Pitlandia in Portlandia: Doggie Palooza

Many of you know that I had the great privilege of meeting Emily from Our Waldo Bungie and Sarah from Married with Dawgs this past week.  Emily made a trip to Portland for a job interview which then turned into a week of Portland blogger fun!

Of course I hung out with Emily all five days that she was in town, because really, who could pass up hanging out with such a super cool blogger?  Not me!  We quickly went from being 'online blogging friends' to 'awesome real life friends'!  I was so excited to also meet Sarah who showed us all around her side of Portland including her pet store No Po Paws.

Aside from eating majorly fatty foods throughout the week (hey, we were both vacationing), Emily and I also attended Doggie Palooza held at the World Forestry Center in Southwest Portland.  Athena and my mom also tagged along for the fun!

For $9.00 per person (dogs were free) we got to spend the day paroozing the exhibits at the World Forestry Center and visiting different vendors that were set up in the different buildings of the forestry center.

World Forestry Center Paroozing

One of my favorite parts about Doggie Palooza was that we had the opportunity to check out the exhibits within the forestry center with Athena (dogs were allowed in for one day only!).  We took full advantage of this opportunity by doing things that the center staff probably cringed at.  Like when we plopped Athena in a raft and took her for a pretend ride.  See the proof here:

Can you spot Athena in this crazy picture?

Pretend raft rides are the best!

We took further advantage of our time at the forestry center by dressing Athena up like a lumberjack and posing for pictures throughout the "forest."

Athena looks pretty good in plaid

Tromping through the forest with an alien dog

Vendor Visiting

Doggie Palooza was host to quite a few vendors with booths for retail, doggy day cares, adoption services, and general dog ownership information.  Emily and I both agreed that the samples that we received from many of the vendors were well worth the $9.00 that we paid to get into the event.

There were more treats in this pile, but somebody ate them all before I got a picture!

Photo Shoots

Athena also had a couple of photo shoots during her time at Doggie Palooza.  The first was for Spot Magazine's Cover Model Search (it cost $15 for a holiday themed picture--the money goes to animal welfare).  I highly doubt that Athena will be featured as their cover model though because she pouted during the entire photo shoot and kept trying to jump off of the stage.  I can't wait to receive her photos in my inbox so that I can share her pouty face with you all.  Even if Athena doesn't reach cover girl status, her picture will at least be featured inside of the December issue of Spot Magazine!

Next, Athena had a couple of pictures taken for free by PDX Photo Lounge.  Once again, she didn't even smile for the camera.  You can see the entire album of photos taken at Doggie Palooza here.

Overall Experience

Doggie Palooza was filled with dogs and their owners and at times it got a bit squishy around the vendor's booths.  However, Athena did an excellent job of staying calm.  She had many opportunities to do some butt sniffin', because everywhere we turned there was another doggy butt all up in her face.  I noticed that all of the dogs in attendance were very well mannered.  There was rarely a bark in the few hours that we spent at Doggie Palooza.  Aside from dog greetings, Athena was also greeted by a slew of people and appreciated pets from all of them.

I think that I would consider attending this event again next year, because it's always nice to find new and exciting things to do with dogs around town!