Fritz is 50% larger than he was two weeks ago (which means he weighs three pounds!), according to the vet! He’s also done with his shots, which means he can learn how to walk on a leash instead of being carried everywhere.

Fritz has turned into a MANIAC. A teething maniac. Sigh. I know it’s all part of being a puppy, but WOW. I don’t remember Bruno being this crazy. Bruno doesn’t remember being this crazy, either, but he’s dealing with it.

Los Angeles architect Fritz Haeg narrows the divide between residents and their communities with projects like Edible Estates, an international effort to convert front lawns into working food gardens.

Watch it all the way through. It’ll make you feel great, I promise. (From Dwell.)

I know, all I have to talk about right now is FRITZ, FRITZ, FRITZ. It’s all-consuming! Things are going well. Bruno has left the “if I ignore him, maybe he’ll just disappear” stage, and has entered the “I’ll play with him, but he can’t sleep next to me” stage. It’s so fun to watch them play! Bruno chases Fritz, Fritz zooms around the house like a maniac, Fritz does a war dance in front of Bruno, Bruno chases Fritz, Fritz falls asleep, Bruno falls asleep (in a separate bed, of course), etc. It’s great. Fritz is also starting to get the hang of the whole housebreaking thing, so it’s possible our living room rug could make a reappearance as early as next week.

Fritz looooooves to chew! He’s also a fan of his new bed from Otis and Claude (seen here with a LUDDE sheepskin wrapped around the cushion). I dream of the day when he and Bruno are curled up in it together!

Meanwhile…
→ the plumbers are on their fourth day of work (!), and the roughing-in still isn’t done
→ the quote came in on our garden plan from the landscaper, and it is INSANE
→ a tree guy is coming to remove the offending mulberry tree today (for a very reasonable price)
→ maybe we can build a fence ourselves after all…

We brought home our new little guy today, and he’s absolutely amazing. He doesn’t have a name yet (EDIT: no suggestions, please!), but that will come soon enough. Bruno is skeptical, but handling it alright. We are very much a family of four, me and my boys. A few more photos here.

I’m curled up on the sofa with my coffee and a manuscript for a book I’m working on the cover for. The story is told from a dog’s point of view, which sounds really awful, but it’s actually quite smart and well-written. I’m still trying to figure out what the protagonist looks like and what kind of dog he is, but that information can really only come from the dialogue of other characters in the book (I do know he has one black ear and one white ear). Dogs, apparently, don’t spend a lot of time looking in the mirror or worrying about their fur color.

I made Bruno a new bed on Sunday (big enough for two!), and he’s enjoying it more than I expected he would. I just sewed an oversized envelope-style pillowcase out of linen, and put a really soft down pillow inside. I was thinking about sewing on a circle of boiled wool in the center, but now that the weather is slowly, slowly getting a little bit warmer (I still need a scarf, though), I think I’ll just leave it as is.

p.s. The plumber is coming today! By this afternoon, all of the roughing in should be done.

As I alluded to in my last post, we’ll be getting a new family member very soon. Next weekend we are picking up Bruno’s little brother, a 10-week-old black and tan long-haired Chihuahua!

The only photo we have of him is awful, but I can’t stop looking at him. I think Bruno (who is half long-haired Chihuahua) is going to love having a wee furry friend around. Well, after he goes through a bout of horrible jealousy. That’s to be expected.

We’ve been thinking about having another dog for a couple of years, and the time finally seems right for all of us. I can’t wait to get to know this little guy, and for the four of us to bond. I wonder what his name will be…!

Dogs are so special. I honestly don’t know how we lived before Bruno came into our lives.

I know the term “beautiful dog crate” sounds like an oxymoron, but late last night while obsessively Googling for non-hideous dog beds and houses, I came across the eiCrate from designGO!.

This is the Bertoia chair of dog crates, seriously. Even if I didn’t have a dog, I think I might want this in my house. It’s funny, because when we bought the chairs for our garden, I commented to Evan that they were essentially the same material as a dog crate—but that a dog crate costs $50, not $400. (I realize, of course, that the price is not based on materials alone, and that good design does frequently come with a high price. I accept that.)

Enter the $320 dog crate ($575 if you buy the starter package, which includes a beautiful cover and a shaped bed insert).

I’m pretty sure Bruno needs one, especially since he’ll be getting a little brother in a couple of weeks. (!) He loves his crate (we don’t close the door, he just likes to go inside and be in his little cave when he feels like it), but it’s a real eyesore. I try not to have anything visible in the house that isn’t well-designed, and the shin-killing crate is usually relegated to the basement unless we need it for some reason.

I’ll start rolling spare change now!

PHEW. Is it really March 9th already?! I don’t know what happened to the last two months, but I am totally exhausted. The past couple of weeks have been pretty ridiculously cruddy (family members in the hospital, jury duty, Evan away on a business trip, train outages, computer nightmares, work nightmares, conspicuously absent plumbers, etc.), and this weekend was just barely an improvement…and now it’s time to go back to work tomorrow. I need time off! I’m so tired and so behind on everything, which is the worst feeling.

In happy, non-whiny news, I have a new computer!!! YAYYYYY!!! We bought a 20″ iMac on Saturday, and then spent the next 24 hours struggling with wireless configurations. Ultimately, we’ve opted to return the problem-ridden Time Capsule we bought, and go back to our trusty AirPort Extreme. (Never, ever buy the first generation of anything Apple makes the first week it’s on the market. Never!)

It was well beyond time to replace the old Graphite iMac, which had been with me since 1999 (!!), and it’s extra super nice to have a second computer to accompany our MacBook, which is primarily sofa-bound. I do most of my heavy duty design stuff at work on a fancy Mac Pro machine, but an iMac suits my needs very well at home. I’m excited. The monitor feels so big!

I’m really, really tired, and it’s going to be another long week. Sleep-sleep-sleep-sleep-time.

p.s. Here’s Bruno on his birthday!

Hooray! It’s Bruno’s birthday! He’s FIVE YEARS OLD. Such a big boy!

Tonight he’s getting a peanut butter and banana Yöghund … and lots and lots and lots of hugs and kisses.

I love this little guy so much.

A lot of warm puppy time, and a little peace and quiet when the cold set in.

Me, my mother, and Bruno.

Bruno doesn’t mind going in the car when he gets to sit on his Mormor’s lap!

We met this pretty lady, Betty the bulldog, at a store in Beacon.

This is Oliver, who passed away in 2003. He was a hairless dumbo rat with odd-eyes (one black, one red) and a blazed forehead. This photo was taken when he was a baby, so he still had a little of his downy fuzz left—by the time he was fully mature, he was completely bald. Ollie was one of the most gentle animals I’ve met in my life. He was my last rat, and when he died I knew it would be a long time before any more rats would be a part of my life.

I’ve posted a few pictures of some of my other late pet rats here. I miss them terribly.

It was 1°F (-17°C) when we left the house this morning! We take a ferry across the Hudson to the train every morning, and as of today, the river is really beginning to ice over. It’s a combination of thrilling and terrifying to be on the boat as it crashes through the mini-icebergs!

On the Manhattan side of the commute, people are wrapped up in scarves and down and boots. I love this time of year—everyone becomes an anonymous, steamy-mouthed, red-nosed, hunchbacked blob, scurrying to the door of an office building to get out of the cold.

Back home on the sofa, wool socks and blankets can’t compete with the warmth given off by a 10-pound dog. We are totally taking advantage of our little Bruno’s furnace-like body, but somehow I don’t think he minds.

Pre-haircut. Post-haircut:

Bruno needs a dog bed, but after nearly 5 years of looking, I can’t find just the right one. This seems to work, though! We’ve had this scavenged Eames shell chair sitting in the basement for a while (it’s awaiting a trip out to Retro Redo for reupholstering), and, well, doesn’t every good puppy deserve his own piece of classic mid-century furniture? Yes!

Legs removed, sheepskin added, dog inserted. Everyone is happy!

p.s. Bruno is going for a haircut tomorrow, I swear. I am aware of the fact that he is looking more and more like Sam Sheepdog every day.

Bruno got a little plaid bulldog named Nigel for Hanukkah. He wore himself out chewing Nigel’s ears off, and had to rest for a bit before starting in on his tail.

This is the goofiest photo ever! We both look like we just spent a weekend eating buttered croissants and rubbing our heads with balloons.