Happy Birthday Gunnar and Rhea!

On January 21st, my puppies turned 8. And thank god for that. 

2013 was a tough year for them. It started off with promise... In Feb, Rhea started a 3 month stint of no seizures. But that was followed with her spiraling into a seizure every 5 days or so. We were frantic to find her some help so we upped her meds, we tried new vets and then we tried new drugs. Unfortunately, one of the vets we visited suggested stepping her down from her main drug at a risky interval. Against our better judgement we did and that didn't go well for us. One morning she started seizing and just never stopped. She had somewhere around 15 legitimate seizures that day but she was never fully "back" from any of them. This was as close to Status that she's ever gotten. She ended up spending two days at the NC State Neurology department on a constant drip  of anti seizure drugs. Those were the saddest days. Walking two of my pups and not three..getting asked from neighbors where our pup was and explaining she's at NC State which usually means the worst. We thought we were going to lose her. The first time they tried weening her off the drip she seized again but on the second attempt she held it together. Now she's on different meds and careful watch. She's up to about 10+ days between seizures and that might be as good as we'll ever get. In conjunction with all this, Gunnar broke a 7-8 month seizure free stint. There's no winning with epilepsy. 

Masi, bless her soul, is perfectly fine. 

To celebrate their life so far I thought I'd post a timeline of them growing up. It was so much fun going through my old photos and finding their puppy and adolescent photos. Made my heart go pitter patter. 

This was the day we brought them home from the farm in Hillsborough, NC. Just for scale, those tennis balls are about the size of a ping pong ball. 

Fluffy girl herself when she still had a pink nose, no name and all her ears. 

Look at that face. The tiny little blaze on his forehead. The ears!

This must have been a couple weeks later. Funny note - Rhea still sleeps next to the toilet. 

Fast forward a year. Just after our pups 1 yr birthday, we adopted Masi. Now we had 3 Border Collies in a 1500 square foot townhome with no yard. I believe that is considered constitutionally insane. (But no really, having no yard is no excuse to not have a dog. It actually forces you to go walk your dog for their exercise. If you don't want to do that to begin with, you don't need to have a dog). 

 This is sometime after their 1st birthday I believe. (Special note for K-man-Kato in the picture. The greatest Rottie I'll ever know). 

This was as close as I got to their second birthday. I wasn't very good at taking yearly photos in the beginning. Notice how Rhea's still pretty "smooth" in this picture. 

This is one of my all time favorite pictures of the pups. This is at the Scott Kerr Dam in Wilksboro NC where the Burn Race is held every year. We went in November and woke up to frost and a steaming lake. 

3 yrs old puppies! Rhea's finally starting to fill out now. At this point we're still in the townhome and Rhea had just started having seizures (Gunnar at this point had not). 

This is during the snow storm of 2010. We were in our second home at this point. Gunnar has started having seizures and we had a foster pup named Lucky (not picture). This was the first good snow the pups had seen. Man they loved it. Rhea still had all her ears at this point!

5th Birthday Photo! Rhea in her full plumage! We hadn't started buzzing her yearly yet. Oh man, her ear is lobbed off in the picture already. Not so funny story...don't trust box fans. I came home to check on the dogs at lunch one day to find the tip of Rhea's ear chopped off. The culprit was the box fan we'd left running to keep them cool. Now she has a U in the tip of her left ear. Poor girl....she's still cute though. 

6th Birthday Photo! I was getting good at doing this yearly now. This was the last year that Rhea and Gunnar had regular intervals between seizures. This was also the last year Rhea's right ear stood up at all (Masi bit it during one of Rhea's seizures and scarred the cartilage so it won't stand up now). 

 7th Birthday Photo! So yeah, this was last year and already featured on this blog but oh well. This was probably smack dab in the middle of Rhea's 3 month break from seizures and we had no idea how much we were about to go through with her. 

Rhea's haircut for 2013. She looks like she did before she went POOF with all the hair!

And then the pups turned 8 this month. It's so sad to know that considering their breed and their health issues they're already over the hill. It's also sad to see them slow down. They're Border Collies, so they've been going strong for 8 years without a hint of tempering their energy. Now all of a sudden they're slow to get up from laying down. They limp after hard runs, they fall a lot more easily and an injury takes a couple days to recovers. One thing remains the same though...the spark in their pretty brown eyes that is the calling card for their unrelenting spirit. Such good pups...

For their birthday cake this year the pups got gourmet (as in I bought them and didn't make them) doggy peanut butter cups! 

Rhea was very confused at first. It smells like chocolate...she knows she's not supposed to eat chocolate... Gunnar on the other hand wouldn't stop inching forward long enough for me to get a decent picture. 

I can haz chocolate? OK!

 Oh Gunnar and the awkward "don't look at the camera" face. 

He was pretty thrilled with the birthday cake option this year.  

Masi's birthday is just around the corner! At which point it will be time for moar doggy photos! 

Liz 

Awww FUDGE!

Anyone growing up in an even moderately conservative household might recognize the title of this blog post as a rather "offensive" curse word. I remember getting in all heaps of trouble using the word "fudge" in the wrong context. 

In this case I'm using the word most appropriately because I'm about to share with you my undeniably delicious and easy fudge recipe. I know this may seem out of season since we're all full into "lose the holiday weight" mode. But when you think a bout it, there's never a bad time for fudge. Ever. 

My Mom had several talents. One of those was being a fantastic baker. There may not have been any ceremony but I feel as though I've taken the proverbial torch from her and am now running. For the most part I've simply adopted her go to recipes and recipe books (I pilfered her Better Homes and Gardens book after my parents' divorce...the one in which she wrote in the margins...yeah I only just gave that back a year ago...) and this recipe in no exception. When I first moved here from NY I couldn't make this recipe because I was missing a key ingredient. Fluff. Fluff is the magic stuff. This is also a recipe direct of the container of fluff. So...there is that. 

Here's the line up...

You can be cheap and get the discounted evaporated milk and butter but do not skimp on the chocolate and for the love of all that is good and holy...don't get the store brand marshmallow creme thinking the recipe still works...

 Yeah I did that at first. But I was so awfully wrong. Years ago, I'd smuggle Fluff to the south from my northern visits. Now you can find it in many of your local groceries stores. I got this particular jar in Harris Teeter. Get the Fluff. That is all. 

 Before you begin I would suggest getting everything out that you'll need. If you've never made candy before then let me let you in on a secret, it goes from not ready to over done in 1.2 milliseconds. Be prepared. If you read the recipe (on the Fluff jar) it tells you to test via soft ball stage. Google that. Then set out a cold bowl of water. And if you have a candy thermometer, get that too. I use the biggest pot I can because one time I double this recipe and the fudge started boiling over. Talk about a mess! 

 There's the recipe, Never Fail Fudge. It doesn't lie. If you follow the instructions you will have beautifully smooth, delicious, calorie heavy fudge for all to enjoy. 

 Start by filling your pot with sugar. Lots and lots of sugar. 

 Follow the recipe and add your butter, milk and Fluff. I try to mix as much as I can while it warms up then I let it rest and do the dirty deed.

Oh yeah...greasing the pans. This was my favorite part as a kid. I loved getting my hands all goopy from the butter or shortening. 

 You shouldn't do this with rings on but I forgot they were there and by this point I'd gone too far. My grandma used to tell me to use a paper towel to spread the goop. But I, like my mother, enjoyed getting my hands dirty. Spread this stuff all over the inside of the pans in a nice thin layer. You don't need a lot and if you use too much it ends up melting and then solidifying on your fudge and that's just gross. 

 Once your pans are all greased, return to your candy. At this point it should just be coming together. Keep on mixing now, you want it to be consistent. 

 At this point you're all mixed together and you're no longer allowed to step away from your fudge because it's about to get hot. Start looking for signs of boiling. It's a lot harder to see when a candy is boiling if your'e not used to it. You see the little air bubbles in this pic? Those ARE NOT boiling bubbles. At best it's simmering now. Keep stirring. 

At this point the candy is  actively boiling and I'm mixing my little heart out. you have no idea how hard it was to take this picture without burning my candy. At this stage my candy tends to brown a little because I can't mix fast enough. It doesn't ruin the taste of the fudge so long as you don't burn it. As soon as you see this stage, start your timer. Also have your cold water and spoon ready for the soft ball stage test. 

I couldn't take pictures of the next few steps but here's how they went. Once the timer went off I did a soft ball stage test and my candy was not quite there so I boiled another min or less and tested again at which point my candy made a soft ball and I removed it from the eye. Once it's removed from the heat, I added my chocolate chips and vanilla and stirred vigorously. The goal is to get all the chocolate melted and mixed in before the fudge starts to harden and you have maybe a minute and a half to complete this. Once the fudge was all mixed together I haphazardly poured it into my prepared pans. It's rather helpful to have an extra pair of hands for that step (someone to hold the pot while you scrape the fudge out).   

TADA! (This is half of the final product) You can smooth out your fudge with a warm wet spatula but in my opinion is tastes just as good like this. 

And that ladies and gentlemen is how you make the easiest, smoothest, best tasting fudge of your life. You can change the flavor of this fudge by switching up the chocolate chips with other flavors. I've tried the Reese's peanut butter chips and they make a very delicious lightly peanut butter flavored fudge. 

Go forth and impress people with your candy making skills!

Liz