Living in the city with a dog can definitely be a drag sometimes, especially when your pooch is a little stir crazy. As the weather warms, take a drive to Elm Bank. Approximately half an hour from Boston, Elm Bank not only welcomes dogs, but provides doggy poop bags to encourage visitors to pick up after their canine companion! Chopper had a blast running at full speed!

Hi Readers!

Elizabeth here! I had the most AMAZING weekend because I got to spend it with my favorite pooch, Emperor Chopper! Having Chopper around is great not only because he is a ball of fun, but because he is teaching me about being a responsible dog owner.

Chopper, giving his best “look back” pose.

On Saturday, we had a bit of drama. We had to take Chopper to the Veterinarian’s office! Friday night, Chopper started to make funny noises; he would elongate his neck and snort. Being the overprotective nervous type, I rushed him the emergency room only to learn that Chopper was “reverse sneezing.” Reverse sneezing is something can be set off by a myriad of things including eating, excitement, even pollen! These spasms are most common in Pugs and Boxers because they have “flat faces”. Chopper’s spasms appeared to be from a slight cold he had developed. Just to be safe, we took it easy Saturday night and watched old movies.

Despite being a bit under the weather, Chopper was his chipper and handsome self. We had a marvelous weekend and I cannot WAIT until he stays over again!

After a sneak preview of spring last week, it seems like we might finally have some warmer weather coming our way.

We thought it was perfect timing to start talking about getting outside to the local dog parks again!

On this blog you can look through our old posts on dog parks and don’t forget to check out our map of all the local parks

What park will you be taking your dog to once it starts getting nicer out?

UPDATE!!! Pictures in this blog are courtesy of Michele Biscoe, Chairperson of Somerville Dog Owners Group. All of her pictures are available for viewing.

Last Sunday it was a beautiful sunny day at Brookline Playground. There were several dogs having fun at the park: members of the All Dogs Play meetup as well as dogs who live around the park.

The Brookline Playground is huge and you can take your dog off-leash there every day before 1pm. Plus, the park is totally fenced-in!

Major Menino celebrated yesterday the opening of the Joe Wex Dog Recreation Space, the new 14,000 square foot dog park located on Washington St. The opening was crowded with people and many gorgeous dogs. We attended the event with some other volunteers of the Animal Rescue League and we walked there with some adoptable, and recently adopted (like the maltese Pootsie), dogs from the shelter.

As you can see in the video below, all the dogs seemed to have a really great time!

The construction of this fenced-in dog park has been possible thanks to the numerous private contributions of several dog owners who live in Boston, the ARL, and even some private businesses. Dog owners and businesses also contributed by sponsoring bricks and pavers like the ones pictured below.

You can click here to see more pictures of the event.

Post a comment below to let us know what do you think of this amazing dog park!

We hope to see you for the final, but most important, step in the founding of Boston’s first Dog Recreation Space, the Joe Wex Dog Recreation Space (Peters Park).

The Grand Unleashing is this Sunday at 3:30 p.m. Bring your neighbors and friends along too as celebrations will continue at the Red Fez and there will be a few dogs from the Animal Rescue League, one of the sponsors of the park too.

The opening of this dog park is an important milestone achieved by the Friends of Peters Park. Thanks to the perseverance of this amazing group of dog owners, the city of Boston finally has its very first official dog park. In fact, other than Carleton Court Dog Park, in the South End, the city has not had an official fenced-in dog park. We hope that this is just the first step in order to get more dog parks’ projects approved in the city.

Here are some pics of Giotto and Tullia, two wonderful Italian Spinones owned by Judy Sue. They are pictured in front of Peters Park with their lovely dog walker, Steve.

Come celebrate with us!

Here are some pictures from the All Dogs meetup last Sunday, organized by Liz and Bubba (pictured above) at Amory Playground, the great park we’ve talked about before.

Amory Playground is a very big park where dogs can run off-leash during the early morning. The park is located at 45 Amory St. in Brookline, MA.
Every dog breed is very welcome to join the playgroups: dog owners, click here to join to this amazing meetup! Every weekend, you and your dog will have the opportunity to spend a couple of hours with other very nice dogs and dog owners coming from Boston and around.

The event was a lot of fun: it was beautiful and sunny out, and around 15-20 dogs of many different breeds attended. Write in the comments section if you attended and let us know what you thought of the gorgeous day at Amory Park.