Merry Happy Hanukamas!

Christmas came, and with it a trip to Karen's house for shmoozing and fressing with her family.

Eggs hung out most of the time on the mantle, backlit by some mini-lights, keeping an eye out on everyone and making sure the dogs kept their distance.

This year featured the introduction of a new member of the family. No, not Eggs, though this is their first Christmas. I'm talking about Karen's new niece, Lucy. Lucy traveled up here with her new buddy, Skie, and their humans, Karen's brother and sister-in-law. Bro shot this photo on the drive up north:

It has been sooooo long since I had a puppy fix: soft, silky puppy fur wrapped around a mouthful of needle-sharp puppy teeth. I was careful to ask Lucy and Skie's humans about what it was okay to feed them, treat-wise. But it wasn't until I diverted Lucy from chewing on my sock-encased toes to chewing on my bare hands that Bro very nicely told me that they don't allow her to do that because eventually, she is going to weigh around 100 pounds, with more teeth and power than she has at only 32 pounds.

That's okay, I get that, though I must say that never stopped me from play-fighting with my adult akitas, and my parents' adult akitas. My mother became torn over inviting me over for dinner or whatever, because one of the first things I'd do was to get down on the floor in the middle of the den and play with John & Yoko (uhm, my mother stumbled onto various artists late in her life, including Lennon and Ono, and so, when she ended up getting two Japanese dogs instead of just one, well, all I can say is, it made sense to her). Getting down to their level physically was their cue to instantly revert to puppyhood, and so we'd have a wonderful tumble and slobber fest. They would then be keyed up for hours, so, while I would go home, my folks were left with two highly energized dogs.

And did I mention that Yoko routinely jumped the 8ft fence that separated their large area in the side yard from the main yard? Or her penchant for fresh avocados, which she harvested for herself from the neighbor's tree that overhung the dogs' area? It took for ages for my parents to figure out why her coat was so much better than John's...and why she was so...plump. She was not a happy camper when they figured it out and took steps that ultimately prevented her from being able to harvest 'her' avocados.

But, I digress. This is, after all, the EIH blog! Once Karen's house started to empty out a bit as guests left, Eggs moved to a nearby table where they eyed some of the Christmas loot, including a photo album and a cute box containing most of the ingredients to make Scotty shortbread (that silvery thing on top of the box is a Scottish terrier-shaped cookie cutter).















Next to Eggs you can see a little Santa in a row boat. That is one of the pieces that Karen got at the Napa holiday crafts faire we went to after the Black Friday wine tasting.
















Eggs did get to hang out for a while in the tree, where they were able to get up close and personal with several of the ornaments, including a couple of the airplane ornaments, and the bare butted Santa hanging down on the bottom right of the photo, another craft faire find.

And that was sort of that! Eggs made it safely through their first Christmas, which included cranberry martinis, a teething Rottweiler, and rum and brandy soaked fruitcake dressed with rum hard sauce.

Hic.

Stay tuned for our next outing, which will probably be the upcoming Winter Wineland wine & food event.