Mango Minster 2012 - Mint's Introductory Wrestling Tutorial

Sneak, sneak... Is there anyone here? Ok, apparently my sis Cinnamon has gone to bed already. Hee hee, now is the chance to take over the blog!

I think most of you already know about Mango Minster, an annual prestigious doggie competition, run by our great blog friend Mango. Cinnamon has entered it before, but I haven't. So, I have decided to enter this year. It was hard to choose a category to enter, in deed. But, I realised that there is only one category that actually suits me - Bad Sports!!

Do you think why Bad Sports? That's because I am an athlete man, but there is a secret that I haven't told anyone. I was secretly training to be a professional doggie wrestler. I didn't tell my family about it, because I knew that they would worry about me. But, now I have become a highly skilled wrestler, so I took this opportunity to make a tutorial video to share some of my skills.

The one I am showing here is the part one of a series of "Mint the Beagle's Introductory Wrestling Tutorial". In fact, this video is my entry to the Bad Sports category of Mango Minster 2012. Enjoy!

Just in case, here is a link to the video on YouTube.


Note: Pepper who appears in the video is a girl, but I called her 'him' in the video, because 'her' didn't sound right in this context.

Liebster Award

Hi! It's Cinnamon.

Yay, we got given an award by our blog friends Digby and Delta in Australia! Thanks so much, Digby and Delta!!

The award is called Liebster Award ('Liebster' is a German word which means 'dearest' in English, according to Google Translate) and has some rules.

(1) Thank the blogger that gave you the award and then add a link to their blog.
(2) Reveal your top five picks (with less than 200 readers) and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
(3) Copy and Paste the Award to Your Blog.
(4) Hope that the people you’ve sent the award to forward it to their five favorite up-and-coming bloggers, and keep it going!

Shall we take on the task to pick our top five blogs? But, hmmmm, it's so hard...because we love all of our friends' blogs. But, we need to pick five, right? Ok, these are the five blogs we have picked:

Monty the Beagle: Monty has just moved from Auckland to Queensland, Australia. I love his marking, especially his white pants!

Agility Beagles (Lenni and Ressu the Beagles): Lenni and Ressu live in a far away place called Finland. We owe them so much, because their human always give our mum helpful advice for agility.

Sapphire the Beagle: Sapphire lives in Malaysia. She is a beautiful Beagle, and her human takes beautiful photos of her.

Le Paws Voyage (Le Le the Beagle): Le Le lives in Singapore. She is a clever young Beagle, who has started competing in Agility recently.

Galleria d'arte di Kimiyo: The last but not the least is my Mum's human friend who does most beautiful water colour paintings.


Well, now I will have to let them all know that they've got an award! So, bye for now.

Sweet Friends Award! ... and Beagle friends

Hi, it's Cinnamon!

My blog friends always brighten my day, and one of them has made me even happier by giving me an award called Sweet Friends Award!

The friend who gave me this award is Lexi the Great Dane, who I had met in person and played together at Honey the Great Dane's birthday party last November. Thanks so much, Lexi! I hope we can meet up for a walk or something soon!

The Sweet Friends Award has the following rules:

1. Copy the image and paste it to your blog.
2. List 10 things that make you happy, do one of them today.
3. Select 10 bloggers who brighten your day.

Here is a list of things that make me happy:

1. Hugs, cuddles, and lots of attention
2. Sniffing
3. Hound racing (lure coursing), i.e. running and chasing
4. Practising tricks and dancing
5. Friends, both real-world ones and bloggy ones
6. Balls, both big and small
7. Stuffie friends
8. Anywhere I can hide, e.g. behind a couch or under a bed or table
9. Mum and Dad
10. FOOOOOOOOOD!!!

Ten blog friends are too many to choose, so I have chosen the following three bloggers.

Jackal - He always gives me helpful tips on my training. Thanks!
Pepper - My new friend in New Zealand. She is a really smart puppy!
Chrissy - Her blog does brighten everyone's day!


Speaking of friends, I've been meeting so many Beagle friends lately. Is our popularity skyrocketing?

For example, last Wednesday and Thursday in a row, I met Louie at a nearby park by chance.



On Friday a woman talked to us, when I was walking with my Mum, and said "I have a Beagle! She had a swim for the first time yesterday!" Then, Mum and the woman had a little chat on a footpath, forgetting about me who was waiting beside Mum patiently and nicely.

On Saturday I met this new Beagle called Harvey at another nearby park.



And on Sunday I met Bella & Barry and Rosie at hound racing!



While I had met Rosie at hound racing several times before, I met Bella and Barry for the first time. Their humans found us in an article about our hound racing club in a New Zealand dog magazine "Fetch!"(Honey's human wrote the article!) and searched for information about the club on the Internet. Then, they came across my blog and contacted me by peemail. I was so happy to see new Beagles at racing! Louie who I met during the week had also been to racing before.



Hay, Beagles across Auckland! Come and join us!

My entries to two more photo contests ... and good news!

Hi, it's Cinnamon!

Today's post is about Mango Minster 2010 again! In my last post I showed you my entries to the Mango Minster Dog Show and Biggy's Dog Pile Competition. After that, I also entered Niamh’s Train Your Dog Photo Contest and Tucker's Sit Stay Competition.

This is my entry to the Train Your Dog Photo Contest.



As you know, I started dance training last October and finished a beginner dog dancing course in December. Now I am working on my very FIRST routine. My entry to the Train Your Dog Photo Contest is a shot taken in Roberta Reserve in Glendowie. At that time I was practising to raise my paws in accordance with the movement of my Mum's feet. Although I can do marching legs (a similar trick, but in the position face to face with my Mum who raises her knees instead of putting her feet diagonally forward) very well, I sometimes get confused when I am doing this new trick shown in the photo.

As you can see in the photo, we use a clicker and treats when we practise tricks and dancing. I love practising new tricks. The harder the trick, the more exciting the practice!!


This is my entry to the Sit Stay Competition.



As some of you know, I am not a great sit-stayer. I find staying still very very hard. I would rather just keep moving and get going! But, I like sitting on my biggest stuffie friend, Ben. He's always been with me along with Cookie since I was a puppy. He never complains about whatever I do to him. Because he is so big and I am so small, my attacks on him seem nothing more than light patting for him.


Well, today I have GOOD NEWS!! My dad's new camera came back from Japan! The camera was sent to Japan after a SD card got stuck in it and was unable to be taken out. When the problem happened, Mum took the camera to a camera shop, but the staff there couldn't take it out either. Because the camera was bought in Japan last September, it was still under its warranty in Japan, but not in New Zealand. So, Mum sent it back to the manufacturer's service centre in Japan.

We were so impressed by services of the service centre. They were so quick and efficient! As a result of a check done at the camera's service centre, it turned out be the SDHC card, not the camera, that had broken! Nevertheless, the service centre's staff did a thorough checkup for free and confirmed that everything in the camera was working correctly.

Now my dad is so happy! And, so am I!!

My entries to Mango Minster and Dog Pile Competition

Hi, it's Cinnamon!!

As you all know, Mango is holding a wonderful dog event called "Mango Minster 2010" right now and the entry is due to close on Wednesday, the 27th January. Although I wanted to ask my dad to take a special photo for my entry, his new camera had been sent to Japan for repair, so I looked through photos stored in mum's computer and chose one that would be a perfect entry to the Hound Dogs group I am entering. Yes, I am hunting a rabbit (not real one though) in the photo!!

For those who can't figure out what I am doing in this photo, here is a video of my fantastic run at Hound Racing.

I have also entered Biggie's "Dog Pile Competition," one of competitions being held at Mango Minster. The one who has piled up the biggest number of items on himself will win the competition. But, unfortunately I am not a big doggy, so I went for showing my nice stuffie friends. I managed to pile up as many as six friends on me with Mum's help. They are Red, Horse, Green, Doggy 1, Doggy 2, and Cow from bottom to top. Although you might think that some of them seem like leaning against the wall behind me, they actually are NOT touching the wall.

In fact, the original photo I first thought about entering was this one.

But, as you can see the legs of my biggest stuffie mate, Ben, are touching the floor, which might be a violation of the competition's rules. So, I had to ask him to stand back and supervise the photoshooting. I think he did a great job for me!

No wonder!

After writing my last post, I visited K9 Natural website and found that they had changed their feeding recommendations. On the package of K9 Natural Frozen Free Flow, there is a table that shows recommended amounts for various weights of dogs. According to the table, their recommended ratio is 1%. But, on the website which has been updated recently, it is 2%. No wonder Cookie has lost weight!! (Cinnamon has both dry food and raw food, so she hasn't lost as much weight as Cookie has.)

Also, I would like to thank Honey the Great Dane for telling us about her raw food diet in her comment on my last post. Yes, it is true that dogs should have something to chew on in order to clean their teeth, if they eat only soft food like K9 Natural frozen food. Currently Cookie and Cinnamon have some beef brisket every week or two and natural dehydrated venison or sheep ears from Truman's Treats (email) every other day. But, they would be delighted if I gave them bones more frequently!

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I am pleased to announce that Cookie and Cinnamon's new Japanese blog is now open! Their dad has chosen the third photo shown in my last post.