Stinky Stuff

**I started this post Thursday night, but didn't finish it until Sunday night after I was already home from Uvalde**

I am headed to Uvalde this weekend for my dear friend, Sami's baby shower I am helping host. I am also excited because another dear friend, Julia, is meeting me in Abilene and we are driving to Uvalde together! We are stopping in Abilene to eat lunch at one of her favorite Mexican food restaurants, La Popular. So, last night we were planning where to meet and all of that and this is how the end our conversation went:

ME: "I'm trying to figure out whether I can bring the dogs with me to Uvalde tomorrow. It wouldn't be such a big deal to leave them here with Richard if we had a fence already, but he's going to be working and they will have to stay inside all day and then he won't be able to watch them if they're in the yard while he's finishing the fence."

JULIA: (and of course I'm paraphrasing) "Oh, well it's no big deal if you want to just get lunch to go and then we can go to a park or something, or eat in Ryan's front yard (where Julia is leaving her car for the weekend)."

ME: "Oh, that would be great! It would be a lot better if I could take them with me...hang on, Richard is in here."

ME, To Richard: "What is it baby?"

RICHARD: "I need you to get out here right now, Maggie just got sprayed by a skunk."

ME to JULIA: "OMGosh, Julia...okay, so much for that idea, I doubt I will be bringing the dogs with me now."

JULIA: (Laughing hysterically) "Okay, I'll talk to you tomorrow."

So, I run outside to find Richard, Maggie and Marlee. Maggie literally has skunk spray dripping from her face and beard, poor thing. She looked absolutely pathetic and I could tell her eyes were bothering her. So, Rich grabs the hose and starts dousing her whole head and eyes. Apparently a skunk was in our neighbor's yard and Maggie took off after it. Richard couldn't get her to come back until she got sprayed and then she whined her way all the way back into our yard. So sad. Marlee didn't actually get sprayed, but when Maggie came back to the house, she gave some if to her sister.

As Richard is washing her head with the hose, I call my parents and ask them what to do. Mom says it could possibly blind her, so we need to get it out of her eyes as soon as we can with water, eye drops, milk or whatever. She also agreed that I needed to call the vet. The vet says more than likely it will not blind her but will irritate her eyes pretty badly and suggests using tomato sauce/juice to get the stink out. You know, I've always heard to do such a thing but wasn't sure if it really worked or not and how quickly it would work or how effective it would be. Nevertheless, I ran to Wal-Mart and bought every large can they had, thinking we would give them a bath in it. When I got to the check out lane, the cashier saw the tomato sauce and the eye drops and said, "I hope this doesn't mean someone ran into a skunk." I said that was exactly what had happened and she proceeded to tell me about her experience and gave me some advice about how to use the sauce.

I got home and we doused BOTH girls with it. Although it was disgusting, it was also absolutely hilarious! So, we couldn't NOT take pictures, of course. Oh, and a little video. After we washed it off, I will admit it was better but not great. Marlee was okay but Maggie still reeked! I didn't know what we would do with them tonight, much less tomorrow.

At 11:45, I called my parents to tell them what we did and how it was going. Mom said she had been looking up remedies on the Internet and suggested one she saw several times. I looked it up, and also saw several times that tomato sauce doesn't take the smell away, it just masks it...your nose gets tired of smelling skunk and starts to just smell the tomato. That's why after a day or so the smell usually comes back.

We mixed up the recipe online with

-3% Hydrogen Peroxide,

-Dawn dishsoap

-Baking Soda.

We put the pups in the tub and scrubbed their heads and guess what...it worked! The only side effect is some slightly bleached hair on their heads, especially Marlee since her fur is black. But it is perfectly fine with me! At least the smell is pretty much gone!

So, if you EVER need to get rid of the skunk smell from you, or your dog, I highly suggest this recipe!

Here are the pictures of their tomato sauce "bath."

Maggie mid-bath

Maggie post-bath but before the rinse off

Maggie and Marlee...by this time they have started licking sauce off of each other.