The Pleasure Of Their Company

(Officially) Introducing Ronan

2012-01-31T00:19:00.003+11:00

aka Brimfeldt In The News when he eventually is big enough to play in the ring with the big kids and more commonly known as Wo-wo, Roni and Macaroni.;) We are only just a TAD smitten.

Easy Peasie (With Lemon Squeezie) Banana Bread

2012-01-25T14:08:00.001+11:00

Getting my "good mother" badge today making something with the Short People's favorite fruit. ;) No, seriously... if Lily were given free access she'd have 3-4 a day easy and La isn't much higher on the self-regulation scale!

1 cup very ripe banana, mashed up

3/4 cup sugar

1.5 tablespoons golden syrup

1.5 tsp vanilla extract

2 tablespoons sunflower oil

1/3 cup vanilla bliss non-dairy milk (yummmm... evil and sugary but so vanillaliscious)

6 tablespoons hot water

a good solid squeeze off of half a lemon or thereabouts

1 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp bicarb

3/4 tsp salt

dash each of cinnamon and nutmeg, more if it's your pleasure

Set oven to preheat at 180C. Mash banana in a medium bowl till it's smoothish... don't worry if it's not blender perfect, you just call it "rustic home-style" and pretend that was your intent - it's half the charm of a loaf anyway. Add in sugar and beat. Add in wet ingredients - golden syrup, vanilla, sunflower oil, vanilla bliss, hot water and lemon juice and mix. Add in the dry ingredients - flour, bicarb, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg. Mix to incorporate, tip into a greased loaf tin and pop in the oven. Set timer for 55 mins or until the crust is golden brown and a toothpick comes out clean. Stand guard while it cools enough small fingers won't burn, tip out, slice and distract the 6 year old with a nose like a bloodhound long enough to have at least one slice on your own.

Miss Not-Quite-Three

2012-01-21T10:41:00.000+11:00

Loves fruit. Apples, pears, bananas, blueberries, strawberries, mandarins and toast with either vegemite or peanut butter but NOT fruit spread thanks.
Has discovered "chuppa chups". (Shoot me now...)
Cheers for Daleks.
Is the only person in our family or group of friends to call La by his proper full name.
Loves her "dancy skirts" by which she means any skirt that swirls when she twirls. Try putting pants on the child and she'll yank them right back off, hand them back and ask for "dancy skirt!"
Believes this look is best accessorized by 'tompin boots' - that's stomping boots for those who don't speak two year old - which are her little faux bludstones.
Is disturbingly interested in shoes. Really, at not quite three the shoe department shouldn't win out over the toy department!
Dances a mean boogie-woogie and likes to sing in the car like her momma. (Has her mumma's complete inability to carry a tune too sadly!)
Gives the absolute best huggies. Full arms around, patting your back, snuggled all the way in with her head either on your heart or in the crook of your neck.
Loves daddy - unless mummy is around, in which case poor daddy rates somewhere below roadkill.
Is Pip the kittens favorite person, despite all logic dictating that toddlers are most cats least favorite people she is the only one he will seek out, rub against and allow to carry him around.
Still cannot stand to have doors in the house open - doors are meant to be SHUT!
Is so going to be her mumma's junior handler - adores her doggies Sisi, 'opie, RIN!!!!, Kiahpuppy and 'wo-nin.

Funny words: shippy tuppy (sippy cup), 'abutty (peanut butter), 'amite (vegemite), shocks (socks), punnies (bunnies), rins (mandarins), toash (toast), bikkit (biscuit),

first race back

2012-01-21T01:03:00.000+11:00

Miss Hope had her first day backrunning flyball the other week after her illness - I have to say that was one HAPPY puppydoggie! On our way back home we stopped and visited the beach. My camera battery was on the red but I managed to snap a few before it died! I do love this area - such a lovely little town. :)

S'more bits and pieces

2012-01-12T16:18:00.001+11:00

First puppy pictures... because there is just NOTHING cuter! Okay so normally that'd be kind of insulting towards my children...and my other dogs... and cats... and rabbits and such. I'm going with it because Ronan is very, very cute AND he's not dug his hay all over the box last night, muddy from wrestling outside (dogs), covered in lunch (LILY) or hanging upside down in the chair playing legos with his feet (that bit of weirdness would be La...) which makes him currently the cutest. Sue me!

This morning I scared the bejeebers out of myself when I went to let the dogs out - bleary eyed from a late night of tummy troubles and pre-coffee, I cued them to sit in their pens and went to grab some treats out of the jar on the hutch for them. Instead of just a few cookies, I came up with a bunch of spiderweb and an unamused funnelweb spider who'd decided to make herself at home. Well... if nothing else, it certainly woke me up!

Taking a wild leap to the next topic with no logical transition... the Demonspawn was a funny nut last night. She is rather OCD about the cats and movement. I know, I know... Kelpie and Jack - that's a big fat lot of, "Well duh!" At any rate one thing we've been working on is looking at the cats while giving calm/relaxed body language. Nothing particularly ground breaking - it's pretty well known that getting relaxed body language can trigger relaxation. Breathing or rather exhaleing has been part of that. So a nice relaxed exhale equals mark and reward. Exhale, mark and reward. Lovely. Possibly even productive. Then she lets out this big HUFFFFFF when I was glancing away and missed the initial breath out. (Bloody humans, can't train 'em to pay attention if their lives depend on it! Pfth!) I laughed. About 0.00008 seconds later I realized my mistake (oh crap, I LAUGHED! I LAUGHED at the manic dog who LOVES that kind of reaction! *mental whiney-stampy-dagnamit dance*) because my formerly 'relaxing and taking a deep breath' dog was gleefully running around on her tippy toes going HUFF, HUFF, HUFFFF!

Back to wishing my post box would magically contain the collars I've ordered for the dogs (two for Ronan and two for the girls and a name-tag for Ronan) and vaguely trying to get organized for the weekend in Wonthaggi as Hopie is having her first flyball comp after being ill! Feel free to repress the trauma of seeing the unco wobbly thirty something doing a snoopy dance...

Puppybreath!

2012-01-04T21:45:00.000+11:00

This is the other part of our news over the past little while... the arrival of PUPPYBREATH!

Sue was kind enough to have me over when mumma gave birth and spoil me with time with the babies to play and take pictures (just a few...) every week since as they've grown.

Here's the wee little slugs in a row just after they were born... only a few hours old. In order from left to right they are "Fat Albert", "Malcolm In The Middle" and "Tigerlily". I was interested in a boy so it was Mr Albert or Mr Malcolm who were likely to come home with me and I had a soft spot for Malcolm as he has a kissy spot on his collar, which most of my dogs have had and I consider a bit of a lucky omen. :) As it happened over the following weeks I just fell more in love with him and another friend fell in love with Albert (yay! PUPPY BROTHERS! *happy dance*) and Sue fell in love with Tigerlily (now Demi) soooooo unless things change it's most likely Malcolm is my "Ronan". We'd decided to use that name as I'd made the wish for a puppy as special as my Verity after she passed at "our spot", St. Ronan's Wishing Well and it seemed the obvious name for a wish come true. So here's a few of the pics (I won't add them all... there's about 300 'keepers' so far. LOL) They are #2-3 at two weeks old, 4-6 at three weeks old and the last at four weeks.

If you're looking for a puppy to cuddle, I'm awfully cute!

With mumma, first time outside!

A bit of brotherly love! With give and take of course. ;p

Beautiful mumma!

2012-01-04T21:15:00.001+11:00

Wellll... it may just have been a little while since I sat down to write on this blog. A lot has happened so I'll give a relatively shortish recap.

One thing I'd not mentioned which was rather momentous for us was adopting Nilla a husbun! Beautiful Master Buttons, a little black lop boy was who she seemed to get along with best at the animal shelter and he is just the cutest little man and I just love him to bits. They had a short period bonding before being able to be free-range housebuns full time together. :)

In October we had Laurent's sixth birthday. He was very chuffed to actually get me to go to a restaurant - Lord of the Fries at Chaddy - and get to order his meal all by himself. He was especially pleased as turning six means he's allowed to transition to the "Big Kids Class" at school, from the Cycle One class (which is ages 3-6) to Cycle 2 (which is 6-12 year olds).
We had a very busy few months after this first with three of the dogs ingesting a mycotoxin, which is suspected to be residue from a bit of rubbish (fast food wrapper or some bit of food) that was tossed on the roadside and blew into the yard. The long story short, when they went out to potty they ate something (nothing was identified in their stomachs during pumping aside from a small amount of white powder in Kiah) and after about 45 mins inside were in dire straights having massive seizures and requiring a week at the vets. Hope was the worst off, seizing for about 8 hours and requiring 2 generals and other medications to get under control. Even then we spent the week waiting to find out of there would be permanent neurological damage. Thank goodness there wasn't and all three girls are back to their usual happy bouncy selves as if nothing had happened. The downside was we had a nice big fat vet bill resulting!

Then not a short while later Laurent was grabbing his schoolbag from the car leaning over the seat and knocked the car into gear. Car went forward, La went flying... end result was the poor kid had a 5-6cm gash in his forehead all the way through and required plastic surgery to fix. The car ended up being stopped when it rolled into a tree in our driveway, leaving it needing 'surgery' as well.

Thankfully everything has been a bit boring since then! Hopie was able to go back to agility training not too long after and will be back to her first flyball comp soon too! :D

I've been doing a fair bit of garden work and the rainbow bridge garden has been really rewarding me for last year because all my little roses are blooming!

Christmas was quiet... we just spent the day at home opening prezzies, playing with prezzies and lounging around. As you can see - it was rough! LOL The kids and critters all had fun with their prezzies though, which is the point of it all.

And my own gifts weren't too shabby! Although to be really honest... my best "gift" of all arrived a bit earlier than Christmas (5th of Dec to be exact) and will be the subject of another post! ;)

painty bits

2011-10-12T17:30:00.002+11:00

So last year in November I decided to teach myself to draw. I found an awesome website called Wet Canvas and started picking up tips and tricks there. I think about January I decided to paint and got a set of acrylics. My first paintings were okay but er... not fantastic. I got quite frustrated with one because I couldn't get the white to quit looking so matte and chalky and put it aside when I got busy with other things.

In September I got the itch again and joined in a Different Strokes challenge. This kitty was the result... my 6th painting. A4 size on canvas pad using titanium white, black, ultramarine, cad red med. (Finished.)

I followed the kitty up with starting in on this handsome lad.... Ch. Combee's Bearfoot Silver Magnum, an old Aussie who was very interesting. Same size, medium and but with chromium green oxide. (I am in love with that green... LOVE I tells ya!) He's still got a little ways to go before he's finished as his jaw/cheeks area is undone and he needs glazing and tweaking of his bone structure at the top of his head (above eyes) and some more creamy colours tucked into his cheeks. (Work in progress!)

Then I played with a quick study of an rabbit that had lots of white and painted these two as a quick attempt to start to figure out rabbit fur. (Obviously still have a ways to go on that...) They are supposed to be Poppy and Violet, two rescue buns. 8x10, acrylic on board, same everything else. (Finished.)

At the same time I started these I started one of Verity, shown here in it's first layer of colour. I'm working on it very slowly as it's very emotional. It's 8x10 on gallery wrapped canvas. (Work in progress!)

I started this one, which is about halfway done, of an Isa Brown chook from a WC reference photo in one of the challenges. She's 4x6 wrapped canvas so just a little bitty thing. (WIP)

I'm still working mainly on finishing up Magnum and Verity but needed to take a break from looking at them. I am also working on understanding a lot of other aspects in painting and decided to do a quick study that I'd have to be convincing with out being able to obsessively tweak for detail and work with a very limited palette. Sierra was napping in deep shadows that she almost seemed to fade into while the light that shone on her lit up her head and front with very high contrast and became my willing victim. A4 using only burnt sienna, ultramarine and white, 1.5 hours. (Finished.)

That was so much fun I sketched up this one... no paint on it for now though. A very obvious work in progress! ;p

Toast anyone?

2011-09-15T12:27:00.000+10:00

As Laurent was stowing his backpack in his cubby at school this morning I notice a large bulge in the back of his pants. A large, box shaped bulge. Since we've had *cough* ISSUES with him sneaking in toys and such before, which the kids aren't allowed to do and for which mum gets the politely-exasperated "we've having the talk about your child ignoring the rules about toys... again" talk I figured he'd tucked a box with toys into his pants not realizing it stuck out about 10" from his scrawny bum and was rather as completely and totally blatantly obvious as if he'd had stuck a billboard with flashing neon lights and a big arrow pointing to his backside.

Good Mummy asked in a Very Reasonable Tone - the one that is slightly more sweet than you feel when you really just want to find a brick wall to bang your head against - "Laurent? What do you have in your pants?"

I am at this point expecting toys stuffed into one of his little carry boxes. I mean, that would be an entirely (relatively...) normal thing to smuggle into class right?

Yeah. Well the normal train doesn't stop at our house.

He grins a very clever little grin at me, eyes laughing and pulls out of his pants half a loaf of frozen bread.

BREAD.

FROZEN. BREAD.

Seriously. Never mind it's bread (and why on earth he's got bread will remain known only to the gods because I got nuttin' out of him!) but FROZEN bread. Down his backside. I am throwing in the towel on trying to make sense of him! LOL

Sooo....

2011-09-09T21:02:00.000+10:00

I may have been a bit slack in blogging what has happened...

A week out from our test date I ended up sick as, well, the proverbial dog. Possibly sicker, considering the dogs were obnoxiously chipper and enjoyed repeatedly shoving slobber-covered toys in my face while I was splodged on the nearest horizontal surface in a puddle of non-coherence. (I love my dogs but I admit my sense of humor wasn't at it's best when I cracked an eye open to discover the taste in my mouth was a combo of slobber-and-carpet-crud-marinated plushie... shoved there in an effort to get it thrown. Ta ever so very girls!) I slept like a narcoleptic, passed out when standing up (hellooooo gravity!), had a lovely visit with my Meniere's as it flared up and food was a Very BAD Idea to see... or smell... or think about... or acknowledge the probable physical existence of. Fantastic for when you're on a to-the-day deadline to train a nice stinky-food based trick right?

The two days before I was quasi-well enough that with about a bottles worth of chest rub stuffed up my nostrils to block out the scent and a medicine cabinet worth of 'better living through chemistry' I was able to get in a few 10 minute sessions in a public space for the first time without hurling. Dogs hey? What boring, normal, positively sane lives we'd lead without them to do wacky crap in the name of training for!

The upside of it all is that Ms. Cleverpants lived up to her name and did the trick despite our lack of proofing. Phew! We found out on the anniversary of her sister's passing she got in. Something to smile about was very welcome on a day that's been drowned in tears and spent in our Rainbow Bridge memory garden painting. Hopie's had her first lesson of foundation and was so excited that the next day anytime I was even remotely near the door she'd dash to the training bag and then the door while bouncing like a loonie so I think she may have enjoyed herself a tiny bit. LOL

And tomorrow we're off for the first flyball comp of the season... whole buckets of yay over getting to be back out doing stuff with my best girlies again!

My name this week...

2011-08-20T19:14:00.001+10:00

is...

Clever McCleverpants. And I can hold the hotdog just like a dumb-bell without nomming it!

While this one got lost in her own back yard and howled her little heart out till mumma came and rescued her.

And these two were just plain mischief!

Breakdown of the hotdog retrieve, for anyone interested.

2011-08-15T18:34:00.004+10:00

Steps mainly follow:
Pre-req for good understanding of 'zen' related food refusal (self control, impulse control), front and finish

I'm deliberately not spelling out steps on some of the skill-sets as there's thousands of others who've covered it well and truly, except where I've done things in a way I want to remember.
1.) shaped retrieve of dumbbell
a.) pick up and take the correct 'bit' of the dumbbell instead of picking it up from other areas
b.) pick up and hold from hand - no duration/distraction at this point
c.) pick up and bring shaping from just lifting off the ground to normal carrying height and then bringing it, duration, distraction, distance
d.) teach to release specifically into the hand and not any other location properly, duration, distraction
d.1.) backing up to hold from hand duration and distraction (seemed more natural progression)
e.) add in distance,duration, distractions to Whole Picture
f.) stim cont
2.) chaining and proofing retrieve with front and finish and proof those for distance/duration/distraction
3.) introducing 'hotdog' in a "can't eat it" form (frozen and either in a PVC tube if your dog is persistent (has a grip that's hard enough to break plasticwrap) like Sierra or in plasticwrap if they're easier (like Hope) and introduce as a substitute dumbbell and work the idea back up. Work on a take and hold with the froze/pvc hotdog, starting brief and working up duration
5.) begin unwrapping small bits of the end, zen work with no sniffing/licking/grabbing the tempty bits and work on take and hold, up duration
6.) unwrap more and more progressively until you are working with the unwrapped frozen hotdog.(This is where Hope is at atm.)
7.) add in carrying it over a distance
8.) pick unwrapped froze hotdog off the floor and bring it
9.) switch to partially thawed, then raw, then cooked cool, then cooked warm hotdogs (dogs may transition easily and jump from froze to cooked or need the transitions)
10.) put it all together so that it's a formal start position, send out, retrieve and release

We will also have to proof this for the hotdog having icky sawdust on it as well as the test will occur in a horse arena which the floor is compacted sawdust. (Blerg!)

The reason we're not a bit further is I was training when tired and my timing in marking was um, just a fraction of a hair late. Which I noticed when (you get what you reinforce) my dog started deliberately relaxing her jaw allowing it to roll out after having a nice firm hold, while I tried to get duration extension! *sigh* Oh well, easy fixed, just no more training at midnight! ;p

Ye Olde Hotdog Retrieve

2011-08-14T00:23:00.002+10:00

Okay, so it's not a real hotdog because I'm a special sort of snowflake and that would make me gag which is hugely counterproductive. However Miss Hopie is being taught the hotdog retrieve (using a 'just as tempting but not-hotdog sausage') as our trick for getting into agility classes at the end of the month to prove I can train and she can learn. It's easy enough to teach and hopefully it looks swish enough for us to earn enough points to get in to the training center because I really, really don't want to wait ages before testing again and would vastly prefer to just be able to train. The whole trick will involve her going out to hotdog that is thrown as if it were a dumbbell in an obedience exercise, have it retrieved, front and handed over neatly before finishing. It's coming along pretty well at the moment, I'll try in a few days to get a picture of her being a clever bean. :)

By George... I think the girl has GOT it!

2011-07-25T11:49:00.000+10:00

Well... that may be a tad (okay, a lot) premature BUT having been working on Hopie's dry skills I have to say we've already seen some very HAPPY results which is awesome.

The first task we focused on was one of our biggest - the stock stick, which had gotten to a point where she saw it and was already anticipating pressure before we even got to the paddock. She's not bothered by sticks or stick like objects in general or in other contexts - so I could use literally the same one as a target wand, run it all over her body,as a prop for freestyle, for fetch etc. so it was purely the fact it'd come to represent an (albeit usually considered mild) aversive. That's been the biggest turn around as well - madam is a wiggling, waggling ball of happy eager dog she usually is and moves off it without issue. Hopefully this will transfer over nicely to non-bucket flocks once we've got latency and distance more where I want them. (Yes, I'm going to proof this to death before reintroducing it and pondering on how to structure the reintroductions so that I can maintain nice fine slices of single behaviours. LOL)

The next we worked on was a basic cast out. She already knows that - well in so far as we'd worked her before and she knew 'get around' meant get your bum out around the sheep and start fetching even if it was too fast, too close in to them etc. so not really what I want as my ideal cast! I started with a basic one anyway to get it firmly on cue and in relation to our flock-o-buckets before I started tinkering with increasing the width she was running out relative to the 'flock', the spaced-ness of her flock and then combining that with my distance from the "flock".

So it went:

flock close together, me close to flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
flock close together, me standing .5m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
flock close together, me standing 1m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
flock close together, me standing 2m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
And so on to get me standing back further from the flock. Then we spread the flock:
flock spread .25m apart from each other, me standing .5m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
flock spread .5m apart from each other
flock spread 1 m apart from each other
flock (which had a population explosion at this point *G* and gained a few dozen members) spread .5 apart from each other, me standing .5m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m of the flock and so on so she had to go around a 'big', semi 'loosely grouped' flock
Then those sheep started being further away from me. They went back to being fewer (about half the flock took a tropical vacation...) and closer (it's cold out) but instead of being 1-2 m away, they were 3-4m away and then began drifting apart again. At this point, now we're working on getting her further back from the flock.
flock spread .5 m apart from each other, me standing back 1-2m, her going around within .5m of their 'bums'
flock spread .5 m apart from each other, me standing back 1-2m, her going around within .75m of their 'bums'
flock spread .5 m apart from each other, me standing back 1-2m, her going around within 1 m of their 'bums' and so on... 1.5m, 2m, 2.5m, 3m etc Then they started spreading apart again... so the flock was 1m apart from each other, me back 1-2m, her having to work progressively wider around their bums. Basically I want her to be comfortable doing what is asked regardless of how far I am from her, how far back from the sheep she is working, how far back the total space from me to the sheep and the sheep to her is or how wide spread they are that means she has to arch out wider to maintain the wider 'space bubble' around the sheepies.

We've got it firmly from the left going clockwise but not so much from the right going counterclockwise. That'll be our next task. I also want to be able to have her keep going (if cued) fully around as she's wanting to come to balance and stop, hesitating if I cue her to keep going and I suspect there will be times being able to push her off/past balance will be very useful to be very comfortable with.

We've also got 'back' down pretty well - very confident on her part, complete with occasional hind foot kicking chutzpa. LOL

We've got 'look away' and 'look bye' (turn your head and shoulders out in the direction, to widen the angle of her path when she's cued to move) pretty well too. Bye is not as solid as away and she'll sometimes offer away still so we need to go pick it apart a bit. Probably (maybe?) to do with handedness as well? That does link with walk-on and we've just started chaining look away + walk and she's got walk-in (straight in) pretty well.

With regard to walk in, I'm pondering teaching it from her being oriented to different directions - ie 2 o'clock, 4, 6, 8, 10 etc. on a radial but debating where exactly I want to consider the 'target spot'. We've enough on our plate it can wait but I'm pondering away anyhow.

It's a fun experiment for us anyhow and hopefully getting us closer to where we need to be. It's also a fair bit of thinking of how to restructure things and getting some much clearer/more precise definitions of exactly what I want for the ideal/perfect/finished behaviours in each case.

Warning to dog owners - deadly Sisotamoxym virus

2011-07-16T22:23:00.000+10:00

DISCLAIMER: PLEASE READ ALL THE WAY THROUGH BEFORE COMMENTING

Due to the massive problem with foxes, the Australian Government has begun to introduce several potent strains of a virus called Sisotamoxym in an effort to control this pest species. However it is not species specific and our pet dogs are at severe risk. The death rate in domestic dogs is 100%.

New strains being manufactured for release routinely. The vector is via biting insects who are bred and deliberately released at various locations around the country to spread the virus. IE mosquitoes and fleas. In order to ensure the virus is spread as far and wide as possible the government has imported and released two types of fleas - the European and Spanish flea - as additional vectors to penetrate areas where lack of permanent water prevents mosquitoes from breeding. All species of mosquito can transmit the disease and some can infect up to 10 animals an evening and remain infective for up to 7 months.

The mosquitoes and fleas transfer the virus when they bite an affected animal and along with blood ingest bacteria. The bacteria multiplies in the insects gut and when it bites another animal bacteria is introduced to the wound. Incubation period varies but averages 5-14 days. Once the dog is infected it's skin becomes red and thickens before traveling to lymph nodes and then organs. It is present in the skin and bodily secretions making it contagious. After 6 days the body has become swollen, with the swellings becoming distended and thickened. Pus may discharge from the ears and eyelids, which become thick and swollen as well to the point they're swollen shut and the dog is blind and deaf. The virus form tumors and skin lesions throughout the body. The entire head swells and in in-tact males the testicles swell and the scrotum ruptures. By this point the dog is anorexic, has difficulty breathing and convulses. If not euthanized, death occurs within 12 days or so. While for foxes this raises a significant issue of humaneness, dog owners need to be alert and aware to the symptoms to prevent an agonizing death.

Once infected, there are no treatments. Death rate is 100% and the current veterinary recommendation is for immediate euthanasia and quarantine of house-mates who may be infected.

The only current option available to dog owners is to keep dogs inside at all times and use mosquito proofing techniques to attempt to prevent infection. If the dog must be outdoors, it is recommended you fully mosquito proof the enclosure and take measures to prevent fleas or mosquitoes from being near. However it only takes one mosquito coming in and having one bite of one dog to kill them all.

There is a vaccination called Nobivac Siso. It utilizes a virus called Shope Fibroma virus which is closely related but which doesn't cause the disease. However the Australian authorities are not at this time allowing the vaccine for fear immunity could transfer from vaccinated pet dogs to wild foxes.

This reasoning is faulty and does not hold with experience in areas where the vaccination is legal. Foxes have built their own immunity independently according to the Australian Department of Primary Industries own publications. There is also a lack of immunity in a vaccinated individual can spread let alone to foxes. In UK and Europe, where the vaccine is available, there have been no signs of a decline in the disease and there is still a great need to vaccinate pets. The British distributors (Intervet) state that:

"...the virus (Shope fibroma) does not spread readily from one animal to another and all dogs in a group should be individually vaccinated"

Now... if you are all feeling properly horrified by the thought of your beloved pet dogs dying a horrible death, take a deep breath. There is no virus called Sisotamoxym.

The REAL virus is called Myxomatosis and instead of being released to control foxes it is released to control wild rabbits. Instead of affecting your pet dogs, it affects our pet rabbits. The only difference is that the word "rabbit" has been replaced with "dog", a pet most of you will have experienced a strong bond with - the medical information is accurate. I wrote this to hopefully provoke thought as a house-rabbit is NO DIFFERENT than a dog in terms of it's intelligence, ability to love and be loved or bond when raised with the love and care we raise our dogs with and lives as a part of the family. We are no less devastated by their loss than a dog owner would be. Yet the Australian Government continues to deny, on the most dubious and shoddy of reasoning, access to lifesaving vaccination. If you are outraged by this please sign the petition for the the vaccine to be made available:
http://members.iinet.net.au/~rabbit/pam.htmwriting

Or write the following people: Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Shadow Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for the Environment and Heritage and Shadow Minister for the Environment and Heritage
along with your local representatives.

Because whatever our pets species, we love them, we suffer when we loose them and we don't deserve to have to stand by and watch them suffer horribly because of governmental apathy.

2011-07-14T12:09:00.000+10:00

We've been saying Kiah is a lot like my old fellow Cade, who is now at the Bridge. She's been growing leaps and bounds, so I decided to hunt up the collar I made him when he was a youngster. It's double sided velvet hand embroidered in a celtic knotwork pattern and looks rather lovely on her if I do say so myself.

Meanwhile my stomach issues are flaring back up again, so I had a little extra snooze this morning so I could lay straight on the heat. Nic went to let the girls out, without realizing Miss Kiah Papaya needs to be escorted straight to the door if it's not me letting her out because she's a big mumma's girl. I soon found myself with an armful of wriggly, deliriously happy puppy moaning and groaning her bliss and attempting to clean every centimeter of my face (she's not usually a licky puppy so this is about the only time I get ecstatic kissy fest from her) before settling in to enjoy the heat pad too. Such a little smile bringer she is. :)

It's also time for the little lovebirds, Romeo oh! Romeo and Cinnamon the Cinnabun to go get their vaxes. Unfortunately the Australian government is STILL with-holding the myxo vax from pet bunny owners for no sound reason (yay for logical reasoning and evidence based decisions... oh, wait, no that would be prejudice, ignoring evidence and just not giving a rip!) but we can vax them against calicivirus which is just as important. So we're off to visit the Melbourne Rabbit Clinic later today.

Romeo would be giving me this face again if he knew what I had planned...

And one of Nilla, just being full of 'satiable curiosity for cuteness sake. Excuse the craptastic lighting in all of them.

combo plater pics

2011-07-06T14:14:00.001+10:00

Rinlicious... proof that while all of us are special, some of us are moreso than others!

But my mumma loves me!

And the older goober heads have a run around Shipwreck Rock...

Two-fer-one

2011-07-06T12:23:00.001+10:00

It's distraction proofing AND reality tv for cows!

No, we're not doing herding - we're proofing down and sit-stays with maintaining attention and focus while mum is at a distance (pics taken with 30x zoom) for several minutes and the cows just happen to decide to assist with distraction proofing.

"I know it's there and I'm ignoring it, I'm not falling for that old distraction and loosing my click!"

(Okay mostly... covert glance!) Meanwhile apparently watching us train is the cow equivalent of Big Brother and really, reeeeeally fascinating because they all come over and right up to snuffle.

"Mum - that reward better be bloody good! I'm ignoring it and I'm staying put but I'm getting COW SNOT on my BUM FLUFF! Cow. Snot. On. My. Bum. Fluff!"

Later on, while we were doing some of our herding dry work I didn't realize the curious cows had come over. Being hard of hearing and it being somewhat windy I had no idea there was a small group right behind me. Hope did and at one point when I went to send her around instead of going where I sent her, she went around behind me. I whirled around wondering if she hadn't lost her marbles only to see the cows fetching at me. Hope was very chuffed with herself after weeks of working dry only to FINALLY some real work! Little monster!

the squidgey edition

2011-07-06T11:35:00.000+10:00

Soo.... Demonspawn Anklebiter McNoseyboots is growing up... from a dainty 2kg when she first arrived the little madam is now double and a bit that size. She has been keeping up with her 10 new people, 1 new place, 3 new things a day for the most part aside from when I've been too ill. She goes with us to club and thinks the place was designed for her admirers to gather. The vets and all around town and bush walking are other favs. We're working on most of the same things we established as a little tyke, keeping their practice up and waiting till she's a bit bigger to push out duration further in most cases. She has fun playing with the flyball box, playing stalky Kelpie dog (in her mind she is a rough, tough cowdog) and generally being a little ball of energy. She is learning calm, control and her on-and-off switch - even when you are watching the other big dogs play flyball and run in agility and your mum won't let you. (Life is DREADFULLY unfair - we are SURE we could do it even better if only we were allowed!)

"Yep, with these ears I almost CAN take flight!"

Proving undoubtedly that she is one of MY dogs - and therefore both weird and ruled entirely by her gut - at her vet visit when she got her vax she never paused in chewing her treats. When she got the thermometer (and no, vets aren't progressive enough to use those nifty little ear thermometers kids get - this is the old fashioned thermometer up the bum) it merited barely even a glance.

"That's right dear, just pay attention to the nice yummy bribe... pay no attention to the man who is about to do... yes, that... here have some peanut butter."
When it came to the microchip needle however, which is fairly BIG as needles go, she alternated between yelping and chewing in a sort of oddly crunchy yodel. *yel...crunch...elp...crunch...YE...crunch...LP..gobble* Now that is impressive dedication to your grub!

All that didn't really slow her down much however. Or, y'know... at all.

She's still her nutty self. The only that that continues to surprise is what a comfort hound she is. Honestly I'm pretty sure she is an Italian Greyhound in a Kelpie/Border jacket. She loves the heat blanket, she burrows under doonas like a seasoned pro, she shivers most pathetically if required to go outside sans a coat and is generally just a bit whussy about the weather.

And I am still loving having a dog I can put a pretty collar on and SEE it! LOL (Please note: Rin is actually wearing a pretty collar -just even with her minimal coat you can't see it!)

Surprisingly, among the dogs it's not just Rin who is finding having a puppy a great blast of fresh air - Sierra has taken on the role of patient teacher and is Kiah's most sought out (and endlessly pestered) friend. They have endless play sessions and mock-battles teaching her to recognize and listen to her native (body) language, rehearsing recognition and responses for HOURS every day. They practice and rehearse apologizing and making amends, taking turns negotiating resolving issues and defusing situations, approaching, inviting games, making requests etc. It is beautiful to watch how elegant and deliberate they are and how they teach and learn! I am reminded of watching a Cade and Bella teaching a baby Sierra many years ago and later all of them teaching a cheeky and irrepressible baby Hopie.

When a response is correct Sierra will bow and invite a game, wrestle or settle in for an ear grooming session (a legacy from Bella I suspect, who was obsessed with ensuring puppies had clean ears) or such before setting back up and inviting another rehearsal. Hope and Rin get in on the act as well, both particularly love to teach play skills - how to respectfully approach an adult to ask for some of their chewie or to play with the toys they have, how to take turns in playing chasing and wrestling games. They will take the toy and dangle it clearly in front of her to entice, prancing and showing it off before taking off at a slow run for her to chase and guide her into being both the chaser and chased, signaling that it's just play or practicing calming down skills. Hope will bring a chew right to her and of her to practice polite approaches and requesting skills. When she gets it right they pointedly and deliberately give her what she's requested, walking away, "I'm done, all yours!" After a few moments they'll inviting her to come away - occasionally having to show another toy to get her to drop the first, pick it up and inviting another round. Bless her, she is such a fantastic little member of our family I don't think we could have picked better!

Hope's sheepdog-type plan rough draft thingiemawhotchie

2011-07-03T16:52:00.002+10:00

So... best intentions aside I haven't blogged for weeks.

However lots has been going on. With Hopie we'd trying to figure out how to train herding using R+ based training wherever possible and to teach her to become more comfortable with human applied pressure for pressure and release. I felt like her instincts were keen and she loves the actual work but the only real sticking point was in her not faring well with even very, very, very minor aversively taught approaches. I had some basic ideas but fleshed it out with a discussion from some lovely folks and (hopefully!) between it we've got a good plan going.

So here is the attempt to write out the plan (something I've been remiss on...) for her and some of what we've been working on. Worst case, it doesn't improve things but we're no worse off and best case it may work super for us. (Certainly hope so!) Either way for a dog for whom the tools 'inside the box' aren't bringing out her best game, 'outside the box' however oddly nontraditional it appears has little to loose.

So the areas of trouble for her mainly include:

Behaviours not fluent before being asked for at working level
Dry training had been in the plans for awhile and after talking to some people who have taught working/trial dogs with R+ I came away even more certain. I decided to start dry until many behaviours are fully/very very highly fluent so I can focus just on the dog, without also having to contend with a number of other independent minds who are not stationary and more difficult to reset for multiple finely sliced reps of the same behaviour. The dry-work has the benefit of being able to practice single behaviours in well split easily achievable criteria in a controlled setting which allows the behaviour to become solid, low latency and have significant duration, distance and distraction proofing added to it rather than try to attain those on the fly with the sheep and concurrent with everything else. Likewise you don't have to rely on other half-trained behaviours at the same time. ;)

Some of this is not new or exclusive as certainly there are a fair few well known working dog trainers who teach a down/stop/come/flanking dry. I'm also wanting to teach to higher standards:
* come in (pretty self explanatory)
* back (move directly outward from the sheep 'target'- not sure if I want this to simply be stepping back or actually turning around or if it even matters... pondering atm!)
* directional modifier cues (not flanking commands - turning out the whole head/shoulder orientation to widen the future trajectory)
* walk - meaning along whatever path your head/shoulders are currently facing until told to do something else. I'm thinking that this can get paired with directionals - walk on, walk up, walk by, walk away) for when I specifically want her to do the movement at a slower than normal pace.
* outruns
* angles to come around sheep on - has previously been something of an issue
* and while not intended to be taught on cue per se but shaping angles for casting out on stationary objects at increasing widths and distances, proper shaped flanking

And maybe other stuff as I think of it or when I trip across the need for them in levels beyond started. She does know many of the cues in the obedience/general context very well but the plan is to practice even those in a herding context and at distances to help them become more as high quality/lickitysplit/'no matter what' as they are in other areas.

Distance
One of the things we were seeing consistently was that she while she was okay giving the sheep some distance she wanted to work relatively close to me and became uncertain if the sheep's distance meant she was asked to work further distances relative to me. Doubly if she was at all uncertain. As well as making it difficult to teach/refine behaviours, it also meant she tended to quarter in and bring the sheep up too close to me for comfortable movement to stay within that relative distance and may also affect lining up for obstacles.

While I've varied my rewards quite a bit - food, toys, games, planted environmental rewards, opportunities to access things - it seems I've unintentionally trained her that there is a 20-ish meter zone that she is to work in and expect reward delivery within relative to me. (Since so far nothing we've trained or done has really required a functional/reliable working distance beyond that beyond a recall.) Because of that and how sensitive she is, working outside that distance especially where the behaviours are not trained to fluency is worrisome. While for most dogs this may not be significant, for her it's a problem. While not directly applicable to herding general distance work may extended her safe/familiar/rewarding/comfort zone so that if there IS a stressor added it's not on top of uncertainty due to distance. Likewise generic (non herding specific) distance (remote?) reward delivery to ensure she is aware that rewards can be delivered at that distance regardless of relation to me.

Pressure
Hope is incredibly sensitive to social approval and her perceiving it to be withdrawn makes her anxious. She is surprisingly confident with external pressure (ie that applied by the sheep and cattle in general or individuals in specific) which speaks to it not being pressure in general she is over sensitive to. Because of this, I do not believe (natural) pressure itself is the only issue, the timing of the pressure or the degree of it but rather the combination of the behaviours not being fully trained ones and the pressure (coming from human/stock stick) being taught as an aversive to 'correct' her into guessing right to get the release.

The direct seeking-in I think is more of an appeasement behaviour over not knowing what is wanted, anxiety re: distance and anxiety re: aversive pressure and an attempt to use a fall back with a high history of being 'right' everywhere else in life. Actions like shooing her out, withdraw eye contact or continuing to request a yield (continued pressure) becomes perceived as failing to be able to appease. The more appeasement is withheld the harder the dog tries to appease and the higher the stress raises, until shut down will be the inevitably hit when NOTHING is going to be able to make things right.

Yielding - Central to the pressure issues imo is that at the moment the yield with a stock stick is taught with P&R being taught as a mild aversive. For most dogs combined with the heavy draw of the sheep it is mild enough that especially with precise timing in the application, the yield gaining removal and the amount of pressure being applied on an 'as mild as possible' basis for the individual and ideally passively (ie the pressure is held at the lowest possible useful level, so the dog can't gain access but is simply waited out vs successively applied increases of pressure) the dog works through any stress.
For some dogs like Hope, even mildest aversives are enough to be significantly off putting but there is no reason the action (yielding) or reacting to pressure must be taught with an aversive. That was the 'reframing' context I was dithering on!!! The same action (move off/yield to either SS pressure or body signal pressure) can be taught in a slightly different manner utilizing R+ to shape the yield and then delivering the reward at or just beyond the peripheral zone. (ie delivery in place or tossing behind/on the outward trajectory the dog may be asked to move next). The result should be a dog who is comfortable with the pressure being applied as positive information - which was pointed out to me (I'd not realized, not being that far along) may be very useful in more advanced classes where you are sorting/shedding or instances where you want to have the dog come into the pressure you're putting on the stock. I likes!

So that's where we are now, working on the dry stuff and then going to start scouting around for a few new sheep who are veerrryyy docile and like to stay together quietly and some quackers now that we can. :)

Sidewalk Chalk: EVIL, EVIL stuff

2011-06-02T20:03:00.000+10:00

Darling Tornado Child and the Lilium Tigrinum left their sidewalk chalks on the driveway.

As it happens, sidewalk chalk when rained upon turns into rainbow colour sludge.

As it happens I did not notice this before shooing dogs and children alike out the door in a bid to make school drop off sometime before "Horribly Late" became "Embarassingly Horribly Late With Abject Appologies Owed To Teachers".

As it happens I noticed them bolting cheerfully through mudpuddles before coating themselves in rainbow colour sidewalk chalk sludge at the exact time Darling Tornado Child opened the doors for them to hop in. In they went, skidding to a stop just before their faces impacted with the cargo barrier. (How they do this I'll never know but they always miss by a nanometer!)

As it happens now my car carpet looks like a clown vomited on it in little paw shaped skidmark patterns. Share the joy!

the continuing adventures of an adorable Demonbaby

2011-05-30T23:15:00.000+10:00

This week, we remember the other poor neglect cases in our training a bit more... in the face of "taking the puppy out every 15 minutes" and spending most of our time out socializing to every person/place/noise I can wrangle and/or playing, their training sessions have been um... well... kinda not... (On the other hand we've done several towns, heaps of people, footing surfaces, the vets 2x and are rocking the mobility aid socialization gig!)

So they are all remembering where they were in stands, Hope is recalling she has a bum and she needs to tuck it for her left about turns, Rin is practicing everything because she's Rin and does everything at warp speeds.

On the cute-adorable-all-kinds-of-wonderful puppybreath front...

Skill-set stuff: mostly the same things but where we were working primarily in relatively non-distracting settings or where if the environment did have distractions they weren't immediate (as in under 1m) we're now starting to add some distractions for the behaviours she does at a decent duration

crinkling a wrapper (so HARD, she LOVES crinkle toys!)
rattling the food container, pieces on the ground one by one while she holds
small/brief movements with toys around her
me moving around - so stepping back/left/right 1 step, waving arms, shifting weight etc
asking for increasing duration near people getting a trolly at the shopping center or where the doors are opening and shutting as people walk in/out
while other dogs are walking around her at home and at club

As she gets better at ignoring each they get progressively longer, louder and more attention grabbing. (wrapper 1 second in pocket, longer, 1 second out of pocket, longer, in moving hand, longer, with a flourish etc. I've totally slacked off on stand, I just find it boring for some reason so that's currently our worst. (Erm... same as the adults actually...) Targeting I've started adding a tiny bit of 'you have to search for it' by placing a smidge around a corner. The bite hold is stronger on tuggy, she is SUCH a little tug freak! Retrieving has taken a bit of a dive - not unexpected as I was just grabbing a voluntary behaviour rather than teaching it properly - as she's determined she can keep it. So voluntary object exchange will be played with a lot this week. Restrained recalls, walking recalls and running recalls are all featuring heavily. Manners stuff is just more of the same for now.

Meanwhile I'm not the ONLY one teaching her things... Rin has been demonstrating the 101 Places Border Collies Don't Belong (But Go Anyway)

2011-05-26T20:09:00.000+10:00

The past few days have been a bit of a blur. "Cold" turned "chest infection" along with "totally lost my voice". Poor Lily and Nic also had it as did La, so we all pretty well curled into balls, took ample amounts of medicine and bonded over seeing who could hack up a lung first.

Unfortunately 7-8 week old puppies (age per the vets opinion) have little respect for wishing to quietly hide under the covers till the nasty bugs are gone so we've mainly been working on stuff at home. We have gotten out to socialize some more today (finally!) and visited Paky and Gembrook as well as visited the vets to practice having a once over and standing on scales. We've discovered the secret to socializing with men - go in the morning when all the tradies are getting their coffee! GOBS of socialization to guys today!

Our coolest socialization moment this week goes to this great big fella in full bikie kit - the jacket, the liberal use of chains, the tatts, headgear, sunglasses and massssivveeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee beard, muttonchops and mustache. He looked like someone you'd NOT want to meet in a dark alley but instead crouched down and cooed at her softly while asking to give some treats, telling me he'd just lost his dog this week and we'd made his day watching her be so clever and sweet.

She is becoming a lot more active and into everything, so the real fun begins! She reminds me a lot of Cade actually - a bit of an old soul in that little fur jacket and similar traits. Watching her as she checks out the cows echoed Cade's reactions to the young and curious horses we had around our place in Michigan. When she is wild she is willlldddd and when she has had her fill of running she sits with me soft and serious-eyed as she considers the world. She is a comfort seeker - give her a cozy blanket or a lap and she's curled up under your jacket. She seems very paw oriented as well - loves to whack things, scuttle them and bat them before taking a massive pounce. She seems deeply loathe of all things cold and wet and detests her poor princess paws getting wet.

Skill-set stuff:

sit and down at about 30 seconds duration (assuming quiet area, that goes to about 15 seconds out and about reliably.... though I was very tickled when she offered +30 seconds holding while very intently watching a tempting fluttering candy wrapper in town today before I decided to mark it while the marking opportunity was still good!
stand at about 5 seconds reliably (without shifting feet or offering targeting behaviours)
touch - now includes 'hit' (feet targeting), nose-to-palm and touch plates. Touch plates are on the floor and at a short distance pretty well! (1 meter)
watch me - about 14 seconds, a bit more in a non-distracting setting
tuggy - bite is still wanting to be very regrippy when she's very excited... I think it's the size of the bite surface though - hard for her to get back into a good grip position so I'm looking for a thin but softly braided one.
picking up an item (keys, rubber kids toy, tiny ball)
bringing back a thrown item
polite release (let go when requested and pop yerself into a sit kid) even while highly excited (aka in feral SHARK PUPPY MODE... dundun dundun dun dunnnnnnn....)

Manners stuff:

zen work
jaw/tooth grip moderation (iow jaw-wrestle games, very softly with mums hand thanks!)
body handling - focusing on head (reaching down toward, tugging lightly on the collar, putting head through things like the collar or circled fingers and examining teeth/eyes/ears etc)
LAT on the kittens (wrestling mobs of kittens are just SO TEMPTING to join... and then sit and yap at when they fail to respond to play bows and offers of tuggy)
environmentally cued sits while walking on lead when mum stops (pretty good unless there is something fairly distracting)
environmentally cued sits when people reach down to pet (about 60% of the time un-cued so obviously still plenty of work to do - made harder by the fact I'm usually trying to keep tabs on a free-roving 2 year old while teaching this!

Indoor play for a rainy day...

2011-05-23T21:16:00.004+10:00

Well since it was bucketing rain most of the day and my shoulder is still sore (although much better - bless my chiro!) I found the third set of clothing my 2 year old needed changing into courtesy of flinging herself in the mud enough we broke out our indoor goodies! After hosing them off we had our ever faithful BOXES. Boxes are wonderful things for amusing 2 year olds and puppies alike - you can crash them, tumble them, hop into them, push them over from the inside, bop at the flappy lid bits and doors cut into them, hide in them, use them as tunnels, bash your toys around in them and chew them to shreds without mum becoming the least bit upset. (Somewhat abashed if you happen to have 2 feet instead of 4 but not upset!) I am certain the nice people at Bunnings think we are a special brand of crazy with the amount we get from them every week but you just can't beat a box in the bun/dog/kittens/kids opinion!

When I was called to pick up La from school after he spectacularly crashed and burned hard enough to register even on his limited sense of pain (well, at least a bit... 3 hours later we're explaining to him he oughtn't bash about and jump out of trees on a strain... *sigh*) we also brought out the ball pit balls in the kiddie wading pool and our newest find -

Check it out! TWELVE dollars at Bunnings! It's a tunnel and a hidey hole and it ROLLS either when you stand on it like this or run amok inside like a giant not-quite-spherical hamster ball! They amused themselves with this for the better part of 2.5 hours before dinner!

I also finally uploaded a vid of her from her on her 3rd day here (so 6week-ish old) trying to find a free editor that works with mov formats to put the clips together.

Random funny out-take shot - Kiah does a Tasmanian Devil impression!

My puddin tats... big kittens now!

2011-05-23T20:35:00.000+10:00

Pipsqueek - still our little motor mouth, if I didn't know better I'd swear he was part Siamese just for the sheer amount of chatter that comes out of his mouth!

Possom - has gone from the smallest to second largest and taken after Pipsqueek in terms of his chatter. He is the first and now LOUDEST to greet me in the morning or evening or upon entering or exiting a room or or or...! If his chat fails to make his point, he'll happily hoist himself onto your lap before repeating himself!

Punkin is proving himself the quiet cuddler... he is a little bit more cautious than his hell-bent-for-leather siblings and wants to look before leaping. At night he is one of the ones who will quietly snuggle himself near me and settle in before looking at me like, "Well, no one was using that space where they? You don't expect me to put up with those crazies really?" (Punkin will be looking for a home after he is neutered, vaxed and microchipped. The adoption fee will reflect only the cost of this vetting. He would like a quieter home with snuggles by the fire-side and would be okay older/quiet dogs, gentle older children, other cats and kitty-friendly house-bunnies as he's been fine with Nilla here.)

And then there is Princess Peachie Pie... don't let those sweet eyes fool you, this one is an adventure princess who is the first into everything! If there is a stalking-pouncing-chasing game she is sure to be in the middle of it but also is happy to curl up in your arms and doze half the night once she's had run play. (Peachie will be looking for a home after she is spayed, vaxed and microchipped. The adoption fee will reflect only the cost of this vetting. She would enjoy older/quiet dogs, children and other cats but may enjoy pouncing type games a bit much to be an ideal companion for a house bunny although she's never bothered Nilla here.)

Saturday and Sunday quickies

2011-05-22T23:48:00.000+10:00

Saturday was rather boring as I've got a nice cold going and played narcoleptic half the day - waking up basically enough to feed and water everyone and ensure the kids weren't running too feral. We did do some basic training with Kiah (yep - it has a name!) and Rin but other than that not much.

Sunday we loaded up on cold meds, loaded up the dogs and went to training. So the girls got their runs in flyball and obedience and Kiah had an absolute blast - she got to meet some of her future flyball team-mates (Collie, Sheltie, Poodle, ShihTzu, Lab, JRT, Border Collie, Golden, various mixes), see the flyball box (ohhh... that is COOL!) and chase a ball and play tugs. I managed to injure my shoulder (thanks Rin!) but still got through stepping in to teach an intermediate class and Hope's flyball before going home. Really, really pleased that Hope was pulling some very close crosses with Maddie flawlessly and Rin was handling crosses, position changes and dual lanes like a pro! Should make September start with a bang!

At home with Kiah did a few quick-bursts of the same stuff we'd started working on manners wise a few days ago, some restrained toy fetching and worked up her tuggy as well. She got SO revved up with the tuggy which has little 'flappy' bits she went into zoomy mode and just ran in great laps for about 20 mins before flopping over. Then we did some cardboard box games - we had a flat piece of cardboard she 'surfed' on while I pulled it around the floor - I'm thinking that'll be a favorite game, a 'tunnel' to be sent through/recall through and a small box to bop around the house with her paws like a hockey puck. I also used an old computer keyboard and some bubble wrap as "weird surfaces it's fun to walk over" and had her jumping on and walking around on them, sits, drops etc. She is a funny little nutter!

2011-05-21T12:21:00.001+10:00

On her second day after school drop off she spent the early morning toddling around after us.
She met:

the kittens more fully and learned that 4:1 are not odds in her favor with curious kittens. Whichever she was sniffing the other two or three would be patting her tail.
the sheep and our neighbors visiting cows and jumped up for a better sniff but without being over the top excited.
gardeners with linetrimmers, leaf blowers and pruning sheers as well as hard-hats and protective goggles
various people at he hardware store, grocery and a park, cafe
plastic door strips on a shop that was closed, with Lily flipping them about and making all sorts of ruckus while I encouraged her to push them with her nose and investigate.

We had several tuggy sessions and introduced the idea of running out to a thrown toy (small rope bone and plastic baby teether) and bringing it back, again with polite releasing. More work on basic sits and downs, touching etc. We also worked a bit on bite inhibition (aka YOUCH! needle teeth hurt!) playing very gentle mouth games with my fingers.

Friday after school drop off she met:

various people at Coles, the shopping strip and neighborhood in Pakenham and in Gembrook - not many men unfortunately.
a community van which is equipped with automated lowering and raising ramps for wheelchair users which they were very nice in letting us go up to and have a meet-n-greet.
the 7-9's class at La's school as well.
Manners wise we continued with sits and downs, making them downs from sits and sits from downs as well as continuing with targeting introducing a target plate. We continued with retrieving thrown toys (soft tuggies and plastic teething rings) as well as tuggy. We introduced the idea that if she wants to get out or into her pen she needs to sit and be polite. We introduced a bit of doggy zen, object trading, some basic body handling (light 'pinches' on the webbing between toes, feet, ears, lips, collar holding/tugging etc), some short and light restrained recalls and eye contact. She's been absolute gold with her house training, not a single accident and only one time using the newspapers provided in her pen - which was really my fault as I had the choice between taking her out when I saw her looking fidgety and chasing the naked-wet-soapy 2 year old who was streaking through the house on her way to merry mayhem, so puppy got ploinked in her pen till I caught and nappied the 2 year old!

As you can see a busy puppy is well behaved by default...

2011-05-18T22:18:00.000+10:00

Quick puddins pics! I missed the 5th weeks due to being ill and have the 6th weeks but my computer ran into some *cough* minor problems due to certain small cute people holding their sippy near it just as it's lid popped off. Turns out computers don't swim well and it's having royal fits. In the meantime I am having to use my laptop which doesn't have photo programs on it so it requires loading the whole files to photobucket and then resizing which is a pain! LOL

Rin 2.0

2011-05-18T22:12:00.000+10:00

Over the past few months we'd been considering either bringing another working dog like Rin into our family because she is such a little treasure and so fun to work with or else a smaller dog as I miss having a littler dog around. We eventually decided that it was probably better to put off a small dog for several more years (3rd in line after 2 more Aussies) and get the working dog now because a little dog would be more likely to get run into in the wild play my girls enjoy just because of the size difference and it would be nice for Rin to have someone around her age (not quite 2 yrs now) to play with given Hope (4.5) and Sierra (10) are past the puppy/teenage sillies and want to lay down after a good play instead of imitating an energizer bunny. After looking at several dogs, I found a litter of Border x Kelpies who needed homes and looked very much like Rin and a week later went to visit with the girls. This little cutiepie is who we all chose.

She's not named yet but her nickname is Demonbaby... anyone want to guess why??? (That's midsnarl with the tuggy. LOL)

She is super clever and in her first day home had about 200x reps in which she picked up the basics of a sit and down with about 15 seconds duration (reliably, occasionally a bit more) as well as targeting with a target wand with two bumps. She's been started on building tuggy value and learning to take it only when told, with a nice balanced bite and letting go politely when told. She met her collar and the leash and discovered she could walk politely. Not bad for 8 weeks old and 24 hours home after not being off a farm before!

In her first full day home she went to: school 2x, pet store, nursery and on a walk around the grocery store
She met well over her "10 new people a day" and included little kids/older kids/older teens with hats/elderly people and using prams, a trolly, a zimmer frame, a pair of crutches, a cast on the leg without crutches and two mobility scooters which she made one ladies day by jumping up unafraid into her lap when she was called.

a rather perfect (somewhat soggy) mothers day

2011-05-08T22:27:00.001+10:00

Mothers Day started here with me sneaking out with the three girls for training for "mommy time" while the kids got their surprise ready. Nothing better in the world than time with my girls and coming home to the kidlets and a warm (and DRY) house! :)

After flyball we started the girls on obedience. We're trying to get back into practice as I'd intended last year to start trialing in obedience with them before we got totally sucked in by flyball. (To be fair we achieved FD, FD-X, FDCh and AFDCh so it's not as if we weren't having fun. *G*)

Initially a few weeks back I was told Rin would have to wait a few months for an opening in foundation (intended to teach novices how to train) because of recent structure changes made her considered "new". Likewise Hope would have to test in on the next test day because of our extended break. I said I'd just test both in at competition level classes instead.

When I came back last week we were thankfully able to bypass that all together and both did well where I popped them in and garnered a lot of comments... such clever girlies. :) This week we had small numbers, basically instructors only (read: few people are mental enough to think training in the rain on mothers day seems like rockin' good fun) so after flyball we had the option of running in higher levels than I've trained for at home or going home. Naturally we decided there were a few centimeters of fabric yet to be totally saturated and stayed! Rin was bumped 2 levels up from where I thought she should be and surprised me by getting compliments in everything but a blown stand-stay! (Poor dog, she loves to catch raindrops from the air so that was tough ask when those raindrops were just TAUNTING her by falling all over!) Hope got bumped up to CD level and did pretty well if not perfectly polished in everything except not tucking her bum neatly in left-about-turns. They even gave us a taste of some more advanced exercises I gather are for higher levels - a broadjump and return (I thought she'd be confused but she did it very nice) and a send out to a box the dog must sit in before coming back out over a jump to you. (pretty nice but I'd not want to push it more than the meter and a bit I was sending from atm) But I still get all melty when I present them with something they've never seen and they manage to fool everyone into thinking we know what we're doing! Such clever, clever little poppets!

When I got home the kids were bursting with tea, cards, flowers, a love-heart La had decorated with 'lots of jewels and diamonds and sparklies', a new set of framed handprints (we do this every year, so I have a little collection of growing kidlet prints) and a big beautiful plant for my rainbow garden. Between the kids and dogs (oh dear, those needed DRYING too...) I got clambered all over by the littlest members as well... little puddins have helped write this by batting at my fingers on the keyboard with their little purr motors going for the first time! Isn't it just fantastic?

Nice try Pointyblackdog...

2011-05-06T12:44:00.000+10:00

While training with Sierra, both Rin and Hope were outside. I could see Hope near the door staring at it and attempting to beam the message into my head to let her back in or at least notice she was doing the behaviours very, very nicely and merited some rewarding. Rin, noticing that standing at the doorway was not working any better this time than the previous attempts, took a slightly different tactic. When I gave the cue to Sierra I heard a ruckus of scrambling sounds and a thunkity-whump near the kitchen window. Perched neatly and determined not to be ignored (surely if I saw how wonderful she was I'd relent and play obedience tricks with her instead of the red dog!) stood Rin with her rear feet on the bin and her front paws on the window ledge. You guessed it - the cue we've been working on tweaking this week is "stand".

The puddins at 4 weeks old...

2011-04-30T19:13:00.004+10:00

From L-R: Pipsqueek, Punkin, Peach and Possum

Bebe #1 Pipsqueek - we started solids this week and Pipsqueek has proven to follow his trend of loving his grub a little too much... straight into the middle of the bowl and tucking in with serious intent. We may have to alter his name to just Sqeek or Pip if he ends up tooooooo pudgy!

Bebe #2 - Possum, our teeny little lad... he's such a quiet little guy but I think he's rather clever. While his siblings are pushing around for the food like little piggies he just waits till they're done and I put fresh stuff down to eat without getting jostled!

Bebe #3 Punkin - I know it's not the best framed shot but it just cracks me up. Punkin is proving to be Pipsqueek's little shadow. Wherever Pipsqueek waddles first - and at this point it is waddling and wobbling rather than walking - after a brief think about things Punkin is right off after him.

Bebe #4 - Peachie-pie! Not one to be outdone she is just as adventurous as Pipsqueek but also likes to stick near her mumma. That can make it hard to decide if she should run off to explore or follow mum back in for a nap! LOL

Post photos... it's hard work being a model! Zzzzzz...

Pictures brought to you courtesy of our local friendly Puddin Wrangler, La.

Random shots of the Borderbrat

2011-04-26T00:08:00.003+10:00

Now look at this face... sweet, innocent, attentive...

...butter wouldn't melt in her mouth right??? How could I resist snapping some pictures of such a lovely, well behaved pup?

Yeah. Well after this one was snapped she whirled around, jumped into the pond, got completely soaked and then soaked everyone by shaking half the pond on us while wriggling gleefully. Looks are deceptive! Borderbrats are evil! LOLOLOL

La and Lily's Bunnyliscious Easter Hunt

2011-04-25T23:39:00.005+10:00

We went to one of our favorite gardens for our Easter-egg hunt again this year. It's to the point where La consider it "the Easter park" because we've gone there for the last few years. The bunny may have also brought some coloring books, crayons and wrist bangles along with the home-made chocolates he'd hidden in the eggs.

Of course you can't go on an Easter egg hunt without the proper equipment!

One requires a basket and most importantly...

BUNNY EARS! Very important for sussing out bunny-trails!

But naturally 5 year olds and 2 year olds are good at knocking the ears off a bit too often in their hunt, so they were stowed for play at home shortly after.

And since someone is growing and hasn't had a decent picture in awhile, I may have cheated in snapping a few non-egg-hunt pics as well...

The puddins at 3 weeks old...

2011-04-25T23:08:00.003+10:00

In which the puddins get their baby names. I'm sure new owners will change them but I can't just call them puddins for the whole time so between La, Nic and myself the puddins have baby names!

Bebe #1 - Pipsqueek Still our feisty little chatterbox and the pudge of the litter, you can't cuddle him without a steady stream of itty-bitty-kitty gossip!

Bebe #2 - Possum He has a habit of curling his little tail up over your fingers when cuddling and with his soft grey fur and little white points and fondness of being cuddled up like baby possum in a pouch, it seemed an obvious baby name.

Bebe #3 - Punkin, still the cuddle bug of the litter and marked like pumpkin pie with a dash of whipped cream

and of course Bebe #4, our little Peach-blossom who continues to be the most adventure prone. La wanted to name her Coo-ee because she is the first to go for a wander! LOL

"Are you my momma?"

2011-04-23T23:45:00.004+10:00

One of the kittens (3 weeks old now) toddled over to Hope (desexed Aussie Shepherd) tonight and nuzzled into her...

"Are you my momma?"
"Well.... I could be... if you want?"

"Well, okay, you smell a bit funny and you're awful big but you're fluffy and you've got nipples... close enough!"

noise of nursing even if there is no milk

Hopie is sniffing bebes ears to see if they need cleaning... bebes ears always seem to need cleaning in her opinion!

Hopie is a contented girl - babies big and little with her. LOL

The puddins at 2 weeks old...

2011-04-17T23:38:00.004+10:00

As is the habit of small creatures, little ones get bigger. And in the grand tradition of things growing bigger, the puddins are a lot more wriggly and active than the last time I tried to get pictures of them - making it tricky to a picture!

Bebe #1 - how is it possible that the most active one (hence the plushie, otherwise he kept crawling to me) that is nigh impossible to get a shot of takes the nicest picture?

Bebe #2 - the smallest at about 210g but such a snuggly little guy :)

Bebe #3 - our little cheddar-n-cream kitten, on the squidge!

Bebe#4 The plushie trick was required for her as well - I think the next few weeks are going to be filled with little rocket kittens, zooming here and there!

Jaak Panksepp

2011-04-16T00:40:00.003+10:00

Behind somewhat behind the times at the moment, I recently had his name mentioned, thought a lot of his stuff sounded really interested and went off on a google quest.

Oh. My. How have I not known this guy as anything more than the person involved with the discovery of rats laughter??? (Which I remember reading at the time and thinking, "Well yes that makes sense in a species with a complex social structure, though it's cool to see it proven.") Affective neuroscience? Fascinating stuff. I have been trawling through the video lecture materials and have a feeling the next few days will be crammed with video downloads and ordering material from the library!

An attempt to define...

2011-04-13T12:24:00.012+10:00

A number of times over the years people have mentioned to me they wish their dogs would act a bit more like mine. (Obviously these people have managed to avoid their crazy ratbag moments... LOL) The implication is that their dogs are just too (silly, wild, crazy, stubborn, insert something) to act like that which simply isn't true. I point out that Hope didn't naturally come with these skills (no dog does - nor any person for that matter, hence the terrible twos in most people and the fact that some people have yet to learn it as adults!) but rather we train for calm focused attention.

I always seem to get met with dubious and disbelieving stares though and queries as to what I mean by that and then fumble around trying to explain. It encompasses a lot of things, much of it simply how we do things in daily life as really the same basic foundations that make your dog well mannered in daily life are the same as those on the training field. The two biggest overall concepts though I find myself reminded of are that you get what you accept and you reinforce what you accept intentionally or otherwise. That includes impulse control, self control, self restraint and the ability to bring oneself down from an excited emotional state! If you accept a dog who pulls and barks nonstop and is out of control as just how things are, then by virtue of not reinforcing sitting, quiet, self-restraint, emotional regulation, attention and manners - you not only allow those things to be self reinforcing and well rehearsed you are essentially training (however inadvertently) for them!

Calm, attentive focus requires attention on their partner (you, who are also required to give it back), self-control and self-restraint, deference based in trust and mutual respect in your relationship and partnership, an on-of-switch so they can utilize the high drives when they need to and turn them back off in situations where a couch potato is called for. (May have to revise that list as I'm sure after I mull it over I'll remember stuff I've forgotten to add.)

For anyone who thinks that Hope naturally came that way though or her personality is inclined toward it may I submit Rin. The insane-o teenage working Border Collie with a less than stellar start who was given up because she was, well... an insane-o teenage working Border Collie with a less than stellar start. She is rapidly learning the same skills and she came to me as a untrained 1 year old with a history of humans being fun at times but generally irrelevant to getting what she wanted in life and sometimes an out and out hindrance to be gotten around. Rin was a dog who was working for her own interests and had little inkling why anyone else ought to matter to her let alone have their desires be deferred to. She also had a wonderful set of bad habits that led to her owner feeling he had to find someone or put her to sleep. These included:

pulling on lead and lunging while scrabbling desperately towards whatever caught her eye (oxygen? that's for whimps...)
jetting away the second she could and only coming back when she felt like it (Bless her owner, not only did he not teach a recall he taught her to run away when approached as a game!) With her previous owner this meant they'd find her 4-5 km away.
obsessively scanning for anything even remotely able to be construed as edible to steal, counter surfing (as well as landing on the stove, poking her head IN the oven etc), mugging people for food they were holding (carrying a sandwhich on the plate? now you see it, now you don't...) and once snatched you'd need the jaws of life to regain possession of
screaming if her collar was touched (and I mean with a single finger) loudly and blood curdling to the point at one event one day I had a number of people and a comp rep come dashing to our tent to check the poor dog wasn't being horribly mangled and hacked to pieces with a machete. Primarily because she feared it would mean being locked up again.
she could not abide being confined - crates, small rooms and cars resulted in screaming-fits and bashing around the back of the car boxing the windows trying to get out because she had a history of being locked up all day, out for a few hours and then locked up again.
an impulse control that would've made a gnats look wildly impressive
a tendency to randomly eat carpet/linoleum flooring/walls/furniture if you weren't looking, even if appropriate and high value chew items were available (whoops, couch arm fell into my mouth ma!)
and despite being a good natured, personable, fun loving, happy-go-lucky little gem of a sweetheart that I was head over heels in love with - all the social graces and politeness of an Ork.

Suffice to say after the first few days my husband was a bit dubious that my mental faculties were in working order every time I enthused to him what a cool dog she was.

The first time I took Rin out on lead (mind this is long after we'd worked on manners at home - we always work in babysteps!) she wanted to pull. And pull. And bounce. And whine. And eat her lead. And paw her collar off to get loose. And play Gandhi and flop over. And croc death roll. And pop up, lunge and pull. And attempt to drag me off after one unlucky pull succeeded in knocking me flat on my bum. And screech that glass shattering excited screech Border Collies seem so talented at when she discovered I was hanging on. After having spent so much time perpetually locked up, in a new place with so many potential things to do and see and sniff and jump on and chase had her in hyperdrive! As far as she was concerned I was a minor obstacle to get around rather than the person who could give her access to all these wonderfully cool things if she cooperated with a few rules.

We were in the parking lot and we stayed there, far away from everyone. The first thing we did was reinforce "mom opening the car is a cue to plant my posterior and wait because it is the only thing that will ever, ever, ever work to get me out!" That was very hard work when her poor little brain was just smoking in overload and considering she'd never HAD to put any pause between impulse and action in her prior life.

When we had some self restraint in the car she was invited out and immediately lost her brain again, dashing headlong towards all the interesting things once her body felt that rush of forward momentum. (And yes she'd had a very solid bit of exercise beforehand!) Unfortunately for her as she discovered she was on lead, so after an initial tanty she remembered herself enough to reorient back to LLW and I reinforced attention with our "Rin Would Jump Through Flaming Hoops For This Stuff" level treats. We sat to play with eye contact while standing, eye contact while sitting, eye contact while laying down and laying on her side with eye contact. We played with a few tricks and targeting, sticking with simple and known behaviours that alternated between active and calm/passive ones. From an outside perspective it probably looked like we were achieving a fat lot of nothing sitting there and goofing around. When we went to training the first time we missed out on her entire actual training classes - the cost thrown away on that fee and a 45m drive a pittance compare to the cost of teaching her ill manners could WORK... SOMETIMES. (Slot machines work sometimes too... and idiots all over pump coins into them knowing full well sometimes isn't likely to be this time because MAYBE it will be.) We lathered. We rinsed. We repeated. We moved to walking in small circles and patterns in the area. Over a few weeks we got progressively better and were able to work up to becoming progressively closer, occasionally having moments where she'd forget herself in the excitement and we had to move back a step or two before quickly regaining ground.

She would still get excited (the joys of working with motion sensitive hyper-environmentally aware Border Collies) but we simply used that as an opportunity to reinforce calmness and attention. Not only was I looking for her ability to engage me rather than be drawn by the environment but I wanted her to learn she could retain the ability to CHOOSE to engage me over it. The ability to choose and be in control of herself rather than taken for a ride on the neuro-chemistry of her impulses.

We'd already done quite a bit of doggy zen and related games so she had some basis of familiarity. Zen would include some of Sue Eh's stuff, bits of Susan Garrett's It's Yer Choice which we've used the techniques of for many years before they were given a formal outline and name and other bits and pieces. Likewise with Karen Overall's Relaxation Protocol.

We did McDevitt's Look At That games, as well as the old standard eye contact (which completely apropos of nothing my brain insists amuses itself by chirping "Look at moi Kimmy!" instead of LAT when I do it). We played rev up and rev down games and combine them with zen. I'd introduce the tuggy, rev her up by dangling it and teasing, waving it and running off hiding it, razzing it over her toes and ears, dashing and zig zagging it, tossing it in the air and catching it before giving her the cue to take it. We'd play hard and then cue out, with a big reward and lay down - sculpting the time it took her to gear down from a big one to brief. The quicker she relaxed under my hands, the quicker we'd get back to the game and bigger it'd be when it came.

We played with marking muscle relaxation, when she was laying there on her side and watching the other dogs, I'd lay my hands on her and softly but firmly draw a long stroke on a leg muscle or along the lips or eyebrows and mark and reward the action of the muscle relaxing under my hands. (Not the relaxed muscle but the act of of it releasing it's tension under my fingers.) I use this as a Conditioned Relaxation response later on, where I can touch them on the shoulder or midsection and their bodies flop over already relaxing before their brains even take time to think on it.

The general idea of all of it was that:
1.) even in the face of excitement you need to control yourself and stay aware of me as your partner (as I do you)
2.) I will give you the tools to do so and help you learn how and be a good leader and provider so we've built trust and our relationship so you can feel confident in deferring to me
3.) choosing me over the environmental distractions and self-controlled choices over blindly following impulses is something you can do; here's how and it pays well
4.) choosing to do so is the only way I will give you access to the other exciting things
5.) in the face of temptation a default known behaviour to center and ground yourself and relax
6.) if you need aid in gearing down I will assist you with the Conditioned Relaxer

It took several attempts before we went anywhere near the field or other dogs, let alone followed along with the drills when we went to training but in doing a lot of "nothing" sitting there we started laying important foundations that will make the training on the field that much easier and builds our relationship, builds trust reliance and partnership and continues to reinforce my value as the gate-holder of all fun and good things.

2011-04-12T11:30:00.002+10:00

Just a quickie... Hope got enough points at the Hastings comp to finish her Aust. FD Championship so now she's AFDCh. Cuebiyar Cross My Heart PT :)

She had fun at the next comp in Ringwood as well and was very pleased to win a bag of treats and goodies for most amusing bandana (bandanas worn by all flyball members in that comp in support of a member who is fighting cancer at the moment) in our matching disco glittery sequin bandanas too! LOL

As you can see, being a flyball dog is a very rough job indeed! LOL For those who have followed our tuggy saga you can also see our BRAND NEW burgundy FLUFFY-WUBBIE!

For those who have missed the saga, Hope had one particular tug toy known as Fluffy-Wubbie she loved and adored above all others. When it was new it was about as long as I am tall and as the name would imply - it was fluffy. She would run back at top speeds and hit it just as hard as she could and tug like mad! After months of "love" though, Fluffy was reduced to a >20cm tatty, bald and sad looking nub. It's size also meant my knuckles were in peril of recieving dental imprints when she hit it. We tried a number of different tuggy styles and I'd bought various bits of faux-fur/polar fleece with no joy. There was just no tuggy as wonderful... till now! She is in looovveeee!!! Long live Fluffy-Wubbie the Second!!!!

The puddins at 1 week old...

2011-04-11T13:50:00.005+10:00

Well some of them were more sleepy than others and more easy to get tollerably decent shots of but here are their one week old pics. :)

Bebe #1

(No prizes for why this one is nicknamed pipsqueek despite being the most chubby! He is very chatty!)

Bebe #2

Bebe #3

(Snuggled next to mumma or her paw anyway!)

Bebe #4... our little girl and the first to start opening her eyes

TWO!

2011-04-08T07:24:00.006+10:00

My little miss turned two... that seems very hard to believe as it really does (cliche aside) seem like only just a tiny little while ago that I was sitting here typing up the post annoucing her arrival a few hours after her birth. Time has literally flown with her - she was an easy pregnancy with an easy-peasie birth who later proved to be an easy baby and one thing just seems to flow into the next with her till she's become my easy, sunny kid. Mind you she knows her own mind and if you manage to actually rile her she's got a temper that's spectacular to witness and a stuborn streak a country mile wide!

Her birthday itself was a quiet one as she's not been well nor have I. But even sick we got a few smiles... sorry for pic quality, this is off my mobile.

Instead we celebrated a few days after with a lovely day of just mum and Lily (and dogs of course)

Before having her birthday picnic at Emerald Lake Park

And of course, the cake... it doesn't quite show it but it's choc with turquoise and orange.

Happy second birthday to my gorgeous girl!

We may have created a monster...

2011-04-06T16:25:00.005+10:00

It's no secret Dr. Who is a popular thing in this house and we've got a running list of cute little incidents involving it and the kids.

La bringing home a drawing from school which he proudly told me was, "The Doctor. And his TARDIS. And his sonic screwdriver!" and explaining why the TARDIS is orange with a smug little "I FIXED the chameleon circuit!" was just plain cute.

Lily started recognizing the Doctors and chirping, "Doctor DOOO!" at 18 months old we mutually agreed was all kinds of adorable.

When La spent the day dancing around chanting "I. Am. Your. Soldier!", quoting lines and speaking everything in an electronic halting voiced Dalek tone and I had to explain to his teacher what he was on about it was a tad embarrassing.

The number of times I've had to endure debates over some point of cannon from my five year old and his thirty year old father made me reflect that with his parents normal was never really going to be on the books anyway.

When Nic had on the scene where Bad Wolf decimates the Daleks and Lily glanced up from her building blocks, notices them being atomized out of existence, waved and innocently chirped "bye bye, see ya later!" we both snorted our drinks.

The fact that Laurent, having nabbed a colouring marker and scrawled a green slash across his forehead, spent the afternoon informing people he was "Slitheen" and about to emerge from his skin suit while making farting noises was a bit much but still... it was cute, in a geek!Pride kind of way. To be honest, we always rather suspected he was possessed and one day the mother ship would one day return for him... so a skin-suited Raxacoricofallapatorian wasn't too far a stretch.

For the past week though my darling little spawn latched onto a pen he asserts is a sonic screwdriver (and dang if he hasn't mastered the "you've dribbled on yourself" look if you try and correct him) and steadfastly started REFUSING to do a dang thing unless he first sonic screwdrivered it. Food? Not edible unless it's scanned and analyzed first. Going anywhere? Not unless it's the direction the sonic screwdriver is leading him. Clothing? Not unless he's checked it's not an alien in disguise. Twenty. Four. Hours. A. Day.

We MAY possibly just have gone a smidge too far in indoctrinating the children.

Hello world...

2011-04-05T18:15:00.006+10:00

Meet our new little sweetlings, who arrived last night -

Two little ginger tabbies, one with colouring similar to our own Jasper and one with a white blaze and boots

a little blue tortoiseshell girl

and a blue-silver tabby baby with white blaze and boots.

They're just beautiful and doing very well with their mummy. La is over the moon, chattering about what we're going to name them and how many new toys he wants to buy them in a few weeks when they can play in between cooing over how gorgeous they are, how cute the little milk squeeks and slurps are, praising mummy for being brilliant and repeating everything he's ever been told about kitten development. I feel very sorry for his teachers in the following weeks as they and the class will undoubtedly be hearing ALL about every detail and factoid that he recalls. Nostalgia has hit BIG time, as he recalls our litters of foster kittens and Emi from last year as well. He still remembers each of them. He's not the only one nostalgia has hit either admittedly!

In the meantime, Hopie had a good time at the Hastings flyball comp and was doing a great job. I had an awesome time, given I had Nic minding both kiddos both days - which meant two full days of no kidlets and all dogs! I love my kids to bits but sometimes it's nice to miss them and just be myself without having to worry about what fresh chaos La is getting into. After a week of Lily having a sky-high fever for several days and did this all day so long, at least so long as she was being held...

as well as craptastic sleep and La having a few days where he was alternating between mad-hatter hyper and tolerating things badly this was especially welcome!

(La in an insane-but-happy moment. And anyone reckon SickLily has got the sad puppy dog eyes mastered? Just a bit?)

Last but not least a picture I'd meant to post awhile back. For those who don't know the back story, Shadow came to me from his owner via Maremma Rescue Vic. His owner "fudged" his history, saying he was used to sheep and poultry. Shadow quickly demonstrated he had some pretty significant issues with wanting to be predatory. He had us absolutely in despair over it and at my wits end because nothing seemed to work for well over a year and even when Jodie came over she couldn't see him acting with much guardian instinct. Not being safe around them here wasn't even an issue limited to our own animals safety but presented a major risk if he were ever to escape as not only would neighboring animals be at risk but their owners would be within their rights to have him destroyed. I kept working with him though because of just that reason... and scenes like this are VERY sweet! Yep... that's the dog who couldn't help but chase them and wanted to eat them. Snoozing next to his best buddy Timtam. The real test will come with the birds but we're moving slowly and cautiously at this point.

Behold - a sign of the end of days...

2011-03-28T20:37:00.002+11:00

I. Went. Jogging.

Yep. I'll give you all a moment to pause and catch your breath from that hysterical laughter.

After not having jogged in *mumbletymumble* ages I started off on our walk and that oh-so-intelligent part of my brain piped up "hey, wouldn't it be nice to get back to jogging?" So I figured what they heck and started. First little while was an adrenaline rush. Whoo hoo... I fell into it like I'd never stopped! That little voice in my head was positively smug - ha! Not so out of shape after all! Yeah. Well... pride and the fall and all that...

I made it not quite a kilometer before the stitch in my side made a persuasive enough argument that we walked most of the rest of our normal nightly-walkies route. So yeah... maybe that whole jogging idea is one of those things I need to do slightly more often. And um, maybe some of that core focused stuff going by the general 'oh hey, remember me, I'm the muscle you forgot you had - surprise!' feeling in that area.

The dogs thought this new revelation was BRILLIANT. They'd figured all my speeds faster than plod had been broken! Who knew???

Now our usual route is along a quiet dirt road and we almost never see anyone along the way aside from the cows, sheep or occasional tethered goat. Today however I also had a few years scared off my life when my mob of dogs saw SOMETHING in the dark and stopped dead in their tracks. Sierra, being the oldest, vaguely recalled hearing "guardian instinct" somewhere in the Australian Shepherd job description quietly growled a low warning. Which is more intimidating if you've never met her and don't know this is the dog who jumps when she's startled by her own farts. Her lieutenants - Hope, Rin and Shadow took a moment to look mutually confused (nope, we haven't done anything to make her peevish at us - huh, must be something else!) before deciding it was their job as lieutenants to back her up even if they had no clue what they were backing her up on. Still they get points for sounding intimidating, even if all three heads were constantly swiveling in randomly opposite directions that seemed to be everywhere other than where the deadly serial killer was apparently laying in wait. The serial killer, who, by the way happened to be one of our neighbors who do know my mob are harmless and their completely stone deaf fat Methuselah of a beagle who paid them utterly NO notice. ~_~ How embarrassment!

2011-03-20T14:17:00.003+11:00

Yesterday we had our Pakenham comp with Hopie (which I *still* managed to be late to... gods I miss traveling with just me and the dogs some days!) yesterday and was quite pleased with it. She did pretty well but even more exciting she was fine with us sitting next to the dog which she'd been previously rather worried about which was awesome!

In the meantime the next day we went to training as per usual but I only took Sierra and Rin as Hope had what we thought was a bug bite but might have been the start of a hotspot. (It's looking like a bug bite after all though!) After Si had a few runs for fun, Rin and I sat down together waiting for our turn and playing in the sunshine. As we goofed around practicing down/sits, please, LAT, eye contact, targeting, on/off switch and leave it I had to admire how clever she is. I had a thought that it was really serendipity that we were sitting here enjoying this today. If I'd not have happened to read the message about her when I did, hadn't responded to ask about her or had they not called VHA in the first place to see if anyone would take her as a last resort before putting her down she might have been PTS and I wouldn't have half the fun in my life I did at that moment. I am so, so, so glad things worked out as they did!

She is a mad hatter, feral-head, wild child, crazy nutterbutter Borderbrat but since I think those traits make for a lot of fun, you can read that as "she's such a deeply cool dog!" Mind you she's not the dog for everyone so I can understand how she'd be trouble elsewhere. She is a professional cardboard box and plastic bottle demolisher. (Incidentally the people at Bunnings must think I'm a mad box hoarder given how often I come in for more boxes...) She needs if a dead minimum of a morning romp with the tennis-ball launcher around the paddocks, an hour or two of merry chaos wrestling around with her sisters at full throttle, a good long walk and training games throughout the day to take the edge off her need to do something. Why? Because if you don't that energy and busy little brain are liable to be found with their mouth on a couch or chair or WALL getting ready to to chew chunks to test which is the highest in palatablity. She is busy and curious and dastardly inventive and wonderfully bloody mindedly creative to work with. She has no sense of gravity and is more liable to sleep on the top of the fridge or woodshed roof than an actual dog bed. (Yes I could change that btw, as I have with perching/sleeping on countertops and stovetops but there is something about her snoozing on the fridge top that makes me laugh every single time, so I choose to keep it.) She comes with two speeds: fast and may-redefine-lightspeed-as-a-standard-measurement. She's Sam I Am in Green Eggs And Ham who must run through every variable when told you don't want green eggs and ham. Yeah you might THINK you don't but what about here or there, in a house, with a mouse, in a box,with a fox, in a car, in a tree, in a train, in the dark, in the rain, with a goat or on a boat? In short she is a nut but she's my kinda nut and I luffs her!

In different news I finished my March challenge painting of the boat - it's a miniature, just under 8x8cm (3x3"). The white isn't reading quite right on the camera and a lot of the more subtle blue, lavender and green undertones in the white don't show.

I also started on Rambo, a 14 year old Sheltie, who also belongs to the team-mate I painted Leo for. He's quite grey in the face so it'll be interesting to paint that much white and try to make it look not rubbish. Here's the rough-in:

I've also done a bit more on the black tri dog and on my cows but part of what I did was some veerrryyy thin glazes which require extra time to set fully so you don't pick up the layer again when you keep going so nothing too thrilling on them atm.

Dexter

2011-03-12T11:31:00.004+11:00

I hadn't said anything to most people just after, not really feeling up to talking about it but I think I've put off talking about it as long as I can.

At the last update Dexter had been prescribed antibiotics long term and supplemental soft-food. He appeared to be going well, not eating much chaff but eating pellets and softer veg/fruit plus the critcare. The mites/ear funk he'd had when I got him had cleared. I'd thought if he had to have these issues at least he's dealing well with all the fussing, wasn't distressed by his injections (smeared a banana bit on the counter and did it while he was licking every molecule up) and he took to the crit care routine nudging the tip for more.

Then I'd been gone with Hopie at flyball on the Sat, leaving early in the morning and getting back lateish and and when I saw him in his little bed I knew we were in big trouble. I was grabbing his carrier and saying get back in the car, ring the vets to say get everything ready when he sort of sighed and passed. The best guess is maybe the antibiotics and/or not getting enough fibre with only pellets/critical care vs hay or stress from the abscess caused GI stasis and I wasn't there to stop it in time. Probably the fact that he'd had the problem for so long before I got him contributed, maybe if he'd seen the vet with the old people it'd have never developed the abscess. I can't undo having not been there when he went into stasis and I hate the thought he'd have felt ill and wanting me all day while I was gone. But I wish even more it were better known by people to have their vets keep a close eye on their bunnies teeth so things can be caught before they're problems. Please have routine health checks bunny mums and dads, they might save a life.

Rest in peace Dexie, until we all meet up at the Rainbow Bridge again one day.

2011-03-03T08:19:00.007+11:00

A brief update on my tri colour Aussie boy - he's gone to the salon and gotten his first layer of highlights! Don't worry, they will be knocked back shortly and his eye shape (gah - too ROUND!) will be fixed so I can move onto his nose and lips etc.

Part of the inspiration for wanting to paint again comes from the a love of the works by my MIL's godmother Mania Mavro along with a few other artists that were friends of my MIL's father and taught him to paint. Ms. Mavro was an absolutely amazing painter - beautiful sense of colour, very bold and energetic. Here's a few examples of their works:

the above are Ms Mavro's, painted in the interwar period while the below are by a friend who taught Nic's grandfather to paint somewhat earlier:

After having not touched a paintbrush since I was very young, I decided to start trying to teach myself to paint instead of waiting to attend a proper course in a few years time because I loved looking at them. (Obviously I'm NO WHERE near the talent and skill here... yet!) So in November and I spent most of Nov/Dec doing 'sketch a day' challenges. I didn't touch anything in January but picked the brush up in February. I finished a few quick challenges along with a small Collie portrait. While I'm most drawn to a semi (vs photo/hyperrealistic) realistic style and animals, I also would LOVE to be able to paint like these artists. The trouble being that while it LOOKS simple it's deceptive to do so in a way that doesn't just create so much messy murky muck slopped on a canvas. And I, um... fall woefully short on those skills, along with lacking the familiarity and understanding of the subjects I have a bit of a headstart in with dogs. So in short, it's really frigging hard - as my first attempt proves!

Leo, finished painting #4

2011-03-02T01:29:00.004+11:00

So here is Leo in his finished state... he's the third painting I've attempted and the fourth finished. I've been pleased with my progress and how a few tips I'd recieved off the critique of my first two attempts worked out on this one. Here's the full shot:

Not the greatest photo, the second close-up gives a better idea of colouring - for example the white of the ruff in the first actually isn't a flat white blob there but has lots of subtle shades of grey and lavender. I think the difficulty in photographing is to do with some colours being more glossy and hence reflective of the cameras light than others. He's 5x7 on canvas, paints are Derivan Matisse Structure in carbon black, titanium white, cad med red, cad med yellow and ultramarine blue. (Pthalo didn't work for it.)

I'm also super excited about my new March acrylics challenge. When I first saw the reference photo I thought there was no way I could do it - rows on rows of boats in dock, not my favorite subject to start with and this monster had no less than 36 boats along with many buildings in the background! It'd be a nightmare even for someone very experienced let alone me. I think I've found a crop I like though - not 100% sure the composition is good buuuutttt excited to get started all the same! Here's a sneak peak of my crop intended for a mini canvas:

In the meantime I'm working slowly on the black tri Aussie, the cows and the floral one atm.

Lukieboos is going home...

2011-02-26T19:07:00.003+11:00

Luka is going home to his mum after being on vacation here, which we knew was not going to go over well with the president and vice president (aka La and Lily) of the Lukieboo Fan Club. When I first told La he wailed that Luka needed to stay here and proceeded to have a fit before curling up while glaring and pretending to be a fire breathing dragon roasting me. Not one for subtlety of expression our La!

I reminded him he's known all along Luka isn't ours to keep, that we'll see him again, that his mum misses him a lot and so on. He was unimpressed, so being a good mum I told him it's okay to be sad or angry and asked if there's something we might do that might make him feel better. Maybe he could paint a picture or make a book with photos in it that he could look at to remember all the fun he's had? When I didn't get much response I told him to just think about it.

A little while later while we were cleaning up the yard he's informed me he knows what will make him feel better since Luka has to go home. He does want to paint a picture but apparently the only thing that will make it better is to get a puppy of his very own. ~_~ I shoulda known better than to ask! He was doubly unimpressed when I told him that we're not getting a puppy for a good while yet and when we do it won't be just his. Poor La, it's not easy being five!

The finished bit of fluff

2011-02-22T07:56:00.004+11:00

From the WC Acrylics board Different Strokes Feb 2011 challenge. I'd been undecided if I wanted to go with my usual way of doing things (aiming for realistic, hitting a somewhat painterlyish approximation of it) or try for something else. I got it to a base layer of 'usual', shelved it because I didn't like it and the yesterday decided "ah heck, the deadline is tonight, I'm going to just play and see what turns up." First I started doing sort of impressionistic squinty smudges but 10 mins in I gave it a good wash and this little bit of fluff popped out. LOL It's what happens when you paint sitting in the car waiting to pick your kid up with the comic section of newspaper spread out. Hopefully I can get a bit better at other styles playing with these challenges!

8x10 canvas panel, acrylics of course ;)

painting updates

2011-02-18T18:52:00.005+11:00

I've been painting a fair bit this week... a bit of cheap therapy for a week that's not been wonderful. These are my fourth, seventh and third attempts at painting respectively having not painted while I was doing the drawing-a-day challenges the other months.

Worked a bit more on this lad. He's acrylics on 10x12" (25.4x30.5cm) canvas panel. Still early days yet but at least he's not *quite* as flat as he was anyway.

A new one started the other day... second and third layers of mumma cow having a sweet moment with her bubba. (First layer is just a light wash of pale goldytan to get rid of white canvas.) Acrylic on 4x6" (13x18cm) canvas. The glare in the upper right corner is just camera as some colours are more matte or glossy than others. Deviated from pure Zorn palette by adding pthalo blue here.

The base of another I started working the other day. I like starting new ones. LOL I have another of Sierra and one of Hope already planned... to be fair I do work on them all at the same time as I don't do wet-on-wet, so I go from one canvas to another as they use similarish colour mixes and there's no sense wasting paint while waiting for the first to dry enough to do the next bit on. Leo is a blue merle Collie Rough owned by one of my flyball teammates. Collie fur is proving surprisingly different than Aussie coat and I've had to totally change brushes to get the start effect of his longer ruff.

2011-02-13T13:25:00.003+11:00

For those who don't know when Cami and Verity passed I buried them in the same area (they were always inseperable in life, so it seemed right they be together now too) and decided to make the area a memory garden we call the Rainbow Bridge Garden. Where Verity rests I put an angel statue and it's surrounded with forget-me-nots, little salvias, roses, daffodils, a federation daisy, iris and some other favorites. I go there whenever I'm thinking about them and it's a sunny, warm spot to remember things.

While I was out there today a big dragonfly appeared. Now I know dragonflies aren't uncommon but in almost 5 years of living here I've never seen one on our property so it was pretty surprising and I stood still to watch it for awhile.

Instead of flitting off and around though as I'd expected, it circled around me for ages about a meter and a half out, just in circles. It was so weird I just stood still watching it and feeling a bit amazed, we had dragonflies all over in the US and I've never had one circle me let alone for such a long time! Then it flew over Verity's angel and just hovered there for a good two minutes (timed on my mobile) before flying back over me and repeating the circles for not quite five minutes. It flew back to her angel for just a second before La came up to see what I was doing and when I looked back from him it'd gone.

Amazing hey?

A Borderbrat update

2011-02-13T11:39:00.003+11:00

Because my feral little pointy black Rindog is just such a funny little nutterbutter!

Fiftyone billionty in my photo series of "Places Border Collies Do Not Belong(But Go Anyway)"

She knows she's not supposed to go over the fence into the paddocks. Technically she hasn't gone over the fence. Technically. ;p At first she'd bounce over and I'd tell her to get back. Then she'd try to come under and I'd tell her to get back. Then she tried to wiggle through and I told her to get back. Eventually she came upon this solution and just perches there like a cat.

Fiftyone billionty and one in the series. The pile of bricks I've got stacked waiting to be made into garden paving. They give a nice vantage point and soak up the heat so they're warm. Comfy hey?

And an ever so slightly SOGGY Rin-chan. Courtesy of all our storms!

Goofy girls. LOL

And a few of her just being bootiful. She's such a gorgeous girl. :)

2011-02-07T19:48:00.011+11:00

By way of update on the critter front, Dexter had to go back in for another tooth trim - it'd already grown that much! While we were there we could tell the other incisors hadn't grown though, which we'd hoped they would. Still I've read they can take 6+ weeks to re-erupt properly after an injury so there is some hope they may regrow. In the meantime there was still some puss around the molar where they suspect the abscess so he's been prescribed long-term antibiotic injections (procaine/pen G). Bunnies abscess a bit differently than most animals. They lack an enzyme which makes it liquid and easy to drain like most animals. As well they tend to encapsulate it and it grows very slowly which is good in one way as they don't suffer from fever or so much pain but difficult in another as it means they are difficult to get rid of and don't easily drain.

He's very good for the injections, I give him a bit of cherry tomato and he doesn't even notice the little needle. He's lot a bit of weight as well so he's on Critical Care which is a special soft food for bunnies that is nutritious and appealing. It gets mixed into a paste and fed to him and he is just the sweetest fellow - just sits there on his little pillow and has a dollop squirted in, chews it, little tongue licking his lips and when he's done has a bit more. If I'm a bit slow he'll sniff at or lick the tip! LOL The pics are him on his little pillow while I was mixing the crit care up and after his food getting a kiss from La.

All together this week seems to just have disappeared on me... namely with school restarting and the roof (that'd be the one replaced last year due to springing a leak and frying all electrics...) re-sprung a leak and causing water damage in 3 rooms. Getting the roofing company to honor it's guarantee is interesting. To boot the tractor that was just fixed busted again and seriously I'm half expecting at any moment to hear a country guitar twang and the start of a theme song about how life done did me wrong writing all this! LOL My birthday was a few days ago as well and that turned out to be quiet but nice. Lily and I hung around the house with the dogs, kits and buns during the day. I got some painting done. I had a nice dinner with everyone and Nic totally surprised me as I was expecting no gift given how many big bills we've generated by presenting me with a laptop! He's apparently been paying for one to be refurbished for a year or so! It's not quite ready but still very exciting! (Our last computer predates our relationship so it was due!) Then Sunday I got given a day to myself at Flyball, just me and Hopie out having fun!

Here's La on his first day back at what would have been the equivalent to the start of primary school vs preschool/kinder. The school has a new building almost finished and welcomed a new teacher who will be sharing in his class so he's excited about that as well as being back with his friends again. A few more of Sir 5 Year Old.

and this is the view just near his school... how gorgeous is that hey!

Plus one of the Lilypillie, who is enjoying having mum all to herself (well, comparatively... still has to share with the furkids) now that La is in school full time!

Art wise, I've royally slacked off most of January. Trying to get back into the swing of things and make time for myself in February. I have two paintings on the go and one more in my goals for the month list. The first is (act shocked...) a dog. Nothing new there although I'm playing with a limited palette - cad red med, cad yellow med, black and white. Here's the roughed in first layer, excuse the dreadful flash shine, rug and jeans!

The second and third are part of challenges. Number two is a WC Acrylics board Different Strokes challenge. The rules let you crop, choose a section/detail, enlarge it or develop it any way you feel like. I really liked the orange lilies up against the bronzy background plant, so I'm planning to tightly crop on that. I can't decide if I want to go with my usual way of doing things given I'm still very new to it or try for something looser, more impressionistic and impastoish. This is the base layer for if I go my usual way. Wibbledywobbdly, indecisive.

The third challenge is to take myself totally out of my comfort zone and go to an abstract challenge I happened upon on the Abstract forum - which is to see how little 'detail' can you use in a piece of art and still convey your 'meaning' - however you understand that term. The subject is a rainstorm, hopefully mixed with a yellowtail black cockatoo. Start of the storm...

Random and unconnected to anything - our neighbors foals, who are just too much fun to watch running around! I mucked with it a bit, think it might make a nice painting eventually?

Poor Dexter indeed! The results.

2011-01-29T14:45:00.004+11:00

Well there's good news and bad news from our vet visit today. Here is why I knew we needed to visit asap!

That white thing is his lower right incisor tooth. (It's a single tooth, I'll get to why the lower left and upper right and left front teeth aren't visible in a moment.) It's huge - it ought to end somewhere around where you see the gums (pinkish bit to the bottom left of the tooth) but instead measures at 2cm long, which is long enough to be poking into his upper lip.

The good news is that his general condition is good otherwise, aside from my thoughts about his manky looking ears being correct and not just an issue he gets when he's moulting! (Mites, requiring topical application to get rid of.) The long lower incisor got trimmed today and is likely to require routine trimming.

The bad news is the tooth situation was definitely not limited to an overgrown incisor which I'd kind of suspected but hoped I was misjudging given the ear lowering and slightly atypical chewing motion. With a second pair of hands holding him we got a better view of the rest of his front teeth which I'd thought were just worn oddly. Nope, the upper incisors and lower left incisor are fractured. This is likely from an injury several months back that simply broke all 3 of them off near the gumline. They may or may not regrow, only time will tell. If they don't and require removing, it will be difficult to extract them because there is so little to grip onto to loosen them.

When we were able to view inside his mouth to his molars using the otoscope, the upper right premolar #1 is missing and the left premolars #1&2 have puss which means the start of an abcess going on. The good news on that is that it was caught in the early stages. In addition the lower premolar and molars are misaligned. Poor lads mouth is a right proper mess! So the damage for anyone who thinks rabbits are a "cheap" pet btw was at about $150 today (consult, trim, antibiotics and revolution) and $30ish for each retrim every 3-4 weeks! He will go back in a week for another antibiotic (Pen-G) injection ($30) and dental x-rays (about $350ish) to see what is going on in his mouth. Hopefully it won't require further surgery to remove the teeth which would of course be more on top of that. Here's a video on normal rabbit teeth and routine problems from Medirabbit for anyone curious:

Poor Dexter...

2011-01-28T16:41:00.003+11:00

I noticed his one ear was down. This in itself is nothing big, they do that sometimes but this just a bit more relaxed looking than normal and more often than normal perhaps. I thought maybe I'm just being paranoid. He was okay otherwise, eating well, active, normal litter box output and he could put it up, nothing wrong with his ears either so far as I could see.

Then I looked a bit closer, hm, was he chewing a bit oddly? A bit more to one side than the other perhaps? Nothing huge, maybe even just the difference between him having less fluffy lips with his short rex coat meaning the movements are more exaggerated than the others?

I had a little niggling suspicion. Ear down on the left. Chewing to the left. Ears on pups often go down when teething as the ligaments are goofing around, perhaps something sort of akin to that. So I went to peek at his teeth. I can't see them all, lacking a rabbit vets tools to see the rear dentition but as it happens I didn't really need them. I am really amazed he didn't show more signs or more obvious ones earlier - I'll try to get a picture when I have someone to hold him.

So we'll be visiting the vets. I do believe that sound is the sound of my wallet sobbing at the thought of Very Expensive Dental Work!

21 months

2011-01-27T21:22:00.005+11:00

Is waking up to snuggles and lazy morning bibi - a girl after her mothers heart who values a snuggly quilt and staying in bed for awhile after waking in the morning.

Uses any excuse to grab my mobile or a telephone and pretend to gab.

Loves to dance till she's dizzy anytime a song comes on or someone claps for her. And then dance some more after laughing at herself for having fallen.

Is giggles that melt my heart, endless kisses freely given and a cheeky smile that crinkles the corner of her eyes.

Loves her brother to bits, trailing after him with stars and heroworship in her eyes... except when she doesn't. La is becoming familiar with the fine art of apologizing to someone half his size, twice his stubbornness and who holds a grudge the size of Texas when wronged.

Adores dogs. Especially WOOKA, who hops up onto the woodpile to peer in the window and play peek-a-boo while she peers out at him on the couch. Although for a pillow while you nap Sierra is the better choice because it tends to stay still longer.

Listens when you say no, actually stops and puts things back if told to do so, helps clean up, helps put away dishes/laundry when pointed to the correct cupboard and is generally well behaved. A novelty considering we're used to struggling with her brother on four of those five counts. Gods it's nice to have an EASY child, however un-PC it may be to say!

Recognizes Doctor Who on sight (Doctors 9, 10 and 11 all claimed as Doctah... 11 to her daddy's delight and mummy's dismay...) and includes Tah-dish as part of her vocab. A proud, if geeky, moment all around.

Loves vegemite on toast, mandarin, nashi pears, ginger biscuits, cucumber and anything sweet.

Still can't stand an open door and MUST close it.

Climbs like a terror and is fearless in exploring her physical limitations. Shades of her brother, although she's saner about choosing her footing and gauging her risks and doesn't deliberately TRY to fall.

Amazes me with the degree from which she can go from sunshine in summer - sweet, warm, going with the flow (99.5% of the time) to a strident and implacable Napoleon (0.5% of the time). This is a girl who knows her own mind and is sure enough of it she will stand against the world in her beliefs.

Still has curls in her hair but only on the tips now for the most part.

When she tantrums, she will taken comfort when SHE is ready and not an iota of a second before. Try it - as several well intending friends have found - and she'll pause just long enough to say NO in no uncertain terms. When she's ready no will change to yes and she'll be back to cuddles.

Bobbing bunnah

2011-01-11T23:05:00.008+11:00

When I got Dexter, I'd been told that he only drank from a water bottle and previous attempts to get him to use a bowl hadn't worked well. I prefer bowls as the buns drink more water per minute, a good crock can keep cool and ice cubes won't jam it in hot weather. So I was keen to get him on a bowl but he was less certain about this whole switch-a-roo business! The first attempts were, well, "less than overwhelmingly spectacular". I started coaxing him by first holding pieces of veg just above the water and later dipping them till Dexter ended up bobbing for (proverbial) apples. LOL It didn't take a few sessions before he noticed it was good for DRINKING too! I'm not sure if it's because of his short rex coat or what but he dunks half his muzzle and comes up with his whole muzzle sodden and dribbly as well, which inevitably seems to result is whomever is nearby ending up a bit wet as well!

Completely unrelated I'm also trying to organize myself to get a plan going for all the things I want to do around this place. One of the major things I want to do is knock off more from our monthly mortgage repayment than we're currently doing. I also want to pad out our "vet/pet" savings a bit more each month as I am very keen to have another Aussie pup and either this year or next a PBGV now that La will be in school full time. I was very tempted to adopt one who came up a few weeks back but more practically I ought to attend to other things first, particularly wrt Shadow because we don't know how long that will take, neighbors weren't amused at the time and Nic is grumpy on the subject to say the least.

We need to do a major overhaul for quite a few things including:

new computer - current is from 2003 and I want a lap top!
new stove/oven - our current one is almost as old as me, the oven bit is completely kaput and cannot be repaired
new washing machine and fridge - both are really old and have been fixed a million times, with the warning from the fix-it guy that they are on their last legs
restump the area under the bathroom - the only place NOT restumped and currently sunk
renovate the bathroom - new bathtub, flooring, tiles etc
repair the ceiling in the study (water damage from the other year, it's fine but really ugly and warped)
a new chainsaw and drill
repaint and refit the laundry, study and loo
put down pathing stones on the walks, to cover the road base and cut down on the mud the dogs drag in
I also want to start saving toward a hydro bath and force dryer for the dogs

Totally aside from all of that I'd like to get Sierra, Rin and Luka all competing and with titles this year, have Hopie finish (or come as close as possible to) her Flyball Masters and finish up her HSA-s. Nothing too reaching given I'll likely reroute some money from training/comps/travel for the other stuff.

Part of it is that we do need to do all these things and I want to get them all sorted out of course but I am also very keen on being able to take the kids overseas - particularly I really want to have us all go to France and be able to visit Dives sur Mer, St Lo etc and financially I know that will not happen until we've taken care of those expenses and knocked a bit more off the mortgage so I'm shooting for having enough for a proper holiday there in 2012-2013.

Unintentionally Trained

2011-01-11T18:47:00.005+11:00

Anyone who is owned by an Aussie knows that it means you will never, ever be alone again. Humans, the Aussie Shepherd is sure, NEED proper supervision at all times or something awful is liable to befall them. Mine are convinced I'm particularly in need of a full escort and this annoyingly seems to include trips to the loo.

Unfortunately for them, I have an annoyingly human habit of not recognizing that The Evil Drain Monster might suck me down the loo when I flush and prefer privacy to a furry escort. The first several times they did it I told them firmly to shoo. They backed up, just enough to be out of the room so I could close the door. Having banished my valiant vanguard they then started laying down with noses and eyes pressed to the crack under the door. Again I had to tell them to SHOO. At which point they all back up exactly one step and lay down as near as possible without being ordered to scram. Now Luka, who is on holiday here has picked this up and I've realized when they took one step back, lay down and SIGHED dramatically in SYNC they've all picked it up unintentionally trained behaviour chain... oh the joys!

Random randomness

2011-01-03T20:49:00.004+11:00

It is very sweet to wake up to a bunny curled up on your pillow next to your cheek.
My kids grandfather may be a professional international dancer/instructor but they themselves are going to be ones who get 'points for enthusiasm'.
It's really annoying when the universe presents a lovely "would jump for it any other time" opportunity but at a not-so-perfect-for-lovely-opportunities time. It's not the be all and end all but it is annoying all the same.

No matter how many times Laurent mispronounces words like "interesting" as "in-STIR-ing", particularly as he tends to say it like a demented Sherlock Holmes I laugh.
Jasper (kitty) is very glad to finally have a rabbit in the house who thinks cats are good for sharing a bed with instead of thumping in annoyance or give him what for if he comes too close. Dexter was raised with kitties and doesn't mind sharing his cushions or cuddlehuts.
Lily is rocking out with a lot of sentences at the moment, most of which involve the dogs in some form - "Luka, here puppy!", "Titty (that's 'the kitty' btw) wants kiss.", "Luka! LUKA! Where areeeeeeeee you???", "Luuukkkkaaaaaa! Have a ball?" She is SO my child! (Luka is the only dog in the house at the moment to routinely be hollered for by name, so I'm not just leaving out her calling for Sierra, Hope or Rin.) Non-dog sentences include, "Close the door!", "'ere you go mum!" and just-for-her-brother, "Oh WOW, COOL!"
Babies - be they four legged milk breath pups or two legged little infants are possibly the most dangerous creatures on earth. They make me stupidly clucky in under a nano-second.
I miss my dogs at the rainbow bridge. I want them back. Veri and Cami. Cade, he's on my mind all the time at the moment, every time I see a little dog. Bella and Bria, even 5 and 10 years on. I know it's impossible but the hole where they should be is just too empty for bearing sometimes and I'd give just about anything for even one more day. While I'm wanting the impossible I'd like my little Matilda Muzzie back too.
I hate that I'm seeing age in Sierra recently. She's healthy and fit, a young and bouncy 10 - most days by sheer dint of verve you'd swear she's younger than Hope. Occasionally on very cold days I see her stand up just a bit slower and stretch herself from some ache or doze in the sun in a certain way that speaks of age and it reminds me that my eternal puppy one day will be an old dog in a way I'm not at all ready for. I very much prefer to play ostrich with my head in the sand on the matter just now.
I hate the number of my friends who have had to learn to live with the sorrow of having lost their loved companions lately. Cancer, in all it's awful forms, sucks.

among the reasons I will be glad Nic is going back to work from vacation
1. he left a can of spray paint out - with an unsupervised 5 year old... 'nuff said
2. he left food dye (for play dough) next to the kids snacks (crackers, raisins, nuts etc) and Darling Tornado Child has decided when he was given permission to get raisins from the cupboard for a snack the dyes presence meant it was okay if he dyed them blue. Turns out counters... and kids... dye better than raisins.
Your not quite 2 year old proudly demonstrating she knows how to breastfeed (holding her teddy bear for bibi) is unspeakably cute. Especially when she is SO pleased with how clever she is!
I am a hopeless handler who is good at doing remarkably dorky stuff - witness this weeks genius: giving poor Hope the signal to come around to my right side (right hand held in a flat 5, moved from hip forward - usually used in obedience/freestyle) instead of her release signal to get the ball in flyball (similar but with the LEFT hand) resulting in the poor gal looking rather baffled but humoring her clearly mad partner by coming around to my right and sitting. She was clearly wondering A.) why the heck I was using a non-flyball cue especially when the start lights had CLEARLY gone off and B.) why the heck I was repeating it when she'd already done as asked. Ladies and gents - I assure you, red is not my natural hair colouring....
Small boys make up for being Tornados most of the time by cuddling their sister, rubbing her back and singing, "We love Lilypillie, she's our pretty baby, she has chubby tummy and a fatty little bummy and we loves her cuz she's our little bayyyyyyyyyybeeeeee!" complete with dance hands for the finish.

Dexter

2010-12-31T15:06:00.005+11:00

Meet Dexter... and his little stuffed bunny friend who has been with him since he was a baby. He is, hopefully, going to be Nilla's husbun once she is better - as she has a URI at t he moment - and he is neutered. He is a 2 year old mini rex whose previous owners were moving to New Zealand and didn't feel taking him was going to work. Even my DH is in love as Dexter is as happy to beg a pat from him as he is from me, whereas Romeo will only ask for ear rubs from me or occasionally La (particularly if there is goodies to be had) and Cinna and Nilla will ask him for pets if momma isn't available.

He's quite taken with hay, just pounced on it and started gobbling like it was going out of style... guess we know a good thing when we see one!

Close up of his curly-whirly whiskers and curly-whirly eyelashes... so cute!

And last but not least - this morning I was woke from a nap with DD to find someone small and fuzzy snuggled next to my cheek. Awwww... so naturally after I got up I snapped some pics of him supervising me folding some laundry on the floor. LOL

Not Just For Christmas

2010-12-23T11:59:00.004+11:00

At Christmas, it's easy to see an explosion of animals bred for the holiday season. These are often victims of impulse purchase, sourced from puppy mills and irresponsible breeders and neglected or dumped in the following year. They contribute to the tens of thousands of animals euthanized each year.

While many are aware of the horrors of puppy mills, bunnies are vulnerable as they are falsely seen as cheap, cuddly, low maintenance 'starter' pet for children. The reality is a bit different:
Bunnies Are Not Cheap
While initial purchase price may seem cheap the associated costs over the rabbits lifetime can be expensive. All rabbits should be desexed by a rabbit specialist, vaccinated and microchipped and these costs factored into the choice to bring a rabbit into your life. Young rabbits mature quickly and you can run into unwanted litters, hormonal and territorial behaviour, alarming rates of uterine cancer and poor litter box habits. Adopting a bunny from a shelter or rescue may mean this is $50-80, whereas private desexing/vax/microchipping may range upwards of $250 for vaccinations, check-up, spay, bloodwork, fluids, monitoring, pre and post op pain management, microchip etc. They will require vaccination annually and may require specialized and potentially expensive treatment for dental issues and GI stasis in their lifetimes.
Bunnies Are Not "Cuddly"
Bunnies are prey animals by nature and physically delicate. The exuberance, desire to pick up, grab, carry around and cuddle with whatever grip their little hands can manage are frightening and dangerous for rabbits. It often results in broken legs or backs or bunnies who learn to bite or kick when picked up after having been accidentally mishandled. Bunnies do enjoy attention and affection but a child's idea of having fun and enjoyment is not generally compatible with how prey animals like rabbits express and understand affection.

Bunnies Are Not "Starter" Pets
The reality is that rabbits are active, highly social animals who require a commitment of 10-12 years. They represent a significant commitment in terms of time, money and owner dedication. Being highly social animals, rabbits ideally should live in pairs as well.

Bunnies Are Not Low Maintenance
Most 'hutches' sold for rabbit housing are woefully inadequate. We would not imagine locking a cat or dog in a cage barely 3 times it's body length and on wire for the duration of it's life but this is what most bunnies are expected to consider home. Wire bottoms can lead to painful pressure sores, broken toes, injured legs/feet etc. The small sizes lead to poor long term health due to lack of muscle tone, loss of bone, obesity, poor cardiovascular health, poor gut health etc as well as the mental cruelty of such confinement and isolation. Outdoor animals are more at risk of disease, mites, fleas, predation, temperature extremes and owners not noticing illness. Bunnies hide illness very well and it is hard to notice subtle changes in an animal who is out of sight most of the day. Any outdoor housing or exercise yards must be completely mosquito proof to prevent exposure to calcivirus and myxo which have fatality rates of 100%. Instead a more ideal home is a bunny condo when it must be penned and access to rabbit proofed rooms in your home so it can be part of the family just as your dog or cat would.

Rabbits also require a fair amount of care - daily fresh food (good quality hay, water, fresh vegetables/herbs and a small amount of high quality pellets), litter changes, mental stimulation and at least 3 hours exercise time in order to maintain health and well being. Short haired breeds should be brushed regularly to prevent the ingestion of excess hair causing blockages or stasis, while long haired bunnies may require daily brushing. All rabbits require nail trimming.

For homes who are definitely keen on rabbits as pets, there are many more rewards but we need more awareness of the reality of owning rabbits responsibly. For those considering rabbits please check out The House Rabbit Society (www.rabbit.org), Australian Companion Rabbit Society (http://www.rabbit.org.au) for more information, Australian based Boing Online (http://www.boingonline.com). For more information on rabbit body language and behaviour The Language of Lagomorphs (http://language.rabbitspeak.com), as well as all sorts of information on Rabbit Links (http://homepage.mac.com/mattocks/morfz/rabrefs.html) and if you're in Melbourne the Melbourne Rabbit Clinic (http://www.melbournerabbitclinic.com) is one of the best bunny vets around!

random catch up photos

2010-12-16T22:02:00.006+11:00

because I've been such a slacker and haven't really been sure what to write

One of the new roses in the Rainbow Bridge garden

Tim Tam, "Where are you going mum?"

Hopie and Luka at the dam

Lily at Ballarat comp

Luka on his birthday! :)

Lilypillie, my smiley girl

The interesting attempts to draw with small children around! LOL

Hopie with the ribbons our club gave her at the end of the year. She was more impressed with the biscuits but I thought they were nice. LOL

La demonstrating his weird abilities to sleep in the most bizzare places...

Hope at a recent comp

Hope, Sierra, Luka and Rin at the dam

Nilla playing sneaky stealth ninja bunny

and demanding a pat from La

Haha, - such shy timid little wallflowers hey!

sonnet 30

2010-11-29T00:21:00.002+11:00

Feeling a bit introspective and thumbing through my favorites tonight and came across a favorite that grabbed me given the current mood I've been in. He was such a brilliant poet with the layers in words and images.

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste:
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow,
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
And weep afresh love's long since cancell'd woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanish'd sight:
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
All losses are restored and sorrows end.

No Nationals...

2010-11-10T13:01:00.003+11:00

For those who don't know Hope well, she is a very happy girl but somewhat dispostioned towards being anxious. It's something I'm very mindful of in training and one of the reasons I introduced and continue to manage her quite carefully in team competitions. I want her to be able to enjoy all the things she loves in life and to do that I have to deal with the anxiety as the monkey on our back. Initially with flyball we worked quite carefully in introducing passes over the hurdles as in doggy terms, a dog rushing at you full pelt and especially in a straight line is a weird, rather off-putting behaviour. Generally the only time they'd do it naturally is if it were a very young pup who was still learning their social graces or a dog with a serious and aggressive intent. So we desensitized, counter conditioned and gave her lots of room and reinforcement, wide passes with late releases and using easy going team-mates she loves. This worked really well and we'd progressed to right up the ladder to nice fairly tight passes.

At Hope's last comp in Euroa she was attacked as we were entering the ring. The dog was really worked up into a frentic state (a personal pet peeve of mine in flyball... people excuse all manner of out of control hyper aroused behaviour in the name of 'building drive' and then shrug as if there's nothing you can do about it) and to get to our start place we had to go by her which just tipped her over boiling point and she lunged at Hope, roaring and snapping out a tuft of fur. Hope's reaction was akin to, "Jeeze what's YOUR issue?!?" and I went into recovery and refocusing mode, which worked well enough that she finished off the comp without seeming terribly phased. She was concerned about that individual dog after but not overly so and remained fully operant, engaged, eager and happy. We found out later Hope isn't the first dog this has happened to unfortunately. I wasn't happy but figured at least it didn't seem to result in any major impact for Hope.

So we went to the next (Nationals team only) practice. I had it in my mind that if she was that stressed again we'd beg off but after a week of practicing chilling out we'd give her a chance at least. She saw this dog again and while they didn't run together at all Hope was stressed seeing her there. She'd be focused and eager for the run but then pull off the last two hurdles to avoid having to cross on the back-run. Our sub-captain who'd not been at Euroa was wanting tighter crosses and I was not willing so it wasn't much fun. At the end of practice the dogs were off lead for a play but I kept Hope with me. The other dog's owner tossed a ball which happened to bounce over and Hope had a major freak out, tucked her tail and bolted behind me cowering and shaking, then proceded to physically tow me back to the car spooking out and panic barking over her shoulder. I about cried, she's NEVER been so freaked out!

We kept everything calm this week and when I went to the next team practice. We didn't get much time in but I was so heartened to see her being confident and full of chutzpa, bouncing around, rolling on the grass like a nut, driving back over all the jumps full pelt, gleefully enjoying the tuggy and being her usual sunny self. Before I could go into much else I was pulled aside and told they'd decided to not to put us in for Nationals. Which is disappointing in one sense because I was very excited about it prior to all this but a relief in another because I wanted a few more weeks of relaxed time and positive practices before we throw a comp her way even with how well she was doing this time. While she's not affected enough to be considered a 'reactive' dog as such, ime one fo the worst things you can do in terms of working with such dogs is to start working them too soon after an incident instead of letting them fully settle out and that would be the case for her as well. Sooo... for better or worse, we're sitting this one out.

Meanwhile, on the way back I'd got a call from Mandi asking if I'd like another dog to run in flyball. Luka is her keeper from her first litter, about a year old now but she's not ready to start serious herding training with him. In the meantime, he's a busy lad and she figured he might do well with a holiday for awhile.

Dogs +1

2010-11-09T18:46:00.005+11:00

Meet "Luka"... he's not mine, he's just come to visit for awhile and isn't he a handsome lad? His mum Mandi wanted him to be able to do some flyball and figured he might come for a holiday with us here.

He is such a typical Aussie personality! Obviously a lot of it goes to his being well raised and socialized but it never ceases to amaze me how adaptable our Aussies are. Picked up from his home where he lives with adults and teenagers and come into the midst of our crazy mob, taken to shops, nursery, school, hardware stores etc and he's not batted an eyelash nor set a foot wrong. He's slotted himself into the routine effortlessly, is full of gleeful bum wiggles, gets along with everyone without fuss and adores the kids... hey, short people who will love on you, throw your ball and play squeaky endlessly while dropping food frequently - what's not to love? They're taken with him as well, it took Lily all of an hour to start hollering "Here YUCA!" You'd never guess he just arrived or that he'd not been raised with kids crawling over him every day of his life. LOL

He's also rather taken with this whole flyball training thing. ;)

and then there were three!

2010-10-26T00:09:00.005+11:00

Meet our new little one... Nilla Vanilla! She is a medium to biggish bunny baby. So far she is very cheeky and active and into EV-ER-Y-TH-ING! It's funny, Cinna was a very active little thing in that she loved to dash around madly but less with the being so full of 'satiable curiosity about the whole world that it needed to be jumped on, nudged, dug at, rolled around, tossed in the air, sniffed, taste tested, chinned and otherwise checked out. LOL

The idea will be to try and bond this one with Cinna and Romeo once she's had all her vaccinations and is desexed. That won't be for awhile yet as she's only a baby! Trio bonding can be tricky and not always (or even often) successful though, more so as I picked her rather than letting them do so. If it doesn't work then sometime mid to late next year we'll visit the shelter to find a friend.

At the moment they are in the bunnies bedroom but in separate living quarters. They can see each other but not reach each other. The only thing we're doing as far as bonding at the moment is some positive association. It's one of those happy coincidences in life (which I have carefully arranged... LOL) that whenever she is out, pellets start being doled out to Cinnamon and Romeo. When she comes near their quarters, parsley appears for them. When they sniff through the wire, tiny slivers of banana.

And one last pic, because hey - when you're this cute you can never have enough photos!

Yay for Dopie Hopie Black Dog

2010-10-25T15:49:00.007+11:00

Here are a few snaps from our Euroa comp of BlackDogBlack running. Euroa was a bit of an adventure. Lily and I bunked together, with the dogs snoozing with us so until 3:30am the scene involved Lily cuddling up with me, chatting, noticing the dogs, pouncing on them for cuddles, then noticing she was away from mum and bouncing back over. She finally drifted off but I couldn't get comfy between snoring velcro child and happy farting dogs so I woke up about half an hour after I nodded off. To boot it was raining so hard everyone was thinking of canceling the comp which would have meant a 3+ hour drive each way for nothing!

Luckily the weather did clear up and some really lovely coffee woke ME up. Hastings only ran one team this time so Hope got plenty of run time. She did much better than Frankston. Meanwhile we've pinpointed several things we'll be doing to refine her training before the Nationals in a few weeks. And in the meantime little miss Blackdogblack earned enough points to qualify for her Flyball Dog Championship title!

So yay for Hopie Dopie the Blackdogblack!

As usual though, the most important part is the fun. Which is found in all manner of interesting places! Ask Lily... ;p

5 years old

2010-10-20T21:59:00.007+11:00

Little mister is five now. And I rarely get away with calling him Bunny Lala anymore. Even "La" is garnering the occasional, "Mu-UUUMMM! Instead he is, "Please call me Laurent...." Unless he's Ben 10. Or *insert dramatic voice here*... Captain Underpants!

Mind you it doesn't seem 5 years since he was more like this:

I miss that little snuggly, squidgey newborn fresh to the world. I miss clumsy baby kisses, reflexively curly toes, milk breath and that divine newborn smell. On the other hand I am pretty chuffed with the rather cool little dude who is gracing us frequently. It seems like maybe the the wild-n-wooly Fours are giving (at least partial) way to a child who is frequently a lot of fun, often very helpful, usually sensitive and who responds to others in a considerate and sweetly compassionate way. Oh yeah... and one who loves poo jokes. I could have lived without that bit.

He had a party with a bunch of his school mates at a local playcenter, where inbetween running around like lunatics they all ate entirely too much sugar/dye/processed and preservative laden junk food and had a blast. He was beyond thrilled to get a whole host of cool toys ranging from puzzle kits to crash-n-spin Matchbox car racing sets to Herofactory toys to Ben 10 and Bakugan. The later two are things he's never actually seen but picked up a keen (obsession) interest in through the joys of friendship. (Oddly enough, his imaginations version of Ben10 is weirdly Croc Hunterish sounding...)

He was also very determined to have HIS kind of party. Namely a Ben10 Party, which was detailed down to the cake. The cake was to be a "Ben 10 chocolate cake with choc frosting and waves (piping) and sprinkles on the sides." As mums oven is broke at the moment, the height of 5 year old culinary coolness was courtesy of Michel's Patisserie.
Last snap - the two of them were on the slide endlessly, as little miss fearless Lilypillie has developed an obsession with them to rival his own! LOL

random bits and pieces of my world

2010-10-14T20:25:00.003+11:00

This pear tree on our property always blooms JUST on La's birthday, to the day, every year. It does fruit but the cockatoos and cows get more of it than we ever do.

How lucky am I? As much work as this place can be, I get to watch sunsets like this from my back porch!

Both girls, looking far more stationary than they are! And it wasn't posed or anything... they were busy goofing around with Lily pretending to brush Rin (that's actually what she's looking at, a comb that's fallen) and Rin manically staring at Hope who had the ball. LOL

A more typical scene... Sierra follows Lily around, ploinks down near her for a nap and is inevitably pounced on, cuddled, kissed, brushed, used as a pillow and otherwise loved on. Aussies and kids are the best combo ever!

piccies from Frankston Pets Day Out comp

2010-10-14T20:25:00.000+11:00

Cuebiyar Cross My Heart PT FDX

2010-10-04T09:57:00.006+11:00

After our last flyball comp at Frankston, we were off to Yarram this weekend and onto more in the following weeks. At Frankston we ran Hope limitedly - much to her dismay (but MUM... the tennis ball is getting away!!!) that is we made our teams up of 5 dogs with her and another novice being switched so they each only ran in a few heats out of each race and weren't overwhelmed.

After Frankston we decided she seems to be running best as the lead dog and that she was okay to have more runs, so she ran in all 5 heats in each race this time all day long. Hopie heaven!

She did really well and I am starting to feel a bit more coordinated. When we got home last night and I'd gotten an e-mail saying she'd actually gotten both her FD and FDX. Fancy pants hey! LOL

Of course the most important job of all is still just being La's best friend! He can't wait till he's a bit older and can play flyball with her. :)

Lily on the other hand just wants to pat, hug and kiss everyone and then splotz on mums lap for a nap!

Royal Melbourne Show

2010-09-19T23:24:00.002+10:00

A few snaps from the RMS yesterday - we got to catch up with some lovely peoples, snuggle a MOST lovely Aussie puppy and fawn over the Petite Bassett Griffon Vendeen some more.

Laurent was really keen to go on rides and particularly wanted to go on "big slides, ponies and scarey "ollea coasties"! He got to go on all that and a ferris wheel which he thought was really cool. Immediately after coming off the pirate ship rollercoaster type ride he did say he wanted to go on a more scarey roller coaster but he was given away as Jodie told me he'd refused to let go of the lap bar the entire time! LOL

Lily was LOVING the ferris wheel and being up so high! She had her little face pressed to the windows and giggling hysterically!

Unfortunately the pony ride has only doubled the request for riding lessons so that "when I get biggered, I can have a pony of my own mum"! Of course, he also requests I get him a Rough Collie (blue and black and white with gold cheeks) like one of my team-mates and a small poodle.

Little Big Girl

2010-09-19T23:15:00.004+10:00

Little Big Girl is growing up so fast - I know it's horribly cliche and all but I swear I looked at her one day a few weeks ago, blinked in surprise and realized seemingly between one night and the next my little baby had disappeared and my toddler had officially arrived!

She tries to be tidy and loves to clean, pick up and sort things. She is also obsessed with doors, drawers and gates - chiefly in ensuring they're CLOSED. I'm being roundly scolded here because the gate is open and Gates Must Not Be Open! ;p

In and out, in and out, in and out... a girl and her dog!

Little miss with a tennis ball and with her best girls!

My little flower girl... she loves to pick the tiny daisies on our lawn.

and in case anyone is wondering - here is the difference between La and Lily summed neatly up!

First comp :)

2010-09-19T23:04:00.003+10:00

Our first flyball comp was Saturday. You could definitely tell it was her first comp but she did manage to pull out 4 nice runs and our Hastings Hit and Fly team ended up scoring 2nd in our division by the end of the day.

I snapped this one of miss Chilled Out Chickiebabe, who had fun along with her brother running cheerfully amok. I do have some footage of one of Hopies runs but I can't get it to upload to youtube at the moment! Our next comp is coming up in a few weeks at Yarram and then we'll go up to Euroa and later to the Nationals! :)

"Hussshh upppp!!!"

2010-09-13T21:01:00.002+10:00

Rin, the crazy little nutter that she is, has developed the ability to jet off which has led to the installation of a long line she can be clipped to when she needs to go out and I can't be right there watching. Rin also has a long standing issue with.... well, let's be polite and just say she is VERY vocal and is frequently told to hush up because she's making everyone's ears bleed with it's sharpness.

At any rate, Nic let her out tonight without putting her on the tie out and sure enough off she went. He called me to come over and whistle her up, which I did. Little Lilypillie toddled along with me out onto the porch. As I shouted "Rin!" and whistled, Lily joined in, mimicing my stance. Only instead of calling out "Rin!" I hear her shouting, "Hush up! HUSH UP! HUSHHHH UPPPPP!!!"

The furkids

2010-09-12T22:07:00.004+10:00

It's been a bit crazy lately... okay, who am I kidding? It's ALWAYS crazy here, it's been MORE crazy!

The fantabulous news in it is that Emi, my foster kitty, left for her new home today and they are thrilled to bits with her. Honestly it couldn't be a better match it seems and it's very reaffirming after having waited all this time to find the perfect home for her to see her go there and the beginnings of a lovely new relationship!

One of the odder developments is that Tim Tam the orphaned lamb has decided the dogs are acceptable substitutes. The dogs for their part figure he's pretty cool too. As usual, everything that lives here is just a bit odder than usual!

Other than that we've just been practicing as Miss Hopie has her very first flyball comp coming up this weekend! So exciting! We've got several more comps coming up in the next few weeks so stay tuned for further flyball reports! This weekend it was the VHA's Duck Clinic with Frances Smith, which was good fun. Hope was not so sure those quackers were something she should work, as she knows she's supposed to leave my ducks alone at home. (In fact they can crawl all over her, steal food from her bowl etc)

Little Miss Rin had no such qualms... the Pointy Black Dog saw ducks and went into instant stalky-staring-slinking Border Collie mode. For such a wild child, she did pretty well... especially given a few people who've seen what a manic little bit of monkeyshine she is probably figured it'd look like a game of skittles with a mad teenage BC bowling ball and ducks for pins! It looks like some of my "you only get what you want by being calm, listening and doing things mum's way" is starting to sink in... a bit, anyway!

Not from the clinic - just one of Pointy Black Dog after she's had a good bit of fun running around my muddy paddocks! The ones below are from her first introduction to duckies. The pictures were taken by Mandi who deserves big kudos for putting on the clinic, hosting us, ensuring all her duckies were ready for us, asking Francis down and generally working her bum off to ensure we had a nice day! :)

(And look, PointyBlackDog DOES have a speed other than ZOOM or SPLAT-LAYING-FLAT!)

Poor Sisi is feeling a bit left out... agility is her gig and thanks to the metric crapload of rain and storms we've had the agility grounds have been too soggy to run on for the past MONTH AND A HALF. Literally the week after we got promoted! DOH!!!

2010-09-12T22:01:00.004+10:00

Playing catch up and sharing bits and pieces of things I'd meant to blog but slackarsed on.

New favorite feeding-sleeping baby photo.... she is such a sweetie, when I rolled back over she wrapped her arms around me, snuggled against my shoulder, gave me a perfect little kiss and said "wuf 'oo". Ladies and gentlemen, this is what refills the well of mummy's tollerance of the times they're crazy little ratbags... sometimes, every once in awhile, they make you melt into puddles of warm-n-fuzzy goo.

These are three shots from Verity and Cami's Rainbow Bridge Garden. Slowly coming together.

And last but not least, after not having touched oils or acrylics since I was probably about 14 I decided to get a little set have have a dabble in it. I sketched this little fellow the other night and got to rough him in over about 15 mins of breakfast. Hopefully over the coming week or so I can find a bit of spare kids-free time to work on him! Not sure if I will keep the background one as artificial halo and take it all over or as grass and fill in the 'sky' after.

Fathers Day

2010-09-12T20:17:00.002+10:00

Obligatory cute photo warning:

Nic with Bunny LaLa and Lilypillie

We decided to go to Healesville for the day, despite the temperamental weather and visit the Beechworth Bakery. Very, very yummy stuff there! Lilypillie got her first bit of bee sting which she was much impressed with!

La of course was chuffed not to just get a doughnut but a CHOC glazed doughnut and one with GREEN SPRINKLES... totally rocking!

On our walk back to the car we got utterly drenched when the heavens let loose and we were all caught out having parked far away and wandered up to the bakery. The upside? Well, it takes rain to make a rainbow!

Catch Up

2010-08-29T19:06:00.007+10:00

Long time no blog... in chief it's because it's been busy. Which is a nice term for "more complicated than I have energy and wherewithall to sit and put into words by the end of the day when I finally have time"! LOL But I did actually write much of it down the other day, so I'm going to pinch some.

Earlier this year Laurent has been diagnosed with a proprioception sensory integration disorder and we've been working on this and the behavioural difficulties we'd been seeing with an occupational therapist and psychologist team. Basically proprioception has to do with the input gained from your muscles and joints. He is under responsive and as a result, rather than the information his senses provide integrating into one useful world picture, all that unorganized sensory input creates a traffic jam in his brain making it difficult to pay attention and learn while also causing him to seek out that missing sensory input. Sensory seeking behaviour for him typically comes in the form of wanting to hang off things, climb, crash, push, jump, fidget, pinch, twist, fiddle and be overly physical with objects etc. In hindsight it explains so many of the things we'd just chalked up to being individual quirks about him!

A 'side effect' of this under responsiveness is that he is also largely insensitive to pain. Consequently, where most people learn that things that hurt are to be avoided, he hardly notices tends to hurt himself fairly often. Even when he was a baby he'd face plant and just giggle or bang his head on the floor and only be annoyed by it. It takes something fairly painful for him to feel it strong enough to register as 'hurts'. It also means his idea of what feels like normal, moderated amount of strength to him when he's playing with a toy is actually rather hard and he tends to rough on his toys and always engaging in a very physical manner seeking that sensory input. Some of it is minor but upsetting to him, while some of it can be much more annoying to us who have to fix or replace things if they break.

His OT is fabulous and has provided a number of immediate and practical tools and therapies that are designed to integrate all the sensory input into the brain and enable his days to go smoother. But we were all quite concerned he doesn't seem to learn from the experiences and has difficulty incorporating what he knows into self regulation to the degree an average 4-5 year old can. While he is very bright (actually has tested quite high) and is keenly interested in a wide range of things his psychologist and I feel his brain is processing, recalling, linking and utilizing the information it encounters in a somewhat atypical manner. Put together with his intelligence, confidence that he can carry out his plans and tendancy to pick his opportunities with impressive skill daily life is full on. When we've had our appointments done in home, they've all observed you can explain something to him in very clear and age appropriate manner, with explanations of why, what to do instead, what could happen if he does it and what action will follow it. This is followed through consistently and fairly, with discussion afterwards. In the case of things he's done before, he also recalls how it felt physically and/or emotionally, how it affected others, recalls if he didn't like that and would like to avoid it again as well. Even doing "all the right things" though, it can make little difference! He demonstrates understanding of all individual bits but he doesn't seem to be able to link it up to come to the conclusion he needs to.

So now we're involved in the headache of trying to access further assessments and services for him, which are entangled with a plethora of bureaucratic red-tape and nonsense which is both stressful, confusing and emotional. In the meantime our good days are gold- he is a funny, sunny little boy who loves his sister and is better with her than many kids I've seen are with their siblings, adores dogs and cats and would desperately love to play Flyball with Hope, wants to go to 'clicker class' with me, loves to garden and especially finding worms to watch or worm holes in the soil, is completely obsessed with food/cooking and all things cheffing, art - especially painting and experimenting with different sorts of paints, clay work and adores anything which lets him run, jump, bounce, crash, flip or otherwise act like he needs to run away to the circus! Bad days... well, we won't go there! We just try to get through them and remember that as bad as they can be there are people out there who have far more to cope with with far less resources so we really are quite lucky especially in light of the number of people I know of directly and indirectly who are seriously ill or who have lost their lives or loved ones lately.

In more cheerful and less serious news Miss Hopie will start competing in Flyball before very long and have several comps around Victoria this year and into next! We're very excited and can't wait! Here's a video of our recent practice, the order of run is Sam (black/white BC), Hope, Quiche (yellow/white BC)

It's also looking like our foster kitty Emi FINALLY has a new home at long last and fingers crossed she will go to her new home on 12 Sept! After 8 months I'm so pleased to see her get her 'happily ever after' and see the faith we had that there WAS the perfect home out there for her somewhere rewarded!

I also decided to be brave and enter Hopie in our first real trials (the PT title, HIC and such being 'test levels' vs open trialing) in Started A course on sheep. I knew she could handle it but I have still got heaps to learn, so the real question was if I could handle well enough. The weather conditions meant that mud was about calf-deep and footing was very difficult to maintain for everyone involved. The result was that we made the first pass, albeit it was not a terribly impressive run given I cut short on the 4th post and I didn't do so well on the center-line gate because of it - poorly lined up! The second run went a lot better and would have been about a 80 except I bodged the Z chute the first go and it took me time to recover enough to get them through - poor Hopie! We had an absolute blast though and it gave me a lot of ideas of what I want to practice as I can't wait to enter again for next time!

We've also had our lovely (and admittedly my favorite) ewe Star become ill for reasons the vet couldn't pinpoint as the symptoms were pretty nondescript. She had a mild fever, some scours, wouldn't rise and if lifted to her legs would wobble and fall. Despite his giving us antibiotics and goodies to help bolter her she didn't make it and I'm now bottlefeeding Timtam.

Random last but not least is Cinna - she's discovered that if I've gotten up the bed is still warrrrrrmmm and makes a cozy spot! Don't know what I'd do without my bunnahs!

Why it's useful to have a sense of humor when you own a BC

2010-08-11T10:10:00.004+10:00

Dear Rin-Dog-Who-Thinks-She's-A-Cat,

If I find it objectionable to have you on my counters I most CERTAINLY do not want to walk by and find you:
1.) perched neatly on the tray of the highchair so you can gaze out the window - beyond the fact you shouldn't be there at all, you're going to tip it!
2.) pulling books off the bookshelf to nap there - especially four shelves up - it's just WEIRD or
3.) on the chest drinking out of the fish tank - that's there for the FISH and you have a perfectly good water bowl.

I'd forgotten just how quirky and smile inducing teenage BC's were with their creative thinking processes I think! ;p

The good news is that the counter surfing business is almost gone. She is occasionally checking (and even that is not as often) but not jumping, does a very nice unprompted "mother may I?" down if she wants something and waits in place.

Herding lesson :)

2010-08-10T19:19:00.006+10:00

They went fairly well and got some good advice. (I could so have done without having to do it with an ear infection, wingey 16 month old and sniffly videographer-who-didn't-video however!)

The things that had been concerning me with Hope's work is that she can do a nice job but also can be a bit sloppy in coming on too fast, can buzz in if she's frustrated with me, tends to rely on me giving direction with the staff where I want to get her doing it more automatically. My main frustration in working with her though is that she is so sensitive to pressure that little things feel big to her, so I tend to find working with that difficult because I'm used to average to slightly bull-headed dogs.

At any rate she had us go out and give an example of where we were at the moment and then gave some suggestions and exercises to try. The main positives she picked to mention were Hope's had the basic stuff pretty well, found/maintained point of balance and covered them fairly nicely, was willing to work out a fair bit at times (20 feet or so), listened to me ask her to walk up, steady her speed and such. When I used the suggestions of how to modify my movements for her she responded well to that also and was working smoother.

The bits we need to work on:
* long term softening the pressure picture for Hope because she is such a sensitive girl
* Too remember not to ask for too much, too soon on too high of criteria. Bad handler has been lumping stuff together in great fat gobs instead of splitting. Need to separate shape, then directions, then tricky situations, all in gradually increasing difficulty.

This was highlighted when we came to a point where the sheep were in a corner of the fence she was a bit unsure and I had to get in quite close to the sheep and encourage to get her to come in and lift them off. It felt like my timing was too slow as well in when I moved back to open space for them to move in, in response to her turning to engage.

Likewise when she got frustrated with a poorly given signal at one point she cut in on flanks. It's not something she knows, so it's not fair asking quite so much at this juncture.

The other real useful bit was to do with pressure pictures (from the dogs pov) and when to give slack. She was giving a nice shape and started to go bye when I'd wanted her to go away, so I blocked and then when she didn't respond followed it up. That was enough to hurt Hope's feelings. So Trudy figured that because she's so soft, I need to maybe give her more time to think about things and take her own initiative to correct rather than take it as a refusal (this is absolutely correct...) instead of being so quick to follow up. (Also spot on, bad me!) She figured the block alone would have been enough and the tap was too strong (yep) for how soft she is, albeit it'd have been not much for the average dog. (In fact far stronger barely merited a "huh? you were talking to me?" from Rin later on. LOL) But moreover, at this point, I created a problem that I didn't have to by insisting she go the way I wanted, especially given she doesn't know directional flanking commands, and I would have probably done better by letting her go in the direction she'd already started toward and then caught her next time for a turn before she committed to a choice. Instead I wasted a lot of time trying to tell her sorry for hurting her feelings and getting her back on board. That would also go to the 'one criteria worked on/taught at a time' thing. I also reckon the directional flanking commands when I teach them because they involve the -R pressure of the staff, would be good for Hope as an individual to be taught with the combo of -R/+R on dry runs like a giant reverse target wand.

Another thing with Hope was the staff I had was a dressage crop thingie with a small bit of contrasting coloured plastic that flared on the end. She'd asked how Hope would go with it and I said I wasn't sure as she is sensitive and we've only used a plain rod (best response) or old rake (too strong of a visual). We talked about it after and came to the conclusion I'm probably better off with the dressage staff minus the plastic bit as it makes too 'big' a picture, so it will be less visually pressure. Likewise if when I use it to block, I stepping back a bit and maybe turn my shoulder a bit off center that may make it easier for her.

Also trying to work where she can hear Lily (who grizzled at one point) is a pain as she wants to go check on her. X_x

Now for RIN... gee she's a little firecracker! It's looking like she will be the kind of dog I really enjoy working with, in this as in everything else. She is just plain FUN and full on! She was absolutely frantic to get to work the sheepies and seemed to be thinking, "Oh my gosh, where has this BEEN all my life?!?!?!?" The working switch is definitely flipped firmly to the 'on' position!

The main thing Trudy felt for Rin would be to insist that she only gets to keep working when she is not being all frantic about it and is using self control and moderating herself. Franti should not be a behaviour that works for her! Absolutely correct. We only had Rin in there for about 10 mins but she did get her to the point of starting to understand she needed to use some self control and moderation in pace and once she did, Rin was doing a super nice job, especially for only being young and only having come here 2 weeks ago. My manic little monkey-doo has loads of zip, no quit, good bounce back and handles pressure nicely! (And um have we mentioned she LOVES it??? Because wow-o-wow, does she love it!!!!!!!!!!!)

Exciting weekend, now can someone pour me into bed?

2010-08-09T13:41:00.005+10:00

We attended the Trudy Viklund herding clinic this weekend and I have to say I am so excited about everything we learned! She is an American trainer and trialler who works Aussie Shepherds in AKC, ASCA, CKC and even 3 sheep trials successfully.

I was just auditing, as I'm just not feeling well with this whole gallbladder/godknows thing (waiting on an endoscopy to confirm, joys) going on and had to really argue with myself not to just huddle under the covers. I didn't think I'd be up to a whole weekend of physical activity. That proved to be a sound if disappointing choice as I was drained after both days even though I'd not been actually working a dog and then woke up feeling supremely lousy this morning with a painful ear, fever etc so I've hauled my carcass off to the doctors. (Huzzah for antibiotics!)

But the weekend was exciting enough that I'm going to attempt a private lesson Tuesday, quite possibly drugged to the gills. I'm hoping to mainly focus on Hope but also get Rin underway and get some specific pointers for her style of working! The techniques are very common sense, many use positioning and a fair bit of environmental management in the training phase geared to minimize the possibility the dog can make a wrong choice till the dog learns it's job and responsibilities, building up pressure tolerance towards taking the sheeps point of eye on balance, while others involve very mild amount of -R (dogs are still remaining quite opperant) for dogs who are quite persistent in slicing in on flanks.

While not a herding instructor, I want to look up some of Alexandra Kurland's stuff as I remember skimming around and reading how she has put quite a bit of work into nutting out a program that combines -R and +R when she uses negative reinforcement. My understanding (which is admittedly very loose and rusty) was that she doesn't use it in isolation (iow simple p/r) where the release is the only reinforcer but follows it up with a positive reinforcer. IOW p/r(-R) and (+R) which I think could apply to the herding situation quite well as access back to the sheep is a huge R+ for most working dogs, especially if it's side on vs head on on the point of pressure.

I'm hoping it will mean Hopie and I have the kind of Started title I want to get and am genuinely happy with rather than one that is gained on passes that are passable but sloppy or ugly. :)

15 Months

2010-08-04T14:46:00.004+10:00

At fifteen months Lily is still our little miss sunshine - placid, easy going and bubbly... however it's looking like she's going to be one of those sorts who is "quiet... till she has something to say"! Moodle on a Mission is a determined little critter!

She still crawls but she does it in double time and having discovered she can walk is toddling around at a good clip!

She has a fascination with picking things up, putting them away and closing drawers, doors and cupboards. I've got a TIDY one! Booyah!

She loves her brother and the feeling is (usually... bashed lego projects aside) mutual. They greet each other in the morning when we wake up with cuddles and kisses and "Hello Lilypillie, did you have a good sleep beautiful girl?" The two of them are gorgeous together... I can't express how thankful I am about that!

She flings herself into you for cuddles and gives very dainty kisses. She is the best snuggler.

She flomps herself into the dogs as well and adores them. She is definitely going to be her mumma's daughter in that regard! She growls if you annoy her and she tongue-clicks if you do something she likes. Dog trainers will find the humor here. ;)

She can whistle. She uses this to summon the dogs and loves it when they bowl her over and lick her from head to toe and quite often will click when they arrive before flinging bits of whatever she's got handy.

She's got a few proto-words.. ..pup pups for the dogs, 'dat for that, a word that sounds like dada and less charmingly 'hut UP... usually at barking dogs. (hm... wonder where she heard that one!)

Fifteen months of Lily is just loverly, loverly, loverly!

First steps....

2010-07-25T19:12:00.000+10:00

First week...

2010-07-24T21:59:00.006+10:00

It's been a busy one but a great one!

We (and by this I mean I...) still haven't quite named her. The current short list includes: Rin, Rime, Wink, Jenna/Gem/ma and Jess.

Madam has started a lot of her foundation training for various things.

House training for one. ;)

That-Humans-Find-It-Disconcerting-When-Dogs-Materialize-On-Counters for another. She doesn't jump, I swear... you just blink and all the sudden there's a dog on the counter feeling as pleased with herself as the Cheshire cat. So we're working on a "mother may I?" She's worked out very quickly that the best way to get what she wants is NOT jumping but politely ploinking her furry bum down and waiting. I'm happy to share but I do insist on a polite request! If I can't give them a bit of whatever they've asked for (ex. chocolate - which aside from being bad for dogs is something mumma just ain't into sharing kiddies...) they get something they can have instead.

She's pretty much got the dinner time routine down - which is that my picking up bowls is a cue for get your bums to your mats, ploink and wait till all the food dishes are filled, distributed and you're given permission to eat, then lay down beside your bowls till everyone is finished, they're picked up and you are released.

For obedience we're working on sit, down, come, eye contact and targeting both a touch-stick and a spot on my knee which will be the base for heel work. Come being especially important!

For agility we're doing some of the same stuff we started with Si - circle work, tuggy*, going after toys when they're thrown, driving out to a touch plate, plus a stretch. *While her tug drive and focus is super duper awesome with awesome sauce, she's needing to learn to take it only when invited and release on cue as well as to take it properly in her mouth and not to re-grip mid-session.

She's had two sessions of flyball introduction training and worked on driving over a hurdle to a target, targeting the box and triggering the ball release. She got some calm focus practice in with Hopie as well.

With herding we're working on calm focus - so practicing being able to look at sheep but still listen and look when requested. That mainly means walking around with me while we do chores - feeding and watering them and practicing having to sit or down and wait there when I had to trim the fluff above the heads, clean up legs and bums.

She is a cheeky minx - when I left her on the other side of the gait she stuck her nose under it and started to wriggle under. I told her no and she stopped and backed out. Then that little brain started turning ideas over... maybe I didn't really mean for her to stay in the middle yard... maybe I just didn't want her going under the gate? Perhaps OVER it would work? I looked back up and saw her perched, all four paws neatly balanced, on the fence post waiting to hop down. After pausing for a moment to admire her cleverness I had to say, "Molly, uh uh. Get down." She was the picture of dejection as she hopped back down, flopped into a down and whined.

She's settling in well overall. She's discovered a number of wonderful games and while it was a toss up as to whom would tire out first - her or La - La won! She is as tolerant and gentle with the kids as the girls and a genuine sweetheart.

She is a chewer - big time - and a shredder! She gets this lovely blissed out, dreamy look going while doing so. We prefer the object of her bliss to be a chewie though rather than sticks, decking, books and chairs. though. Good thing we order dog chewies in wholesale boxes! :)

She is a cuddler and a snuggler - she loves to be picked up and cuddled in my lap and will fall asleep held in my arms. She loves beds - particularly snuggling up in them and comfy chairs. The whole house-dog gig agrees with her it seems!

The only 'problem' behaviour we've really discovered is that she hates being confined. Which is not unforeseen considering her history. In a crate, in a room (regardless of size or if there are crates, crates in an ex pen etc) or the car - regardless of if we're there or she's with another dog, she balks, starts barking and digging frantically and trying to escape. It doesn't take a huge imagination to gather why - 12 months of experience tells her being caught by the collar meant she was about to put isolated for endless hours of boredom and nothingness. The thought of it after a taste of freedom must be terrifically upsetting. So we're working on a lot of rewards for going into crate, special stuffed/frozen nomliscious Kongs and such that only appear when she has to be confined, playing crate games, desensitizing her collar being grabbed into a fun game etc. (oh.... MUM moves toward/touches/grabs/lightly tugs my collar and cheese/vitamin paste/peanut butter squirts into my mouth!) She is better than the first few days already so I suspect that this sort of work, along with experience that confinement isn't a predictor for being alone and bored for hours will go a long way to settling that. All in all though she is an awesome little girlie and a real treasure!

The new exciting news at our house...

2010-07-19T13:11:00.004+10:00

Meet "Molly"! (Her name is subject to change pending me actually deciding what suits her!)

She is a 12 month old working line Border Collie. She'd been bought at a fair, the last of a litter born on a sheep farm. Her owner was trying hard but in a tough position - on a suburban block, worked all day and of course slept at night, which meant 16 hours a day or so this super smart, brimming with energy, high drive teenager had nothing to do. Her owner felt if he couldn't find someone who could keep her busy, he'd have to put her down.

I've been missing my Veri-blue girl like crazy. I was not coping well without her and prayed for something to help with how lost I feel without her. I am (fingers crossed!) getting a puppy in several months time which I am VERY excited about. I couldn't shake the feeling that while that puppy is going to be fantastic for me, it wasn't Verity's answer to my prayer. I'd seen a BC boy who snagged my eye at the RSPCA. Very odd as I'm not overly keen on BCs as a breed I'd want to own. Nothing against them, I just like the look and style of my Aussies far more! By the time I could've got up there he'd been put down sadly. Then I saw mention of this young girl. Something pinged on my radar and I enquired.

We went to meet her at the VHA trial. I was stunned to see her, she's such a pretty shiny jet black and after having whined about wanting a "black bi with minimal white" she definitely fit that bill too - the only white on her is a tiny smudge on her chin and a little star on her chest.

She got to have a little go so I could see how she was with sheep which went well. She was utterly unfussed about everything going on, let Lily crawl all over her, La had a blast playing with her, good with the girls. She has super awesome tuggy skills and jumps like gravity doesn't exist, has a huuuugge ball drive, manically tugs like there's no tomorrow, is gaga over toys and tested very well with sheep this morning. In short she is the kind of dog most sports people would fall all over! :) As Mandi said to me, "You wanted intense - well, you got INTENSE!" She is sooooooooooooooooo COOL!

And a few videos... little madam on her first day had the beginning of obedience, did several tuggy sessions, went to Hastings with me and had a short session there, got her first look at flyball and figures that's pretty cool and discovered that 4 year old boys with soccer balls are great toys! This is her tuggy session at Hastings - and bear in mind that this is AFTER she's had several long play sessions and is a bit tired! The first night here, she tugged for about 3 hrs straight! That is a LONG time to maintain that sort of high energy play!

And this is from her first day home... out in the yard playing with La and the girls.

She's been getting a lot of training work and exercise put into her as she is so starved for it that she just couldn't get her fill of it. Besides the obedience basics we'll be working a lot on doggy zen, 'countersurfing is not cool', crate/confinement as a safe/relaxing place and calm attention I think as well as other necessities like 'dogs piddle OUTSIDE'. LOL

She is such a funny bean though. Even today she is finding ways to make up funny games. I turfed her, Hope and La out with a totem tennis stick and gave La the paddle. He spent two hours in gigglefits batting it back and forth while they bopped it back, circled around it and all three are close to tired... they then came inside for tuggy sessions and a rousing round of "squeek the annoying squeek toy nine bajillion times". LOL

Last but not least, nothing to do with the rest of the post - just a cool shot of Air Hopie. Not the greatest photo but it was so funny I love it! She is such a goof, I will try to get some video of her when her new flyball harness arrives running with the team! :)

Hello world!

2010-07-09T23:16:00.004+10:00

Yesterday Star gave birth to two little chocolate lambs - a boy and a girl. She is such a sweetheart, having spotted her just after the babies were born she let me pick them up from her corner of the paddock and carry them to the shed following me quietly the whole way. We've had fox problems and nights are quite chilly so it just wouldn't be great for her to stay with newborns out in the paddock. She finished passing the afterbirth in the shed.

I'd meant to crutch (trim the wool around the bum and udder) as well as clean up the scruffy bits on her head, face and legs but having not felt great this wasn't done which means it's harder for bubs to find the milk. Patient girl that she is she let me just lay down on the straw near her, tuck the bubs under and help them attach for their first drink with me crawling halfway under her with them to see despite cold fingers goosing her poor udder. Now THAT ladies and gentlemen is a very cooperative ewe!

She even let me trim most of her icky bits the same way... standing up and just getting treats. It's not the prettiest haircut but it did the job and without stressing her while she was still bonding with her bubbas. I just have a pair of hand shears and let me tell you I have a whole new appreciation for old time shearers who had to do hundreds of sheep a go without electric clippers! Thankfully Star is very docile and loves her treats!

Here's a video of mum and bubs at 1 day old

And while not quite "aw" worthy as lambs, I finally got around to choosing a colour for my hair - that's a Cinnabun tucked in my arms btw

2010-07-05T23:41:00.006+10:00

At our herding trial some weeks back I'd brought my camera. As it turns out someone (suspecting La...) unzipped it from my safe and snug bag allowing the camera to get soaked. Suffice to say after 6+ hours of drenching, it went to that great photo lab in the sky.

I had the hard choice between waiting until I could afford a really kick-butt DSLR or a less cool but decent camera now. I ended up going with the later as I couldn't stand missing out on months of photos! So here's a few of the first shots out of the new one:

(Okay, it's a dreadful shot - but it's a cute picture!)

I'm still trying to get used to it. For the first week or so I thought I might take it back. It was just annoying - it felt awkward, I didn't like the casing, it was S L O W. I'm learning to deal.

Lily had her first attempt at solo standing - she stood up unassisted for a good bit of time before plomping back onto her bum to clap herself and blow kisses to us as we cheered for her! My little love!

There's not too much else to write. I've been hauling my sorry-hide to training but being slack practicing as I'm feeling like something even the cat wouldn't drag in at the moment. The doctors reckon ye olde gallbladder needs to come out and there may be some sort of bacterial nasty irritating my stomach. In the meantime as I'm not willing to forcefully and instantly wean Lily, all I can take is a bit of panadol. Apparently all the good stuff is non-breastfeeding friendly. Ah the joys!

Facials anyone?

2010-06-25T15:07:00.007+10:00

This weeks agility homework: rear end awareness. For those not aware, for dogs the but just sort of follows the decision-making front end because it's attached. They don't give it a whole lot of thought. There are areas in training having control over their rear is very useful though or important to working safely.

Now Sierra's a brilliant dog but erm... has not spectacularly successful... at rear end awareness before. It's just not particularly a strong area for her. We've taught with (flat) ladder and cavaletti in her puppy agility classes and those and backing in freestyle. She's inconsistent with the ladders and cavaletti to the frustration of myself and instructors. She does okay with backing, though she tends to crab a few degrees after several paces. We've tried rear paw targeting and spins on various equipment and via capturing, shaping and luring. She can climb ladders, both standard and more difficult ones at playgrounds which involves a fair bit of awareness of footing placement. When we're doing heel work in obed her left-about turn was taught with her tucking and swinging her bum off my left shoulder position. She can also do erm... I guess you'd call it lateral heeling - it's not great, there is two-tracking (I never bothered to refine it) but it's there. I've speculated part of it may be her physical build - her rear is not the best conformation wise so perhaps she feels the strain more - but she can move that rump! I think the only thing I know of we've not had a go at is the balance balls.

For this particular class they want pivoting on a point (pivot box) with the front anchored, ladder work and cavaletti work to be passed through to the next level. All pretty standard and they ought to be simpler than climbing the ladders but she bodges them up.

I decided to tackle the pivot box first because I actually have the equipment in the house for that and prefer not to be soaked by all this rain! The main sticking points for her have been her dancy front feet when excited... it's almost like that subconscious excitement whine some dogs do. Getting her to anchor her front in the face of excitement is difficult as she doesn't realize she's moving/shifting them

Almost as soon as I wrote it (okay, WHINGED it) onto my facebook page I realized my solution. I couldn't work with unconscious behaviour, it needed to be made conscious. There needed to be a way for her to have a sensation that would call her attention to the fact her feet were moving. I pondered for a few minutes. Novel surface textures wouldn't suit, it needed to be on her paws so she was aware of it on and off the box. Socks? Nah. It'd likely be very mildly aversive and her focus would be solely on that rather than placing and planting her feet. Coke? (An old showing trick to give dogs a bit of extra grip when gaiting...) Not noticeable enough. Needed to be stickier but not messy either.

Solution: I put peel-off facial stuff on her paw pads, you know the stuff you put on, let dry and then peel off? She lays down to be groomed, so with her melting into a puddle of bliss I put it on her feetsies and let it dry until it was just barely tacky but not messy. Not only did it work - in four sessions she has quieter feet - but she now has "softer, fresher, younger" paw pads that "feel refreshed and renewed"! ;P Booyah for David Jones facial stuff! Six sessions and we've got a reasonable if rough pivot going on. May the great god Murphy ordain we actually get the cavaletti and ladders next!

Sunday

2010-06-20T23:14:00.005+10:00

I had a lovely day today, as Sunday's usually are.

We left early for training, having to arrive early for set up as we'd borrowed one of the sets of Flyball jumps to practice with over the past fortnight. I had a nice chat with a couple different instructors before Hope had her obedience. She did lovely, as she always does.

Then Hope got to do some flyball and did excellent again - she was actually running heats on the competition team today! We got our form to sign up for competitions as well. As much as her runs, I'm also very happy with how nicely gives calm attention on the sidelines . For those not familiar, in a number of clubs the dogs are encouraged (or at least not particularly discouraged) from being in a state of extreme excitement. We all chatted about dogs, training, behaviour issues and with one of the instructors whose heart-dog has required a lot of work to get to the flyball team how deeply we love those dogs whom we've gone through so much with.

The club had a work bee after which I helped out with a bit before heading home. I spent the rest of the afternoon cuddling and playing with Lily and La. I did a bit of sketching. Had a laugh at bunnies flomping on fresh laundry. Chatted a bit. Had a nice dinner. Marveled over how perfectly adorable my offspring are and how I ever got so lucky as to have such lovely munchkins. (Yep, I am perfectly saccharine I know. Deal.) The gooey factor went up a notch watching them play with the girls. La is trying to get Hope to do flyball in the living room and Lily patted my little embroidered dog on my jacket and chirped, "aug!" before clicking! Naw, my little mini dog-nuts!

So all in all I had a really lovely day. Which is of course why I feel like crying like the quietly mad mess that I am, because I miss the dog who is not here. Gah, I am such a damn headcase!

A question of leadership

2010-06-19T09:43:00.002+10:00

I thought I might post some of the stuff that gets bandied about in e-mail discussions because it's always interesting to get other perspectives than just one or two. :) So the first one was a question about how does one explain to a new owner how to teach their dog to take the cues from the owner - what training is necessary, what is effective to teach a dog like an Australian Shepherd who may have a reserved temperament and some guardian instincts to respond appropriately.

My thought is leadership isn't a training technique or set of exercises to teach so much as a way of living with dogs and relating to them which also incorporates training. A dog that is awake and breathing is watching and learning at all times, not just when we decide we're training.

So if you want to be a good leader, you must first be someone worth following. Some traits I'd associate with a good leader might be confident, sound in judgement and decisive but also things like fair, clear, consistent, trustworthy, flexible, responsible, approaches problems with thoughtful consideration and an ability to listen and consider other viewpoints. Someone with "people skills" ie they can read and respond to those around them, play up their strengths, motivate, focus them and are savvy at diffusing problems before they become problems. If there's a external problem, they take responsibility for it and will go back their people up if need be so they are reliable also. Much of this translates well to dogs. These can mostly be learned but is a more difficult and longer process because it means we must be aware of our own ways of behaving to change them and confront the basic assumptions and perceptions that create them.

I do use various training techniques of course. I start obedience, body handling, trust games and a conditioned relaxer from day one. There are games I play which would constitute training (in that they educate) but are just part of life vs. sessions set aside to train. With dogs with problems additional counter-conditioning, desensitizing, teaching alternative behaviours etc is done as appropriate to the individuals needs. Learning to do this is easier as they're just mechanical skills really, assuming you can read the dog and are willing to listen to it's feedback.

Training alone falls short though. It covers a few minutes a day in a constructed situation. While what they learn in it (sit, down, stay, come) IS undoubtedly valuable if the dog experiences 5-10 minutes a day training on one task but an owner who is inconsistent, unreliable or unpredictable in the dogs view the other 1400 some odd minutes a day you cannot expect it to be effective, especially in an intense moment when it counts most. If you want the dog to defer to your judgement or stand down where it's perceiving a threat, you need to have proved yourself to have consistently sound, reliable judgement and an ability to deal with problems in your dogs eyes with the little things that happen every day. Otherwise why on earth should the dog trust your judgement when it's own perceptions and senses are telling it there is a real threat and it's owner hasn't handled it?

To me this is also why a good temperament is a fundamentally sound and resilient temperament with strong nerves and Aussie's in particular their guardian nature is based in being level-headed, intelligent and uncannily discerning and able to moderate their responses to the situation. A dog that can moderate it's response is in control of itself which in turn eliminates dogs whose responses are based in fear or anxiety. It may still misinterpret what is a threat but it's in control enough that it is (neurologically) able to defer.

I also think we don't always appreciate what a big ask it is to ask our dogs to defer to us. It takes a lot not to just react based on what your senses are telling you is dangerous, even if the other person may know something you don't. Contrastingly, if we're wise we also trust our dogs and consider what they're telling us to see if it's truly in error or if they're picking up something we're not.

I do expect my dogs to defer but I also have a very good deal with my dogs - if I never put them in a situation where they'll need to bite to defend themselves and they won't. In my mind, I as an owner must be my dogs first advocate in a world where we will run across other dogs and people who may be well intentioned but ignorant as well as rude, obnoxious idiots.