Long Time, No Blog!

I have been busy (before the holiday), on holiday and ill... hence the long time, no blog.

Before I went on holiday, we had lots of beautiful, sunny, warm days. Like the day we walked with my friend Barbara and her dog Lenny:







While I was cruising around Italy, Spain and Portugal, my parents were here to take care of kids & dogs. It meant that I could go on holiday totally carefree. And that is worth a lot!
After 8 days, I returned to happy kids and dogs (parents and hubby were happy too).

First thing I did, was buying a new dog bed for Ghandi. By the way he was making his bed, I often felt that he wanted one of those cosy, cuddly beds. So I got him one. Too small for Wesha, I thought...



I was obviously mistaken... as she was in the bed before Ghandi even had a chance, hehehe!

But Ghandi also loves the new bed and now they both sleep often in it, taking turns.




I haven't been to dog training, because I was ill and when I was well enough to go again, the trainer was ill. I think it will be good to return to training, because Wesha is obviously taking some liberties that she wouldn't have taken a month ago. Running off to examine things in the woods, and not returning when I call her, but when she feels like it. Tsk, tsk!

Dogs in the fog:




Wesha and miss Moo:

Dummy training

Today, I started dummy training with Wesha. We are starting at the very beginning, with the "ground/start" and "front" position (Wesha does both pretty well now, because we have been working on these commands before). The other thing that we are working on now, is having Wesha take the prey dummy in her mouth and let it go again at "out". We practise this as follows: I take Wesha in "front" and then I offer her the prey dummy. I hold the dummy on the sides with both hands. As soon as Wesha takes it, I say "out" and she lets go of it (while I am still holding on to it). Then I give her a reward out of the prey dummy. At this moment, she doesn't hold it more than a second, but at least she takes it in her mouth properly.

She was working very concentrated today, until the end of the training. She was obviously mentally tired from being so concentrated all the time and she started to drift off a little and sniff around. But because she worked so well before, I didn't really mind.

Wesha "en profil":

Photos from the past month or so

Nordic Walking with 2 dogs

Yes, it is possible. Today, I did Nordic Walking (walking with sticks, quite sporty) with both Ghandi and Wesha. We went to the river Thur near Altikon, where there is a great, flat, long path, where the dogs can run free. Ghandi had never even seen my Nordic Walking sticks, so he had to sniff at them first. It was funny, because he first thought it was a target stick and he touched and touched it with his nose. When I didn't say "touch" or reward him, he gave up on it.

As soon as I started walking, Ghandi walked right next to me and sometimes right behind me. The sticks got in his way a few times, but then he soon increased his distance a bit and from then on it went fine. In the meantime, Wesha was busy sniffing everywhere. She would fall behind and then catch up again. She repeated this about a million times. But when I called her, she would immediately come. I had to call the dogs to me various times, because we encountered joggers, horses, hikers and bikers. But I would call them, let them "sit" until the others had passed and then we could go on again. Both Wesha and Ghandi did very well, they listened perfectly. I am very proud of them.

X-ray results!

Today we got the results from Wesha's hips & elbows X-rays: AA/00! YES!!! That is the best there is and we are very happy! Now it is time to start thinking what sport I would like to do with Wesha. I think we will start will agility (for fun). Because we sometimes do some of the agility things during our training sessions and Wesha is always very enthusiastic.

Ghandi got me cleaning and cleaning...

Ghandi is causing me quite some work this week. On Sunday, we put a trash-bag in the kitchen, to fill it before we put it outside. However, we forgot to put it outside in the evening. And since we have Wesha sleeping in the crate now and Ghandi sleeping whereever he wants downstairs... We got a nasty surprise on Monday morning:



I think Ghandi had the time of his life during the night, while poor Wesha could only watch him having fun with the trash. It was not just in the kitchen, he had dragged lots of things into the living room. Some things were in his bed, others were just lying around. He must have eaten some leftovers from Saturday too, because we didn't find them in the mess.

So Monday morning started with picking up and vacuum cleaning and then on my knees to wash the kitchen floor.

The only good thing was, that he didn't seem to have any problem with whatever he ate. He was healthy on Monday and Tuesday.

However, when I came downstairs this morning, Ghandi had been sick all over the living room. So once again, I had to start cleaning first thing this morning... Scooping up, then scrubbing the carpet with carpet cleaner and now I am waiting for it to dry, so that I can vacuum clean again.
Poor Ghandi really wasn't feeling well, he didn't want to eat or go outside at first, he was just curled up in the chair and didn't move. He did go outside to relief himself a little while ago. And he seemed a bit more lively. I don't think him being sick is related to eating the trash on Sunday night, because he was fine for 2 days afterward.

I will keep a close eye on him today.

Medical update

I forgot to mention that Wesha was weighed on Tuesday: 15.3Kg.

We returned to the vet for a check on her stitches yesterday. I was curious to see whether Wesha would still be so happy about going to see him. She is usually sooooo excited and happy when we go to the vet. When I lifted her out of the car, she was excited as usual. Also at the reception and in the waiting room. But when the vet himself came into the waiting room, she was suddenly not sure whether she was still happy. On one hand, she really wanted to greet him as usual, but on the other hand, she wanted to walk away from him. When he took us into the examination room, Wesha was suddenly certain, that she really, definitely wanted to GET OUT!! She was pulling to the door very strongly. When the vet offered her a Frolic, she did walk over to him, sat down nicely and ate the Frolic, but then she wanted OUT OF THAT ROOM!! Once I lifted her onto the examination table, she was standing still (not shivering or anything) nicely.

The vet was very happy, he said he could see that Wesha wasn't licking the stitches at all (and she really isn't, when we are around, we don't even let her wear the T-shirt anymore). We have to return next week Friday, to have the stitches taken out.

It is becoming more and more of a challenge to keep Wesha calm. She desperately wants to play with Ghandi. Also in Ghandi we have noticed that he doesn't get the action that he is used to. He now sometimes takes a toy into his mouth and then he just races around the garden like an idiot. So this week cannot pass quickly enough!

Since the operation, Wesha is shedding even more hair. I thought she was all done, she has only a strip of long hair on her back, but even that is coming off now. Must be the stress. She is really a short-haired Toller at the moment! I took this pic during our walk this morning, so you can see how "naked" she is.