Stick Dog Craves Candy Book Review

Stick Dog and his friends return for another adventure in the seventh installment of the Stick Dog series: Stick Dog Craves Candy. While out on their nightly scavenger hunt for food, Stripes sees something terrifying. Two witches in a house across the street!

Poo-Poo, Mutt, Karen and Stripes look to Stick Dog for answers. Realizing that it must be Halloween, he and his friends come up with a plan to get candy from all of the houses in the neighborhood. Can this band of pooches remain unseen in their candy quest? Will humans spoil their Halloween fun? Will anyone ever figure out what Karen is talking about?

I could not put this book down! I absolutely love it! Stick Dog and his hilarious canine companions are sure to tickle readers’ funny bones. I found myself laughing at their antics with every turn of the page. I can also relate to Stick Dog’s role as leader as he tries to deal with his friends in a caring and compassionate manner even when they frustrate him.

I also love how the pages of the book look like that of a notebook. It gives the reader a feeling that he/she is reading a diary. The unique spacing of text is very eye catching and makes for added suspense.

Watson’s illustrations are basic, yet adorable and funny. Children will be drawn (no pun intended) to the characters of Stick Dog and his friends. My personal favorite is Karen, the Dachshund. Owning a Dachshund, I can easily relate to Karen’s forgetful personality.

This is a wonderful book for anyone who loves Halloween and dogs. Children ages 8-12 will delight in Stick Dog’s adventures. I cannot wait to read more books from this wonderful series.

 

Curious Kitty

Tomorrow will officially be October!  And we all know what that means.  Halloween is rapidly approaching.

Miracle, our rescue kitty, has decided to start celebrating a little early.  She has an unusual fascination with my pumpkin tote bag.  It was housing a few Halloween decorations, but now….you’ll have to see for yourself.

 I was just sitting here, minding my own business, when this bag attacked me!

 

 Must…escape…bag!

 

 Maybe I will use this bag as a hat.

 

 This is the perfect hiding spot!  Domino has no clue that I’m about to pounce!

 

 These straps sure are fun the chew.

 

Peek-a-kitty!

Cliche Costumes

Fall is my favorite time of year.  And even though I hate scary movies, I love Halloween.  Since I am the mother of six fur babies, I also greatly enjoy dressing them up in costumes.

Every year, my husband and I attend Bark in the Park, Canine Carnival and Celebrate Spot.  Each of these events offers a costume contest.  We try to come up with unique concepts that have not been overdone.  One of our favorite creations was the infamous “rally squirrel” from the St. Louis Cardinals. 

We already owned a squirrel costume and we found a dog Cardinal’s jersey at the Cardinal’s Dug Out store.  So, we simply put the jersey over the squirrel costume and…voila!  Rally Squirrel!  My husband got so excited at Bark in the Park because people kept coming up to him and asking if they could take Theo’s (our long-haired Chihuahua/rally squirrel) picture.

Naturally, we thought we would be a shoe-in for first place.  As Matt walked Theo around the staging area, people went crazy.  “It’s the rally squirrel!” they cheered.  Imagine our extreme disappointment when we didn’t get first place…or second…or even third!

Guess what won first place?  Yep, the old Dachshund-dressed-as-a-hot dog routine.  We have seen this combination at every single dog event that we attend.  We get it!  It’s a wiener dog dressed like a wiener.  Clever.  Now, get over it!  There is no originality to this concept at all.

Second place was given to a very cute dog dressed as a pilot, complete with doggie goggles.  That was adorable.   But third place was a complete joke.  It was a dog in a purple t-shirt that had a picture of Minnie Mouse on it.  Seriously?  And this dog was already a co-mascot for the event!  I don’t think it should have been allowed to enter the costume contest.

As I was looking through the costumes at Petsmart the other day, I noticed something:  there is hardly any variety!  You see the same costumes year after year.  The cow, prisoner/”bad dog,” cheerleader, angel and “rufferee” always surface.  I was excited to see that Disney is stepping things up by offering complete Winnie-the-Pooh, Tigger and Eeyore costumes.  Great if you have as many dogs as I do!  Sesame Street has also come out with at least five different costumes of their most beloved characters, including Big Bird.  But, these costumes also come with a pretty price tag.

So, as I perused the less expensive costumes, I became very disappointed.  This year, some of the “costumes” are screen printed t-shirts.  Check out the police officer, doctor and French maid costumes in the store.  You will see what I mean.  I actually have a police offer costume and it is so much cuter.  There are actual felt handcuff attached to the felt belt along with a stuffed night stick.

Why are there not more creative options?  I remember dressing Adriel up as a Flapper from the 1920’s.  She was darling!  Everyone at the event agreed, yet, she didn’t even place in the contest.  What gives?  I am also beginning to question the judges’ judgment.  What does it take for a dog to win?

At the Canine Carnival in 2012, I saw the most creative costume.  There was a dog that was covered in Polaroid photos of him with his family.  A brown piece of cardboard hung from around his neck with a small tube sticking out of the front.  I had thought that he was a camera.  What I could not see (due to the shirt covering the dog’s body) was the fact that the dog had three legs.  He was a tripod!  I loved it!  Not only was it a super creative and outside-of-the-box idea, but, I loved how it embraced the fact that the dog had a disability.  I was very happy that he won first place.

Since I am a very proud dog mom, I will tell you that Adriel did manage to win the Best Dressed Golden Paw Trophy at the 2012 Celebrate Spot event.  She was an angel with this amazing little halo that actually was suspended above her head!  I think her tongue birth defect helped greatly.

Still, I would love to see more originality in the dog costume department.  As dog parents, we need to come up with concepts that truly showcase our dogs’ personality.  So, please, put the hot dog costume back on the rack and look to your pooch’s spirit for inspiration.

Perturbing Petsmart

My husband and I love to shop at Petsmart.  We have the Pet Perks card (of course).  They have such a wide variety of items, like dog clothing!

Each October, they hold a special Halloween bash.  For $10, you can bring in your costumed pooches and have their photo taken in front of a spooky scene.  You will also receive a collectible Halloween themed frame to proudly display your picture in.  And the best part?  Half of the money raised from the sales of the photo frames goes to help homeless pets.  Score!

We have taken our dogs for the past two years and have had a blast!  They even hold a costume contest in their training room.  But, I have to admit, last year’s photo shoot was anything but fun.

The staff had no idea how to work the digital camera that they had been given.  We were the first people in line and had to have the photo re-taken….six times!  We had all five of our babies with us and by this time, they were very restless.  They like to move and we NOT thrilled about having to sit still again.

When the photo was finally printed, it looked like an amateur had taken it.  The picture was zoomed out as far as it could go, so the Halloween backdrop looked like a huge piece of decorated cardboard (which it was).  Plus, you could see some of the isles in the store.  Not exactly the family portrait I had wanted.

Upon a recent trip to procure a third collar for our kitten, we noticed a large cardboard display for their Halloween events.  Sure enough, there was the photo event.  But, something had changed.  Now, the sign reads:  “Come and take your own photo of your pet in front of a spooky scene.”  What?  You have to bring your dogs AND take the photo?  I could do that at home for free!

That got me thinking.  “Are they still going to be offering the exclusive photo frames?” I asked my husband.  He decided to ask a sales associate.  After talking to three separate people, the answer:  No.  They have done away with the frames.

I am officially bummed!  I honestly looked forward to that every year.  And I know that this event makes a lot of money for Petsmart.  So, why are they scaling it back?  The associate did remind us about the costume contest, but, we never win and don’t want to make our fur babies have to sit in the store forever.

While my sadness about this fandango is beginning to fade, I am worried about one thing:  the Christmas photo with Santa.  Will this be done away with, too?  Shame on Petsmart for not understanding that to some people, their pets are their children and they want to commemorate adorable holiday moments with unique photos.