Homeless Pictures

I take A TON of pictures of dogs at work, but a lot of those pictures I can't use for various reasons. So I thought I would compile a few recent ones plus one of my favorites into one post so that you can get a sense of how hard it can be to get good photos for use in my blog or on Facebook.

This first dog I did on Sunday. I do him about once a month, and I wanted to get a before and after. Wouldn't you know, I ran behind and forgot to get an after picture. This is one of his before pictures. He absolutely did not want to look at the camera.

Here's Dillin! I was trying to get a picture of him and Hailey sitting nicely next to each other by me on the sofa, but he leapt at the camera just as I took the picture. 

Here are some before and after pictures of a dog I did on Saturday who didn't want to look at the camera. Here's the before.

Here's the after. Her body looks good but you can't tell how cute her face is.

This Westie puppy clawed the crap out of my hands. He also wouldn't look at the camera or hold still.

Black dogs make for terrible pictures. I try and I try and they just have no detail whatsoever. It looks like this guy has only one eye, but I promise he does have two.

Talk about a whoopsie picture! I had to put my phone down and run to grab a bag before any of them could step in the mess.

Now I have a whole bunch of pictures of just one dog. His owner likes him to be curly so I do the haircut before the bath and send him home damp so he'll dry curly - the blow dryer straightens hair and makes dogs look poofy. Look at the camera Fido (not his real name).

{whistle whistle whistle} Look at the camera!

OK, maybe I'll just hold your head up and point it toward the camera. They like his head HUGE like this. Usually they do a teddy bear head, but this day they wanted to try a mustache with a big topknot instead. So here he is all brushed out and before the haircut.

Fido, look at the camera.

Look at the camera {kissy sound kissy sound}. Fido!

Look at me!

Close but no cigar. Now we're blurry.

Not blurry...not looking.

OK, let me hold your face up again.

Dang it, you can't see his mustache properly in that shot. Fido, look at the camera! {kissy kissy whistle whistle}

Look at me, please!

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE look at me!!!

I'm over here...

What's on the floor? Over here! Over here! {whistle whistle whistle} Look at me! {kissy kissy}

This is after the bath so you can get a sense of how he will curl. I finally gave up and held his face again.

Now for possibly my favorite messed up picture of all time. This is my old Cocker request, and he started to shake right when I took the picture. I think he looks like a Picasso painting!

So there you have it. And this is only a small fraction of all the messed up pictures I have. Are you interested in seeing more posts like this in the future? Let me know!

Havanese

I've been really busy with work and exercise for the last couple of weeks and excelling in brain farts, so it's been quite some time since my last blog post.

I was looking through all of my photos, searching for inspiration for a blog post, when I noticed that I had quite a few pictures of Havanese, which are becoming a popular breed, at least around here, but still aren't quite as popular as their cousins, Shih Tzus and Lhasa Apsos.

At my very first grooming job, we only had a couple of Havanese that came in. It was enough to know what they looked like and how to groom them, but not very many at all.

At my next job, we still only had a few Havanese that came in, and most of those customers asked if we had ever groomed Havanese before.

Now, I seem to be working at the Havanese mecca. I groom far more Havanese than Shih Tzus these days, and that sort of boggles my mind since I used to average AT LEAST 5 Shih Tzus a week. Now I'm lucky to do that many in a month.

So for those of you who may not be very familiar with the breed, here are pictures of 7 different Havanese with different haircuts and coat types.

This first one is a new client I did recently. She came in with the blue tail, I didn't do that. The owner didn't want much of a trim on the body, she mostly just wanted her to have a light trim and long "wispy" bangs. I had never done wispy bangs before, so that was an interesting puzzle to attempt, but the owner was thrilled with the result and booked another appointment.

These next two dogs are my regulars and come in on a regular basis, every 6 weeks, I think. This first one is the curliest Hav I've ever seen. The first time I groomed her, I apparently left her topknot too long and the owner said that after she grew out for a couple of weeks, "She looked like Diana Ross," so now I take her topknot a length shorter than her wavy-coated sister.

Neither dog particularly wanted to look at the camera. What you can't tell from the pictures is that the dark dog is SO much more outgoing than her sister. The light dog is very shy and timid. They are both very good to groom, though, and I enjoy doing them very much. Anyway, as you can see, they get a pretty short cut; I leave about 1/4".

This next dog is another of my regulars. I think he's about 8 months old now. He's very good for as young as he is. It sounds like the owner wants to grow him into a full coat, at least until Spring when she may or may not decide to take him shorter. He's never matted, so that probably won't be a problem.

The next two dogs are also my requests, both from the same family. This first one was born without eyes, so the owners like her to have a really long visor to cover the areas where her eyes should be. She's a little lazy but very good otherwise. I leave about an inch all over on her body.

This dog as a collapsing trachea, so I need to keep the grooming loop behind one of his legs and not just around his neck. He can be a little wild, but he's pretty good. I leave about half an inch on him.

Finally, I have my full-coat request. She has a LOT of hair, and it's like mine - it likes to stick to itself even when she isn't matted. Even with minimal trimming, she takes me a solid 2 hours to groom from start to finish. This is the best picture I could get of her somewhat looking at the camera. You can't really tell from this angle, but under all that hair, she's quite hefty. Still, she's basically a really good dog, just a little lazy from the extra weight she's carrying.

As you can see, Havanese come in all different colors and coat types. They can have straight, wavy, or curly hair, and they can get any length of haircut.

So there you have it, a primer to Havanese. I hope you enjoyed this breed-specific blog post; I'll try to do more as my picture collection expands.

Before and After: Bichon and More

OK, here we go, another week's worth of before and after pictures. 

This first guy is an old Wheaten that I did yesterday. He was covered in warts, moles, and cysts, and had a hard time standing for too long, but otherwise he was very good to groom. Here's his before picture.

And here's his after picture. You can see one of the cysts on his back hip there. I went slightly shorter around the cysts than the rest of the body to try to keep that area clean and mat-free. The owner wanted a shorter cut in general for the same reason, but not too short since it's getting cold. I left 1/2" on the body and 1/4" around the cysts. She likes his ears shaved but no fall, so I did something resembling a teddy bear head. You also can't really see his tail in this picture. It's a natural-length tail, not docked, and the owner likes it short "because otherwise he looks like a fox." When I did the dog the last time, I left his tail just a hair longer than the body, but she wanted it even shorter this time, so I did it the same length as the body. 

Next, I have a cute 6-month-old Westie puppy. Luckily I thought to snap a picture before I even washed her, because she was filthy! She was also wiggly, so it was hard to get a good shot.

Here's a view of her face before the bath. Man was she dirty. As terriers should be, really...

Here's her face all done. I actually managed to get her attention long enough to get her picture!

Here's a side view of her all done. I had done her once before and put the pattern on her body with a snap-on comb that was 5/8". This time they wanted her halfway between that and a regular Westie cut - since she's still a puppy, they wanted her to retain some puppiness to her look. A regular Westie pattern leaves 1/4" on the back, so I went with my 3/8" comb. I think it turned out well - she still looks puppyish but is clearly a Westie, as well.

Next we have a Scottie with a Westie head. This lady also has a Westie, but her pictures didn't turn out very well. She's a little older and shaky, so the pics were blurry. Anyway, the owner likes the Westie head on both dogs. I think it looks strange, but I guess it doesn't look bad. Here's her before picture.

And here's her after picture. She is SO fat that trying to blend her skirt without dropping the line WAY too low is very difficult. I think she turned out pretty good, though. Naturally, she refused to look at the camera.

OK, now for the Grand Finale. I think most non-groomers (and maybe some groomers, too) will be really impressed with these before and afters. This dog was such a mess when she came in. She's one of my regulars, sort of, but they went somewhere else the last time she was groomed. I'm always flattered when people come back to me after they try somebody else. Here's the weird thing: the customer whipped out her phone to show me a picture of her dog right after I had last groomed it. She wanted her dog to look just like that again. I take really good notes, so that shouldn't be a problem. People bringing pictures of their dog (or other dogs they want theirs to look like) is not new, but somebody showing me how I groomed the dog before and that it was perfect (rather than: see this part? it was too long. or something like that) was a first for me.

Here's a side view of what a mess she was. Not matted (much), but extremely dirty and very curly. Also whoever groomed her before left her ears way too long.   

She HATES having her head blow dried. I was afraid some of these scratches would break the skin and I would wind up bleeding all over my clean white dog, but I got lucky and they were all superficial.

Here she is clean and dry. Do you see how the hair on her back leg looks strange and separated compared to the rest of her body? Those are pin mats, which I will need to brush out.

All brushed out and ready for the haircut.

After, side view. I leave 5/8" on her body and skim her legs with a 7/8" comb then scissor them. She doesn't have perfect column legs because I didn't have enough hair to work with - you can see that from her clean pictures. I think her body turned out pretty well, though, I'm pleased with it.

Hey, thanks for looking at the camera! Her head isn't quite perfect, but considering how few actual Bichon heads I have done (compared to plenty of smaller teddy bear heads), especially with the ears blended into the head like they are supposed to be instead of long like most people want, I'll take it. The ears aren't quite right, but this is still one of the best Bichon heads I've done. I hope they continue to bring her to me on a more regular basis so I can practice more. 

 That's it for today. I hope you enjoyed today's selection, and as always, comments are always welcome!

Recent Before & After Pics

I'm so sorry I haven't posted anything for so long. Work has been slow and life has been busy, which isn't a great combination for taking pictures and writing blog posts. But this blog post is well worth the wait, I promise!

I've been trying to get better about taking before and after pictures of all my dogs, or at least the ones that will look dramatically different. Sometimes I get too busy, and sometimes I forget, but I have amassed a nice selection of before and after pics from the last week or so for your viewing pleasure.

I did this Schnauzer a week ago. He came in with quite an...interesting pattern. Here's his before picture.

Do you see how poofy and uneven it is? Probably, but just in case, I traced it for you in this next picture. Needless to say, the pattern should not look like that.

Here's his after picture. I couldn't get his back leg quite as blended as I would have liked, but it is much better than it was to start with as far as placement and blending, so I'll take it. I think the strange owner was happy about it, too.

For my non-groomer readers, I traced the outline of his skirt again. This is what the pattern should look like on Schnauzers and most terriers.

I did this Bichon a few days ago. It was a new client, and when the dog walked in with that giant head, I cringed. I hate doing giant Bichon heads. Much to my surprise, the owner said she doesn't like his head like that, is there something else I could do that was shorter?

Yes, I can do shorter. I was afraid to take his ears too short, so they look a little disproportionate to his head, but oh well. Anyway, she loved his new, smaller head. Man, I groomed the dog and took the pictures, and I still can't believe that is the same dog. What a difference a good brushing and haircut can make!

This next dog is a Black Russian Terrier. To this day, he and his sister are the only ones I have ever seen (in person). I used to groom this dog every time he came in, but when my schedule changed, they started seeing somebody else. I got to do him again the other day, and I was shocked when I saw him with this haircut.

He's supposed to have a skirt. The pattern on his legs is wrong for the terrier cut, and it's also wrong for a lamb cut. It's also poofy and not blended at all. Since he's black, it's pretty hard to see the pattern lines, so I highlighted them for you.

Here's a close-up of his hip. You see that poofy hair on his butt? That isn't supposed to be there.

Here's the outline of the pattern on his hip. What is that? It's not from any pattern I've ever seen.

This gave me an idea. I decided to show you all on one picture how a lamb cut and a terrier cut would look compared to how he actually looked. Those drawn-in lines aren't perfect, but they're close enough for you to get the picture. No pun intended. 

Now here's his after picture. It's going to take some time for his skirt to grow in a little, and his legs aren't much longer than his body, so it isn't even obvious that he has a pattern cut - which is really how it should be. No pattern should be blatantly obvious on any dog or breed.

So to give you an idea, I drew it in again. See the difference between the before and after? Crazy, right? I'm really not trying to knock inexperienced groomers here. I was inexperienced once, too, and I'm sure I sent dogs out looking as bad as the dogs that I now have to fix. It's just the circle of life as a dog groomer, I suppose. 

Here's the best shot I could get of his face and fall. Between him being black and not wanting to look at me, it was impossible to get anything better than this. Frankly, this picture turned out better than I expected.

Next for a Doodle I did yesterday. I neither remember nor care whether it was a Goldendoodle or Labradoodle. They're all the same to me. I REALLY wish I had taken his picture before I washed him. He was so filthy that I had to scrub him three times. Just to look at him, he looked matted, and the owner was terrified I was going to have to shave him, but I could tell that his hair was stuck together with dirt and not mats. Anyway, here he is clean and fluffy, just shaggy.

And here he is all finished. I took about half the length off of his body, but as you can see, he is still plenty fluffy. His head shaped up really nicely if I say so myself.

Lastly, here's a sweet Cockapoo I did yesterday morning. She was sweet, but MAN was she wiggly!!! Of course the owner just wanted a light trim all over. I thought my longest snap-on comb might take her too short, and I wanted to practice my scissoring skills, so I decided to hand scissor the entire dog. Yep, you read that right, without using a guard comb to set the length first, I hand-scissored the entire dog, head to tail. I'm pretty sure this is the very first time I've tried that (except maybe the odd Pomeranian). It was an interesting experiment. Anyway, here's her before. It clearly hadn't been too long since the last time she was groomed.

She doesn't look very scruffy at all.

Here's a close-up of all the frizziness that the owner wanted me to take off. It's not much in the way of length, but it would make a big difference in terms of her having a tidier look about her.

Here are her after pictures. As you can see, there's not much difference in length, she just looks much neater. I couldn't get her head to look right because she was SO wiggly, but all things considered, I'm pretty pleased with the way her cut turned out. I will definitely be willing to try hand-scissoring again when the opportunity comes up again (but hopefully on a dog that will hold still!).

Here you can tell that all the frizzies are gone and she looks much smoother.

And one more for good measure.

So, there you have it. Plenty of before and after pictures and a little bit of explanation of dog grooming patterns. I hope you enjoyed this, and I will try not to wait so long between posts.