I won an award

It was given to me by Tina over at Mummy Diaries

It was for the answer I gave for The question:

How can i stop my child from coming out of their bedroom and into mine every night? I hope my answer helped Lyndsey from the UK. Here is what I said:

Start by developing a bed time routine. Make it the same everynight this will help them mentally ready for bed. Then when they get up at night you have to take the back to their own bed immediately. Talk to them there about why they are up. Don't turn on any lights as this will wake them up more. Once they have settled back into their own bed the go back to your. This may take several times before they stop doing it but you must be consistant.

If you want to participate in the question of the week stop over to Mummy Diaries she has a new question each week .

Thanks for the award Tina

Walking The Dog

I think many people take for granted that our best and most loyal friend never complains. So today I'm going to let Cricket do some complaining for them.

Hi my name is Cricket, my family rescued me from a very noisy place where I was kept in a cage. There were lots of other dogs there and all of them were as sad as I was. At my new home there was another dog named Wags and she told me stories of all the places she had lived with her new family. One of place was so hot the pavement could burn her paws If she went out in for a walk in the middle of the day. She could look out the window and see other families walking by with their dogs ignoring the fact that while the covering they had on their feet protected them from the burning hot road their four footed friend was suffering loyally beside them.

She told of other places like where I was born that got so cold in the winter the ground would freeze. Though the cold ground was no bother to her well padded paws, the big trucks that lumbered down the road poured stuff out the back that would get up in between her paws and irritate them. Lucky for Wags that our family made sure to clean her paws after their walks together. But after living in the place with the hot pavement she wondered how many other families with dogs remembered to take care of their paws after a walk.

Wags has gone away but her stories stay with me and I'm glad I have such a thoughtful family to live with.

Cricket

The Rosco Report + 1

I have two pictures to share today the first is little Rosco the Frog who has finally gotten his front legs. He still has his tail though you can't see it in this shot because of the fake plant.

You Grow Rosco

This second one is of my old friend Fitz once again trying to thwart my computing efforts as he snuggles down for a nap on my chair leg.

Awww How could I make him move I had to save blogging for another day.

The other day I came face to face with my turtle’s future self, a lady had gone jogging one morning and saw a large turtle in the road. She decided it didn’t look healthy and bless her kind heart wanted to take it home and take care of it. She brought the turtle in a large cooler to Petco (where I work) and asked what she needed to take care of it. The first thing I told her was that what she had in her cooler was a Red Eared Slider. Then told her the best thing she could do for him was to find the closes water to where she found him and release him back into the wild. From there I began to explain everything she would need to keep him as a pet. Not surprisingly she decided to return him to the wild. By the way the Turtle she brought in had a shell that was about a foot long. The original tank we bought for Rex (the one sold as an aquatic turtle kit) was only 12 inches wide and would have never been big enough for the turtle in the cooler.

Red Eared Sliders are relatively cheap to buy, and the young do look particularly delightful, but it is surprising that many people buy them with no knowledge of what they have bought, and not even providing the bare essentials. Many places sell them at an illegal size (under 4 inches) in a little fish bowl like this one.

This set up is completely inadequate for a Red Eared Slider giving him no room to grow and none of the lighting he requires.

Aquatic turtles like sliders need fairly elaborate and expensive housing. They need regular exposure to ultraviolet (UV) light, so pricey bulbs designed for reptiles that produce UVA and UVB light are needed for turtle tanks. Without this light, they can develop metabolic bone disease. Turtles are very messy, and even with a good filtration system you will still have to clean in regularly. Remember turtles have to drink the water they are living in. Their tank should be deep enough and wide enough to allow swimming and a place to get out of the water to bask. Here is a list of equipment you will need if you have or are thinking about getting ANY aquatic turtle:

A suitable sized tank
Heater and thermostat
Filters and air pump
Light bulbs
Suitable depth of swimming water
Dry area
Thermometer

Though aquariums are good for young turtles, make sure you get the largest one you can afford to help prevent the need to keep buying larger and larger ones. At their full grown size the will need a tank that holds about 100 gallons. One of the owners I've talked to used a pre-formed plastic pond (like you get at home depot) to build an indoor pond for his turtle. You might also consider putting him outside part of the year if you have pond in your yard that has a good fence to keep predators out.

Now I'm not tell you all this to keep you from buying a Slider, I love Rex and think he is fascinating to watch. I love when I come into the kitchen first thing in the morning he is happy to see me. Yeah I know he knows I'm there to feed him but it's still fun to watch him climbing around trying to get my attention. Opps started getting off track LOL, I'm telling you this for the turtles sake. Many people take them home and when they get to big dump them. Once these turtles have lived with people they CAN NOT be returned to the wild and expect to live very long.

Don't feel down and blue if you have discovered after reading this that Red Eared Sliders are to much for you to deal with. I have some alternative you might want to consider. They will still need the whole aquatic turtle set up but do to their smaller sizes you can buy a smaller tank. The First is the African Side Neck Turtle:

I borrowed this picture from California Turtle and Tortoise Club I home they don't mind. If you want to see more pictures check out their site (click here). This is the larger of the two I'm suggesting with an adult size of 6 to 8 inches.

The second aquatic turtle I'm suggesting is the Three Striped Mud Turtle:

This photo I borrowed from Pbase.com you can visit them (click here) It's a photo host and share site.
Thise cute little guys only get 3 to 4 inches. So in the first tank I had Rex in I could probably happily house 4 or 5 of these little guys.

I think anyone who is thinking of getting any kind of pet should visit their local library first. Read everything available for the pet your considering. That will help keep surprises to a minimum and insure that you have a healthy long lived pet.

New Tank For Rex The Red Eared Slider

A little bit of advice for anyone condsidering a Red Eared Slider. Double Check the food lable.

Not the best picture sorry but you might notice the two red circles. One lable says Growth Formula the other says Maintance Formula. Make sure when you grab your food you get the Maintance Formula not the Growth Formula. We made that mistake for you and the results is that we had to go and get Rex a new Tank sooner then planned all because I wasn't paying enough attention.

Presenting Rex's new "Indoor Pond"

This thing is about twice the size of his original.


He still has some growing to do but now he will do it slower and will still have plenty of room.

I have more to say about owning a Red Eared Slider but it will have to wait until tomorrow since I have to go to work shortly.

Cleaner Hands

I was helping out with the fish today and one of the cleaning shrimps wouldn't come out of his bag. When I reached in to get him out he decided my hand needed cleaning. It was pretty cool I could actually feel him tuging on my skin.
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T