Keeping Up With the Joneses: Spa Day

Today was the day. The day we had talked about and planned for quite a while. Today was..... SPA DAY! Not for us of course but for Nattie. She has been in need of a bath for quite a while now but seeing as she is an outside dog, we just don't do that every week. I feel really sorry for her because she has been getting eaten up by gnats and mosquitoes. She had a couple places on her rump that had scabbed over where she had scratched so much so we decided to give her a bath. Not only would she get a bath but she would also get her nails done, her ears cleaned and a good pen scrubbing. Good thing she is a dog because if she had known ahead of time, she would have packed her little bag and hit the road.
If you have ever been by our house when we play with Nattie, you know she LOVES the waterhose. We have to put her up when we clean the mower, water flowers, etc because she just wants you to spray her constantly and she always tries to bite the water. This is fun when we want to play but not so much when we need to use the hose. We decided to clean her pen out first, that way it could dry while we were giving her a bath. We had cleaned her ears out and trimmed her toes before this so she could play for a while and not be so stressed. After we scraped all the hair from the fence, Seth sprayed everything really good. We mixed some bleach and water in a bucket and used a big brush to scrub the pen. I had to shut him in while he was cleaning the inside because Nattie lept trying to get in and get in the water. After he finished the inside he came and scrubbed the outside to get all the algae and dirt off the pen frame. We rinsed it really well and shut the door so a dirty dog didn't run in :)
As far as water, she doesn't mind one bit if we spray water in her face or on her chest but the minute you try to get it on her back or belly, she goes nuts. Well, that was the first issue we ran into. She also hates for us to clean her ears and clip her toenails but we can deal with that. I mean, she knows who is in charge :) Anyway, the only way that we could get her to stand still while we got her wet was for Seth to bear hug her while I sprayed her. Let's just be honest, you didn't really think I was going to hold her and get wet, did you? Well, needless to say the water wasn't exactly bathwater. I thought Seth was going to die when I first got him wet; maybe a little more than necessary but that's not relevant.
Once we got her good and wet, we soaped her up with about half a bottle of flea and tick shampoo. She liked that part. She just stood like a good little girl and let us shampoo her. It was kind of like a cold belly rub. Once we scrubbed her really good, I attempted the rinse. That went over about as well as the soak. Once we got her still enough, she just hung her head like we were beating her so all the soapy water kept running in her face. I tried to hold her head up but she would have none of it. I think she was really upset with us. After we finally got her rinsed off, we let her run and do what clean dogs do. Rolling in the grass, shaking and of course, a snack. My mom had given me a peanut butter flavored Luna bar. She loved it once she realized we weren't going to take it away from her.
After she ate her snack and dried off completely, we put some antibiotic ointment on her bug bites and put some cream in her ears to help with any itchiness. I think she was glad when we finally told her "House" and she could relax. Her coat was so shiny and she smelled much better. She didn't have to say it but I knew she felt like a whole new woman :) Here are a few pictures of "Spa Day"

Helping Dad clean out the pen