Maggie is doing much better now that she's had her paw-tectors on for a little over a week. Her paws are looking much better, but we're going to give them a few more days before taking her booties away.

We started taking her on some longer walks down along the Marina to town and back over the past couple of days. Maggie was fine with the longer distance and it really helped to improve her mood to be back out and about. Her boots were quite the attraction in New Buffalo.

Everyone we passed either stopped to ask us about them or we heard "Did you see those boots?" behind us - or the kid who exclaimed "Mommy! That dog has shoes on!". Most people I'm sure thought they were goofy, but a few people asked where we got them - maybe Mags will start a trend in New Buffalo and we can make fun of the other dogs in their boots this summer.

We took Maggie to the Michigan City dog park both Thursday and Friday. Thursday was just us there for a while, and then some creepy guy came with his two Newfoundlands. Those dogs were either aggressive or they played very rough. Maggie clearly didn't like the way they were coming at her (she boxed one in the face with her bootie) so we got her out of there. Their owner did nothing to try to control his dogs and didn't pick up after them either. We considered that day kind of a bust - and figured that's what we get for going to the dog park during a work day - that's when you get the creepy unemployed guy.

We tried again Friday which went much better. Some of the friends Maggie made during her first trip to this park were there, along with several other friendly pups. She made a couple moves like she would play but then backed off. Maybe next time when she isn't in her booties she'll come back out and play. She seemed to enjoy the park though and this put Mags in a better mood the rest of the weekend. Oh, and of course, Maggie really just lives for going for car rides, so we probably could have driven her in circles around the block and she'd have been happy.

Maggie was completely fine with the fireworks. When she was at home alone, we turned the fan on which drowns out nearly every noise from outside, so she just slept through those (we can tell when she's been sleeping from her "bed head"). Everyone and their brother in New Buffalo likes to shoot of their own fireworks, so she had plenty of exposure to them on walks. This is another Maggie mystery - you sneeze or make one funny move, she jumps out of her fur - but an M80 going off 100 yards away doesn't phase her one bit. We're not sure if she just equates it to thunder, which she also had zero reaction to, or what she's thinking, but we're very happy that they don't bother her.


Maggie was really in a good mood by the time she got in the car for the ride home. She finished off a tendon that she had in progress over the past couple of days. She drank plenty of water out of her travel water bowl (shown in the first picture). Up until now she's not really taken to that. She even drank some water while Kat was pouring it out of the bottle, which she's never done, but is another one of those normal dog behaviors we love to see.

All of these pics are from the car ride home and our cheery li'l pup.