool Canteen bandanas which they wore on a chilly walk around the park. I put them on today for a bit of a photo shoot and managed only single photos as Dixie was being her usual hyper self. Thanks so much for the bandanas and for meeting up with us. It was great to meet fellow dog bloggers in real life.

A while back I mentioned that we had bought a new lens for the camera and that we would test it out at Dog Field dog run. Well we did last weekend and got some great action shots.