Christmas morning

We had a simple Christmas this year. We are up at the beach house, which is different. We used to rent it out at this time of year before, but have decided to move up here permanently soon, so have it all to ourselves now!

We had already done prezzies with Megan and Marieke last week, but we still had a few more on the morning.
I am a master unwrapper...see the blur that is me, ripping the paper off this one.

Gracie tried to help, but I was fine doing it all myself.

What's this...?

I think it is... yes, it really is... a big Wobble that dispenses food everytime you knock it over! Yay! It took me about 5 seconds to work it out. I whacked it all over the living room getting treats with every swipe.

Kay said I had to give Gracie a chance too, but she was so slow at it - I couldn't watch. Anyway, while she played with the Wobble, I got the rock. It is very chewy and bounces in crazy ways...it's a challenge to work out which way it will go.

Unless Gracie gets it first, then it goes where she goes - and I chase her round the yard until she is too tired to get away from me.

We hope all you doggies in the blogosphere also had a fun day and got lot's of fun toys and all the best for a great new year!

cheers,

Ruby

update on the pupsters

Sometimes we wonder what those puppies are up to in their new homes...
and then we received some photos from Miss Squiggle, now known as Chili.

Doesn't she look just like her big sister, Gracie!

What a cutie.

We also got a gorgeous pic of Elsa (was Purple ribbon) with her pal, Charlie.
She looks just like me! What a handsome girl she is.

They are about six months old now and certainly good looking examples of an Airedale. We've heard reports that the others are doing well too.

Some even auditioned for the Great Gatsby movie, but Baz ended up going with a Schnauzer puppy as our guys were a bit too big for what he had in mind.

Could have been a path to stardom, but it wasn't to be.

Gracie's first trial

Gracie entered her first obedience trial on Saturday evening.

She did really well and got a qualifying score (and ribbon which she is modeling here).

She got a score of 94 out of 100.
The judge said the dog went really well, but it was Kay's sloppy
handling that lost most of the points - ha!

Two more of these certificates and Gracie will have her Community Companion Dog (CCD) title!

I, ahem, unfortunately bombed out of my class. The Open class is MUCH more difficult than the CCD ring and although I started out really well, I lost concentration after awhile :(

Lucky Gracie was there to bring home a win for Team Airedale.

dawn patrol

5:07 am, Monday morning...

5:12 am, Monday morning...

5:20am, Monday morning...

(Accompanied with deep sighs and slight moaning)

5:25am, Monday morning....

6:00am, Monday morning...

Success!

at the beach again

Here we are at the beach again. We just love it up here!

The seagrass was covered in magical star-shaped seed heads.
They blow around in the wind and we chase them.

We also fetch sticks.

And check out everything that anyone is doing.

Dive off the dunes.

And just enjoy the wonderful light on the water.

It's pretty good!

never take your eye off the ball

Kay brought in two new balls from the car and put them down on her dresser. She didn't think about it, but in a few minutes, I had a bead on them. I sat and looked at them like this.

Ten minutes later, I was still looking at them like this. I don't think I even blinked.

Focused staring, it works every time. Eventually Kay couldn't resist me and she picked one up and threw it. Ha! The game was all on then.

The balls would ricochet down the hall and we kept missing as they rebounded. We played until our tongues were to the floor.

Because the hallway is scheduled to be repainted soon, it didn't matter so much about all the slobbery tennis ball marks all over the walls...

For the finale, we got to chew and chew on them to our hearts' content. They were wonderfully chewy and kind of just squished in your mouth, but you could never quite get a bite out of them. Kay brought them from America. We love them.

looks like such fun

I just found the coolest Airedale blog from a young Dale in Germany. He is doing all the things I wish I could do - schutzhund and tracking. Real dog work! I would love to have a go.

Then I found out, he is only two years old - what a clever pup he is. His name is Exe vom Bismarkstein. Lucky that Google translates the German to English, but even without it, the photos are inspirational!

Now that Kay is back from overseas, we are hitting the training hard to try and get ready for some trials before the weather gets too hot. We have quite a way to go before we are as good as Exe.

birthday meet-up in the park

We met up with Fozzie and Ringo last weekend to celebrate our birthday.

Ringo, Gracie, Ruby and Fozzie

It wasn't raining, but it had been through the night. There were some lovely big patches of mud.

Ringo really, really liked the mud. See it all the way up his legs.

The rest of us were a bit more dainty - we only have muddy socks. We had lots of fun and chased balls and each other.

Aren't my brothers handsome? I'm very proud of them, even if I did growl a lot and acted really tough. They don't call me 'savage sister' for nothing.

it's my birthday!

Hi, it's Gracie here. Guess what? I'm turning two years old today!

Here I am with my mum... I'm only a few days old in this photo. Real puppy love!

I soon looked like this.

Then this (at my first show)

And then this when I was about a year old....

And now I'm as big as Ruby!

I am meeting up with Fozzie and Ringo tomorrow for a birthday party in the park... except it is forecast to be raining. I will post a picture of the three of us, if we manage to get one between the rain and the romping around.

training Miss Yellow

Here is the final puppy training video. This is Miss Yellow puppy at 10 weeks. She has stayed with us a bit longer because she is flying to her new home in Brisbane today and needed to be that bit older before going on the plane.

Like all the puppies, she will do just about anything for a bit of hot dog. Here she shows what she has learned so far.

So now, Juliette and Tim... it's up to you guys to keep those hot dogs coming!

She is such a clever little girl.

puppy in a pot

More puppy playing video. This was from our last day all together. Things sure have quieted down now that there are only four.

The last bit of this video is Pink trying to get into a flower pot.

puppies and Gracie playing

This was the last day that we had all nine puppies together. Five have now gone off to their new homes. The last four go over the next week or so.

We sure hope they are not too lonely without all their brothers and sisters. Judging by the folks that picked them up, I think they are all going to be spoiled rotten, so I'm not worried at all!

I think Gracie is going to miss them more than me - I'm a bit over them by now. I want to go back to being the centre of attention!

She just loves playing with the little guys. Watch them here.

early morning, 5am

Here's who's waiting every morning for someone to get up and let them out to play. They are so cute, it's hard to resist them!

puppy training

Kay has been introducing all the pups to the basics of clicker training. The hardest part seems to be getting them to eat the tiny bits of hot dog from her hand. They don't know where that great smell is coming from!

Here is Purple ribbon puppy demonstrating how to follow the lure, sit, down and roll over. Puppies at this age can't really learn it all yet, but they are getting imprinted with the correct behaviours. At least we hope they are!

All the puppies are doing the training and all are very good at it. These are some smart dogs, my pups.

asleep

It gets so quiet when the pups finally fall asleep! After a riotous play period this morning, they finally dropped in their tracks.

Except for some, who like their mother, always keep an eye on what's happening.

puppies in the straw

Well, it's like a barnyard around here now. Kay and Neil went out and got a bale of straw today and covered the entire backyard. It was pretty muddy and awful before.

The pupsters think it is great and played in it for the longest time. Then they settled down and chewed on it for a while longer

Squiggle

Green

Yellow with Aqua

Pink (chewing on a piece of straw)

puppies in the sandbox

We have had torrential rain here for the last 3-4 days. Everything is muddy. Kay is losing her mind trying to keep up with 44 muddy paws everywhere.

Yesterday the rain stopped for a brief time and the pups headed out to the sandbox for playtime.

Neil and the pups

The puppies had staged a raid on the recycling bin. They found all sorts of fun toys, like milk bottles and yoghurt containers. You can see the evidence in the background of this video.

Neil went to check out what they were up to and they were delighted to see him.

Gracie loves the puppies

Gracie likes to keep an eye on all the pupsters. She spends hours with them, quite happily playing and wrestling. This was yesterday morning's play time (6am).

With Yellow ribbon girl.

With Pink ribbon girl.

Bitey-face with Purple ribbon girl.

Mobbed by all of them.

Here she is romping with them in the very small yard.