Time Well Spent?!?!...Not.

Well for some time now (a couple of years I'm guessing?) I've groomed our house dogs, Kalli and Shelby. It dawned on me that spending around $60 every 8 weeks wasn't helping the money making business where the dogs were concerned. Also, I have to drive 20 miles there and back & there and back to get them there. Which is also time and money. Now, I don't do as good a job as the groomer does, but they look pretty good.

This job usually takes me at least 4 hours. Bathing, drying, brushing and cutting. I really dislike it. So I also put it off. Which makes it a bit harder and takes a bit longer.

I had the day off today and decided they needed haircuts now. No more procrastinating. It's enough that I have a puppy who refuses to "go potty" outside since it's been rainy. At least the other house dogs can look decent and I can know they are really clean.

So, this a.m., after steps one and two we get to the haircut stage. I use the trusty tv babysitter for the boys, cuz you really can't do it with them under your feet. Jaden was wonderful. He played and watched Alvin and the Chipmunks so nice while I was doing my thing. Today I kinda decided to skip step 3, cuz that can be an hour in itself. I was giving them summer "dos" and so was gonna cut it all off anyway.

Well, Shelby was done, no incidents. Kalli's turn. Even tho I used the blow dryer, she was drying very slowly. So I decided to use a scissors to get some of the extra hair off. Why dry what you're just going to cut off anyway, right? Then I'd use the grooming shears.

Well, Kalli had some mats. Quite a few in fact. As I was cutting a mat off I went too deep. What I thought was still the mat of hair was really skin. My poor dog. She didn't even cry. I cut a chunk of her skin off. Not just a cut. But a chunk. Like an oval shape. All the skin...gone.

Amazingly it didn't bleed much, but I wrapped it up and called Brandy to take her into the vet. I was covered in hair and in need of a shower. I didn't even want to step foot in the van. Then I called the vet, who was at lunch. How wonderful to say you think your dog needs stitches because you cut her while grooming her. During the wait I got lots of questions from Tye. "Mom, what's wrong with Kalli? She's bleeding!" "Mom, why did you do that?"

Brandy came home, no Kalli. Apparently they have to put her under to stitch her up. Poor baby. Kalli does not like the vet and is almost never away from home. Especially without us. She's 13 years old. I feel so bad. Sheesh.

So, do you think that was time well spent?? I saved $60, wonder how much the vet bill will be? More than that I'm betting! Maybe I should consider going back to the groomer...