Mad Dogs

There has been much hilarity in this house over the last few weeks, mostly caused by the dogs, Henry and Badger being the main suspects.

Firstly though we had yet another episode of the toe, I took Badger for his one year check up and innoculations and we discovered two lumps in between two toes on both front feet. Not good. Still, I felt optomistic, surely the vet could just remove them and although the prospect of driving back and forth to the vet with a sore poorly dog for a couple of weeks wasn't a great thought at least it would get it sorted. The trouble was it turned out not to be quite that easy, Badger went in for a couple of X-rays and it turned out there were five or six little lumps in both front paws and this might mean having more toes amputated and it dosen't take a rocket scientist to work out that a dog can only have so many toes removed and then it would have to be a leg removed and if that's going on in both front feet then removing both front legs just wasn't an option, I'm sure you can work out what that option would be.

So we got referred to a specialist way up in Fife, to cut a long story short the fantastic lovely amazing specialist vet said that the lumps were something that happen in puppies and once they are past 12 months they should cease to form or grow and everything in Badgers feet had most probably stabilised. However they did find an absess in his foot where his toe was removed in the summer so they sorted that out, gave me some anti biotics and sent us on our way. I could have cried with relief, I honestly wondered if I was going to be bringing him home.

Since our visit to Fife Bdger has become the most happy, friendly and affectionate wee pup. He had turned into a grumpy, growly, bad tempered dog who no longer wanted to go in the car, had stopped us stroking him, would completely freak if we tried to touch his toes or legs and it was beyond me what to do with him. I think I'd describe him as smiley now!

On to the hilarity, since Badgers trip up north he has become more mischievous and has joined forces with Henry to create as much havoc in the house as possible. In order to keep this contained I've dug out lots of toys from Ferg and Bons days and Molly, Henry and Badge are like little children in a toy shop with them.

The first toy was a ball which you put treats into and it has a recordable switch where you can put your own voice and talk to the dog every time it moves the ball to get the treats out. Molly had played with this a couple of years ago but I took it away when we got Henry in case they fought over it. Amazingly she remembered what to do with it straight away, never underestimate the power of a greyhounds brain! When Molly stopped playing with it I turned the sound bit on and Henry really freaked, it was a recording from my ex and Henry never liked him much and so he pounced on the ball, it flew up in the air and the recording bit flew out accross the room and hit the wall. you couldn't have made it up in a film, you could say we won't be hearing from my ex again hahaha!

The next side splitting event came from Badger, he has a football which was an outdoor toy but has made it's way inside and Badge has slowly chewed a massive hole in it. He drags this ball around all over the place, putting it on your lap when youre wearing nice clothes, bringing it upstairs and placing it gently on your pillow and waits patiently for you to play fetch the moment you wake up and are faced with a slimey big thing right in front of you. Last night he discovered that the hole is now big enough for him to madly shake the ball and have it slap all around his head. How he does this and stays standing up or even concious I've no idea but once he'd done it the first time he kept on doing it, adding wee extras like slapping it against your legs or climbing up on the back of the sofa while youre watching tv and suddenly shaking it against your head to make you jump.

The ball got revenge though as mid shake it went right over his head and suddenly we had a football headed dog running about the house, attempting to look as though he really meant to have it on his head while trying to work out how to get it off before bumping into anything. It was so funny that we couldn't help as we were laughing too much which is probably a bit bad but it was so funny that even the though of it while I'm typing this is making me laugh.

So that's the madness for now, will be back soon with more...

Timberdogs

Today I decided to chop some of the logs that I bought a few days ago. If it's a nice winter or autumn day, chopping logs is quite a nice occupation, it's all sort of rustic and homely and gives you an immensely good feeling when the logs are all stacked up by the fire. Strangely, when I have lots of coal, lots of logs and lots of oil in the tank I feel quite wealthy, it's a good feeling, no matter how much money there is in the bank.

So, while chopping the logs the dogs have to of course get involved. This means hanging around me, sniffing logs I'm picking up and then progressing to sniffing the big log that's used for chopping on and then even more dangerously, sniffing the log that is being chopped. They then all hng around me while I piled as many chopped logs into my arms and took them inside to stack beside the fire. Whilst stacking them, all three dogs watched intently as every log went down and the next was places beside it. I was then followed back outside to start the process all over again.

It's funny how dogs watch your every move with such instense interest sometimes. I was once told that although us humans spend quite allot of time watching and learning about our dogs, we will never equal the amount of knowledge the dogs have about us, they watch us all the time and know our every move even before we know it, that's how while thinking about taking them out for a walk as soon as you've finished washing up will mean that you'll come accross the dog bouncing about wanting to go out as soon as you've pulled the plug. Dogs are fab, really fab and although mine sometimes drive me nuts they all look angelic laying in front of the log burner which is currently roaring away with the chopped logs and a bit of coal inside.

Chicken Feed

Yesterday while cleaning out the chicken house I noticed Henry was being unusually quiet. Whenever I do anything with the chickens they tend to hang around me like a big chicken gang which Henry really wants to join.

After half an hour I went back into the garden to do something else and saw Henry emerge from the store where the sack of chicken corn is kept. What made him look so suspicious was that he was trying to keep his mouth very still while little bits of corn fell out the sides! He honestly looked like a wee boy who had been caught eating sweets and was trying to look like he wasn't eating anything. When I went into the store he'd tucked in to about an eighth of a sack.

Now why on earth would a dog want to eat chicken feed? I do feed him honest, even though he is a skinny dog, but chicken feed? I just can't see anything remotely attractive in it for a dog apart from the fact that the chickens eat it so therefore Henry wants it.

What I do know is that this is going to make for some interesting poop scooping later...

Blog Holiday

Sorry I've not posted anything for so long. It's been a mad few weeks and it was quite nice to take a blog holiday, until yesterday when I decided to catch up on all the blogs I followed and I realised how much I miss this and all of you.

On the toe front Molly has recovered very well. It wasn't an easy ride, she couldn't go out for three weeks and Molly is the kind of dog who watches the clock for the minute she is going for a walk and then leaps up and bugs you until you take her. However we made it through and she is now on shortish walks that are getting longer so very soon she will be up to speed and back to normal.

Over the last few weeks Henry's sense of humour has increased greatly. I had some shopping delivered one day and while putting it away I went to answer the phone, once off the phone I put some washing in the tumble dryer and carried on putting the shopping away. It wasn't until later that day that I discovered the bread wrapper, a container for a ready meal and a packet of toilet rolls at the bottom of the garden.

Then last week I made a chocolate cake, this is a rare event for me and I'd made it really chocolately and put lots of chocolate findant icing on the top. While waiting for the icing to set I put it right at the back of the kitchen work surface - this is somewhere that is relatively dog proof, until now - and went off to do something else. After a couple of minutes I heard a crash in the kitchen and shot through to see what was happening. Henry had climbed on one of the chairs, knocked a load of plastic containers off the work surface and pulled the cake to the edge. Not only that but he had licked the lovely fondant icing completely off of one half of the cake. Needless to say the cake ended up being a dog treat over the course of the next few days, I'm not sure what this teaches them but after all that hard work I wasn't going to throw it in the bin!

On a good note, Henry has stopped barking madly at the chickens. I can't remember if I said that I got four lovely Lavender Araucana hens, they are very beautiful and posh, in fact they are too posh to lay an egg so have become more pets than functional. For the first few weeks Henry barked at them non stop but thankfully now he has begun to get used to them and only barks if they are right by the fence. I think there is no doubt he'd have a chicken dinner if he could get through the fence but at least the barking has stopped.

Badger is doing well too, he had a bath last night which is a major event, but he is now adorable and fluffy and so cute looking. He's still a pest though with all his collie-brained habits like never ever keeping still but at least he is a clean pest now!

Well I'd better get on and go to work and I promise not to take a blogging holiday again for a while.x

More Toe Problems

You couldn't have made this one up. We have more toe problems in our house.

Time it's Molly, gorgeous, peaceful, silky, loving Molly who does nothing wrong, is never irritatingly bouncy or loud and just wants to be my friend. She was out for a walk with Other Half and tried to catch a mouse in the hedgerow. As she pounced she yelped and Other Half noticed her toe was at a funny angle so he brought her home and when I looked at it I decided it must be dislocated so we put it back into place and called the vet. No answer, hmmmmm, we called again and still no answer so I called her medical emergency line and they said to call the vet. Aggggghhh! I tried the vet one more time, got no answer and decided to assess the situation.

There was no blood, she seemed quite calm and un-bothered by her toe, and although she was hopping it wasn't stopping her from moving about and scrounging in the kitchen so I decided to strap it up, doing what the vet had done to Badgers toe, popping bits of cotton wool in between her toes, wrapping more cotton round her foot and bottom part of her leg and then bandaging over the top of that, except I didn't have any cotton wool so we had to use extra soft toilet roll instead.

Other Half had the job of taking Molly to the vet the next morning and it turned out that she had broken her toe. This was a bit of a shock to say the least espcially as we'd manipulated it back into place! So she had to stay in for the day and get it set and cast. Poor Molly, she is the most careful, dainty greyhound you'll ever know.

After work I ran down to the vet and collected her and was greeted with some hilarity about our bad luck with toes, and out came Molls hoping along with a great big dressing on her leg, ot bothering about it one little bit. She hasn't even tried to chew it, she's that good so here's hoping I won't have another lampshade dog for another six weeks.

In the meantime she is to have absolute rest, this should be fairly easy, she is a greyhound, lazing around is their speciality, especially when her bed is in front of the log burner.

So here we go again, back and forth to the vet but hopefully this will be an easier ride, fingers crossed. x

New Arrivals

Henry, Molly and Badger have four new friends, they are one hen, one bantam hen and two bantam hen chicks. All the bantams are beautiful lavender aracaunas and the hen is a white aracauna. I've been after some aracaunas for about two years as they are the chickens who lay blue eggs which you very occasionally find in Tescos for an extortionate price and of course if I see them I have to buy them however much they cost because they are so lovely to look at. Aracaunas are also very hardy which is handy as it's very bleak here in the winter and you'd need to be a tough bird to withstand it.

So off I went at dusk last night to a wee small holding to collect my birds and instantly felt very bad as all the chickens there were housed in deluxe coops, one even had double glazing! Our coop is small and basic but I suppose it does the job although I think a few alterations might be in line before the winter comes in. After we'd caught the chickens, well, after I'd watched the lovely lady who I bought them from catch them, I trundeled home with them chirping in a box in the boot. It was such a lovely noise and quite funny as every time I hit a bump the hens made a sort of egg laying noise.

Once I got home I then had the tricky job of getting the birds from the box into the coop without any getting out to be lost into the night, this was harder than I thought as they refused to move and due to space restrictions I couldn't really get hold of them properly. However after a while I had them all locked up for the night.

Then this morning the alarm went off. I lay there groaning that it was early and decided to treat myself to 15 more minutes and after a couple of those minutes suddenly remembered the chickens. Oh no! Who's ridiculous idea was it to get chickens? I'd never get a lie in again! I dragged myself out of bed and still in my jammies pulled on a big fleece and wandered outside, all three dogs following and wondering why they weren't getting breakfast yet.

As soon as I opened the coop door out popped all the birds and they started pecking at the food I'd put down while making satisfied chicken noises. I have to say it was such a nice noise and a lovely sight to finally have chickens here that it was very worth while loosing that exra 15 minutes in my bed.

I shall of course report on our first egg.

Well Done Badger

Yesterday we went to the local agricultural show. After some thought I decided that Henry and Molly would be better staying at home but that we'd take Badger as he hasn't been anywhere in the car since his multiple expeditions to the vet which have made him hate the car - can't blame him really as every time he went in it for two months somebody hurt him at the other end.

We dosed him up with anti-sickness/nerves pills, took them all for a walk to wear out Hen and Moll and let the pills take effect for Badge then off we went. Once we were there I realised this was the first time Badger had been anywhere with crowds and lots of noise so I was a bit worried it might not have been the right thing to do but he coped with it as if he goes off to agricultural shows every week.

We wandered around for a bit to begin with and then started to meet people we knew, in fact the whole day turned into one big social event as everywhere we turned we bumped into someone else we knew and it was great having a good catch up with everyone from the village and surrounding farms.

Then there was an annoucment about the dog show and I suddenly thought why not enter Badger? So off I trotted, paid my 5op entry fee and stood in the middle of the field with Badger in the puppy class trying to look as though I did this sort of thing all the time (ok I know I did it a month or so ago with Hen but that was the first time since I was about 14!). Badger took an instant dislike to a very beautiful blue coated, blue eyed dog who was fairly close to us so I edged away before anyone of importance could hear this lovely cute pup growling like a wolf.

The judges made us walk round and round the ring and then run up and down - this was the hard bit as Badge pulls like a train when he's on the lead and I've got a dodgy knee so it could all have ended up in the infirmary. Then we had to stand in a big circle while they decided who had won, and guess what? It was Badger!!! So I guess that means we officially have the best pup in the area so I'm busting with pride for him, and this makes up for all the problems and stress we've been through with him in the last few months.

Well Done Badger!

Second Day Off

Well I have another day off today hurrah! I woke up at 7am, well actually Molly woke me up with her teeth chattering and dancing around next to the bed, being very insistant that I get up, so I got up and Henry and Badger instantly sprang to life like a switch had been switched and we all bumbled down the stairs. I say bumbled as Henry shoots down the stairs as if they don't actually exist, Badger somehow slides his front paws down the stairs while his back legs propel him and Molly makes both front paws step on each stair in turn while her back paws step on every other stair. In the middle of all this is me clambering down while hanging on to the banisters for grim death hoping I wont loose my footing - yes I have tried to make them all go down in front of me but they wouldn't listen.

After letting them all out and waiting for them to come back in I promptly went back to bed. This is very rare for me, once I'm up I'm up but today I decided to treat myself to an extra 3 hours of sleep, bliss. Even more bliss was having Henry curled up beside me, a practice which is banned when Other Half is in. Molly eventually decided that lazing around in bed was not good enough and she shot up the stairs and jumped on me to wake me up, she also tries to paw you when shes being very insistant so I scrambled out of bed trying to avoid getting clawed in the head while both Molly and Henry barked at me, I was certainly well awake by then.

So what will I do with my day off? I think I'll see if my friend fancies a walk around the castle grounds with our dogs, her dog is coming to stay on Saturday which will mean four dogs running around the house. Her dog is Badgers sister, Rosie and she is lovely, very different to Badge, shes more sleek and has pointy ears and she's wriggly and affectionate and very fast!

First things first I'm just going to move very slowly and enjoy having no rush to get anywhere or do anything, after all I'm back to work tomorrow and Sunday when all of you are lazing around...

Lovely Day

It's been gorgeous here all day. Just the sort of day to wear summer clothes, an event which if you live in the far north dosen't happen very often. If actually coincided with the unveiling of a spray tan that I had done during a girls night at my friends house last night. I came home thinking I looked all tanned and glam only for Other Half to burst out laughing at me. Rather insulted I trotted off to the bathroom and got an almighty shock, all you could see were my teeth and eyeballs standing out bright white against my somewhat Irn Bru'd skin. It did look rather funny I have to say, but thankfully most of the colour was the bit that washes off after the chemical bit has cooked you so I look far more normal today.

As well as sunshine, it was also my day off so I've spent it working in the garden, mowing the lawn three times as it's not been done for over six weeks due to rain and work stopping play, I also did some work while sitting at the garden table, again another rare occurence due to low temperatures, rain, wind and midges, thankfully none of them were around today.

Molly lazed on her bed outside all day long, alternating between the sunny bit and the shady bit as she got too hot and Henry and Badger spent most of the day wrestling, playing tug of war with bits of rope, play fighting and generally acting up like two little boys, oh and Badger decided to spend the entire time I mowed the lawns trying to round me and the lawnmower up, then when I spotted a long lost bone and flung it out of the way he decided the lawn mower was actually trying to eat his things and decided to attack it at every opportunity, not the best pastime for a puppy so I had to do a bit of shouting, then while I was distracting the boys, Molly snuck off her bed, grabbed the bone and took it back and guarded it for most of the rest of the day, good on you Molls!

Then early evening I took the dogs for a stroll along the lane while drinking in the niceness of it all, the farmer is mowing the silage, and still is at nearly 11pm and the swallows were singing as they flew about. I made two new discoveries this week, I didn't realise that big beech trees had blossom on that smells heavenly, nor did I realise that thistles smell lovely when they come into bloom. Usually I'm walking too fast or am contemplating too much to notice these things, or Henry will see a hare and start his howling barking and dancing around to try and get to it.

Now all the dogs are lazing around the living room, jostling for space in front of the log burner or takign up far too much of the sofas. A good day had by all I think.

Dog Stress

Well what a few weeks we have had here.
Poor Wee Pup Badge has been in the wars.
First I thought he had something in his pad and it was causing it to swell and be a wee bit sore. Then the pad looked a bit 'wrong' so he went in to the vet to get it looked at a bit more closely. That meant a biopsy but best be safe than sorry. The biopsy came back saying that although it wasn't anything sinister, he had a calcifying lump in his pad and it would be rather painful and the best solution was amputation of his toe. Well this was rather a shock to say the least, strangley though, there was a three legged dog in the waiting room of the vets and he seemed to be ok so I guessed three toes would be a walk in the park in comparison.
So that was the first 10 days of visits to the vets every couple of days to get dressings changed, and the walk in the park was begining to turn into a long distance trek.
Then we discovered the same type of lump in between his pads on the other front foot, oh no! But the vet said she could take them out without any amputations required and I asked her to do that at the same time even though I knew it would be hard going for a few days but at least it would cut down on the number of operations Badger had to have and hopefully shorten the recovery time.
So off we went to the vet one morning about three weeks ago and I went off to work. I then whizzed from work to the vet to pick Badge up and he was quite rightly feeling very sorry for himself but everything had gone to plan and he would be alright, huraahh!
What I didn't bank on was quite how much hard work getting Badge back to alright was going to be, especially when I've been quite busy at work. Every two days I've had to bomb home from work, then bomb down to the vets to get his dressings changed. This in itself doesn't seem so bad but put that together with Other Half being away at the time and me having to do everything around the place and look after three dogs as well as work and work being ten miles down winding twisting roads in one direction and the vets being 18 miles down winding twisting roads in the opposite direction things start to get a little complicated and exhausting, not to mention somewhat expensive when the petrol station is 10 miles in an entirely different direction.
Anyway, we are finally through all of that and I will come back later and tell you more but Badger has finally come out of his bandages, and last night got all of his stitches out (and there were loads) and he is now on the road to recovery. It will be a long one as he has become a bit tetchy and growly and has even tried to bite the vet on several occasions all of which I'll have to sort out while he is still (just about) a pup so that he dosen't grow up into a dodgy scary collie.
The maddest thing about the whole episode though is that even despite everything he has been through he still drags me INTO the vets and greets everybody he sees in there as if they are his long lost friend, even though just about every time he sees them they do something to hurt him - amazing!

Well Done Henry!

I decided to enter Henry into a local dog show, I had absolutely no idea how we would do but as Henry is such a fun dog I thought it would at least be a good time out with him. And guess what happened?...........


He won Best Lurcher, and came second in Best Rescue and Most Appealing Eyes. I honestly can't believe it, and I certainly can't stop smiling for him. This makes it all worth while and I'm so pleased I have him.

To celebrate Henry did a super fast circuit of the garden with Molly.




On a different note, whilst eating my breakfast this morning, I look out of the window to see this:

Other Half invested in an inflatable hot tub and I think Badge was after a quick dip!

Puppy Dog Tails

Dogs. Don't they do the most disgusting things sometimes? I've just watched Badger eat a slug. It took me some time to realise that it was a slug and by the time I worked out what it was he shlurped it up and it was gone. Eughhhh!

Today Badger is beautiful, his coat is lovely and shiney and clean, in fact very clean. Probably the cleanest it's ever been. That's because he has had three baths since last Tuesday.

The first bath was just routine maintenance, Badger spends allot of time rolling around on the ground with Henry and then as much time as possible relaxing on the furniture. This means that half the ground ends up on the sofa so a bath was in order.

Badger likes a bath which is a good job really.

The second bath was on Saturday. We'd been out to the zoo in Edinburgh and left the dogs in the house, Badger in his cage where he always goes if we go out. Coming home is always interesting since we got Henry as we never know if he has left us a welcoming gift on the carpet so we always enter the house with our noses first.

When we got in, we detected the signs of a bad smell, but we couldn't find anything. Henry and Molly bounced around and shot outside into the garden. As we went into the living room the smell got worse and once I let Badger out of his cage it became apparent where it was coming from. It turned out he had had an upset tummy and had an almighty accident in his cage.

That was not good, as he'd tried to get rid of the poo by digging up the fleecey blankets which sort of spread it about even more. It also meant he got poo on his paws and as he spends quite allot of time scratching, he'd got it all over his coat.

I don't know if anyone reading this has been to Edinburgh Zoo but it's basically build on the side of a mountain. It's exhausting. Honestly, if it wasn't for the animals it would be a day spend climbing. So coming home to a dog cage full of poo wasn't ideal.

So poor Badge ended up in the bath again.

The third bath happened the very next morning. By this time we realised that the new food we were feeding the dogs wasn't really agreeing with them, except Badger was sleeping in a confined space so yet again we had a rather smelly mess to clear up and yet again an even smellier dog to bathe.

We've changed the food back and all three dogs systems seem to have recovered, so I can only describe this as a lesson learned in buying different dog food, shampoo, conditioner (yes honest, he's very hairy is Badger) and disinfectant.

Oh and my legs still ache...

Good Boy Badger!

I'm very pleased with Wee Pup Badger.

Last night I took him to Henry's dog training club for the second week in a row. Henry wasn't very pleased about this as he adores going to dog club, its like a dog social club and very friendly, all the dogs get to know each other and all the humans talk about nothing but dogs, that to me is great.

I decided to take Badger as he is getting increasingly wild. He's only 8 months but because we live on a farm in the middle of nowhere he rarely goes on a lead, has absolutely no traffic awareness cos he never sees any, he also never sees any other dogs apart from Henry and Molly and the farm dogs. He spends his days rolling around play fighting with Henry and ignoring me. I decided it was time to take him in hand and add a bit of training.

So last week we went along and it was a nightmare. As we walked into the hall Badger started growling. He didn't stop growling until we got into the car to come home. It was terrible, he was grumpy and determined not to do anything I asked, I think this was made worse by him being on a lead for the whole hour. Still, I didn't give in, I eventually got him to walk to heel, well just, and when it came to the fetch excercise he came into his own and loved it. By the end of the hour I felt we had made a eeney weeeney bit of progress which was confirmed by Badger as he howled in the car all the way home!

Badgers exploits in week one made me all the more determined to have a well trained dog so off we went again last night. To my amazement as soon as he got out of the car Badge dragged me to the door of the hall! He went in full of gusto with no growling and said an enthusiastic hello to a puppy labrador. He also tried to jump all over the labradors owners but we are moving one step at a time here.

In the class Badge struggled a bit with walking to heel due to wanting to desperately speak to the dog in front, but we actually managed to get him to sit at one end of the hall while I walked nearly to the other end and called him, and just to add some icing to that one, instead of running straight past me he actually sat in front of me when he came! Brilliant!

I can't say how pleased I am, I had begun to worry a bit with his growling and rebelling but I thnk with a bit of practice and persistance he will be ok.

The only problem is that I think he has adopted me as his owner, he lays on the floor by my feet while i'm on the computer and every evening he snuggles up with me on the sofa - Other Half isn't happy, but then he isn't the one taking Badge to dog club.

Oh and he howled in the car on the way home again last night, it's so funny!

Blogging is good for the soul

I've decided to have a post in order to entirely agree with MBNAD Woman. Blogging is great. Since I've been doing it I've found a network of other peoples blogs that I've realised make me feel happy, serene and like I've just spend time with a fabulously good friend.

Yet I have never met anyone else who blogs. Mad isn't it?

I love Mad Again. It's become a fascinating story like a wonderful novel that you can't put down but can't read more than a page every few days. MBNAD Womans other blog, Mossie, had me hooked about her tales of a gorgeous Collie-Wobble way before I unexpectedly ended up with a Collie-Wobble myself. She also seems to be a lovely person, just the sort to go on seriously long dogs walks with.

Thanks to MBNAD Woman I've added a new blog to my list of daily reads, Dagenham Dave. What can I say? I sat with tears pouring down my face when I read the first post of his blog. It took me straight back to being a child and all the mad practical jokes my brother and me used to play on my poor parents who always took it in good humour. I then went on to read about a Robin Reliant tipping over with it's two occupants still inside and had great difficulty in staying upright on my chair. I was also late for work that day from being glued to his blog, thank you so much for the best laugh I've had in ages!

Cupcakes at Home is wonderful. Tracy not only lives in the most beautiful house, it's also in one of the most beautiful parts of Scotland. Add to that her collection of absolutley delicious whippets and deerhound and you've got total canine heaven for me. Wee Pup Cricket is so lovely I could eat him! I'm also in love with Tracy's crafts, and of course envious that I never find the time to make things myself.

Back Porch Musings and Our Creative Life are two blogs from America. I stumbled accross them while looking for inspiration for my house and I'm constantly amazed by the wonderful decorative ideas these two really nice ladies have. Thanks to them I actually decorated my house for Halloween, something I've never done before but actually it was brilliant, it took away the drabness of mid Autumn and filled in the gap to Christmas. Thanks for the inspiration!

Catherine Holman paints the most wonderful folk art, I've tried this myself in more arty moments but I think I'll leave it to her, her paintings are gorgeous and so is her blog.

So that's my regular list of readings, in no particular order but one thing I can say is that reading them is a bit like going to a spa for an hour or so and coming out and feeling all happy and refreshed, thanks everyone.x

If you look very carefully you will see a lesser striped Henry Hound blending in with the trampoline, whilst basking in the sun
Please excuse the mess of the garden, it dosen't look like this in real life, only in photographs for the blog, anyway, here is another one of Henry surveying his estate with his land agent Other Half. As you can see, Other Half is listening intently to his masters instructions about building a luxury summer house for him to lounge in on cooler days, a heated pool and a dog treat dispenser...

It's been so long since I last wrote anything about Henry's antics, that's not to say that he hasn't been up to anything. On a daily basis he waits at the bottom of the garden for Mr Hare to come out of his den and stoat about in the field completely safe from Henry on the other side of his Henry-proofed-fence while Henry does his very loud howling bark at him. Mr Hare of course is completely oblivious to it all and just carries on eating grass and hopping about.

We've reached another milestone with Badger, he's not such a wee pup any more and I decided to allow him to sleep outside of his cage at night. So he slept in it with the door open instead. Oh well. He did attempt to sleep on the bed with me but having a collie bum planted in your face at 2am led to a very hasty expellation of a collie onto the rug on the floor.

Molly has been great, she's always great, very quiet and well behaved, I think she needs a bit of madness in her, although the other day she shot round the garden like a tornedo completely out of the blue and when we all looked at her she suddenly stopped so I think she does this quite allot only in secret!

Please excuse the ridiculous underlining, I've been doing a bit of tweaking and can't work out ow to stop it. Anyway, I can't resist posting this photograph, if you go from left to right you have a caravan with a trailer wedged underneath and then a trailer with a Henry wedged underneath.....

Trampoline

I've been trying for ages to get a picture of Henry on the trampoline but it's been almost impossible as he moves so fast that by the time I've got the camera he is off doing something else. However the other day I happened to have the camera in my hand and here is is:



I couldn't get any more because he wouldn't stay on it, as soon as he realised I had the camera he shot off down the garden!

Henry Says Hello

Relaxing

Henry takes relaxing very seriously


Very seriously indeed




After all, he needs to re-coup all that engery for more bouncing tomorrow

Chickens or not?

I have a dilema.

Should I get chickens.

I promised myself that I'd get chickens the minute we moved into this house. But the move was so exhausting and getting a new kitchen installed within 24hrs of walking through the door and similtaniously getting the flu for three weeks put it on hold as all that delayed the unpacking.

Then followed the decorating, very slowly. The house was fine when we moved in so there was no urgency to change anything except maybe lighten it up a bit and of course tackle the diy artex that had beaten the previous two sets of residents.

Weeks turned into months and months have turned into two years and still I have no chickens.

I do, however, have a rather deluxe chicken house and a run but it is empty whilst I think about this.

To be honest, although I'm quite a busy, motivated person, I am also one for paring things down to make life as easy as possible. This is one reason I had for not giving the dogs breakfast, it's just one more thing to do (they ground me down on that one though).

Everyone I have spoken to with chickens says they are no trouble, that they look after themselves and cause virtually no problems. Hmmm, they must demand some sort of attention surely?

The big problem is the letting them in and out every morning and evening. It's not a huge job to do I suppose but it will HAVE to be done whether I like it or not. We dont have a problem with foxes round here but the chickens WILL have to be let out of their house in the morning, and what if I forget? I'm not likely to but all eventualities have to be explored.

Maybe I'm thinking too much, after all I'm all set up for chickens, they have a house and a run, and they are going to be able to wander around one half of the garden and out into the track and fields if they want to. I've even sorted out seperating them from the dogs, the garden is conviniently seperated into two even sections which willl ensure the chickens safety but I keep hesitating.

I think it's the thought of just one more thing to do each day....... hmmmmmm

Perhaps an automatic chicken house door closer would be the solution, they do them for cat bowls so why not chickens?

Hmmmm I'm not sure.

But I'll keep you posted.

Sunshine at last

It has been sunny here for two whole days.

Now I had typed a whole lament on how despite it's beauty up here, the weather is bloody awful and the orchards, fields and lanes of Kent are very appealing when I'm trying to battle 70mph winds to get to the car but I accidentally hit the wrong key and it all went which is probably just as well as Other Half is likely to walk into the kitchen at any moment and him being Scottish and all that wouldn't make a good start to the day.

So, as I said, it is sunny, and still, yes no wind in the windy valley. The birds are singing and the lambs in the field next to the house are bleating and running around.

It's lovely.

MBNAD Woman tagged me, now I've never been tagged before but here are mine and Henry's replies - hope that is what you are supposed to do.

1. What are your current obsessions? Me: Same, getting more miles to the gallon in my large 4x4, so far by driving like the middle aged person I really am I have acheived 100miles more per tank. Cant work that out in mpg. Henry: Hares. Spending ages looking out the window scouring the landscape for them and barking madly at them when one appears which it always does.

2. Which item from your wardrobe do you wear most often? Me;Waterproof windproof weatherproof coat, even in May. Henry: My collar and my harness.

3. Last dream you had?Me: That I was in Kent in the sunshine and waking here to the rain on the roof.....Henry: Hares.

4. Last thing you bought? Me: a bag of coal. Henry: He didn't buy them but it was tripe treats which he loves.

5. What are you listening to? Me and Henry: Radio 4

6. If you were a god/goddess who would you be? My god/goddess education went amiss somewhere so I don't know.

7. Favourite holiday spots? Me and Henry: Currently the Solway Coast.

8. Reading right now? A Home for Rose about a collie pup in America.

9. Four words to describe yourself. Me: Laughing, smiling, relaxed, slightly, mad. Henry: Mad, Fast, Funny, Lovely.

10. Guilty pleasure?Me:The Archers. Henry: Stealing food and not getting caught by Other Half, laying on the bed when Other Half has gone to work.

11. Who or what makes you laugh until you’re weak?Me: Watching Henry and Spending time with my parents. Henry: Life

12. Favourite spring thing to do?Me: Walk the dogs in the countryside in the still, warm air, looking out for the first swallows Henry: Look out for Hares

13. Planning to travel to next?Me: Nowhere cos of my knee Henry: Up the track to look for hares

14. Best thing you ate or drank lately?Me: Truffle oil at work mmmmm Henry: Stolen butter tub, it was so good he got it all over his head.

15. When did you last get tipsy?Boringly I can't remember, dosen't mean I've not drunk though, it's just the age switch that comes on to tell me I've had enough (this dosen't work under the age of 35) Henry: Hopefully not tipsy but he does always have a tipple of beer or wine whenever I do.

16. Favourite ever film? Madness of King George for the beautiful bell ringing scene.

17. Care to share some wisdom?Wisdom?Me and Henry: Smile, look up and always be optomistic.

18. Song you can't get out of your head?Me: Neopolitan Dreams (Surf advert)its happy and nice and I downloaded it onto my phone.

19. Thing you are looking forward to?Me: Sunshine, gardening, family and friends visiting, lazing with my dogs. Henry: the first hare of the day, breakfast time, dinner time, walkies time, laying on the bed after Other half has gone to work.

20 If money were no object, where would you choose to live?Here, or here further up in the Highlands.

As you can probably tell, I'm quite a happy optomistic, smiley soul, ready to laugh at the first funny thing. Henry and I go together rather well I think.

Normal House with no grumps

Other Half is at work.

It was very quiet.

For a while.

Until something woke Badger in his cage, this in turn woke Henry, Molly and myself.

I chose to stay in bed, I dislocated my knee a couple of weeks ago and should be re-cooperating but theres been little chance of that since I did it so this morning was the first that I thought I'd laze about and read some of my book before breakfast, a rare luxury.

Henry however had other ideas, whatever it was outside was causing him to be very concerned and it meant he had to jump on me in my bed several times to get me up. I did try to put up a bit of resistance by hiding under the covers but with a four stone dog leaping all over you and a dislocated knee I decided that there was a good chance I'd end up back in casualty so I got up.

Usually I let the dogs outside when I first get up. The run around the garden, look through the fence and over the wall, do what they have to and come back in for breakfast.

This morning though I decided to look out of the window first (I've no idea why the type has gone slopy sorry) and looking back at me was a sheep in the front garden.

So that was what all the comotion was about.

Oviously I couldn't let the dogs out into the back garden as they would run down towards the front garden and scare the sheep and all the sheep here either have lambs or are about to have lambs, the absense of a lamb with this sheep made me decide that it probably was about to have a lamb.

The sheep kept looking at me and me, Henry, Molly and Badger looked at the sheep through the window as I wondered about phoning the farmer to tell him one of the sheep was out of the field.

As we stood there pondering the farmer came along with a sheep trailer and expertly sent the sheep inside. He then explained to me that the sheep had run off from the herd as he brought them up the track and had planted (not literally) itself in the garden and wouldn't come out.

So drama over. I then let the dogs out and they all sped down the bottom of the garden to look very hard at the bit of the front garden where the sheep had been standing.

After a bit of rough and tumble in the living room between Henry and Badger they are now all asleep, Molly on the sofa, Henry on his bed and Badger somewhat bizarrely on the cold hard tiles by the back door.

It's peaceful and quiet and nothing like it is when Other Half is here.......

Grumpy

It's spring! And everything is springing around here, plants are springing out of the ground, calves are springing around their mothers and Henry is springing everywhere.

The best thing about spring is that the garden dries up a bit and the dogs can run around outside without getting completely covered in mud which inveriably ends up in the living room.

This morning I got up first and let the dogs out into the garden and went out there to sit on the bench with a cup of tea. Molly joined me by climbing up on to the bench and we watched Henry and Badger play fighting all around the garden.

It was really nice, the sun was shining and the dogs were happy and barking and running about. Everybody was happy.

Then out of the upstairs window comes a loud bellow.

Other Half, trying to have a lay in is completely offended by the barking and happiness in the garden.

It's not that early, just half past nine for goodness sake!

I try to quieten the dogs down even though I don't really think they are being that bad, they were only playing after all. But it's not enough, grumpy in the roof decides they should all be silent so we all come in, Badger goes in his cage, Molly on her bed and Hen lays in the living room doorway rolling his eyes in disgust as he watches me read the blogs of the day.

Then Other Half gets up. What does he do? Comes downstairs and lets the dogs out into the garden and watches them bombing about and barking while expressing that it's a lovely spring day and how nice it is outside in the garden.

I give up.

Trampolining Hound

I know I have no photographic evidence but Henry has decided to take up trampolining.

Even I can't quite beleive it. At regular intervals during the week he does a bit of mad running around the garden, this involves taking in as many obsticles as possible and jumping or running under them. Fergus did a very similar thing so I can only assume this is a Saluki thing. Anyway, lately Henry has been jumping onto the trampoline and then on to the wall at the end of the garden, trotting very quickly along the wall, down into the vegetable patch and springing out over the wall of the veg patch onto the lawn to continue the mad running.

This week though he has always stopped on the trampoline and sort of bounced about on it, no wall or veg patch just the trampoline. It's really mad.

Then in the sun the other day I decided to sit on the trampoline and was instantly joined by Henry who proceeded to bounce about and play bite me while barking. It's very funny and I don't understand why he is doing it but he seems to love the bouncing. He even jumps on when my stepson jumps up and down on it which causes much hilarity.

I'll do my best to get a photo, if I can catch Henry in the act.

Visiting Part2

Sorry I'm a bit behind with my blogging, life has sped up a little thanks to the weather at last allowing me to get out into the garden and finally start the jobs that should have been done at the begining of spring - it is I suppose technically the begining of spring here but it feels like we should be half way to summer....

Anyway, the dogs and me had such a great time in Kent. The difference in the weather down there was amazing, it was mid summer own there compared to Scotland and the dogs spent as much time as possible basking in the sunshine, Molly has been down several times now and always makes a beeline for the lawn and lays in front of Mum and Dad's caravan enjoying the reflective rays until she is so hot she can't move.

Badger didn't really understand the heat. He was born in the middle of September and has only known the winter so he spent quite allot of time underneath the caravan in the shade. Henry decided that life was too short to lay around and spent many hours springing around the garden, leaping over bushes, ducking at high speed under apple trees and perfecting hurdling over the carefully erected fence around my Dad's newly sewn vegegables.

Henry also decided that he'd get all the other dogs in the neighbourhood going several times a day, every day. He would stand in the middle of the garden and bark. Then bark again. And again until he got a reply. This then got other dogs in other gardens barking until every dog around and beyond ws barking and Henry would come into the kitchen looking very proud of his work. Strangley the whippet cross we had when I was a child used to do exactly the same thing!

We did have a bit of a stress. Badger decided suddenly to attack any moving vehicle along the road while we were out walking. Oddly enough the first time this happened I was telling my Mum about Badger's brother who does the same thing along the lane to the farm when Badger suddenly swung out at a van, very nearly pulling Dad into the road at the same time. We all laughed at this as it was quite a funny coincidence but after it had happened several times in a few hundred yards we realised it was a potentially fatal pastime so I had to spend quite a bit of time walking Bader up and down the road trying to calm him down whilst he did his mad Collie stare at every oncoming vehicle and lurched out to kill it as it passed.

I managed to get him sorted out after several attempts but then it was time to come home so I'll have to take him to a town to see if it worked or not.

All too soon our visit was over and I had the long haul back home, I tried very hard to bring the sunshine with me but unfortunately it didn't want to come until this week. However I did manage not to give in and visit the shopping mecca Bluewater or Lakeside and so came back to Scotland with nothing but homemade sandwiches and cake from Mum for the journey - a financial miracle!

Visiting

Last week the dogs and me went all the way down to Kent in England to visit my parents. At first I thought it would be best to just take Henry with me. As he is my boy I like spending time with him alone, going for walks or even just a drive in the car, but as preperations started Molly started tugging at my heart strings and then I was starting to feel bad about leaving Badger on his own if I took her with me.

So I called my Mum and warned her that I might possibly be arriving with three dogs....I got my Dad as Mum was out and he was very enthusiastic about it so off we went.

The first hurdle was to get Badgers cage in the jeep, Molly and Henry would travel in the boot where there is a proper dog guard but as they all like to spring out when I open the tail gate I decided that Badger should travel in his cage in the middle of the jeep so I could have some control over getting them all in and out for wee stops.

It's not easy getting a cage in the middle of a jeep but I managed it eventually then I packed up the jeep with everything else and off we went.

The second hurdle was getting Molly and Badger along the first few miles of twisty turney roads to the motorway without them being sick. It was very early in the morning and I think I caught them on the hop as neither of them threw up, thank goodness.

This was the first long trip Badger had been on so to begin with he sat in his cage and whined while looking curiously and Henry and Molly who as soon as we got on the motorway laid down and went to sleep. After a while though Badge lay down but kept an eye open just in case.

The journey down was great, no traffic ques or anything and about half way down I turned round to check the dogs and noticed that Badger has an unusual travelling position, upside down!
He was laying in his cage completely upside down with his legs in the air! It was so funny! I tried to take a picture with my phone but I couldn't manage it while driving along and every time I stopped he turned over. Goodness knows what lorry drivers and people in buses and coaches much have thought!

Stopping in the services for the dogs to wee wa interesting, Molly and Henry know the routine well, they know it's not a walk so they do what they have to do and then we go back to the car. Badger on the other hand thought it all a big adventure and couldn't help running up to every person he saw and giving them a rapturous greeting. It took me a moment to realise that he never actually sees people apart from us and the people on the farm so it must have been big stuff for him.

Once we arrived my Dad helped me get the dogs out of the car and he absolutely loved Badger. Henry and Molly knew where they were and settled in straight away by inspecting every inch of the garden and starting to play. Badger was in his element, licking and wagging his tail and smiling with his choppy mouth.

Then we all went out into the garden and the dogs entertained us with a mad running game all around the flower and vegetable beds. Dad had made a sort of criss cross fence around some seedlings in order to keep Henry off but he ended up using the fence as a hurdle, luckily the fence went right round that bed and Henry has a long span of jumping!

We then went into the kitchen where Mum was making the dinner and the dogs did that thing of laying all over the kitchen floor just where you tread. Mum is very experienced in dog hopping and went about making the dinner stepping in and out of legs and over bodies as if they were there all the time. She also threw the odd bit of meat every now and then where it would land in the mouth of whichever dog it was aimed at without the dog having to get up.

It was true doggie heaven, very relaxed and laid back and we spent the rest of the evening talking about dogs, drinking wine and laughing.

Wake up Call

For the last few weeks Other Half has been getting up at 5am for work. This means he lets the dogs out around that time for the first pee of the day.

This is not good. Dogs like a routine and if you impose one on them they soon get right into it and adopt it into their 24hr internal clock.

So, as I said, Monday to Friday they are out at just after 5am. On Saturday they aren't. But they want to go out at 5am as that's what they've been doing all week. In a misguided effort to try and let them know it was the weekend, Other Half ignored their whining from downstairs whilst I remained asleep.

At 8am he went down for a cup of coffee and on coming back up the stairs mentioned to me that 'my dog' had pee'd on the hoover.

He didn't actually do anything to the hoover, just cleaned the pee up around it and left the hoover.

Now, the 'my dog' in question here is of course Henry. And the hoover is not just any old hoover, its a rather expensive Roomba robotic hoover which works all on it's own, no human required. It's like having a lady who does come and do for you without having to leave a key or pay her. The robot hoover is my very best friend and a superb investment, how on earth could Other Half just let it sit there with the pee seaping into it? Worse still, Other Half told me that it was making funny noises and wirring a bit!

Aggggghhhhh! Out of bed I sprang and came downstairs, growled at Henry who did that funny little tail wag and sloped off to his bed. I got the screwdrivers out and stripped the hoover, cleaning it up with a collection of baby wipes and toilet paper. It's now in pieces drying out completely before I put it back together again.

If it dosen't work I don't know what I'm going to do, I'm not sure if I can claim for a new one on the house insurance or if I should raid the credit card for a new one. One things for sure, I'm not living life without a robot hoover!

Nice Quiet Routine

For the last few weeks I've been going out in the morning, either to work or the shops or on various errands that need to be done.

Because Molly and Badger are both car sick (something I need to get sorted out very badly) it's a complete nightmare to take the dogs out and about with me. Henry is fab in the car, if he's in the boot he usually stands looking out of the window and the world going by and if very occasionally he is on the back seat he actually sits bolt upright in the corner and looks down his nose out of the window, it's very funny as he looks as though he is being chauffered.

Anyway today I am in all morning, doing all those housework jobs that need to be done before the weekend and I've noticed that the dogs are all very calm and just lazing around. It's total bliss, just like it used to be when I had Ferg and Bon, the most laid back dogs in the world who basically laid around all day and night with the odd burst of mad running in between.

So am I hoping for too much to think that a sense of canine calm may be coming over our small pack? That they have all finally settled into life with each other and us and have reached that serene state of being able to lay on a dog bed or sofa and just watch whats going on instead of frantically all jumping up to follow me every time I move around the place?

I'm probably hoping for too much, I think this calm is from the recent routine of my being out every morning lately and this is what they do while they wait for me to come back, but I can dream can't I?

Right, I must get back to to doing the washing and cleaning....

Snoopy

This one is for MBNAD Woman, I couldn't catch Badger upside down on his cage but this is the next best thing!

And I forgot to say in my weather report for Catherine Holman that the pee-wits and curlews are flying all around us now which is so lovely, especially at night, perfect!

Pictures!

Ok I think some long overdue pictures are called for.

This one is what is left of my back garden after a winter of being 'Henryised'! Can you see the track that he has carved into whats left of the lawn, it's more visible down by the oil tank but runs right round the lawn.

Here is Henry looking so good compared to this time last year. He is now literally twice the dog he was after putting on all the weight he lost. He's really confident and I hope very happy and enjoying his life with us here in the hills.

Here's the lovely Molly, I think she could be hinting that it's about time I cleared last years flowers out of the tubs.

Here is an attempt to get all three in the picture at the same time! Goodness knows what Henry is doing!

Spring Clean

I only realised the aptness of the title of this post when I wrote it, I've spent the day cleaning and tidying the house and it's spring (well just about) so I guess that means I've been spring cleaning!

To be honest, this was inspired by the carpet Badger the other day. I just had a feeling that everything had a faint whiff of dog eminating from it. This was confirmed when I put on my trusty 'round-the-house -and-comfy-and-don't-care-what-it-looks-like-fleece and it really smelt of dogs. It actually smelt more of dogs than the dogs do so into the washing machine it went and off to the cleaning cupboard went me.

To begin with I stripped Badgers cage out, put the contents into the washing machine and washed down the cage, luckily it's foldable so I popped it into the bath and sprayed it with bathroom cleaner and then hosed it with the shower.

I then went all over the carpet rubbing it again to remove another Badger and got the end of the hoover pipe and went all round the edges and under things. I also dismantled the sofas and hoovered under the big cushions, something I haven't done in a while, along with cleaning the windows. Along with all of this I dusted absolutely everywhere so now the living room is looking very spik and span.

And the washing machine is straining under the pressure, it's been washing dog beds, blankets and coats since mid morning and I still have loads more dogs stuff to do, all those fabric dogs toys that they all chew must be very stinky (I'm not going to sniff them..) along with towels and big wipe down things that i got in Tescos the other day. I'm also going to wash all the covers on the sofas to freshen them up too.

Once I've finished that I then have all the other washing to do but that's small fry compared to this marathon!

So now that I've done a days work I now have an evening shift at my real job, work as a dog owner is never finished is it?

Quiet Week

As I said in the previous post I've been catching up on some training with Henry and it's going really well.

The biggest thing is to get him to come back if he is off the lead (which he isn't unless he has escaped), so every single time he's been out in the garden and sometimes on a walk (am still forgetting to take the treats with me grrr!) I'm calling him and instantly giving him a treat.

Well, it's working. It's a bit of a pain to remember the treat every time he comes in from the garden but what made me realise it was working was when I said his name out on a walk to try and stop him from pulling and he instantly turned round and ran the length of his vast expanding lead back to me, brilliant!

All I need to do is keep it up and really condition him to come to me every single time.

On the Badger front, things have been getting big. He has completely outgrown his bed. This is the bed which when I bought it made him look like a small potato lying in the middle of a kingsized bed. Now I think he out grew the bed a couple of weeks ago but Other Half insisted that it was still ok, until yesterday morning he was in his cage digging and moaning allot and when he stopped he let out a huge sigh. I looked over and there he was laying half on and half over his bed while looking at me with a complaining expression.

This was a bit of a pain as I really didn't have the cash to buy a new bed this week, so I carefully folded a spare duvet into the exact size of the cage and wrapped it in a lovely fleece blanket and now we can't keep Badge out of his cage. He's in there all the time perfecting the art of dog relaxation in every position he can manage!

I've also had an attack on the living room carpet. It was looking decidedly grubby but I really couldn't work out why until I tried to remove a small coffee stain from it and while rubbing away I noticed that about half a million dog (Badger) hairs came up. So I got a carpet cleaning spray for freshening carpets up, sprayed it over the carpet and got down on my hands and knees and rubbed the carpet all over in circular motion and I reckon I got a whole Badger out of it. I think the carpet probably enjoyed it too!

We now have a lovely fresh smellying and new looking carpet again. All I hope is that this was Badgers fluffy puppy hair coming out and that it's not a permanent shedding thing as we'll have to buy a new hoover that beats the carpet.

Training

I've decided that I've let dog training go a bit.

As soon as I got Henry I was determined that he would be better trained than Fergus. It wasn't a case of not bothering with Fergus, goodness knows I spent a small mortgage on trainers and training clubs, but Fergus was a completely different kettle of fish, or dog biscuits.

All I want is to be able to let Henry off the lead and to have control over him so he can run free like he is made to do.

So for the last couple of days every time I've let Henry into the garden I've given him a small treat whenever I've called him to come in. This took a couple of goes to work as obviously the animals and smells beyond the garden fence are much more appealing to Henry than my calling him indoors. But once the penny dropped in Hen's head he started responding really well.

A couple of times I forgot the treat and he's pestered me like mad and I've wondered what he wanted and then I've remembered. I guess this means that he is probably taking the training even more seriously than me.

Taking things slowly so as not to bombard Hen with too much to different too soon I decided to try the treat thing on our walk today. It worked brilliantly. Every time I said his name he bombed back to me, looking me in the eye and got a treat.

I even tried calling him back when he was going away from me directly after getting a treat and he still came back. Excellent.

I did this lots of times during the walk and he seems to be getting the idea. So lets hope that with lots of practice (on my part) we will get to the ultimate thing of letting Henry run.

Once thing that I did think about at the end of the walk was that I noticed that Henry looks me right and straight in the eyes when he comes back to me. I know it sounds daft but I've never noticed this before so I'm going to make a point of making sure he sees me looking back at him in the eye too and maybe a connection will be made, who knows, it's worth a try.

Now I must go and stop Badger from destroying the robot hoover which this week he has decided to take a big dislike to and if he breaks it that will cause me masses of hard work!

Snoopy

We have horrible weather here, all sideways rain and big winds which make the tiles rattle on the roof.

This sort of weather is always a pest, before dogs it was the sort of weather that made me want to curl up beside the fire with a good book or watch good tv but now I just see it as even more cleaning as the dogs insist on running on the grass, get covered in mud and run back inside before I can catch them to clean their paws.

One person in the house is thinking of nicer weather though and that is Badger.

Yesterday I found him lying on top of his cage, upside down and looking at me with his one blue eye as if this was perfectly normal.

I'm sure I remember Snoopy doing just the same and dreaming of sunny days.....

Canine Confusion

This week Other Half has been helping out on the farm, feeding the sheep and cleaning out the cows. Now I don't mind sheep but cows are another thing, they may look all lovely and docile but I've heard stories about how they will get you on the ground and kill you at the drop of a hat so I am not keen on going in the barn with them, preferring to stay well behind the bars. I don't dislike cows, in fact I do actually really like them but having been chased several times both on foot and on my bike I think it's best that I admire them from afar.

The dogs are rather confused by Other Halfs temporary occupation, espcially Wee Pup Badger as Other Half now comes home smelling of all the wonderful farmyard smells that dogs like and only the farmer usually smells of. Badger adores the farmer and always licks his wellies whenever he sees him, the wellies are usually splattered in deposits from the cows and various other unspeakable substances. So this week Badger can't quite work out why it's Other Half who has the tasty wellies and why he's not allowed to lick them.

Henry is also a bit perplexed as he usually barks at the farmer and Wee Pup Badgers brother as they walk up the field next to the house to feed some of the sheep and the farmer usually says hello to him but now Other Half is the other side of the fence telling Henry to be quiet and stop barking.

Just to add to all of this, Wee Pup Badgers brother now follows Other Half home and hangs around the outside of the gate waiting for Other Half to come out, so Henry and Badger now bomb out towards the gate to see if he is there every time they go outside.

Molly is of course taking all this in her stride and taking complete advantage of the fact that the other two dogs are so intent on everything that is going on and has stolen the prime basking spot in front of the log stove - very sensible in my opinion.

Have Another Log for the Fire

While I've been typing the last post about Henry running mad in the forest I was aware of a small commotion somewhere else in the house.

Other Half is home and I just assumed it was something he was doing.

The noise got rather loud and there was a bit of a crash and bang so I decided I should investigate and I found Badger dragging the ornate, cast iron, log holder upturned around the living room.

He must have been trying to steal a log to chew and had somehow got his collar caught on one of the decorative ends of the log holder and was desperately trying to stop it from following him around the room!

I think Badger is spending a bit too much time with Henry!

Mad Running

Being a Saluki/Greyhound mix Henry is a fast dog. In fact everything he does seems to be at 100mph, eating, chewing a dog chew, moving round the house, exploring the garden.

Another thing about being a Saluki/Grehound mix is that Salukis are renound for not coming back if they get off the lead. Fergus was the worst for this, for fourteen years I took him about on extender leads, learned how to build dog proof fences and stressed like mad everytime we had visitors in case they left the front door on the latch. He absolutely refused to come back, in fact I found out that he could run at 42mph by chasing him up the road in my car (probably a rather dangerous thing to do but at the time that was the only thing I could do to get him back as I'd open the back door and he always jumped in to be chauffered home). I did try, and try and try to be able to let him off, even paying a proffesional dog trainer £30 and hour but in the end after spending half an afternoon trying to persuade him to come back from chasing the rabbits on a railway line I gave up.

So, as the lovely lady who runs the local dog training club where I take Henry says 'You pass your mistakes from your first dog onto your second dog' and what a true saying that is. I know Henry isn't my second dog, he is actually my third after Fergus but he is my second Saluki mix and most of the time it's like having Fergus around all over again. But I just can't summon the courage to let him off the lead.

Every time Henry escapes I feel the old panic rise inside me, it's like a terror that's very hard to control and if people knew how scared I feel they would lock me up! But I have to say that Henry has always come back, even the time that I didn't even realise he'd escaped (by squeezing himself through a square of stock fencing and nearly castrating himself all over again) he came back so why do I worry so much.

So imagine how I felt yesterday. We took the dogs up into the forest for a nice long walk. It was a lovely day, the sun was shining and everywhere was covered in snow. It really looked like a Christmas Card, especially the snow that was stuck to the pine trees.

As we were walking along a deer bounced accross the track. This was excellent to see as we'd seen deer the day before as well. But of course Henry and Molly went absolutely mad and when that happens they are a bit hard to control. Henry was doing his usual howling bark and started to jump about trying really hard to get out of his harness, he's actually so bendy and bright that he knows how to get his front legs out of the harness so we've had to link the harness to his collar so that it's impossible for him to get out of both.

Well yesterday that theory failed. Henry struggled and bended and pulled and jumped, all at the end of his long extender lead so there was very little we could do from 25 feet away and he managed to wriggle out of his harness and then yanked his head out of his collar.

And he was off up the track.

At 100mph.

And I was having a heart attack.

It was bad enough that he was off the lead but pine forests are planted really densely so I knew that if Henry ran into the trees I'd have very little chance of ever seeing him again and he'd probably end up getting shot by a game keeper or injured and we'd never find him as the forest is literally miles big.

Other Half and myself started yelling at Henry to come back, hoping against hope that he wouldn't run into the trees which so far he hadn't done. But he wouldn't come back, he just kept running about like a mad thing but staying a fair distance away from us.

Then he did it. He ran into the trees and my heart dropped.

I actually threw my arms in the air and turned around thinking this was it. We'd have to walk home with just two dogs and wonder forever what happened to Henry.

But then Henry re-appeared. And started to run towards us and I though it was all over and he was coming back but no, he scooted round and ran further down the track and then over the brow of the hill and once again disappeared.

So I shouted at Other Half, blaming him for all this which wasn't really fair so Other Half shouted back at me and the I realised this wasn't really getting us very far so I started sprinting up the track trying to catch up with Henry or at least try to see if I could see him.

And once again Henry re-appeared, over the brow of the hill doing probably more than 100mph, with his head down and his legs going so fast they were a blur, and best of all he had a big doggie grin all over his face.

He ran towards Other Half who managed to grab him, but then he let him go and Henry actually just stood there while I (by now a snivelling but happy wreck) put his harness and collar back on.

So it goes to prove that my lovely dog training lady is right, you shouldn't pass the mistakes you make with your first dog onto your second dog, even if they are a Saluki mix.

And I'm going to get really brave and find a field with a big fence and try letting Henry off the lead so he can run. After all he was built to run.

One Man and his Dogs

Oh dear, Other Half has had something of a stressful week with the dogs.

Firstly, becuase I am usually working when he is at home and vice versa, Other Half has the dogs on his own quite allot. We have different views on dogs, I think that if you leave them to get on on their own they are quite happy. Other Half on the other hand is always watching them and monitoring what they are doing. Consequently he sees all the naughty things the dogs do and is often telling them off or trying to stop them doing something, or trying to take something that they shouldn't have away from them. This causes Other Half allot of stress.

So this week, Other Half decided to take the dogs out for a walk somewhere different. He bundled all the dogs into the boot of his car and took them to the hills behind a village about ten miles away. Other Half's car boot is different to mine, mine is split so you open the top half first and the bottom half stays shut, allowing you to grab the dogs leads before letting them out. Other Half's boot opens from the bottom, making it alomost impossible to grab the dogs leads, because of this Other Half decided to test the dogs staying abilities as he opened the boot.

Bescause the dogs knew they were somewhere new and exciting none of them stayed and all three jumped out of the boot and of course all three ran in different directions. A car was coming along the lane and poor Other Half had the devils own job to try and round all the dogs up before they got run over. This he managed to do somehow and then proceeded to take them up the hill.

During the walk the dogs were pulling and sniffing and eating sheep poo and generally behaving in a very excitable way. They are always like this when they go somewhere new. Other Half has been up this hill many times with Fergus and Bonnie and didn't see why Henry, Molly or Badger should be in any way excited. So they got shouted at quite a bit.

Then when Other Half and the dogs finished their walk Other Half felt guilty for shouting at them for pulling and misbehaving on their walk so he took them to the village shop and bought them all a milky way to say sorry!

A couple of days later Other Half got up in the morning and let the dogs out into the garden at just the same moment when the farmer next door came past the house with his dogs to feed the sheep. There was an almighty amount of dog barking and yelling as all the dogs always want to get together when they see each other either for a fight or a good game. Wee Pup Badger's brother was one of them and he came through into the front garden to bark through the side gate. This made our dogs bark at the other side of the gate and somewhere along the way one of them must have jumped up and caught the catch and the gate opened.

This caused a mass canine break-out!

Henry and Badger cleared off into the farm yard, and Molly did as she always does when Henry has done something naughty, she came back indoors and acted all agitated. It took Other Half a few moments to realise what was going on and then he looked out the window and saw the gate was open. Poor old Other Half, still in his jammy bottoms, grabbed a coat and a pair of wellies and flew out of the garden to find Henry and Badger.

He found Badger in the cow barn with Henry and Badgers brother chasing a chicken in between the cows legs! How none of them got trampled by a cow I've no idea.

Badger was easy enough to catch but as soon as Other Half tried to get hold of Henry he shot off up the track to pay a visit to our neighbours.

Luckily the farmer was already up there and caught Henry, turned him around and sent him on his way back down to Other Half. Other Half intercepted him at our driveway and Henry bombed back into our garden.

Henry and Badger had had a great time, but I think Other Half's nerves were rather frayed to say the least!

And I still can't work out how neither Henry or Badger got trampled by a cow!

Snow Dogs Again

I really must get the batteries sorted out and charged in my camera as I missed a brilliant picture yesterday.

I let the dogs out into the snow which they all absolutely love and Molly decided to sit in it which is very strange but it's what she does, and sometimes she lays down in it, odd for a dog with very thin fur but she likes it, maybe there is a dog expert out there who could explain it.

I then went indoors and after a couple of minutes I looked out of the door as I heard Henry barking madly and Badger barking back at him. Well, you would honestly never believe what I saw, Henry was on the trampoline actually bouncing around in the snow on it with Badger underneath trying to bite Henry every time the trampoline stretched down! Both were barking like mad and it really seemed like they were smiling and laughing!

Who on earth would have thought that a dog would go on a trampoline, let alone bounce about on it?

Mad Dogs and Busy Women

This is just a quick post to let everyone know that I'm still here, it's just been a bit busy with my new job and my old job and fitting everything in.

Henry is still just as mad, he's currently barking at the farm dogs as they go up the track for their morning preamble to feed the sheep with the farmer. To see the farm dogs he has to balance with his hind legs on the arm of the sofa and his front paws reaching over about 2.5feet to the window sill which is quite slippy. How he does this without slipping is beyond me.

Molly is still very laid back and very much in charge, her winter coat is fully in now and she is like a giant hamster, all lovely and velvety soft, I'm not quite sure what it says about the temperature of our house if one of our dogs has grown a winter coat but she seems to have done this for both the winters we've had her. No complaints here though as it's gorgeous to stroke.

And wee Pup Badger is finally caged. Hahaha! I knew I'd get revenge somehow! Only joking! He decided to go on a one pup demolition voyage in the kitchen so it was either get a cage or move out myself and as it's cold out there I decided the cage was probably the best option, and what a great move. Badger is now in the living room at night with the other two and has settled in the cage really well, I never thought I'd ever get a cage for a dog but it instantly removed about 95% of the stress of having to keep an eye on him all the time. He NEVER wee's in it which again is another stress removed and I know that when he is inside it he can't chew anything that he is not meant to chew. Consequently I have found that my relationship with him is a million times better as he never does anything to drive me mad so we are now really good friends. Not that Other Half likes that very much, especially as we were out yesterday afternoon and on letting Badger out on our return he ran straight past Other Half and bounded up to me, whoops! Guess I'm just more of a dog person than Other Half hahaha!

Henry to the rescue

Yesterday I was having a bad pup day.

It seemed that for days Badger was on a mission to wreck the house and cause as much mess and destruction as possible. He has ruined my kitchen, removing and chewing all the Scandinavian hearts that are on the unit doors, thereby completely wrecking the entire theme of the kitchen, he's wee'd so many times on the laminate flooring that it's now starting to de-laminate itself in areas, he's scratched the paint off the wall in one place and has really chewed the bottom of the solid oak kitchen table.

Put this with his mysterious ability to actually remove anything from the kitchen table, despite being still very small, and dragging whatever is on the table about the floor, chewing it and then weeing on it, and then pulling his bed through the wee as well and you have a very stressed dog owner.

I think I'd be much more tolerant had it not taken 10 months to house train Henry, which was on top of a further 10 months of problems with dear old Fergus who had started to have accidents in the house and previous to that I had the same problem with dear Bonnie.

So for literally three years I have been cleaning up dog accidents in my house and just when I can see a good 12 years of clean floors along comes Badger, who may look cute but will not ever keep still and goads the other two into constantly playing and rolling around and fighting and generally wearing me out.

So I shout at Other Half for bringing a puppy that I didn't want into the house and tell him to do more with Badger so he has started walking him at 7am which should help.

Anyway, yesterday, in a rage of anti dog feeling I decided to take them all out for a walk in order to tire them out. Badger was off the lead as usual and also as usual being a real pest, constantly jumping up at Henry and Molly and biting their faces.

For a change I decided to walk round the field which has a river running along the side of it. It's a nice walk and puts me in a good mood so things improved the moment we got through the field gate.

Once we reached the bottom of the field, we stood by the part where the river meets with a second river and I stood looking at the view while Henry and Molly paddled in the river. Badger decided to have a go at paddling too, he's never been in this field before so this was the first time he'd seen a river.

The paddling and looking at the view was going very well, until Badger decided it would be a good idea to jump in the water. Only to get instantly swept away as he jumped into the deep bit.

Instantly I was in the water after him, he was paddlign furiously with his little paws and whinining and crying and going round and round in circles.

I was in up to my waist, dragging poor Henry behind me, who was having to reluctantly swim, while Molly sensibly jumped onto the bank and was following on her extender lead.

I was wading as hard and fast as I could through the water but no matter how hard I tried I just couldn't reach Badger who by now was in a complete state of panic as was I.

After what seemed like ages I realised I was never going to catch him as the water was going to fast and I had to get out before Henry and I also got swept down the river. I decided that the only thing I could do was get out of the water and try and chase Badger from the bank and hope that there would be a shallow area where he'd be able to catch the ground and I'd be able to get him - I also knew there was a good chance he'd be pulled to fast and far down the river to ever be seen again but there was nothing I could do, it was truly an awful situation to be in!

I started to drag poor Henry out of the water, only to realise we were on the opposite bank to Molly, so I had a puppy being swept away, a frozen wet dog half in and half out of the water and a dry but unable to be let off dog on the opposite bank - agggghhhhh!

By a huge miracle at this moment Badger got swept to the same bank as us but further down. I yelled at him and he seemed to get caught on the edge which somehow got him out of the flow of the river. He straight away started to swim towards me, while I waded towards him. As soon as he was within reach I grabbed his scruff and pulled him close, giving him a hug that nearly squeezed the life out of him. He was shaking and cold but I had him back!!!!!

Then I had to negotiate getting back over the river to Molly so I kept wading until I found a shallower part past the point where the rivers meet and yet again poor Henry had to get back into the water to get over, while I carried Badger.

Molly was really pleased to see us and she and Henry sniffed Badger all over and then we started our soggy walk back home, my wellies were completely full of water and even though I emptied them out they kept re-filling from my wet clothes!

I realise that jumping into a swollen, fast flowing river after a dog was really quite a silly thing to do, but looking back it was just second nature to wade in and try to grab Badger but before I knew it we were way down the river.

Still, we are all safe, warm and dry and I'm not feeling so anti-puppy any more!

Happy New Year

Well Christmas is over and it's the New Year.

We survived the festive season without the tree being weed on once. That is amazing, since we have too dog dogs and had a real tree. I can't say the same survival statistics applied to the tree decorations though which were regularly removed from the tree and then removed from one of the dog dogs mouths. Molly strangely didn't join in the bauble chewing.

Other Half took all the decorations down before I got up on Monday morning and I came downstairs and promptly didn't notice the lack of a 6ft tree and various sparkly things around the living room. I think this lack of notice didn't go down too well but I was half asleep at the time.

I have to say that it's nice to get back to normal, I hadn't realised quite how minimalist our living room is, and it's great to be able to dust again without having to knock over loads of cards or decorations, not that I really want to dust at all but someone has to do it. The dogs did their best to help by capturing and arguing over the long duster on a stick and bending it so that it now goes very effectively round corners.

The dogs have also been trying to keep me busy by waiting until the living room is lovely and clean and then sneaking a log onto one of their beds and chewing away at it until an appropriate amount of mess is made and then getting up and leaving the log for another dog to find and take away to another bed to make another amount of mess. I'm sure they are doing this on purpose but I'm not letting them know that.

So apart from that life has gone back to what resembles normality in a three dog household and it's all a bit flat really but hey ho!