It started out somewhat as a joke – Borks and Boost, Still Plays With Dogs, etc – but the small weekly meetups a few of us have been having over the last couple of months have sure enough basically turned into excuses to watch the dogs play, while there are coincidentally some nice cars also dotted around.

In case people are wondering why they hadn’t heard of these it’s because – despite calling the initial outing earlier this season the first car meet of the year – these are really just a group of friends keeping in touch and hanging out once a week or so to catch up. And, yes, watch the dogs play. We will have our proper meets later this year, but until then these are purely a result of a few of us just messaging back and forth asking if anyone wants to come out for coffee or – in more recent weeks – ice cream.

They’ve been a great deal of fun and brilliant ways to spend lazy weekend mornings, and some of the resulting photos have been hilarious as well. As the pictures you’ll see today span the last couple of months you’ll notice changes in the lighting, weather, and naturally the cars – be it from new mods or even new projects being picked up – but the stars here are the dogs. Cars and Coffee and Canines, Volume 1: I hope you enjoy!

Winston smiling for the camera.

Justine’s new FR-S made its debut earlier this year, as the follow-up to her E90 which was sadly hit and written off in a snowstorm during the winter. This car has already received a couple of rather large changes, as you’ll see later on in the post.

This is the last time you’ll see Danny’s M2, as he decided that it wasn’t quite…”him”. It has since gone to a new home and he’s back with a manufacturer that shouldn’t really come as a surprise.

Coincidentally, one of these little meetups happened to fall on Noodles’ birthday! She received a little party hat but it didn’t last long as she was keen to knock it off. We did at least manage to get a few photos while it was on though!

Birthday girl.

Dijon made the odd appearance though it hasn’t been out much in the last few months in order to stay clean and safe. I think we can officially now count this as another daily driver ruined!

Dustin’s S15 also made an appearance one week, shaking off the dust from storage and seeing the first kilometers of the year. Perhaps we can get some more photos of this and my Spec S together, this season.

Kip Hortons.

Hatchback gang, along with Erin and Melodie. Mk3 nerds may be able to spot a couple of the recent changes to Arabis as a preview of the install post/video still to come. I’m quite pleased with how this mini project is going thus far!

Meanwhile, Melodie’s FiST received a bit more visual aggression to go with the new big turbo setup in the form of an RS-style double-layer spoiler.

While the weather was decent the Thunderbird also had a brief time out from storage, ahead of coming off the road again for a few upgrades under the hood. There’ll be some fairly big changes to share more on, in due time…some planned, some not.

Merlin, sitting with his dad Aldrich.

Merlin’s a funny one – all teeth at times but also just a big old goofball. With the amount he’s shedding currently there’s also surely a bit of him in everyone’s car by now because his hair is going everywhere.

Kipper’s face in this one makes me laugh every time. He spent quite a bit of energy chasing Penny’s toy on this particular morning…

…but also sat very nicely for a photo with Mel and the Celica.

In case you hadn’t guessed, Danny went back to Audi by picking up a “red” (it’s clearly orange in person, Audi) RS3. Once he starts really tweaking this car it should look absolutely nuts, and he seems to be really happy to be back in an AWD car from the brand he’s enjoyed so much previously.

And all of a sudden, Justine’s FR-S is a freaking highlighter! New wheels and a full wrap have already drastically changed the car, on top of the carbon fiber hood that was fitted earlier (and was seen in the background of a photo above).

Maybe one of these days I’ll actually buy an ST and stop being the SE owner trying to fit in. Haha

Standoff, between Kipper and Noodles. A few seconds after this photo was taken one of them made a move and both took off running full tilt around the lot.

And finally, a couple more of Kipper posing nicely thanks to Mel standing behind me and getting him to look my way. That’s all for today, but there are already more photos to come from these little hangouts and sure enough each week the ratio of car photos to dog photos continues to shift, ever in the dogs’ favour!

-Bill