Happiness is?

I totally believe that our dogs (and probably most dogs) are happiest when they are with their human family.  Sure they love the other fur members of the family - but it's different.

This first photo of Jimbo posing for a photo with me - one of the few of just the two of us up close (back when I first tried to do a selfie!).  We were out on one of our walks to a favorite local park just a short distance from our house.

Happiness is - well for our dogs it's simple.

Did you say Ride? Walk? Park? Snack? Starbucks? Mike (their best human friend that is our friend)?  The excitement can get a little overwhelming for them, but the joy is so pure, so simple and who can deny that it brings a smile to your face?

We have been blessed that ALL of our dogs have just loved to travel – travel short distances as well as long distances.  As such, we take our dogs to many dog friendly places locally including parks and restaurants. 

Not the best photo, but the expression on Abby's face is priceless.

By far, the best food places are a local place with an outdoor patio, Gaspars, located in Temple Terrace, Florida.  Often we will do an outside breakfast at Shamrocks, also located in Temple Terrace, Florida.  Of course, all of our dogs love drive-thru places, but for the most part (except for Starbucks and the Pup cups) drive-thru places are limited to when we are doing long distance travelling.  And yes, I know that Starbucks pup cup isn’t good for them but you try to ignore 6 brown eyes (I can sometimes).

Our dogs all love those car rides, but sometimes they realize that they ended up at an undesirable location (aka the vet) which is always fine until they either have to be separated from Mom (aka me) or go into the little room.  Rue and Ollie being smaller take refuge under the chairs…(so happy to be somewhere, but not so happy about this location!).

Happiness is going for our morning walks – although, every so often Abby thinks it’s going to be worthy of taking a favorite item with her (which eventually ends up being dropped and I am carrying another item).  I think Abby was having an 'unsecure' morning and bringing her cow gave her comfort.

Sometimes happiness is having a little cuddle with one of your fellow dog siblings….

Happiness is traveling to a nice park where nature runs abound whether it's in Florida close to home....

or in western North Carolina - a long way from home.

and for Ollie, who just loves her "Poppa" sometimes it's just hanging with him while he takes photographs of something other than her.

Happiness is....

1. A car ride
2. A walk
3. Time with my humans
4. Time with my fur siblings
5. A snack (aka treat)

And I'm sure there are many other things that make our dogs lives so complete, but these things top the list.

It all boils down to "where is the next adventure going to be - close to home or miles away, as long as I have Mom and Pops, that's all that matters to me".

For now, Jimbo says I'll leave you with one of the only video's of me as I create a nice place to lay down and chill - hope you enjoyed this week's blog post featuring candid cell phone photographs of the Perdue-Vargas dog family.

Interested in Pet Photography Session?

If you would like to discuss or book a custom pet portrait session, send an email to [email protected] or give us a call/text Linda at 813-610-2671 in the Tampa Bay area (Hillsborough/Pinellas/Pasco/Polk counties in Florida).  We have flexible rates and packages to fit most everyone’s budget as we believe that having wonderful photographs of your pet is important to so many people.

Blogging with Pet Photographers

This is a personal project that I try to participate in each week (as much as possible).  This post is part of a 'blog circle' which is with several other Professional Pet Photographers around the world.  Each week a different theme is provided to the group and we, as pet photographers, interpret the theme in our own way.  Follow the link provided at the end of each of my blogs to the next pet photographer's blog - and when you arrive back at my blog - you've completed the entire circle of blogs for this theme.  For more pet photographers sharing their take on this theme, head over to Atlanta dog photographer CM Bryson takes you behind the scenes of creating an award winning image for Embark's Colorific challenge because happiness is Colorific!