Zeppelin, a.k.a. the dog formerly known as "Snoop" ADOPTED

Seems like I've been falling in love with a lot of dark colored mature male pits lately. First Debo, and now Zeppelin.  Zep is the sweetest boy.  He's at least seven years old and seems to not be in excellent shape physically.  He's clearly underweight and has some sort of skin condition going on. This poor boy was all itchy and uncomfortable in his own skin despite us having him in our care for a few weeks.  

Today was his first day in training.  He did really well, considering we were teaching him a completely different name from what he has been used to for the last seven years.  His name used to be "Snoop," which I think is hilarious, especially when you look into his big sweet face.  The whole drive to training I had "Snoop Dog, Baby" by Reel Big Fish stuck in my head.

Anyway, Zep did a good job starting to learn his new name and was starting to respond to it more by the end of our hour long training session. We played a lot of the "name game" which consists of immediately giving him a treat when I say his name. Basically rewarding him for hearing his new name.  He didn't have to react or anything, just hear his name and eat his treat.  Then we took him outside to continue his training with a few more distractions.  At first he was dragging me all over the place. He may be underweight, but boy is he powerful. Luckily he's just a big mush who wanted to sniff everything and was completely unreactive to the other dogs, even when they were getting overexcited.  

By the end of training he was walking fantastically on the leash, not dragging me at all.  He followed me like a little lamb and automatically sat and stared at me when we stopped moving! I was happily surprised.  If this is how much he can learn in just an hour I can't wait to see where he will be in a few weeks. 

Unfortunately I think this is the last time this semester that I'll be able to work with Pitty Love because I have to go back home soon.  Hopefully all my favorite dogs will be gone by the time I get back! My absolute favorite dog Oreo already got adopted which was kind of bittersweet for me, but I'm glad he got a good home.

See Zeppelin's page HERE!!!!
Zeppelin has since been adopted!

Peanut Butter Bread

I admit it, I have a problem. Everyone I know is aware of it, some of them disagree strongly with it. It's an addiction that can't be stopped.

My name's Isabel and I'm addicted to peanut butter.

Peanut butter, peanuts, peanut butter flavored things, Reese's, all of it.

And I don't care.

So when I found a recipe for peanut butter bread you bet your butt I was scribbling it down and running to the kitchen immediately.  I think I had it in the oven less than half an hour after stumbling upon the recipe.

I don't even care that I told my dad I wouldn't make anymore recipes that I found online. It's peanut butter bread! He will understand.

Other than my peanut butter addiction, there's another thing you might not know about me.

This girl bakes in a cardigan.

A black one at that.

I dare flour to try to touch me:

I do wear my personally altered apron though. Aprons never ever fit me right. The neck strap is always huge and the strings are always way to long, and with cats in the kitchen , that's not an option.  So I went to my trusty sewing machine ages ago and shortened the neck strap and added some ribbon accents.  This is my clean apron, I have another one with brown ribbon with polka dots that's my chocolate apron and pretty much never gets washed.

Anyway, back to this magical recipe.

It was super simple, I'm really glad that I had everything I needed in the apartment or there would have been an emergency Wegmans run.  This recipe is basically a peanut butter cookie recipe by the looks of it, just way wetter, which is alright by me.  

According to the recipe, before you add the milk, the batter will be super dry. It was, but don't worry, it improved with the addition of the milk.  Before the milk it sort of looked like my dough for dog biscuits looks like, that's how dry it was:

Once I added the milk it pretty much instantly became more liquid. It was actually squelching in the mixer, which was kind of gross but it smelled like peanut butter so who cares.  The most promising part of making this recipe was that the dough/ batter looked and smelled almost exactly like peanut butter. I guess that's what happens when almost a third of the mix is made up of peanut butter.

The recipe also had a tip to use wax paper in the pan to help get the bread out easier when its done. I've never done this before but I figured why not, might as well try it right? Well, I was a little obsessive compulsive about my folds but this is what I came up with:

The batter was surprisingly thick when I went to pour it in. It may have looked liquid, but it was way less viscous than I was expecting, which was a pleasant surprise.  Overly liquid doughs always make me paranoid that I've done something wrong.

I got it in the pan, smoothed it out, and popped it in the oven: 

I waited impatiently for it to be done.  I may or may not have snacked on straight peanut butter while I was waiting:

When it finally came out....

Yep, that's burnt on the sides. Damn you college oven.  I would have taken it out earlier but the center was no where near ready.

Not. Pleased.
Although I will say that the parchment paper was a godsend. I will definitely be doing this from now on.
Now, me being me, I didn't let this burnt crap bother me.
I just grabbed my bread knife (thanks dad!) once it had cooled and cut/ scraped off the burnt edges.  The rest of the bread was fine. And my apartment smelled amazing.

Problem solved!

Ingredients:

2 cups flour

1tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup butter

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 cup creamy peanut butter

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup milk

Preheat oven to 350.

Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl and set aside.

In a mixer, cream together the butter and both sugars.

Add the peanut butter, egg, and vanilla and mix well.

Slowly add in the flour mixture.

Slowly pour in the milk and mix well. Be sure to scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl as the thicker, drier dough will stick and not be incorporated if you don't.

Pour the batter into your prepared pan.

Bake for 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick poked into the center of the bread comes out clean.

Recipe from: A Pretty Life In The Suburbs

Krusteaz One Step Blueberry Muffins

A couple of weeks ago my dad sent me an absolutely fantastic care package.

One of the things that I was excited to try was the One Step Blueberry Muffins from Krusteaz.

I made their crumb cake box mix all the time so I was interested to see what one of their other products was like.  Although I did feel like I was completely cheating by making something so oversimplified with only water as an added ingredient.  I went ahead and tried it anyway.

Here's what the mix itself looks like:

The only thing you had to do to prepare it for pouring into the pans was to add water and shake it.  

So I shook and shook and shook:

One thing I will note about it is that there should probably be some sort of warning that shaking it too hard or too long creates pressure in the bottle.  It surprised the crap out of me when I opened it to pour it.

It looked pretty much how I expected it to when I opened it. Although I was a little surprised at how cylindrical the "blueberries" were. I'll never get used to the look or taste of fake blueberries:

The mix was supposed to make six muffins but apparently the muffin pan I have is ridiculously oversized because I barely got four out of them. Oh well, into the oven they went:

They didn't end up rising all that much, or getting much of a muffin-y top. But even though they looked more like biscuits, they tasted like muffins:

So overall, they weren't the best muffins I've ever made or eaten, but they were certainly the easiest by far. 

Adoption Spotlight: Dashing Debo! ADOPTED

Oh Debo, how my heart bursts with affection for you! 

This giant meat-head is the most ridiculously affectionate dog I think I've ever met.  Admittedly, he looks a little intimidating at first (although you can't tell that in these pictures). Even me, being the pit lover that I am was a little intimidated when I first walked up to him and saw that enormous pitty grin:

It seems silly now that I've met him, but that grin looks like it could absolutely swallow you up! Debo instantly showed me how wrong that thought was:

Debo is absolutely the biggest mush I have ever met.  It took a lot of patience and blurry pictures to get some good ones of him because all he wanted to do was be right up in your face being loved. And yes, there are a ton of pictures of him because I just couldn't help but love that gorgeous face!

If Debo's heart is half the size of his head I'm sure he'll be the most loving dog in the world. 

He's also a huge goof.  

I think belly rubs are his absolute favorite. He stayed like this for about ten minutes straight and would flop over to get a tummy rub if someone even started to walk towards him:

Some of the smaller puppies didn't quite know what to think of him, but all Debo wanted to do was be best friends.  Even with such an imposing presence, this boy managed to win over the hearts of everyone that was there.

If I was able to adopt a dog, Debo would probably be at the top of my list.  You've never met a more kindhearted and friendly dog.  All he wants to do is be part of a family again. Can you find a place for his giant head in your family?

Debo's Page!!!

Debo has since been adopted!

Tessie and Tige Playing ADOPTED

Tessie's adoption page

Tessie being adorable ADOPTED

Tessie's adoption page

Pitty Puppies!

Meet Miss Tessie!

She's the happiest, wiggliest little puppy I think I've ever met.  As soon as she sees someone walking towards her, or even look at her, her whole body starts to waggle.  She wiggles so hard that the tip of her tail touches her shoulders :

She adores everyone. Kids, puppies, big dogs, little dogs, everyone!  Just look at that perfect pitty smile! Could she look any cuter?  She's only three months old and full of life.  If you're in the Rochester area you should really come see her! She would love to meet you!

This is Tige! He's the cutest little puppy. Unfortunately he's already adopted and was just there for socialization, but I couldn't help but share some pictures of him anyway: 

I don't know what he thinks he did, but he has such a good guilty face:

For Tessie's page!

Pitty Friday!: Lily and Henrietta

This week I present to you two beautiful white pitty girls.  The first is Lily!

Lily is a sweet girl.  She's full of energy and life and just wants to be a dog.  She's one of those dogs where her spirit shines through in every picture of her, she even winks:

Unfortunately, Lily lost her home when her owners divorced.  She's perfectly housetrained, has good leash manners, and loves everybody!  Her energy level means that she probably shouldn't be adopted by a family with small children.  I think she would love to live with an active family and go on hikes and adventures.

Someone please come adopt Lily! She is so ready to love you!:

For Lily's page.

Our other white pitty girl from Friday's adoption event was Henrietta!

While Lily likes to wink, Henrietta loves to GRIN!:

Henrietta is a super special little pup.  She's actually deaf, which isn't all that uncommon for white pitties.  She's doing very well learning her hand signals and behaves very well around other dogs and children. If you've had some experience with deaf dogs before, Henrietta would love for you to come meet her!

For Henrietta's page