Oprah Talks to Michelle Obama

The Exclusive O Interview by Oprah Winfrey ~

Our new First Lady on the surprises of life in the White House ("If you want pie, there's pie! If something breaks, it's fixed. In an hour")...the rules she's laid down for Malia and Sasha ("I want the kids to be treated like children, not little princesses")...and how she hopes to use "one of the best jobs in the world" to help women transform their lives.

Read Oprah Talks to Michelle Obama

Presenting my Sophia as the Cover Model for the Spring issue of City Dog Magazine.

Presenting my Sophia as the Cover Model for the Spring issue of City Dog Magazine.

We are charter subscribers and have crossed paths with the CityDog team on several occasions. We are proud to have been asked to be a part of this great West coast canine publication!

CityDog comes back from the printers on April 7th, so you can look for it in stores (or your mailbox) shortly thereafter!

And happy 6th birthday to you Sophia, on Wednesday April 1st. You look hot! Love your Sock Bunny...

Extreme Sheep LED Art

Ok, this was totally cool. Passing it along the internet highway!

I had my pawdi-pedi and my fluff and buff - now I am ready for my close up

Sophia was booked to be a cover model for CityDog Magazine and we had much to do to get ready for the March 9th photo shoot.

First she had to get her nails trimmed. When I adopted Sophia her nails were very long and the first time I took her to the vet (Pet Care Center on Admiral Way) to get her nails trimmed I found out why. It was the first time I heard what is known as the "Iggy death scream". Obviously nail trimming was a very traumatic thing - this explained why the quicks were so long. Her nails did not get trimmed very often. So even when they are freshly trimmed, they still look long. And I know someone is going to look at her photo on the cover and if the feet are in it they are going to cattily observe that I keep my dog's nails too long. That's not the case at all, but I wanted to mitigate that possibility.

It takes a team of three to trim Sophia's nails. One to trim and file, one to officially hold her down, and me - who soothes her and tells her she's not going to die.

After the nail trim, she then went for a bath. This used to also be a very traumatic experience. Using high value treats as a reward while under water, now Sophia goes up the steps to the landing, and then jumps down in the tub by herself. AND it used to take two people to bathe her - I ran the water and Steve did the shampooing and conditioning. Now I can even bathe her by myself. What a difference a year makes (or now, almost four).

We go to Murphy's Paw in White Center for our self-bathing needs. I have found their real bathtubs much more dog friendly than a utility sink (like at The Wash Dog) and the water temperature regulator here keeps the water temperature consistent. When we first started taking Sophia for a bath we would often have to come back several times because the water at The Wash Dog would actually be cold. It became annoying and I was very happy to find a good alternative 2 miles from home.

Steve took on toweling duties.

Then we were ready for our Monday morning photo shoot. Here Sophia greets Brandie, the editor-in-chief of CityDog Magazine at the mag studio. (Apologies for the red eye.)

Here J. Nichole Smith of Dane+Dane Studios, who has an adjoining studio, did the photo shoot.

I thought Brandie was joking with me when she asked me if Sophia had a pink collar or something since they were planning to use pale pink as the backdrop. It is Spring and almost Easter. I exclaimed, "Pink is our signature color!" I brought collars and jewelry and also her sock bunny.

I have no idea what photo will be on the cover. It took about two hours and Sophia was tired afterwards. The bunny was real popular and there may be a "shabby chic" theme to the photo. Or it may be an action shot (like in the photo above) . I am looking forward to having something special of Sophia to frame and put on the wall.

It was a real privilege to have my Sophia chosen for a magazine cover. She has competed in the summer photo contests for CityDog, which has helped keep her face top of mind perhaps? Thanks Brandie and Nichole!

A Pink Letter Day

I had an amazing day on Thursday, February 26th. Most people would have called it a red letter day, one for the books. Since pink is my signature color and the theme of my holistic life, I am calling it a pink letter day.

Special thing number one: Early in the morning I received an email from a local media relations company, asking if I.knew someone who was going to live blog the keynote speech at the Built Green Conference the following week. I was not attending, primarily due to the cost of admission - $185. I don't have the budget for these extras at the moment. In fact on February 16th I took over the front office administration of my real estate brokerage. Times are tough, and to cut costs the company had to layoff its office manager. I am the only agent in the company who has background that would enable me to step in to the office managers position. In fact, I had even been sending out resumes for the exact same job at other real estate companies because I needed to increase my income. I began looking for work in September, and as of February still had not landed a full time position. I had some good interviews, but the competition now is incredible, with so many well qualified professionals looking for work. So when the time to let the office manager go (planned for a couple of months), I stepped in to keep the office running. The pay is a token, and I am only contracted to work 25 hours a week, but I have my a-board out on the sidewalk and could pick up new clients just by being in the office. I won't go into details about the difficulties I had  wrestling with new technology (such as learning to administer the company website) but this brings you up to date with my situation.

Shortly after the initial email exchange that I would see if I could find someone who was going and was a blogger I thought: well, if someone bought my ticket I would go and do it myself. The media rep said sure, she would give me a Press pass and put my name on the list. Wow! That was so cool. II was very exciting. One, media is beginning to recognize blogging as reporting. And two, I was getting a press pass!

And then I immediately - and finally - made a technology investment in my business and bought a netbook (Asus EEE PC) so I wouldn't have to thumb type all day. (It's a write off after all.)

Read my live blogging sessions from the Built Green Conference on March 6, 2009:
At the BGC (Built Green Conference)
BGC09 Keynote Speaker: Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Creating Community as part of Green Building
The Market Value of Green-Certified Residential Projects
Early Adopters: Taking Ourselves and Our Networks to the Next Level

Special thing that happened number two: I heard from my broker who heard from one of our fellow GreenWorks agents that an article published in Seattle Homes and Lifestyles Magazine in which Ben Kaufman and myself had been interviewed for had reached subscriber mall boxes and it reflected very well on our company. More press! The author of the article called  me off of my profile on the GreenWorks Realty site and was interested in talking to me because I lived in a townhome in a Built Green community. So we talked for awhile and then when she started asking me the really hard questions I said she should be talking to Ben and made that connection for them. (Read: Onward and Upward)

And special thing number three, the cherry on top: In the afternoon I received an email from CityDog Magazine, of which I am a subscriber and big fan of (and the editor also lives in West Seattle) inquiring into Sophia's availability for a photo  hoot for the Spring cover of CityDog Magazine. Sophia has received some of her own press before. She has ben photographed for a book about rescued dogs which has not been published yet, and she was the reason I was a part of the book Dog Park Wisdom. The author of that book came to an Italian greyhound picnic at my home and we were photographed and had a story in a special spread the Seattle Tomes/PI did a couple of years ago. The article was about IGGY Ambassadors-Emerald City, the meetup.com group I founded in 2006 to create a social playgroup for Italian greyhounds in Washington state. The group will have its third anniversary in April and it remains the largest IG playgroup in the world with over 200 members in the Seattle group and additional chapters in Spokane (IGGY Ambassadors-Inland Empire) and Portland (IGGY Ambassadors-Rose City). One of the groups member recently relocated to Maryland and may start a chapter there. There also is a member who moved to Florida who has inquired into organizing a chapter there (Coral Gables area I think).

So those are some amazing things that happened to me recently -- all on one day! It really was a Pink Letter Day!