Chloe gets a "Haircut"

A new segment in my chronicle of Chloe the Dog.

So, I got pretty tired of looking at her in all her matted glory, and the groomers are booked solid until about the 1st of April. Ouch. Those mats have got to be hurting, they tend to pull the hair. So I called my friend to talk me through the process of clipping it off myself. She decided to come over and help since she has shaved dogs, goats, and pigs (I had no idea pigs had hair that needed clipped!) We oiled up my clippers and went to work. Her back went pretty quickly, her sides were already bald, and we did down her sides as far as we could get her to let us. Up the nape of her neck and across her chest. Then we wanted to see what we still had to work with, so she got a really good bath, got all that encrusted dirt off her skin, out of her footpads, under her tail. Poor thing. We still had her face and belly/groin area to do, which dogs really don't like being messed with, and we needed her to stay very still. So we sedated her.

Benadryl, it turns out, works great on both kids and dogs to make them super drowsy! Once that kicked in, we were able to go to work. It took a couple of hours working mats out with dematting combs and haircutting scissors, then clipping the fur more evenly with the clippers. We had to take it pretty short all over, and I still have some work to do on her face and front legs, plus her claws still need clipped pretty badly, so either tomorrow of Friday afternoon I will have to give her more Benadryl and do that. She snores.... too cute.

So this is her side in all it's glory. You can see the back paws are clipped down, but the front are still long. That's Jade in the background, my kitty. Her bare spots are worse off that I thought. The skin is a different color that the stuff that was covered with hair. Kind of like a sunburn, but winterburn, caused by the exposure to the cold. She wears a shirt here to protect her skin, and I have started putting a non-scented, superior grade massage oil on the bare skin to moisturize it and provide a barrier. You can tell she feels so much better now.

Her front looks much better. You can actually see her eyes now, but you can tell her face is a little uneven, and that should look better when I can clean it up a bit. She has a slight curl to her coat that will be so cute if kept clipped short!

We took her over to the Mayberry's to meet their dog and the rest of the family. She loves Jasper! I think she is really lonely for another dog. And although he was a little reserved at first, she has such a winsome personality that by the end of the visit he followed her out to the car as if to say, "Why are you taking my new friend away?" So I think they will be just fine. She made herself right at home. This has made Mark happy, he only has to put up with her until next week. I am happy she will have such a great family, and I can keep tabs on her and go play with her occasionally.