Style My Pooch Prizes :)

Yesterday we posted about winning the Style My Pooch competition and today our prizes arrived... Super speedy delivery eh! :) We're thrilled with all 5 pieces, they're so adorable!

Everything came wrapped up in some lovely gold tissue paper...

 Buffys dress!

I fell in love with this the moment I saw it on SMP's website and it seems I'm not the only one who adores it, Buffy fell in love the moment I unwrapped it! It's stunning in person, the fur trim is wonderfully soft, the body sits so beautifully and the little ruffled skirt part falls perfectly. So in love with this!

 Raffertys cow hoodie!

 This is almost an inside joke, as we call Rafferty 'Gibby Cow' sometimes (a reference to her pregnancy), so we just had to have this for her! Although Raff isn't one for clothes, this hoodie is so soft and cosy even she couldn't complain. You can't see too well here but there are little silver sparkles in the furry trim on the hood - precious!

The 3 adorable t shirts!

(1. Monroe. 2. Lola. 3. Lily.)

Ahh I love these even more in person than thought I would! The blue t shirt is still my favourite and looks amazing with Monroe's colouring. The red-ish t shirt is a beautiful colour, it's not quite red, not quite shocking pink and Lola works it ;) The lime green is almost neon and has a fab retro/80's/pop art party vibe, it looks so cute on Lily!

Also in the package were 3 cards for SMP...

2 of which had a lovely Chihuahua on! How appropriate?! ;)

Isn't everything super cute!?!

We absolutely adore every single piece and the girls look beautiful in their new clothes, so we want to say an absolutely massive 'thank you!' to Nicola, Tiny and everyone else at Style My Pooch :) 

Sadly the light wasn't on our side this afternoon, but over the next few days we'll be sure to get some pictures up of the girls modelling everything! In the meantime if you see something here you like don't hesitate to order, the 20% discount we mentioned in our last post expires January 10th and we'd hate you to miss out!

Love and licks as ever,

Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo

Style My Pooch contact info:

Website - www.stylemypooch.co.uk

Facebook - StyleMyPooch / Tiny

Twitter - @StyleMyPoochUK

Blog - http://stylemypooch.co.uk/category/blog/

Style OUR Pooch(es)!

As you may know we're on twitter (@riochanelhilton) and we follow a few great doggy sites/brands, one being @stylemypoochuk! Tiny (the adorable Yorkie and SMP model) and the Style My Pooch team decided to run a fabulous Christmas competition, with the grand prize being £100 worth of their lovely clothes!

We decided to enter and thank our lucky stars we did, because we won!
(Which caused me to dance around my kitchen a little)...

We chose 5 items, a pink gingham dress for Buffy, a black and white cow print hoodie for Rafferty and 3 fabulously cute t shirts (1,2,3) to go between Monroe, Lily and Lola! (I think t shirt 2 is my favourite of the 3). We're all so excited for everything to arrive, I know the girls will love their super special Christmas presents, Buffy especially will enjoy her new 'princess dress' :)

We want to say an extra big 'thank you' to everyone at Style My Pooch and we advise anyone looking for cute clothes to check out their website, blog, twitter account or facebook page!

We'd suggest you to get your orders in quickly too, because Style My Pooch are certainly in the festive spirit, as we're not the only ones getting an extra pressie or 2... To say thank you to everyone who entered the competition they've very kindly arranged a 20% discount on all orders, plus free shipping! Just enter 'STYLISHCHRISTMAS' at the checkout to get your discount ;)
 
Love and licks as ever,
(With extra licks to Tiny!)
Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo

P.S We'll be back soon, not least to show the girls modelling their beautiful new SMP clothes, so be sure to keep an eye out for our 'Style My Pooch Prizes' picture post!

Pet of the Month (November) - Animology Competition!

A while ago we reviewed the wonderful Animology line and ever since we've been keeping an eye on their Facebook page and Twitter. A few weeks ago they came up with a fun new competition on FB - 'Pet of the Month'. We decided to test the waters and enter one of our favourite pictures of Lola (incidentally it was her 1st bath and we were using Puppy Love!).

We're delighted to say Lola was chosen as a winner and we got some fabulous prizes from the lovely people at Animology. (Thanks guys!)

The next competition (POTM December) has already started so be sure to head over to their FB page now and upload your pets picture to be in with your chance of winning! Good luck if you do decide to enter :)

We'll be back soon, we have quite a few posts lined up so be sure to check back with us!

Love & licks,
Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo

Discover Dogs (Plus Our Ticket Giveaway!)

Discover Dogs is right around the corner now and with that in mind we thought we'd share a little information about the big event and tell you how to get your hands on a pair of complimentary tickets!

Discover Dogs is a huge 2 day annual event run by The Kennel Club and sponsored this year by Royal Canin. At Discover Dogs you can expect to meet over 200 breeds of purebred dogs and their knowledgeable owners, who are waiting to tell you all about their furry friends! You'll learn about not only the look of the each breed, but also about their personalities, any distinctive traits and their needs as a breed.

Discover Dogs isn't just all about the purebred pups though, scruff-ty mutts are more than welcome with events such as the Scruffts Grand Final being held there and the Companion Dog Club Competition!

As well as the purebred meet and greets and the host of shows/competitions and agility demonstrations, there's also the winners display from the Dog Photographer of the Year 2011 competition!

If that still isn't enough for you then you're in luck, the 100+ trade stands should keep you busy for a while ;)

For any more info on what's on at this years Discover Dogs you can check out the list of events and start planning your route around the show!

With only a few days left before the show starts it's time to grab any last minute tickets you might want... We're pleased to say we can offer a little help on that front to one lucky winner, with our giveaway! We're offering 2 complimentary Discover Dogs tickets to you, our lovely readers!

To get your paws on this pair (2) of tickets all you have to do is tweet or RT a link to this post, with the hashtag - #DDTicketsAHWTH and we'll pick a winner! I'll put out a tweet that you can RT to simplify things :)

We'll message the winner Wednesday 9th November, so take to Twitter and RT for your chance to win!

Best of luck to everyone who enters,
Love & licks,
Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo

ETA - Congratulations to our winner from Twitter, @misstew :) Glad you had a fabulous time!

Giveaway - Win a copy of 'Awkward Family Pet Photos'!

You may have seen our recent post about 'Awkward Family Pet Photos', if you didn't then be sure to read our review and find out what all the fuss is about!

Now we're very pleased to be able to offer a copy to give away! Entry is simple - I'll post a message on Twitter and everyone who RT's it will be in with a chance of winning :) Alternatively, if you don't have a twitter account then you can comment on this post below to win!

I'll message the winner Saturday 5th November to get their postal address, so if you enter be sure to check your inbox ;)

Good Luck!

P.S We'll have another giveaway coming up soon, so keep a look out for it...

ETA - Congratulations to our winner, Clarissa!

Pup Idol 2011/Puppy Awareness Week (PAW) - Part 6

This is our penultimate PAW post! I think I'll miss these when we're done with them :( Today though we wanted to tell you about Pup Idol and how you can enter :)

Pup Idol is a competition to the doggy stars. Think your pup is adorable? Think they have a certain je ne sais quoi? Then they could be the first ever Pup Idol! 

If you think your pup has what it takes to be a Pup Idol, scoot on over and enter here by uploading your adorable puppy pictures. You'll be in with a chance to win family tickets to Discover Dogs and Crufts 2012! Discover Dogs will be held at Earls Court 1 in London, between the12th - 13th November and Crufts will be at The NEC, Birmingham, between the 8th - 11th March 2012.

The only rule when entering Pup Idol is that the dog in the picture needs to be a puppy! Other than that snap away and get entering :)

You can post as many pictures as you like and your puppy can be a perfect pedigree or a cute as a button crossbreed, every pup is welcome!
Entries close on the 23rd September and judging will take place on the 30th September.

Good luck if you enter and we hope you'll come back tomorrow for our final word on Puppy Awareness Week!

Love & licks,
Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo

P.S We'll remind you about entry details in a few days when we share our entry :)

Scruffts!

Scruffts is a competition for our nations cute crossbreeds and offers a fun day out for the whole family. This is Scruffts 11th year and The Kennel Club have been running this years shows countrywide since late February. The last show will be held mid October. There's still plenty of time/shows left to get your dog a place at the final, so to find a show near you, check out the shows page here. This years heat winners will go on to the Grand Final which will be held at Discover Dogs 2011, in November.

Pretty much any dog can enter, as long as they're aged 6 months - 12 years and of course, a Scrufft-y crossbreed! Rosettes are awarded to the dogs who get 1st, 2nd and 3rd place in each local heat and the 1st place rosette winner from each heat goes on to Discover Dogs for the Grand Final!

Entry is simple, you just turn up to the show nearest to you and be ready to wow. Entry is only £1 and all the money goes to a great cause - The KC Charitable Trust!

The KC Charitable Trust are working hard to 'make a difference for dogs' by funding research into canine diseases, helping welfare organisations and promoting better care and understanding of all our 4 legged friends, pedigree or cross.

So with that in mind and the possibility of seeing your dog with a winners rosette, there's every reason to go ahead to one of the local heats and let your dog have its day!

There are 5 heats left - Sussex, Kent, Cambridgeshire, Suffolk and Nottinghamshire. To find out where to go and when, check out the information here. We hope you'll turn up to support the KC's Trust and let your dog strut its stuff :)

Each local heat has 4 classes for entry - 

• Most Handsome Crossbreed Dog 6 months - 7 years
• Prettiest Crossbreed Bitch 6 months - 7 years
• Child's Best Friend* 6 months - 12 years
• Golden Oldie Crossbreed 8 years or over **

*(Handled by a young person between 6 and 16 years of age).
** Dogs entered at the organiser's discretion.

Scruffts is a fun competition, for the owners and the dogs entering, so the judges will be looking for happy, healthy dogs, with sound temperaments. Does your dog fit the bill? Try out and let us know!

As a bonus each dog that enters any Scruffts heat will get a free bag of Wellbeloved treats - as they kindly sponsor Scruffts :)

We hope you go along, whether you enter or you just go to have a fabulous doggy themed day out with your human family members!

Best of luck to everyone going!

Love & licks,

Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo 

Dog Photographer of the Year 2011 - Entries.

4 long weeks ago we posted about the KC's 2011 'Dog Photographer of the Year' competition. Well seeing as the competition is officially closed to entries as of today, we thought we'd share our entries. We entered 3 of the 5 categories - Dog Portrait, Dogs at Play and Man's Best Friend.

We entered this picture of Rafferty in 'Dog Portrait'.
Doesn't she look lovely?

We decided on this baby picture of Monroe for 'Dogs at Play'.

And we chose this shot of Lola on my slippers for 'Man's Best Friend' :)

It was so tough choosing which pictures to enter! We have literally hundreds of pictures of the girls and we love them all ♥ The toughest choice was picking our 'Dog Portrait' entry, we had to rope in a friend to help us with the final 2!

Now for the judging to begin! We wish everyone who entered the very best of luck and to anyone who hasn't already entered hurry up, it's for such a good cause and today is the final day! To slip in a late entry or to find out more, click here.

We'll no doubt do a post once the winners/runners up are announced, so we can share loads of fabulous pictures with you :) The winners will be announced via the KC website and the pictures posted on Flickr. The Grand Prize winner will get their award at this years Discover Dogs. Judging will take place 14th September and winners/runners up will be announced 15th/16th September, when we should be about to post about it, but of course we'll be back long before all that happens ;)

Love & licks,
Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo

A look at Lola :)

Lola's been here with us now for a little over a week and she's settling in great, the girls have taken to her (apart from Buffy, who gets bullied mercilessly by little Lola! It's all in good nature, or so Lola tells us...)

We had a play around with our camera earlier and got a few nice shots of Lola, so we think we'll end up choosing one of these to enter the Dog Photographer Competition :D

These are what we have so far;

Gorgeous right? And hasn't she grown up an absolute ton already? This is her just a week and a half ago...

It's crazy how different she looks already, just by her ears coming up! We can't wait for her fur to start coming in, in a few weeks, her fur is insanely thick already, she's what's known as 'double coated'* which just means she has a thick downy soft undercoat, so her fur should be lovely when she's older :)

*Unlike our other 4 who are single coated, i.e they have only their topcoat, which is longer, finer and less velvet-y.

We'll upload a video of her playing and some pictures of her with the girls in a day or 2!

In the meantime we're stuck trying to choose our favourite picture from this lot xD
Might be worth opening it up to a poll and asking your opinion...

Until then,

Love & licks,

Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo

Dog Photographer

of the year 2011... certainly isn't going to be us! Not with our useless camera and often uncooperative 'models' ;)

But there's no harm in entering, so fingers crossed for us, it's a great thing to do especially with the proceeds going to such a worthwhile charity, the Kennel Club Charitable Trust.

There's also prizes to be won, such as a Pixum canvas print of your pooch and a Lomo camera, the runners up prizes aren't bad either and a friendly competition is always fun :)

To find out everything and anything you could possibly want to know about the competition, including how to enter, clickity click over here!

As info isn't our strong point here, how about we give you a run through of the Hilton's top 10 model-esque tips, that way at least your model is prepared! (Or should that be prepawed?)

1. Look fly! Bathed, brushed and pampered to perfection? Lookin' like one hot dog!
2. If the world is your oyster, then your home, garden and local park can sure be your stage. Try going out and about for some great action shots.
3. Macro, you know how adorable your dogs crinkly nose is, get in close and show the world.
4. A happy dog is your best friend, caught in natural poses, your dogs eyes will shine.
5. Think outside the box. What makes your dog unique? Try to capture their personality in the shot, with poses and props.
6. Faces, your dog has as many emotions as you, use toys and your voice to bring out different expressions and catch them on film.
7. Angles can be your best friend, everyone knows what a dog looks like from above, get creative and be prepared to get a little mucky!
8. A dog is art in it's own right, don't over complicate your shots, let the subject speak for itself.
9. Have fun, if you're taking pictures for your photo album or for a competition, your feelings will show in your shots and most importantly...
10. Be proud of the beautiful dog you call your own and work those cameras!

Best of luck to everyone who enters!

Love & licks,

Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Lola.
xo

ETA - You can check out our entries here!

Octoberfest-ive!

So time for some words!

Not much in the way of news, the puppies are 4 weeks this Sunday, so we'll have a video of them running around then, they're getting pretty good at toddling round now :)
Turning 4 weeks old also means a second dose of wormer :(
To be fair, it's chocolate flavoured, so it's almost a treat xD

In way of the "Christmas Competition", as it stands now, we're going to go ahead :)
So feel free to start entering!
Email your picture, pets name, age and breed, plus your name to - competitions.ahwth@hotmail.co.uk :)
Feel free to add a line or two about your pet, or even yourself!

Entries are welcome for a whole month (we'll update regularly about it) and then we'll have 2 weeks judging, before announcing winners, getting prize details and shipping your prizes out just in time for Chrismas :)
Hopefully this will all be done with time spare for people to send us their prize pictures and we'll do a Christmas special :)

Speaking of Christmas, is anyone else getting really festive already?
I'm getting far too excited to say it's only just October, which reminds me, first it's Halloween!
That means only one thing, trick or treating!
Which means I get to dress up my little darlings, much to their disgust :)
I need to get thinking what they will all be!
Oh the fun ^^ I think it would make for an endearing and rather comical post ;)

Anyway, we're off to the land of nod now, as it is nearly 4am xD
Night night blogger!

Love & licks,
Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Alfie!
xo

Updates, reviews, news and opinions? (Christmas Competition!)

We'll start with the updates shall we? :)

So all the girls (and Alfie) are doing well, Lily's eyes are fully open today, whilst poor Alfie only has one open! He looks like he's winking and we keep calling him a pirate xD We'll post pictures of them tomorrow when we have decent light to work with, but we dare say his second eye will be open by then :(

Other than that, (edging towards reviews now) we had a lot of packages come today from hyperdrug and bonniedog :)
From hyperdrug we had 2 boring items, some Royal Canin puppy milk and Sherleys puppy wormer, but we also had a fleecey Kong "Snugga Wubba", a Kong toy that I've now forgotten the name of >.<, a Kong puppy teething bone and a Jolly Teaser Ball, plus some Coachies puppy training treats xD
From bonniedogs we had an EzyDog harness and lead in chocolate  brown (for Monroe). 
All in all very pleased, the Kong Snugga Wubba went down a storm, as did the Coachies and the EzyDog harness and lead are proving a sound investment :) (We're ordering one for the rest of the girls too, but decided to order only one to begin with to try the size out on them all :) Sadly even the smallest size, adjusted as much as possible is still too big for teeny tiny Rafferty, so we'll have it altered once we receive it!)

Now the news and opinions part of this post are kinda rolled into one!
We here at "AHWTH" have been thinking about running a "Christmas Competition" and want to hear your opinions! We'll pop a poll below this, along with some idea of the kind of prizes and rules we'd have for the competition, as well as any restrictions or special requests :) Feel free to vote or email me with suggestions!

polls & surveys

So, seeing as we loved them so much, we thought as prizes we'd offer the following*;
1st place = 1 EzyDog Harness and EzyDog Vario2 Training Lead, in a size** and colour of your choice, currently retailing at a total of £28.98.
2nd place = A Kong "Snugga Wubba" in blue or pink and a 300g jar of Coachies (puppy or adult), which are currently £7.94 for both.
3rd place = A goodie bag of sweets and treats containing a 75g bag of Coachies, a 50g bag of Fish4Dogs Super Stars Training Treats and a 325g bag of Burns Keltie Treats, altogether retailing at the bargain price of £3.18!
*Plus a few bits we've yet to try actually!
**Price does vary according to size, we calculated with the price of the X Small.

How to enter!
Step 1 = Subscribe ;)
Step 2 = Send us a picture of your beloved furbaby! (And you, if you so desire :P)
Step 3 = Sit back with your fingers crossed ^^

Please send your pictures to; competitions.ahwth@hotmail.co.uk

We will take entries from our start date (which we will post soon, if we decide to definitely go ahead) and run it for a month, after which we'll take a week out for judging, before letting you know our winners via email*** and a blog post and ordering all the prizes :)
***For the winners.
All the winners will be chosen by me and Jonny and any disagreement between us will go to a vote via a poll.
All breeds are welcome, although species wise we do ask you stick to dogs, age also isn't a problem!
Just send us your cutest picture and we'll do the rest.
Winner pictures will be posted in a special entry, along with a few details about your pet and a quote from the winning owner, so please keep this in mind when you enter!
We may also ask for a follow up picture with your pet and it's prize, so again, please remember this :)
We will not post your pictures or details anywhere else, scouts honour xD
At this time, the competition is restricted to the UK, in the future however, if all goes well, we intend to run them worldwide!

Let us know what you think!!!

Love and licks as always,
Rio, Jonny, Buffy, Rafferty, Monroe, Lily and Alfie!
xo

Rafferty = Semi Finals Superstar!

Yayyy! Rafferty did it!

A while back, we made a post asking for votes to help Rafferty win a "cutest pets" competition...

Well something must've worked, because Rafferty is in the semi finals!

She will appear in the book and is now in the running for "cover pet"!

We're all very excited here at the Hilton household!

Well done Rafferty, you were always a winner in our eyes anyway ♡

Love & licks* Rio, Buffy, Rafferty & Monroe.

*And many, many thanks!

Please vote for Rafferty! :)

 Hey everyone, we just had a quick favour to ask! 
We'd be really grateful if you could take a second out of your day to click the link below and vote for Rafferty as the "cutest pet of all"! :) 
Thanks in advance!

http://www.cutestpetcontest.com/view100377020.htm