Fashion Show! Fashion Show! Fashion Show at lunch! (25 Days of Christmas version)

So...long time no blog. One of my resolutions this year is try to blog more, so we'll see if I can stick with it! My other resolution is to be more like Kelly Kapoor of The Office. I'm totally kidding...or am I?

I've always thought it would be fun to do a picture diary as a sort of fashion show of what Rory and Lane wear each day, but somehow remembering to take a picture every single day actually ends up being quite a tall order, or maybe I'm really just that lazy. Keeping that in mind, I'm asking you to go ahead and excuse the poor quality of several of the pictures below. Sometimes my BlackBerry and poor lighting was the best I could muster up by the late hour I remembered to take the picture.

Rory and Lane have such a large holiday wardrobe, and I was pretty confident I could commit to the picture diary idea for 25 days starting on December 1 and in the process make myself feel better about the sheer volume of Christmas outfits they have accumulated. I succeeded on the first count and failed miserably on the second. I probably should be ashamed to admit that I grossly underestimated the amount of holiday attire, specifically dresses, not to mention pajamas, they have collected, so this picture diary is really more of a glimpse of the whole picture. This year, I think I may need to start the day after Thanksgiving and go through the end of December to make sure that everything makes it in the rotation.

It's just so hard to resist all the adorable handmade Christmas dresses! Should I even mention the cheap tees from the $2.50 bin at Target? I mean that's basically giving them away, and it makes them way too easy to buy and forget about. (Justify, justify, justify.) Since Facebook somehow managed, with no notice or explanation, to delete several of the picture posts uploaded in the past, including several of the daily holiday outfit posts, I'm even more glad I have this all in one place.

Now, without further aideu, here is Rory and Lane's 25 Days of Christmas Fashion Show in pictures:

Day 1: Elf-Sized.




Day 2: Bite Me.




Day 3: Tacky Holiday Sweaters.

Day 4: Sweet.

Day 5: Bah Humbug!

Day 6: Sorry Santa - I ate the cookies.

Day 7: Santa Baby.

Day 8: Santa's Little Yelper.

Day 9: Just go ahead and put me on the naughty list!

Day 10: Merry Christmas.

Day 11: Crystal Snowflakes.

Day 12: Santa's Helper.

Day 13: Holiday Patchwork.

Day 14: Lil Teddy.

Day 15: Winter Wonderland.

Day 16: The Grinch.

Day 17: Reindeer in Training.

Day 18: Santa Sweater.

Day 19: Christmas Elegance.

Day 20: Santa's Lil Helper.

Day 21: Holiday Party Taffeta Hand-Smocked Dress.

Day 22: Candy Cane Bouquet Strappy Ruffle Vest.

Day 23: Little Miss Candy Cane.

Day 24: Gingerbread overalls.

Day 24 (Christmas Eve dinner): Holly Halter Christmas Dress.

Day 25: Holiday Peppermint.

Day 25 (Christmas Dinner): Candy Cane Halter Formal Dress.

Get the Look:

Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, Day 6, Day 7, and Day 8 are from Target (in-store only).

Day 9 is Mudpuppies.

Day 10 is I See Spot.

Day 11, Day 24, Day 25 are go.fetch.

Day 12 and Day 21 are Oscar Newman.

Day 13, Day 14, and Day 15 are Ruff Ruff Couture.

Day 16 is SissyAngelWear.

Day 17 is SimplyDog often found at Walmart.

Day 18 is Dallas Dog Sweaters.

Day 19 and Day 22 are Prissy Paw Fashions.

Day 23 is by ChloeBella, who unfortunately is no longer in business.

Day 24 (Christmas Eve Dinner) and Day 25 (Christmas Dinner) are tonimari.

tonimari Easter dress

When I think of Easter, there is always one deliciously sugary treat that comes to mind. I don't mean Cadbury Eggs, but YUMMO! I mean the deliciously marshmellowy goodness of Peeps. Peeps used to be synonymous with Easter (and blowing things up in the microwave or at least trying to), though I guess now that they've seen a marketing opportunity you can get Peeps for just about any major holiday.

This is my very long-winded way of introducing the girls' Easter dress from one of our very favorite designers, tonimari. When tonimari first posted a swatch of this Easter fabric, which I immediately began referring to as the Peeps fabric, I was instantly drawn to it. It wouldn't be the first time my stomach influenced a decision. Cupcake fabrics anyone? The instant I saw it I knew Rory and Lane had to have an Easter dress made from the Peeps fabric.

It's no secret what big fans of tonimari we are, so it was no surprise the finished design was above and beyond what we could have imagined! This tonimari dress is almost too much cute in one place, and I couldn't stop smiling when I opened the package. It's apparent each and every detail was well though out. Let's work our way from top to bottom of this gorgeous creation, shall we?

The dress pulls together two very complimentary colors, cotton candy pink and Tiffany blue. The pink fabric has a beautiful glittery sheen to it, which makes this fun, bright, and vibrant pink sparkle as it catches the light, making it the perfect fabric for any of our girly girls. The cotton candy pink Peter Pan collar is trimmed with Tiffany blue ric rac and is accented with a coordinating polka dotted grosgrain ribbon bow in the same Tiffany blue with pink dots. The bodice of the dress has an embroidered chick doing an adorable little jig with an expression of pure glee on its face. The embroidered chick is dancing in an embroidered field among the wild flowers and butterflies. It is the perfect spring portrait, making this dress suitable for not only Easter, but Spring in general. The waist is belted with the same polka dotted grosgrain ribbon found on the collar, complete with a centered bow above the d-ring for easy leash attachment. Moving down to my very favorite part (and it was extremely hard to pick a favorite part amongst all the cuteness) is the skirt, which is made from what I referred to above as the Peeps fabric. This fabric has the same sparkly sheen as the cotton candy pink fabric. The irresistible pattern on this fabric has the Peeps reminiscent chicks floating between colorful eggs in solid, dotted, checkered, and flowered patterns in colors of pink, blue, and green. The bottom of the skirt has detailing typically reserved for only the fanciest of children's holiday wear and is edged in white eyelet with a satin Tiffany blue ribbon running through it with pink ric rac trim, pulling together the ric rac trim from the collar. As always, the perfect finishing touch is the seemingly never ending layer upon layer of shimmering Tiffany blue tulle, giving this dress even more oomph.

We just love everything about this dress, and it is simply gorgeous to watch it shimmer as Rory and Lane twirl (okay, more like spin in circles and pounce on toys) and the light catches the fabric. Any little girl would be lucky to have this tonimari dress for Spring. I think it's safe to say the designer behind tonimari has outdone herself yet again!

You might have noticed throughout this blog that I never call the dress by name. That is because the designer has yet to come up with a name that will do this lovely dress justice. If you have any suggestions, please share them!

You can see more pictures of Rory and Lane in their tonimari Easter dresses here.

Get the Look

This, as of now, nameless tonimari dress, will be available for order in Spring 2012.

The girls are wearing boutique bows custom made to match by M'Lady's Dog Bows.

Guess who?!?!

Guess who I finally got to meet?!?!

Last week, the whole family headed to Forth Worth, Texas for the 2011 Yorkie Kingdom meetup. During our trip, we were finally able to meet and visit with one of our very favorite and world renowned (seriously, her designs can be found in brick and mortar stores all over the world, including Belgium, Bermuda, Canada, Germany, Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, Russia, Spain, and the United Kingdom, just to name a few, but who can keep up?) canine couture designers, Desiree Mendoza. Des is the incredibly talented and sweet designer behind the fabulous go.fetch and ToniMari lines.

It's worth noting that despite several reminders from both my sweet fiance and Des that I waited until the last minute to get pictures of my girls with the celebrity herself, and we didn't have the greatest backdrop or lighting. Maybe next year...

Also, guess who else we got to meet? I don't want to make anyone jealous or anything (or maybe I do...nanny, nanny, boo, boo), but she also brought along her adorable little maltese, SeRi, who is even cuter in person (if that is possible) than in all her gorgeous modeling shots showing off her mom's latest creations.

I liken Des to the Marc Jacobs (naturally after his makeover) of the doggie design world. It wouldn't surprise me at all to hear she got a call from Louis Vuitton to work alongside him, the current Creative Director, as the Canine Creative Director, if they ever decide they want to expand beyond dog carriers and collars and leashes. Seriously.

As fans of go.fetch and ToniMari already know, she is constantly pushing the envelope when it comes to her designs. You can find everything from doggie diapers to formal wear in her collections. It is apparent that she is never satisfied with even her most wildly popular styles by the way she continues to push the envelope and out do herself with each new design, season after season.

Incredibly, I think we are now even bigger fans of go.fetch and ToniMari. They've always had impeccable customer service, but it's always nice to know the person behind the company is someone who is so appreciative and gracious for all her success.

You can see more pictures of the girls with Desiree Mendoza here.

You can see more pictures of the girls with SeRi here.

Disclaimer: We only brought our crappy point and shoot camera with us to Texas. The flash caused all the pups to have those "demon" eyes, so we are left with these pictures, which I realize appear to be taken underwater, in a cave, while I was swimming by, with my first ever cell phone's camera from 1999. Okay, fine. My first cell phone didn't have a camera, but you get the picture; no pun intended.

Get the Look

Rory and Lane are wearing ToniMari's Madison sleeveless tutu ballerina dress, which can be found here.

SeRi was debuting a new style of tutu in ToniMari's upcoming vintage tutu line. We can hardly wait until these go on sale!

All the pups are wearing bows by M'Lady's Dog Bows. Rory and Lane are wearing velvet bow ties, and SeRi is wearing a single looped 5/8 inch bow.

Hoppy Easter!

We had a wonderful Easter with the girls and ended our fun day with an Easter egg hunt, Hello Kitty style of course. The girls had beautiful, more formal, Easter dresses this year that we'll blog about later, complete with the obligatory photos of the girls in bunny ears. The perfect ensemble for their more active events of the day? Overalls with Hello Kitty, naturally disguised as a bunny, on the bib were the obvious choice.

The girls sure are glad they didn't make the same mistake as Dexter, especially since the Easter Bunny dropped off some goodies for them. Thankfully, it looks like Dexter only got to the Canadian Easter Bunny.

The Easter Bunny dropped off lots of plush toys, one of the girls' favorite treats, Cocotherapy coconut chips, Oscar Newman's Fantasia Tulle dress, Truly Oscar's Girlish Charm dress, go.fetch's Bubble Ducky flannel nightie, and tonimari's Some bunny loves you hooded pajamas. The hooded jammies are made from such a soft and cozy fabric that I wish I could find some in my size! Lane found the softness irresistible and couldn't keep her sweet little head off of them.



Rory and Lane were just like little kids rushing over to their baskets to check them out (read tip them over and attack). They always know when something is for them, or maybe it's just that they think everything is for them...and they are usually right.

We finished off our day with an egg hunt for the girls. We've had egg hunts for the girls before, so this year we decided to use Cocotherapy's suggestion for something a little different. We stuck Cocotherapy coconut chips inside the eggs, so the girls would be attracted to them and hid them (in pretty much plain sight) all around the living room. As to be expected, Rory was a whiz rushing around and pawing at the eggs. Luckily, she is a sweet girl and was willing to share her egg collection with Lane.

And this is why we can't keep tennis balls within their reach during the day:

I'd spend the entire day trying to fish tennis balls out from under the sofa!

You can see more pictures of the Easter Egg Hunt here.

You can see more pictures of the girls in their Hello Kitty Easter overalls here.

For even more pictures of Rory and Lane, you can find us on Facebook.

Get the Look

To compliment their adorable Hello Kitty Easter overalls, Rory and Lane are wearing boutique bows custom made to match by M'Lady's Dog Bows and custom Hello Kitty centers by Spotted Frog Designs.

Rory's Canine Celebrity Crush

Rory (or maybe it's just me) has a canine celebrity crush, Whiz Portman. Natalie Portman has been everywhere these days between the pre and post Oscar buzz and her pregnancy, which means we've gotten to see a lot more of Whiz, her adorable yorkie. Not to take anything away from the very handsome Jake, in fact, I think they kind of favor each other, but Rory has definitely put Whiz on her safe list. You know, the list of pups she is allowed to play fetch with (literally) should the opportunity ever present itself, and it doesn't count as cheating.

Whiz looks like a giant teddy bear, and Rory found herself immediately charmed by his good looks. I obviously have a soft spot for teapot yorkies with floppy ears, and I admit I wouldn't mind cuddling up with him.

You can check out some pictures of Whiz in this feature by People Pets. Celebrity Dog Watcher also has several pictures of Natalie with Whiz, though you might notice he is incorrectly identified as Charlie in some of the photos. Charlie was Natalie's adorable terrier mix who passed away before Whiz joined the family.

Check out this adorable video of Charlie on David Letterman:

Charlie makes his appearance around the 6 minute and 10 second mark, though he is mentioned earlier in the interview.

Natalie and Whiz even starred in Funny or Die's Between Two Ferns With Zach Galifianakis. Just a heads up, this video is NOT appropriate for children. I don't really think it's all that funny, but the adorableness of Whiz does steal the show. It looks like his mom isn't the only actor in the family.

One thing is certain, Natalie Portman has always had adorable pups, and I just love that she brings them with her almost everywhere she goes. Rory has started complaining she isn't as well-traveled as Whiz, so I guess we'll have to work on that...or marry her off.



Mrs. Whiz Portman...Rory likes the sound of that.

Rory and Jake, sitting in a tree, P-L-A-Y-I-N-G...

Well, after talking it over with Rory's publicist (hopefully, you know I'm kidding), we decided it was time Rory went public with her love life. She's been keeping a big secret for almost two years now, and she is tired of hiding from the puparazzi every time she goes out on an imaginary play date. Rory is finally ready to confess: she has a long distance lover, an adorable little yorkie named Jake. Dressed in a penguin suit, I dare say he is the studliest muffin of all. I think Carrie Bradshaw said it best, “Hello, lover!”

Jake asked Rory to “escort” him to an online Valentine's Day ball back in February of 2009, and the rest, as they say, is history. Not only is Jake, or Jakey Bear as I like to call him, just about the closest thing to a real live stuffed teddy bear (Teddy Ruxpin, anyone?), he also loves to spoil Rory rotten. There have been cookies, framed pictures, jewelry, toys, and clothes. So it comes as no surprise that Mr. Jakey Bear had his mom send Rory an amazing Christmas gift.

Jake sent Rory an adorable pair of fleece teddy bear print pajamas with a matching korker bow, along with a reindeer toy and plush bear toy that snores when you squeeze him! Even cuter, there is a hoodie you can pull up with ears on top. Always the gentleman, Jakey and his sister, Willow, made sure to include Lane in the fun with a reindeer toy that matched the one Rory got.

The girls have been obsessed with these reindeer toys from the moment they saw them. I think they are essentially rubber balls with squeakers covered in plush, so it's the best of both worlds in doggie terms. The girls love to toss them around and watch them bounce. As you can see, they simply couldn't resist, so we gave them a little break during our photoshoot!

The only thing cuter than Rory in her new pajamas? Jake in the same teddy bear pajamas! You can see for yourself in the new 4”x6” he sent to go in the frame on Rory's nightstand.

Since Jake and Rory have yet to meet nose to nose, she spends a lot of time dreaming of the day she and her Prince Charming will be able to fetch toys together.

Get the Look

Rory's new pajamas are made by Klippo.

Rory's new matching korker bow is made by Anabella's Bows.

The reindeer toys are made by Grriggles and can be found here. Okay, so Amazon calls it a moose. Reindeer was more festive though.

Lane's Christmas lollipop boutique bow is from M'Lady's Dog Bows.

L'Oreal's Dogtober Fest II

In early November, we headed to Etsch Farms for L'Oreal's Dogtober Fest II. We'd had so much fun at L'Oreal's Your Dog is Worth It Too Day that we knew this smaller-scaled event with all the proceeds again supporting the Susan G. Komen Fund packed full with Fall activities would be just as fun, so we packed up our HHMB and thankfully found the farm without a problem. Of course, I thought wearing a sweatshirt and jeans would keep me plenty warm, but I was very, very wrong. Thankfully, my fiance gave me the thermal shirt he was wearing under his hoodie, so I had a little something extra to help block out the wind. Despite my resemblance to the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, I had a great time waddling around all afternoon.

As expected, there weren't nearly as many vendors and rescues as the big event in August, but we loved having all these Fall activities to do with the girls. We started off with pumpkin bowling, which consisted of using a pumpkin to try and knock over ten shampoo bottles. Naturally, we let the girls sniff the pumpkins for good luck before our turn. I'm ninety-nine percent sure if I had left the pumpkin in front of Rory for another second she would have attempted to take a giant bite. Since she does get canned pumpkin at home sometimes, I'm just going to assume she's very fiber conscious. Oh, and apparently, all the time we've spent Wii bowling has not paid off since neither one of us got a strike, but we did pick up two shampoo bottle consolation prizes.

Next, we headed over to the corn maze, which was my favorite part of the whole day! There was a smaller corn maze, which we completed without too much difficulty, which my 6'5” fiance reminded me wasn't much of a challenge since he was taller than the corn stalks and could see the entrance and exit. Perhaps feeling a little overconfident, we headed the larger maze. We decided it would be fun for the girls to let them choose which path to follow. Since Lane is typically a follower, it is not surprising Rory happily led the way at every turn. I only wish I had thought to take video since at certain forks in the path she would literally look from side-to-side trying to decide which way to go! A few times she was anxious to make her own “path” straight through the corn stalks to greet another person or pup, but we didn't permit any cheating. We were having a lot of fun answering the trivia questions along the path and posing with the different corn figures that it wasn't until after about twenty minutes we realized we were getting nowhere near the maze exit. So, at one point, when Rory decided to go one way, my fiance vetoed Rory and said we should go the other. Not ten seconds later did we walk into our first and only dead end in the maze. If only Rory could talk...I can only imagine what she would have had to say! Needless to say, we continued to let Rory make the decisions until about twenty more minutes later we found the exit. I have to say I think Rory might have been Toucan Samming it (I love making up words) and following her nose to the exit, where I discovered my newest addiction (and quite possibly Rory's too), Sweet Jersey Kettle Korn. More on that in a later blog.

We let the girls walk around in a bin of corn to sniff for Milkbones, but I think they all must of have been gone by the time we went through since neither of them seemed very interested in anything other than trying to grab pieces of the corn, which did make an appearance later in it's same form. You're welcome for the extra information.

We rounded out the day posing in the cutouts screaming photo op and with a hayride around the farm. I think the girls thought it was just a very slow car ride though.

Overall, we had a wonderful day, and I was thrilled to have a day of Fall activities that was dog-friendly, even if it was only for this event. I will say I never understood why more farms aren't dog friendly all the time, but after attending this event and seeing all the people who unfortunately didn't deem it necessary to pick up after their dogs, I'm sad to say I get it. To date, these L'Oreal events have raised over $500,000 for the Susan G. Komen Fund!

For more pictures of the event, including the amazing goodie bag full of L'Oreal products, be sure to check us out on Facebook here.

Get the Look

Rory and Lane were staying nice and cozy in velour monkey joggers by MonkeyDaze.

Their matching bows were custom made to match by M'Lady's Dog Bows.