WANTED: One Sheep Shearer

As some of you know Seattle broke a new record yesterday for being HOT! Wow it is hot here. They say it hit 103 degrees Fahrenheit in Seattle but I think in our home with this wool on I broke 203 degrees. Us poor sheep can hardly stand to sit here and type on the internet much less alone go on adventures and get our pictures taken. And of course there is no A/C. anywhere Well we all know how lazy Erin is. She has really been letting her hair get long and she's missing hair cut appointments. So you can imagine how late we are for our yearly shearing. I'm not waiting any more! I'm taking matters into my own hooves. I am looking for a Sheep Shearer for 3 sheep. We will pay you $4.82 in shiny pennies. Please, hurry!

Changing of the Maps

Looking back on the past year we have had many visitors to the blog. Well, we had 1333 visitors to be exact from many different countries. including:

United States (US)	1,113
United Kingdom (GB)	68
Canada (CA)	45
Germany (DE)	10
Sweden (SE)	8
Australia (AU)	6
Netherlands (NL)	6
Austria (AT)	4
Finland (FI)	3
Malaysia (MY)	3
South Africa (ZA)	3
Italy (IT)	3
Norway (NO)	3
Mexico (MX)	3
Brazil (BR)	3
Denmark (DK)	3
Costa Rica (CR)	3
Greece (GR)	2
Japan (JP)	2
Ghana (GH)	2
Romania (RO)	2
Spain (ES)	2
China (CN)	2
India (IN)	2
Serbia (RS)	2
Belarus (BY)	1
Russian Federation (RU)	1
Estonia (EE)	1
Ireland (IE)	1
Poland (PL)	1
France (FR)	1
Ukraine (UA)	1
Slovakia (SK)	1
Turkey (TR)	1
Nigeria (NG)	1
Philippines (PH)	1
Vietnam (VN)	1
Colombia (CO)	1
Singapore (SG)	1
New Zealand (NZ)	1
Argentina (AR)	1
Chile (CL)	1
Hong Kong (HK)	1
United Arab Emirates (AE)	1
Portugal (PT)	1
Albania (AL)	1
Georgia (GE)	1
Pakistan (PK)	1
Egypt (EG)	1
Kuwait (KW)	1
Jordan (JO)	1
Macedonia (MK)	1

Wow, that's a lot. And if you don't know where all those places are, look on the map.

1333 Visitors to Prowling Sheep from July 22, 2008 to July 23, 2009.
(Click to view full map.)

Please, welcome the new map and add many many more red dots. We don't want it feeling left out from the other maps, do we?

A quilt for Zackery

Our friends Bill and Alyssa had their first baby. It's a boy! So we decided to make him the cuties baby blanket. Don't worry we know how to use a sewing machine...when Erin isn't around.

Of course this is right.

This quilting thing is a lot of hard work. And I don't understand. We just cut all this material only to sew it back together. I think the person that came up with quilting was daft...at least defiantly not a sheep. And it is even harder when you have a monkey on your back pushing you to get it done before the boy goes off to college.

Hey, were did he come from?

But we finally got it done.

Warm and cozy. Are you sure we have to give it away?

I think it was a good deal. We gave up the blanket but also got rid of that pesky monkey. Let someone else deal with him.

Yes, I'm sure I saw a banana in the box. Just dig a little deeper.

Now that that's done, I'm going to take a nap.

Bite of Seattle

Wow we have been really busy this summer. Probably because it is not raining like normal. I don't know why Erin doesn't like use playing in the rain. But today it was nice and sunny so we went to Bite of Seattle. I was so excited that I bit Chris for practice. But Erin told me it was not biting Seattle itself but rather all the good food Seattle has to offer.

So anyway we got in the car and drove to the Seattle Center. It was really hard to find parking so we were late to meet up with Theresa.

UGG! Where is the sheep parking!?!

But finally we got parked and then the eating began. We had fresh squeezed Pink Lemonade, Halibut and chips.

Nummy

Then we had better than ice cream stuff. Chris had a Raspberry Sunday. Mine was coffee flavored so I'll be up all night. Erin seemed thrilled.

O I can feel the caffeine seeping into my veins.

Then Theresa had a kabob. She said it wasn't Lamb but... I don't know, it looked like someone I knew.

Hmm, taste like chicken.

Then we went back to have a funnel cake. Yay, more sugar! Erin made us wear bibs this time. She said powder sugar and sheep wool didn't mix well. I don't know what she was talking about. It mixed just fine. And besides, it reminded me of when I won that blue ribbon in the Iowa State Fair.

Bringing it back Iowa Style.

And then when no one was looking I got myself a Mango Lemonade. I thought my sugar buzz was dying off. So I got that back up and running. And now I'm ready to go until next Thursday. I asked Erin, "Erin, now what? Huh..Huh...Huh...now what can we do?" But she just told me to get in the car. Party pooper.

mmm...mangoie.

Groeten uit Nederland!

I must be the luckiest sheep in the world! Jenni took me to the Netherlands with her and the family! Sadly, Shaun the Sheep had to stay home due to a scratched eye (what a wuss!), but I got to come!

I'm all packed and ready to go!

The plane ride was long and boring... It was about 13 hours of travel, but I was tucked away safely inside of Jenni's carry on.

When we got to the Netherlands, the first thing I noticed were these crazy wooden shoes. I mean, it's strange enough that people actually wear wooden shoes, but isn't it even stranger that they keep flowers in them? Do they take the flowers out when they want to wear them? Or, do the flowers use them as a method of transportation?

Which is stranger - people who wear wooden shoes, or letting your flowers walk around in them?

Now I realize that I'm just a baby sheep, but even I know that flowers don't just get up and walk around! Even if they did, would they really want to use shoes?

It took much convincing, but I finally convinced Jenni that I should be allowed to go to Amsterdam. She wouldn't allow me to visit the Red Light District, but I know that I'll be going back. I still have plenty of time to convince her that I'm old enough for that!

Does this thing really give out train tickets?

Okay, so maybe I needed a little help buying my train ticket to Amsterdam. Not only do I not read Dutch, but my poor little legs don't lift me up high enough to get my bank card in that pesky slot!

Here's my round trip ticket to Amsterdam!

I quickly discovered that the train ride is a little long and quite boring, so I picked up a newspaper so that I could immerse myself in the language and culture.

Trying to learn to read Dutch on the train.

Needless to say, trying to learn to read in any language is still a bit beyond me. I settled for looking at the pictures.

I took one look at the dirty sidewalks in Amsterdam and decided that Jenni could carry me. I must say that I've always heard that the Dutch are the tallest people in the word - but I saw proof! Judging by the size of this wooden shoe I found, they must have GIANTS!

I sure wouldn't want to make the guy that wears this shoe mad. Dare I ask where the other shoe is?

Now I realize that I am but a baby sheep, and am not allowed to drink, but I was pretty excited to find the building where they make some of that crazy Dutch beer!

Wow! It's actually sunny! Oh my, is that Heineken in the background?

Here's another traditional Dutch site - the Amsterdammetje - the cute little red-brown post thingy that seperates the sidewalks from the street in Amsterdam.

In 1984, there were about 100,000 of these! Sadly, these are being removed at the rate of about 2,000 a year.

I was quite excited to find a shop in Amsterdam where I could buy sheep! Look at this cute guy!

Jenni said that I couldn't take him home because we might get caught smuggling him into the country. I hope that he finds a good home!

I also found out that the Dutch sure do love stinky cheese! Why, they have whole stores that sell practically only cheese! I was afraid that my wool would stink like stinky cheese if I went all the way in the store, but I braved a picture at the entrance:

Peeew!

On my way back to the train station, I noticed that I was getting quite hungry. I whined a little bit, and Jenni got me some yummy patat! (Dutch French fries!) They sure were yummy!

Mmmm!

After we got back home from Amsterdam, Jenni took me to a park to play. It was hard to play much because I'm so small, but I do love the teeter-totter!

How do I get down again?

A few days later, Jenni even took me to see the North Sea! Just the thought of getting salt water in my wool was enough to make me scared, so I stayed away from the water. Here's a nice picture of me playing in the sand. I sure hope that I get to come back here soon!

Ahh, this is the life!

What trip to the Netherlands would be complete without a picture of a Dutch windmill? Here's an awesome picture of me with a few windmills in the background. Yes, it may look like I'm playing in the street, but I promise that Jenni was careful - there weren't any cars coming! Take that PETA!

Hmm... those windmills sure are pretty, but can I get back in the safety of the car now?

Summer Vacation

Erin's family came to town and she took some time off to show them the sites of Seattle. First thing we all did together was go fishing in the Sound. It was a lot of fun, especially when Erin got hit in the head with a flounder. She didn't think it was that funny...but it was. She got us back for laughing by catching a SHARK!

SHARK!

And it wasn't a very small shark either. Look how big it is. It has to be at least 50 times bigger than me.

"It was this big."

We hid for the reminder of the fishing trip. That shark could have eaten us. After we landed we went home and held onto the floor until we got our ground legs again.

The next adventure was garage sale hunting. We found a lot of fun stuff. D.J. was getting into trouble like normal. I tried to put a sticker on D.J. and sell the little sheep but no one was interested. Not even at 1/2 off.

I think I can go to the moon in this.

And I found a great buy. I found a glass dish just like the one that I broke...um...I mean...D.J. broke of Erin's.

Look what I found!

We got a lot of great stuff but Erin didn't think it was that great. She kept saying we didn't need things. For example, she said we had no need for a 2T child's rain coat. But what does she know anyway?

Our loot

After a good day of digging through other people's trash, we decided to get trashed ourselves. So we went on the Redhook Brewery tour. It was a lot of fun getting to sit at the bar and get all the drinks we wanted.

Cheers!

Maybe we drank a little too much. We seemed to have lost our ground legs again. But they had a nice green patch of grass for us to sober up on.

Make it stop.