for a lifetime
Friday, December 18th, 2015
Recipe: homemade dog paw wax
Today is my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary. I’d say that is a pretty impressive accomplishment for any time in history, but especially now. Jeremy and I will be heading out to celebrate with them in the spring since the week before Christmas is a pretty terrible time to travel or do anything for that matter. I scanned a few photos from the early years of their courtship and marriage, because it’s fascinating and touching to look back on those days. Another place, another time. My parents were younger than I am now in all of these photographs. I’m glad they made it to 50 years and I hope they log more years to come. Happy anniversary, Mom and Dad. I love you.
i think this was college – ah, young love
early 70s (i’m the little fat one being held)
a day at the beach (probably winter)
When Jeremy and I agreed to bring Kaweah into our family, all I could think was, “We’re getting a puppy!” She was my first dog and I had no idea what to expect. There were some things we did right and some things we did wrong. We learned as we went and I discovered that loving that dog – my sweet Kaweah – for all of her 15-plus years was one of the best things to have happened to me in my life. Once we decided to make Neva a part of our household, I didn’t dwell too much on her puppyhood (aside from the sleep-deprivation and training), but focused my sights on her doghood. After all, she’s only a puppy for a blink of an eye, but she’ll be a (good?) dog for her lifetime. The puppy stage was the time to introduce her to life as a Colorado mountain dog. We have mapped it all out for her: hiking, trail running, skiing, SUPing, swimming, backpacking, maybe even mountain biking. Kaweah is our reference point and Neva seems to be following right in her footsteps and then some.
But Kaweah learned the Colorado mountain dog life as a strong and athletic adult. Neva is still developing into her adult stage. So when we took her ski touring in a foot of powder a few months back, I was surprised that she experienced some trouble with her paws in the snow. I’m still unclear if it was from ice balling under her paws or if the snow was just too cold for her footies. Whatever it was, this was new for us because Kaweah never had these problems out west. Of course dogs like Banjo with longer hair between their footpads are practically guaranteed to get ice balls forming underfoot on powder days which can be painful. Erin (Banjo’s person) uses a combination of dog booties and Musher’s Secret (dog paw wax) to protect Banjo’s paws. I got Neva a couple sets of dog booties, but stopped short of buying Musher’s Secret because it’s spendy. That’s when I looked into making it myself and you know what? It’s not only cheaper to make it yourself, but it is ridiculously easy. First, you need to find a place that supplies what you’ll need.
rebecca’s herbal apothecary in boulder is awesome
There are plenty of great online stores where you can source the ingredients, but I wanted to keep my business local if possible. Thankfully, Rebecca’s Herbal Apothecary makes that possible. They have a physical shop in Boulder and an online store for orders to ship. The store carries a wide selection of butters, salts, oils, teas, waxes, herbs, and so much more. I went in finding everything I needed as well as getting some great advice on shea butters and making sure the ingredients were safe for ingestion in case Neva decided to lick it off her paws.
all you need: olive oil, shea butter, beeswax, coconut oil
cutting up the beeswax
**Jump for more butter**
