Marley - Where's your treat?

Marley Retrieving in Water at Bond Lake

Marley Presented with His Diploma

Here's Marley and Kaye with Marley's diploma from completing the Senior Puppy Training.

I think that we're going to continue training him. Next up will be Rally Novice Training. It will start July 12.

Marley and Us - Part 21

Marley graduated from his Senior Puppy Training June 1st. He passed all 20 steps of AKC's STAR Puppy Program.

Happy Birthday Mama!!!

To the best mom anyone can ever ask for.  Happy Birthday and may you have many more blessings to come.  We love you.

Marley and Us - Part 20

Hello everybody!!!

I really need to put some time to blog regularly.  We have been so busy with a lot of different stuff and going back to amateur radio (just got my license a couple of weeks ago) does not help to clear some time for me either. 

Anyway, tomorrow will be Marley's last day of Senior Puppy training.  He has learned a lot of new stuff but most importantly, he learned how to pay attention.  He still needs to improve that but he is getting there.  He is the youngest in his class but he is doing much better than most of the other dogs there.

He went for a swim yesterday at Bond Lake, which is about 8 mins away from our apartment.  He was so excited to see the water and was retrieving a stick that we were throwing in the water.  He even goes underwater when the stick sinks.  I wish we remembered to take a video of him doing all those things but I guess we were also very excited to see him retrieving in the water for the first time.

Air Power Airshow at Langley Air Force Base, Hampton, VA

I have not been able to blog for quite a while.  We have been pretty busy lately.  Kaye had her biometrics done.  Marley is in his last two weeks of Senior Puppy Training.  I took and passed my Amateur Radio Test and now hold a Technician license.  Too much going on.

Anyway, we went to Langley Air Force Base last weekend to watch the Air Power Airshow which featured the Thunderbirds.  They were amazing and it was quite an experience for Kaye and also myself.  We took a lot of pictures.  Here's some:

Marley & Us - Part 19

It's quite a while since I last blogged.  We were just pretty busy and can't find the time to post things here.  Marley is now 20 weeks old and he has gotten pretty big.  He is now about 35 lbs.  He has been going to Senior Puppy Training at Durham Kennel Club and Kaye is his handler.  He is also changing his puppy teeth to adult dog teeth, which is much better.  Puppy teeth are so sharp.

Kaye and I are going to Langley Air Force Base this weekend to watch the Thunderbirds.  I'm definitely taking lots of pictures and will post some here after our trip.  So standby.

Marley and Us - Part 18

Hi Everyone!

It's been a while since I had time to post something here.  I've been pretty busy lately but a lot of things have been going on with Marley.  He is now 18 weeks old and about 32 lbs.  He started his Senior Puppy Training last Wednesday with Kaye as his handler.  After the 6 week course, he will be evaluated for the AKC STAR Puppy program.  I hope he gets his medal.

He's the youngest puppy in his class.  He was not supposed to be in the Senior Puppy class but he already knows the basic commands and he will get bored with the other younger puppies so the trainers recommended that he joins the senior class.   Most of his classmates are very good with attention already, he's still struggling a little bit with that as he is still very young.  But other than that, he has been very good.

He hasn't had any accidents in the apartment lately so I guess that his housebreaking is already paying off.  We completely ignored the crate training as we feel sorry for him so he roams around the house and sleeps with us in our bedroom.  So far, he has proven to us that he can be trusted with that.

Anyway, he's also been spending time at the Cary Dog Park around 2 to 3 times a week.  He burns all his energy there.  As usual, he prefers to play with bigger dogs.  He likes roughing it up with them.  He thinks that he's already a big boy.

We will bring him to Pupsi tomorrow so he can see his regular playmates and socialize and play for the whole day.  He needs this to grow healthy and strong.

Dondi Dondoyano's visit to Pflugerville - April 2011

Marley's Video @ 16 weeks

Marley at Cary Dog Park

It's his first time at the dog park.  I forgot to take a video earlier when he was still very energetic and was running around with all the other dogs.  He likes playing with the bigger dogs.

Marley and Us - Part 17

Marley is now 16 weeks old.  He will have his last puppy booster shots tomorrow afternoon.  He will also have his rabies shot during the same appointment.  He will be able to go to dog parks after that and have fun playing with other dogs.  He will also start Senior Puppy Training @ Durham Kennel Club on April 20th.  It's a 7 week class.  Kaye will be his handler.

I'm really excited to see him get his AKC S.T.A.R. Puppy Certificate when he passes the tests that will come after the classes.  He is very smart and is always ready to please. 

Go Marley!!!

Marley's Videos - Part 2

Here 3 videos of Marley @ 15 weeks old.  Taken after he came back from obedience school.

Marley and Us - Part 16

Marley is coming home today.  We were at Pupsi yesterday and we worked with him.  He lost all his unwanted fats and looks like a very handsome dog now.  He did good with his basic obedience stuff.  He heels, sits, stays, comes and he even went down one time. 

He is still a puppy so some mistakes are excusable.  We will have him home but will bring him to Pupsi everyday to continue working on his obedience training and of course continue playing with his friends.

He likes to roughhouse with the bigger dogs/puppies.  He knows that he can only get the kind of play that he prefers with bigger dogs so he is somewhat biased and kind of snobs little dogs in their play area.  He picks dogs that are at least twice his size to play with.

We're glad to have you back Marley!!!  See you later this afternoon!!!

Marley and Us - Part 15

Marley is back in training at Pupsi since Monday, the 21st.  We miss him already.  I need to bring some more food for him.  I hope my knee gets better.  I've been home since Tuesday, getting old (arthritis).

Marley @ Lake Crabtree 3/19/2011

Here's Marley's first visit to Lake Crabtree.

Marley @ 8 weeks old

Here's Marley when he was 8 weeks old. Still very tiny. Now he's a big boy.

My New Website

Hello everyone! I just finished creating my website. Go take a look at it by clicking HERE. You can watch my piano videos there, listen to some of my original compositions, look at musical slideshows or if you're bored you can also just chill and play games.

Be sure to navigate through the different pages and if you find a broken link or any error, let me know. Please use the contact form to send me a message para may pakinabang naman...hehehe. Okay?

Marley and Us - Part 14

We are bringing Marley to the Vet today for his checkup and hopefully he is not contagious anymore so he can return to training.

He gained more weight. He is now 23 lbs and still growing fast. He is back to his old ways of being hyperactive and always wants to play. We hope that he is fit enough to get his scheduled vaccinations today and that the Vet will give him the OK to go back to training.

He is a very smart dog and can figure out his puzzles in minutes. I guess his motivation for food is that good. He loves working on his puzzles to get his kibbles. We are feeding 1/3 of his regular meals using his puzzle toy.

Marley and Us - Part 13

Marley looks like he's feeling way much better than when we got him last Thursday. He's become his clumsy self again doing a lot of funny stuff. His energy increased by about 10X since 4 days ago.

The only thing constant is that he always finishes his food quickly even when he was very sick. I am quite puzzled that he still does not bark after barking too much and losing his voice last Thursday. He might have though that barking makes him lose his voice so he better shut up.

Anyway, less worries for me and Kaye now that we know that he is feeling better.

Marley and Us - Part 12

We picked up Marley yesterday. The trainer brought him to our Vet because he was coughing. The Vet said that he is starting to have cough and gave him antibiotics good for 7 days. He has sore throat today and is coughing more. I'll be picking up some cough medicine for him.

I hope he gets better soon.

Amazing Dog riding a scooter

See more funny videos and TBT at Todays Big Thing.

Afternoon Breeze

George The Happy Dog

Lauren's Kung Fu Action

Marley and Us - Part 11

We visited Marley at Pupsi yesterday to bring his K9 Advantix for use today.  He's doing well with his housebreaking, however, the trainer told us that he is very dominant and its going to take a while to get him to do things properly.  He barks a lot and wanted to impose his will.  He is very smart but he just wants to do things his way.

We hope that he learns soon so he can come home.  He's not coming home until he gets it.

Good Luck Marley!!!

Museums in Raleigh

We visited 3 museums last Saturday.  They are the Museum of Natural Science, Museum of History and the Museum of Art.  They are all in Raleigh.  We spent the whole day for this museum tour and it was a lot of fun.

Museum of Natural Science

Museum of History

Museum of Art

Winstar Casino - Oklahoma

Just got this picture from Mama. 

Mama, Papa and Roel in front of Winstar Casino in Oklahoma.

Marley and Us - Part 10

Marley is in boarding school.  We boarded him yesterday to start his complete puppy training.  We intend to prepare him to get a K9 Model Citizen certificate and then go for Agility Training.

We saw him join the pack at Pupsi yesterday and although we were quite a distance away, he looked very happy interacting with all the other puppies and small dogs there.  They have large play yards for different sizes and ages of dogs.  They get at least 8 hrs of playtime everyday and his schedule looks like this:

7 am - Breakfast
8 am to 12 noon - playtime
12 noon to 2 pm - staff break and rest time
2 pm to 5 pm - playtime
after 5 pm - training then dinner then rest

We're allowed to visit him but will only be able to see him from a distance while he is playing.  We will be reunited with him when he is ready, anywhere between 5 days to 3 weeks, depending on his progress.

I'll keep you posted.

Gasoline Prices

This was sent to me by one of my colleagues.  It's funny but its no joke.  These gas prices are really affecting a lot of people already.

recipe for buttered fish

Buttered Fillet of Fish

Ingredients:                                           Procedure:
                                                               On a frying pan,sautee garlic and arrange t
                                                              he fish and spread parmesan cheese on top
                                                              of fish and cover for about 2 minutes to
1 lb. salmon or tilapia fillet                   cook one side, then flip and cover again for
1 tbsp. butter                                        2 minutes on medium heat until fully cook
2 tbsps. olive oil                                   ed. Serve hot. (You may extend cooking ti
                                                               me)
1 tbsp. parmesan cheese
salt and pepper to taste
2 tbsps. crushed or minced garlic

Marley @ 11 weeks

Took this picture 2 days ago.  He is growing fast.... now at 18.6 lbs.

Marley and Us - Part 9

We've been trying to find out what food is good for Marley.  His digestive system does not take Natural Balance well.  His vet suggested that we give him Science Diet and gave us a little bit of sample which we used.  He seemed to improve but I really don't want to feed him that because the main ingredients on it are not the best.

I bought Eagle Pack -Large Breed Puppy food yesterday and started him on it gradually starting this morning.  Need to monitor him the next couple of days.  Eagle Pack, please be it.......

He's never looked sick and is as playful as always but we just want to make sure that he gets the best.

Marley and Us - Part 8

Ok, PETCO screwed up big time for us.  We went there last Saturday on time for Marley's supposed 1st Puppy training class.  Guess what???  The trainer called in sick, Petco did not call us to let us know and they even claim that they don't have any training scheduled for puppies to start that day.

Very unprofessional.  I do not want to have anything to do with them, EVER.......

I will try to get Marley into a boarding school for puppy training starting next weekend.

We will visit Pupsi this afternoon and see if its a good place to brin him.

Marley and Us - Part 7

Marley goes to puppy school today!!!

It's Marley's first day in puppy training school.  We enrolled him at Petco.  We hope for good results.  He's a very active young boy and he needs to calm down a little bit. He has mastered sit so far but nothing else.

Marley and Us - Part 6

Marley had a successful first Vet visit yesterday.  He had his scheduled shots done and the doctor thinks that he is in good shape although she warned us that we need to watch Marley's growth carefully and mak sure that we do not overfeed him.  Imagine, he grew 7 lbs in 3 weeks.  That's a lot.

I also got a call from the Vet this morning notifying me that his fecal test results were negative for parasites.  They are still asking me to go pick up a dose of dewormer though to make sure that we get rid of any parasites that were not detected during the exam.  Just precautionary though.

I'll keep you posted.

Marley @ 10 Weeks Old

Finally, here's some pics of Marley @ 10 weeks old.

He has grown so much.....

Marley & Us - Part 5

 Today will be Marley's first trip to the Vet.  I sure hope everything is well with him.  His appointment is at 4pm.  He has grown a lot, from 6 lbs @ 7 weeks old to 13lbs now @ 10 weeks old.

You can see the big bones start to develop.  Muscles are starting to form at the right places.  And I'm not sure where he is putting all the food that he is eating.  He eats about 2 1/2 cups of dry food a day and he seems like he hasn't been fed for a whole week everytime he sees food in the morning.  He would always be jumping up and down waiting for you to serve him his breakfast.

Kaye said that she will take some pictures of Marley later.

Get 1000 free rollover minutes with AT&T

If you are an AT&T subscriber, text "YES" to 11113020 and they will give you 1,000 free rollover minutes.  I just tried it a couple of minutes ago and it works.

Marley and Us: Part 4

Today is the last day of Marley's 2nd deworming.  He is getting bigger each day.  We did not weigh him today but I think that he is already over 10 lbs.  He's only been with us for a week and a half and he has gained 4 lbs.  He is much taller and has so much energy.

Kaye gave him a bath today.  He is getting better at getting baths.  He doesn't whine too much.  I still don't want to bring him to the dog run to burn all his energy as he only had 1 parvo shot as of today.  His next one will be at 10 weeks old which is 2 weeks from now.  Once he gets it, I will probably let him play there as he will have 2/3 protection by then.

We have not taken any picture of him lately so I'll try to bug Kaye to take some pics of Marley.  By the way, we received his AKC Registration papers and Pedigree a couple of days ago.

Marley & Us; Part 3

It's been a week since we got Marley and he gained 2.8 lbs as of last night.  We also switched his diet to Natural Balance.  He seems to have more energy with this new food that we are giving him. 

He knows how to "SIT" and "STAY" now.  Although sometimes he does not want to stay for too long and would whine when we ask him to stay for too long.  Another funny thing is, when he knows that we have a treat in our hand he would sit even before we give him the order.

He likes everybody and you can not walk him around the apartment complex without him wanting to be petted by people that he sees.  he would always want you to bring him closer to other people so that he can play with them.  We'll try to post some pictures later.

Marley and Us: Part 2

We weighed Marley today and he is now 9 lbs.  He was 7 lbs when we got him.  He is growing fast.  It's only been 3 days since we got him.  We changed his food today from Beneful to Natural Balance which is a premium brand and is supposed to be much better.

He is also learning to go to the training pads to potty.  He just needs to aim better.  All the hard work is already showing some encouraging results.

Marley and Us

Today is Marley's 2nd full day with us.  He was much better with the containment that we made in the kitchen.  He does not whine for 2 hrs anymore like what he did yesterday after I setup the gate.   He still whines and barks to try and get us to come to the kitchen with him but not as much.

He is starting to play a lot with his toys.  He is also sleeping in his crate now.  And the biggest surprise is that he did not mind when Kaye brushed his teeth for the first time today (no more bad breath).

He is now 7 weeks and 1 day old.  I will try to post updates as often as I can.

What is your favorite Filipino Dish?

After more than a month of polling, the results are as follows:

Adobo - 42%
Kare-kare - 21%
Sinigang - 21%
Dinuguan - 14%

Meet Marley

It's sad to say but we had to give up Toby.  He has some temperament issues that it is better for him to be with a family who has had previous experience in handling a Shar Pei.  We thought that it would be good for both Toby and us to part ways.

Anyway, enough of the bad news.  The good news is, we got Marley.  He is a seven week old yellow labrador retriever.  He seems to be a very nice puppy with the right attitude and temperament.  So without further ado, here is Marley!!!

My New CD

Hello everyone. I just found out that my album is now available also on iTunes and Amazon. Yeah!!! If you haven't yet seen it, here is the link:

CLICK HERE

Happy Birthday Len!!!

Today is your special day.  Have lots of fun with your family.  I'm sure you will celebrate it somewhere and definitely with good food.  I wish we were there.

Our new baby "Toby"

Hello everybody! I'm Toby and I'm 8 weeks old. I'm a purebred Chinese Shar Pei and I'm very sweet and playful but stubborn at times.

I will grow up to be the best dog ever! I love mommy and daddy, they take care of me and love me.

Trying something new in our fitness repertoire....

We decided to add a new activity to our fitness routine.  Its hard to keep yourself motivated to exercise if there is no fun in doing it.  Inline skating is our new thing.  We bought 2 pairs of beginner to intermediate skates yesterday.  One for Kaye and one for me.  We also got some protective pads just in case.

I thought that it would be easy since I used to skate before.  But that was 30 years ago.  Man, was I in for a surprise.  It wasn't that easy but at least I'm able to stand up and skate a little bit.  I have to get used to it though.  My shins started to hurt after about 20 mins.  I guess it's normal.  Just needs some stretching before  I skate which I obviously did not do.  I also need to strengthen my leg muscles and make them more flexible.  This should happen in time.

I just hope that we start getting better days so we can skate more.  It's freezing here.  I'll take pictures of our skates and post them later.

Hello Everybody

I have been very busy the past week and was not able to blog for a while.  Nothing much is happening at home but there is a lot going on at work so that keeps me from updating this blog.  I'm glad to see some family members accepting my invites to become contributors.  I hope you guys contribute to the blog.   The more people getting involved in this blog the better for all of us.

Kaye and myself just came back from the store to pick up a new mattress.  Our old one just doesn't feel right anymore.  I'm sure that this new mattress will bring me a lot of good night sleep.  Can't wait to use it but we have to wait until tomorrow as it still needs to air out.

Kaye is cooking daing, dried pusit and eggs.  That should be good dinner.  I can smell it now and its making me hungry.

Snow Again

We're expecting about 3" of snow today here at the Triangle.  It's expected to be messy as the temperatures will probably not be low enough to keep it powdery.  Might have to deal with ice.  I can deal with driving in snow but I really hate driving in ice.

Hopefully, its not gonna be as bad as expected.  I'll post some pictures later.

Asian Food Shopping

We went to Grand Asia Market yesterday and bought some stuff to make some filipino food.  Man, the prices are really high compared to New Jersey.  Does anybody know a cheaper place to get Asian Food?  Well, anyway, I guess we'll just have to deal with it since there are only 3 places I know of that sell asian food here in this area.

Back to Reality

I'm back to reality after a wonderful Christmas vacation with my family in Texas.  Well, I guess all things come to an end so here we are back in RTP.  Time kinda flies too fast.  I can't believe that its already 2011. 

Me and Kaye went to a couple of mattress stores in the area and trying out different mattresses.  I think we like the tempur-pedic ones the best.  I'll let you know which one we end up getting.