Halloween - MWAH HA HA HAAAR

Here in Australia Halloween is getting more and more popular. There was a market happening a few suburbs away and they were encouraging children, dogs and adults to come along and get dressed up for the occassion.

I bought an adult sized costume vampire cape from a discount store, and lucked out because I was charged less than it was marked for and it was $12!

It was 140 cm long so clearly too big for the Mouser. Mouser wasn't home last week because she was away going for her Green Collar (more about that next week), and Barbie refused to get up for measuring purposes. Bender ended up being the model, and it fit him pretty well.

I picked Mouser up on Thursday night and tried it on quickly. It seemed like it would do, and I added to the outfit with a medallion (which was from a bike ride I did in 2011). Then on the day I added some eyebrows.

There were a lot of other dogs there who were dressed up too, but they all admired Mouse's cape. It turned out to be just a little bit too long for her so I had to make sure she didn't stand on it as we made our way through the crowds. 

We also rode there, so I decided that I should take the GoPro and make a video. I ordered a crepe and sat down on a park bench to share it with Mouse. Then I dug into my pocket to pull out the camera, and .... it was gone!

The mozzies were biting and it was dark so after a brief search I gave up and went home. My phone number is on the back of the case so I figured that the chances were good I'd get it back if an honest person found it.

At about 5pm on Saturday I got a phone call from a strange number, so I leapt across the room to answer it. It was a lovely lady who had found it in the park! I drove there and grabbed it off her straight away. So glad and lucky to get it back!!!! 

Here is the video:

Barbie goes for a cruise around Roleystone Markets

The dogs know when it is the weekend. If it is past 8.30am and I am still pottering around the house, they start to follow me closely. They cannot let me go out on an adventure without them! The plan for today was to go and check out a friend's market stall and partake in some goodies.

I briefly considered bringing both greyhounds, but decided I wanted to be able to socialise and purchase food without worrying about a bouncing dog on the end of the leash (looks at Olive). Naturally Barbie was my choice of companion. Olive tried very hard to state her case by leaning against my legs whenever I tried to move around the house.

(Olive said I couldn't use the photos I took of her attempting to trip me over. She suggested I use this photo from yesterday when she got dressed up to support my Aussie Rules football team, the Fremantle Dockers)

When we first arrived Barbie was a tiny bit nervous, I think the place reminded her of the Canning Show where we helped with a Greyhounds as Pets Display. She really didn't have a great day there, there was a noisy band with brass instruments, and it rained pretty much the whole time we were there.

The markets were pretty busy but it was a nice mellow atmosphere with an acoustic musician playing and quite a few other well behaved doggies perusing the stalls.

There were pony rides and so I was happy I didn't bring Bender, he is petrified of horses. After we walked around and were there for a while, Barbie decided to just flop down onto the grass. She is such a cruisy dog.

It made it very easy to partake in the goodies my friend was selling, and people mainly didn't bother her. She waited patiently for me to get her a treat. I think she wanted a soft serve icecream, but I got her a sausage instead.

The people at the sausage sizzle were a little bit confused about my request for a 'sausage sizzle for me and just a sausage with no bun for the dog'. They only charged $1.50 for Barbie's sausage and gave me a bunch of serviettes to carry it in until it cooled down enough for her to eat. 

Overall I think Barbie enjoyed her day out, even if I didn't buy her an icecream as well. She was so well behaved, I think I will definitely go to more dog friendly markets in future, even if I do have to drive to them.