Baked, Boiling & Bubbly: 2023

Friday, December 22, 2023

Thursday Throw Back #7 : Ocean Spray Cranberry Punch for cookbook club

We recently went to a library cookbook club and took lasagna and this Festive Cranberry Punch from Ocean Spray thanks to a recipe cut out many years ago. It was a beautiful red color and tasted wonderful. As you can see from the gallon jug there was very little left at the end of the evening.

Just three ingredients: cranberry juice, orange juice, and lemon-lime soda.

Sunday, December 17, 2023

Sunday Randomness #413 : B-B update and uncovering the wood floor

Top picture taken Dec. 4, 2023

Bottom picture taken Dec. 16, 2023

B-B's incision site is nicely healed with fur starting to grow in again.

And we started tearing out the carpet:

It was rather funny the first day because B-B was scared of the new wood flooring and didn't want to walk on it to get to his nighttime spot under the bed. We had to coax him with treats to get him to go on the wood floor. Once he realized it was solid he was okay. On the other hand, B wanted to help with taking up the carpet tack strips-she didn't mind the wood floor at all. We had to keep shooing her away so she wouldn't accidentally get hurt on a tack or staple from the carpet pad before we had a chance to pull them all out and shop vac up the residue of wood splinters and lots of dust.

Sunday, November 19, 2023

Sunday Randomness #417 : A Month of Medical Pt. 4

Mego escorting B-B back inside so that B can be in the backyard for a bit because...

---if we don't keep them separated to a certain extent they want to play.

But they do have their moments where they will be peaceful. B-B gets up on the couch very slowly and very carefully. We're at the stage of weighing his actions with his recovery. Will letting him on the couch help speed his recovery? Yes. Can he get on and off without injury? At this point we believe the answer is yes. We've monitored him closely and inspected his wound for any signs of complications like swelling, puss, stretching, excessive heat, etc...

All looks good and he's healing nicely after a week at home.

So much so that we separated these two who attempted some mild play in the house. Silly puppies. They're definitely going to be excited when they can play together again. But not yet!

Sunday Randomness #417 : A Month of Medical Pt. 3

The first night ended up with me sleeping on the floor next to B-B. He moaned unless I was petting him or holding on to one of his paws and gently squeezing. (It's a thing he likes-it seems to soothe him when we handle his paws and gently squeeze them.)

Next day he slept on the yoga mat and mattress pad.

Incision site looks nice and clean.

He's been a good boy and let us put corn bags from the freezer on his belly. The first time he actually sighed and closed his eyes like it felt so good. (We put the inner bag with corn inside a ziploc bag and the pink you see is the corn bag pillowcase.)

Learning to eat with a cone on. Rice and the bland canned food that they said is the dog equivalent of saltines. He's been amazing with taking all his medicines.

Sunday Randomness #417 : A Month of Medical Pt. 2

The three priorities for Triage at AVC. B-B was in priority 2 for Bowel Obstruction.

After checking into AVC they got B-B on an IV to see if the fluids would help anything move. He had his second set of X-Rays around 10:30 to 11:00 p.m. and they called to say that nothing had budged and they wanted to operate to open B-B's stomach before anything more happening such as a section of his digestive system getting cut off to the point of getting infected or, worse, necrotic. We gave them the go ahead and they said they'd be calling in a couple of hours. I set a timer so that I wouldn't sleep through the ringing of the phone. He came out of surgery just fine-and was recovering around 1 a.m. Saturday morning. Thank you AVC Vet Team!

We went to visit him around 1 p.m. and he looked all sad and doped up with his red and blue surgical tape holding on his IV. They said as long as he kept recuperating well and held down some water and food that we could take him home Saturday night. We fed him solid food that they provided (canned chicken and bland gastro-intestinal canned dog food) and he ate well but we didn't try to feed him all of it at once. He was drinking water so around 8 to 9 p.m. we got to go get him and bring him home.

First night home was rough-he started out on the dog cot-his choice. We gave him a couple of options from the dog cot to a yoga mat with a mattress pad. B laid down right by him on her own. She sniffed him with concern the first night.

Sunday Randomness #417 : A Month of Medical Pt. 1

Mego had never been tested for allergies or asthma but has had a lifelong cough. No asthma but a bunch of mild allergies including cat and dog. No allergy to horse. He joked that we should get a pygmy horse like Arnold Schwarzenegger. https://www.sportskeeda.com/bodybuilding/dogs-donkey-miniature-horse-arnold-schwarzenegger-s-pets Ultimately he seems to have a case of chronic post-nasal drip which results fairly frequent nose blowing and some coughing. But nothing like lung cancer or the asthma so we are grateful.

Then B-B who is usually so prolific with bowel movements only had two in a twenty-four hour time period and did the curl of pain (lying in a circle and just looking miserable) after throwing up in the middle of the night. So of course Daisy and I decided he needed to see the emergency vet at 3:00 in the morning. I called Mego who went with me so Daisy could go back to sleep. They had polite signs up to remind clients to be courteous.

I know people are hurting when a family member (human or animal) is in the ER but from all the medical people I know whether for human or animal they are there to try to help. When clients try to be courteous and show patience it can go a long way in making their jobs more bearable. They had other cases so they sent us home to see our regular vet in the morning when they opened. We got a 9 am appt. and B-B got x-rays which showed something stuck in his stomach that was unidentified but not food and not metal but nothing more specific.

B-B at the regular vet-they are amazing! B-B loves all their staff from the front desk to the back room.

Sunday, October 15, 2023

Sunday Randomness #3425 State Fair Entries 2023: Ribbon count

34 food entries-

25 ribbons: 8 blue first place, 7 red second place, 9 white third place, and 1 pink fourth place

While it was fun, if not grueling at times, endeavoring to make so many food entries, I'm undecided if I will enter things in the fair next year or not. We'll just have to see. I am proud (and thankful to my friend!) for the sourdough start that I've kept going and made a number of loaves of bread along with some chocolate muffins and cinnamon rolls.