Brixworth Country Park, Northamptonshire

We had lovely walkies yesterday afternoon with Alfie in Brixworth Country Park! There are 3 or 4 different walks to choose from with varying distances from 3/4 mile to 7.5 miles (around the reservoir)!

We took a 1.5 mile route, and went round it twice, which made for a nice lengthy bit of exercise for all!

An enjoyable walk, very dog friendly and highly recommended! There's a 'little grey men' trail you can follow (see pic) which is good for kiddies, and there's also a play are too if you're that way inclined!

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Proud to be a Theo Paphitis #SBS winner 05.05.13

Facebark etc

Are you following Barkitty on Twitter, or do you ‘like’ our Facebook page? If not, you should join the 3,800 (and counting) people who have!

I absolutely promise it’s not about sales, it’s about sharing pictures of pets, and having a few laughs too! You really get a sense of community when you join in, and I run prize draws, quizzes and much more!

See you there!

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#SBS winner!

Last night Theo Paphitis chose me to be one of his 6 weekly winners of #SBS (small business Sunday)! To say I’m thrilled is an understatement!

For those of you who don't know what I'm on about see the description below, and visit the website (and see Barkitty on the homepage)!!http://theopaphitissbs.com/

Each week Theo rewards small businesses that tweet him @TheoPaphitis and describe their business in onetweet including the all-important hashtag #SBS. Only tweets made in the time slot between 5.00 PM and 7.30 PM each Sunday count.

Each week Theo reviews and chooses his favourite lucky six who are then re-tweeted. As he has over 350,000 followers, this provides a massive boost to the chosen lucky businesses.

The benefits range from increased Twitter followers, to positive media publicity and crucially for many, increased sales! Of course, none of this is guaranteed as it is largely down to perseverance and hard work. A smidgen of luck comes in handy.

I had been tweeting Theo every week since July, so I was over the moon when it paid off and he recognised how hard I’ve been working!

So, watch this space, who knows what will happen next…

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Proud to be a Theo Paphitis #SBS winner 05.05.13

If you go down in the woods today...

Last week Alfie and I took a little ride down the A5 to Leighton Buzzard, where we met our friends Hannah and her cocker spaniel Baxter for walkies!

We went to Rushmere Woods, in Heath and Reach, Leighton Buzzard, where we had such a good time! Lots of mud, and hills, and things to sniff for the 2 boys! Baxter is only 3 weeks younger than Alfie, and just a bit smaller, so they’re great playmates!

Here they are next to a giant seat in the woodlands! I call this one ‘honey I shrunk the dogs’.

It’s well worth a visit if you’re in the area with the dogs, Alfie and I really enjoyed it. More info can be found here; http://leighton-buzzard.co.uk/rushmere.htm

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Proud to be a Theo Paphitis #SBS winner 05.05.13

Birthday party!

We had a birthday party for Barkitty on Saturday, and it was a wonderful day! Lots of bottles of bubbly were consumed, and we had 21 doggy visitors in!

Sharon from Zigwags came in specially to make personalised leather collars for customers as they waited, which was a really popular service!

I want to thank everyone who came, I truly appreciate the constant support I receive from friends and customers. I promise I will continue to keep up the level of service you have become used to, and will always do my best for you and your pets!

To see more pics from the birthday, see my Facebook album… https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.492375287484776.1073741829.274973055891668&type=3

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Proud to be a Theo Pathitis #SBS winner 05.05.13

For the love of Dogs...

I keep seeing the ads on ITV for Paul O’Grady’s ‘For the love of Dogs’ based at Battersea Dogs & Cats home. I’m really looking forward to the new series, as I enjoyed the last one so much, but also because of the good it does for animal rehoming!

It started last week, May 9^th on ITV – and continues every Thursday at 8.30pm.

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Proud to be a Theo Pathitis #SBS winner 05.05.13

Fur better, fur worse

After hearing so much about them, I bought Alfie and Jasmine a FURminator deShedding tool each to see what all of the fuss is about! I’ve got to say, I am a total addict already, they are FANTASTIC!

As soon as they were delivered I had to give it a try, and just 10 minutes of brushing him produced so much dead fur I couldn’t believe it! It is lovely to use, with a comfortable rubber handle to grip, and it glides through fur with ease.

Alfie really enjoyed it too, and it was actually quite good for our bonding. Afterwards, his fur was just so soft and really shiny. I have been using it regularly since, and so many people have commented on his shiny, sleek coat. I used the large breed, long hair FURminator on Alfie, as he weighs around 26kg at the moment, and has really long wavy hair on parts of him.

Jasmine was harder to get hold of, but once I could pin her down she did start purring. She is quite long haired, so the amount of fur to come off was astonishing! I can only do a bit at a time with her because she won’t sit still long enough, so I have been working my way round her a bit at a time! You can really see the difference in the parts I have done compared to the parts I haven’t got to yet! She looks so much tidier!

Have a look on YouTube for plenty of recommendations and demonstration videos, like this one… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUIcQQ64vmo

I will be keeping Alfie’s in the shop for a while, for demonstration purposes, so feel free to come in and try it out!

I can honestly say, if you only buy one accessory for your pet this year, it should be a FURminator!

Finally, I have matched my low prices to Pets At Home. Get yours here http://www.barkitty.co.uk/category_dog_furminators_1.shtml

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Proud to be a Theo Pathitis #SBS winner 05.05.13

Barkitty Birthday Statistics!

Well, it’s my 1^st birthday already! Where has that year gone?? For fun, I have been putting together some statistics about the shop which I thought you might find interesting!

In total, to date on April 23^rd we’d welcomed 582 pet visitors through the door. 579 dogs, 2 cats and one coatimundi (an animal from the raccoon family).

The most visited breed is Jack Russells, of which we’ve met 46.

We met 37 Chihuahuas, 36 Labradors, 26 Shih Tzu, 25 cocker spaniels, 19 Dachshunds, 18 Bichon Frise, 18 Westies, 17 Yorkies, 17 pugs, 14 French Bulldogs and 12 Staffies amongst many crosses in between and many more breeds!

As my Facebook and Twitter followers will know, I have been posting pictures of different groups of pets who have been into the shop, or featured on my social networking sites. This culminated in a huge image of nearly 400 pets who have visited – and I am going to print this onto a canvas for display in store.

Can you spot yours?

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank each and every person (and pet) who has visited the shop, and/or supported my Facebook and Twitter pages online. I truly appreciate your love for the shop and what I do! The best thing about opening the shop has been the new friends we’ve made! Here’s to many more!

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Proud to be a Theo Pathitis #SBS winner 05.05.13