Our Ori-Pei had puppies last year in April.  Seven of them.  The sire of these pups was a black lab and mastiff mix.  Pearl's breed is a cross between Shar-Pei and pug.  The puppies were too big to be born naturally so we had an emergency c-section, and the vet and his assistants were shocked at how big they were (Pearlie lost 13 pounds with the birth!).  We enjoyed them for a little while, sold some, gave away a few, and kept one.  We chose him because of all the pups, he was the most laid-back.  Ha!  With the unusual mix (shar-Pei, pug, black lab, and mastiff) he is HUGE - more than twice the size of his momma, and absolutely beautiful.  We call him Oliver. 

Oliver eats everything in sight.

He ate my hot tub cover.  He ate the siding off the hot tub.  He has eaten several of the rails in the new deck.  He has eaten nearly every single dish he has ever had (including the metal ones - go figure).  He uses the firewood for chew toys, dragging stovelengths up onto the deck and flinging them about - he broke the screen door this way, then figured since it was broke anyway, might as well eat it.   I think he ate a gopher who had the poor judgement to poke his head up in our yard.  Oliver is still all pup, and that makes him a little dangerous with the kids because he likes to play and doesn't realize that his 100 pounds to their 40 or so is not conducive to a good time.  His favorite toy is a stretchy-squeaky thing that dangles proudly from his jaws as he trots around the fenceline to see who is watching and coveting his stretchy-squeaky thing.  We call it a chewy-boy. 

He poops everywhere.  It's HUGE.

I have picked up enough poop to fill several large cans just in the last couple of weeks, and we feed them the "good" dog food, you know, that's supposed to cut down on the clean-up - apparently with this ginormous dog, it doesn't work.  I try to get the kids to do it as part of their chores, but it just hasn't worked - they always hide and avoid and take advantage of my distraction to wriggle out of it.  Who can blame them?  Usually the rain washes it away - Seattle's got plenty of that this time of year!

I thought once about making a saddle for him, but realistically, I think the neighbors would complain to the ASPCA or animal control or something if they saw my kids riding the dog. 

Oliver has taken up residence on the deck, right outside the dining room slider, and the unfortunate affect of this is that we just don't use the deck anymore.  It's just too much work to try to avoid getting smacked with a tail packing 100 lbs of force behind it (my legs are bruised from hip to ankle whenever I stand too near him, the happy waggy thing) and to try to keep him from jumping - although I must give Michael credit for coming along admirably with the training, the dogs are both much better lately, which has led to us deciding to reclaim the back yard today.  We are taking it back from the dogs!  It's OUR yard and OUR deck and we wanna use them!  Keep the kids from having to play in the street! :-)

Today we went out and mowed, dragged debris left over from the massive windstorm of last December that brought down part of a tree, picked up the never-ending poop, cleaned up what was left of the hot tub cover and emptied the yucky rainwater before it can become a mosquito farm, and basically told the dog in no uncertain terms that we are back and we won't let them rule the back yard again.  Ha!  We triumph!

Kinda sick that I feel so superior to a couple of DOGS. 

Find out about Ori-Peis here.  They are a wonderful breed!

And by the way, the yard looks FABULOUS!

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