Puppy pics from Rafe (Guest Blog)

Rafe here.

So, puppy pics. Moved here when I was 7 months. No photos of when I was on the farm. These'll do, Pippin says. From my first days here. Still look young, do you think?

Here I'm looking at a garden bed. Missed the poppies blooming, but they'll bloom again this year. Soon.



Hamish is a couple months older than me. He's a pal. We growl around a bit, wrestle, play bitey face. Good dog. Here's us saying hi.



This is a funny picture. I look twice as big as everydog else. (I'm not.) Don't know where Pippin is. She was standoffish at first. We're getting to be friends now that I'm older.



Well, there you have it. Sorry I was late posting. Had a Thin Mint episode this weekend. Best not give details.

Woof,
Rafe

Puppy pics from Miss Tansy (Guest Blog)

Greetings Gentledogs!

Miss Pippin requested that I present an entry about my puppy pictures. Now, she well knows I have no true puppy pictures, but suggested that my earliest pictures with the Flock would suffice. (We heard that handsome Dave of Army of Four had the same situation.) Therefore, I will here show you some of my earlier photographs.

Here is first photograph, with my initial Rescuer. I had not been inside a House before, so I perhaps look a bit uneasy.


Below is an image of me at my Foster Home. I was very camera-shy, so Foster Mother (Bless her) held up one of her Kitties for me to gaze at. You may be able to see a bare spot on my front leg. I was most distressed with boredom and loneliness and limited environment at my initial residence. Such frustration led me to chew my leg fur and, alas, the white end of my tail off.


When I first arrived Home, I considered it best to stay quiet and observe my new Flock. You will notice I was granted my Couch immediately. Perhaps the younger members of my Flock could learn to respect my position now and end their fruitless challenges.


Despite my shy appearance, I was beside myself with joy! Miss Pippin and Sir Renzo and I ran about and played with delight. Miss Pippin and I had a great deal of fun:


At one moment we stopped playing to sing:


I do feel most fortunate to be with my Flock now. To those kind rescuers who helped me on my journey I am forever grateful. My Flock members tell me they are indebted to me for having introduced them to Sheep. It does then seem appropriate for me to end with a close-up photograph of me Working. You may be able to see that my fur is thick and the tip of my tail is white.

Pictures from the true puppy (Guest Blog)

Hi, 'member me? I'm Kyzer, the only real puppy left in the house. I turned 5 mos. old on last Saturday, so I still have quite a bit of growing to do. Two weeks ago, I made the big boy move to only have two meals a day instead of three. So, these pictures are all of me when I was still a little puppy who needed to eat three (or four in the beginning) times a day.

Here I am at 5 weeks playing with two of my sisters. We are tugging the camera strap. I'm the big one on the left
Here's another one of me with my littlest sister, Emma. Right now, I weigh almost 30 lbs and she doesn't even weigh 20. She's pretty feisty, though.
Here's the whole puppy pile on the day we all went home. Can you guess which one I am (hint: I'm the biggest in the whole litter)
If you didn't find me, I'm the one laying the farthest to the right. Don't we all look a little bovine? Here's me awake that day (and pretty worried about what was going on)
Look at my ears (Hamish said I should say that.) I settled in pretty nicely at home. I got to sit in the person's lap all the way home even though I was supposed to ride in a crate. She just didn't want to put me down and the crate was SOO big for such a little fellow.
Look how cute and sweet I was out on the deck. Looks like I'm going to have floppy ears.
I may look sweet and all, but I'm no pushover and I know how to defend my stuff. Rafe and Hamish have always wrestled and played with me and taught me how to keep hold of my stuff. The older dogs (and definitely Queen Pippin) don't play with me at all. They're boring.
I got to see sheep for the first time when I was 8 weeks old, but only from outside the pen. I was pretty interested. Even though Hamish got be in the pen with the sheep when he was just 4 1/2 mos. old, I have to wait until I'm 6 mos. old. It's not really fair, but what's a boy to do?
I like to play with balls, toys and tugs a lot. I try to keep them away from Hamish and Rafe. I "bat" about 50%, but my averages are getting better as I get bigger.
Here was my official portrait at 4 mos. Look, my ears are coming up a little bit. That's when I got weighed at the vet and I weighed 25.4 lbs. The vets say that puppies will be about double their weight at 16 weeks, so I'm gonna be a pretty big guy. That's good--then I'll be as big as Rafe. He weighs almost 50 lbs. Hamish is a skinny guy. He only weighs 41 lbs, but he's taller and longer than Rafe. That's why he's the corner back on our football team. I don't have a position yet, but my people keep saying lineman or tight end. We'll see. (Rafe is the quarterback, Pippin is the wide receiver; Renzo is the kick returner and Tansy is the linebaker--aren't the people doofy?).

Even though I'm a big boy and all, sometimes I just have to rest a little bit. And where better to rest than a spot in the sun?
Finally, here's the "portrait" my person took on the first day I got no lunch. Don't I look like I am starving? I'm completely gaunt. It's amazing I didn't keel over from low blood suger. That's pretty much what I still look like, only bigger and more handsome. And look at my ears! They look like they're going to be tippy ears.

"Puppy" pics from First Dog, Renzo (Guest Blog)

Hi everydog. You might remember me. I'm Renzo, first dog. The people became a pack when they added me back in 2001. I was young and very skinny. They didn't have a digital camera then. The very first pictures of me aren't on the computer. That's o.k., except for gaining a few pounds, I don't look all that different. Most of these picture are from life B.B.C. (before Border Collies). I had fun then. I have fun now too.

When the people finally joined the rest of the world and got a digital camera, some of their first pictures were of me. Here's one
I'm glad the people like taking my picture. I don't like the flash, though. Never have, never will.
One of my main jobs for the pack is squirrel duty. I don't like them and they don't like me. Kind of like Miss Ivy, I am part of a secret Anti-Squirrel Army. Here I am patrolling the borders of my property while on squirrel duty. I found one lurking in a tree.
Here I am just keeping an eye on things from my preferred vantage point on the deck
In B.B.C. times, I used to play with my neighbor, Zuri. Her people got her only a few months before I claimed my people. But, she hated Pippin from the moment they met and after Pippin came to live with us, Zuri didn't want to play in the yard with me anymore. That's o.k., I like Pippin. Zuri went to live with new people last summer so we don't see her anymore.
I trained the kittes about dogs in B.B.C. time. It's a good thing too since B.C.'s sometimes like to "herd" kitties. The people *almost* had to give me back because while I was training the kitties, I was pretty relentless about one of them and did whatever I could to try and catch him. I just wanted to tell him that dogs are o.k., but he kept running away. The people made all kinds of barriers and that kitty moved to the basement for a while. But, look, now we are pretty good friends
The big white cat Macchio and I always got along. He taught me how to be gentle and I taught him how to hug a dog. I really still miss him.
Finally, the thing that caused life to go from B.B.C to A.B.C (after Border Collies) was flyball. Funny thing is, I'm the only dog the people actually trained to play. So, here are two pics of me playing flyball and one of my person asking me to stop barking (my nickname at home is Sir Barks-a-lot--I don't know why people think that's funny).

Puppy pics--Hamish (Guest Blog)

From the desk of Hamish Braeburn Moy, Esq.

After being inspired by the Aof4's puppy picture-a-thon and some newly found photos of Copper, my sister Pippin decided that we should do the same thing and for some inexplicable reason, she picked me to be first (probably because I was the cutest puppy on the planet). So, here I am as a little tyke.

This was the first picture the breeder sent to my people of me even before they thought they might get me. So, this is before I was Hamish.
Here's a picture of me after I became Hamish. Still pretty guinea pig-like, huh?
Here I am on my first day in Michigan. I had a hard travel from Canada because I got car sick. Let me tell you, it's no fun being car sick for 8 hours. But, I survived o.k. Look at what my ears are doing.
My big sister Pippin (she and I have the same mom) was really nice to me right from the start. That's unusual for her, so I decided I must be a very important dog. She still likes to play with me the best.
Although I look sweet and innocent in this picture, what it really captures is my very own first dug hole. Wouldn't Meeshka be proud? And, hey, check out my ears here!
My people thought I was so smart that I should go to school right away, so off I went. Here I am with my diploma (and some really wacky ears)
Finally, the big day came for me when I first got to see some sheep. I was just a whipper-snapper--only four months old--but on my second visit into the pen, I ran up to the sheep and told them they had to listen to me. And guess what, they believed me! My people were so stunned they forgot to take a picture, but here I am waiting while Tansy had a turn--and still with those who-knows-what-they're-gonna-do-ears
It didn't take long before I was doing more or less "real" (but still beginner) sheep work. Here I am at 8 mos sending the sheep through a chute. That's me in the back.
And finally, about this time, my ears made up their mind and here's the final product. I'm the only one in my pack whose ears both stand up pretty much all the time and all the way.
Watch for the early pics of the rest of my gang in the coming days. One of my people thinks it's really neat to see all the different ear types, so don't be surprised if the ears of my packmates get pointed out too. Of course, you should feel free to tell her she's a big geek.

Sincerely,

H.B. Moy

My bubba and my person

Hi everydog. You might have been wondering where I've been (at least I like to think you've been wondering that--it helps feed my delicate ego). My person went away for a long time to stay with the toddler in her family (some of you might remember when the toddler came to visit me). Toddlers are human puppies. In dog time, a 2-year old toddler is like a 3 month old puppy. Old enough to feed themselves, but not old enough to keep the food in the bowl all the time.

People believe that our ages and their ages are related by "7"--people think that a 1 year old dog is like a 7 year old human. So a three-year old like me is the equivalent of a 21-year old human. Where do you think they got that idea?? Why "7" and not "8" or "6". It sounds to me like a lot of what they do--make something up that seems like it might be right based on their random, ad hoc observations of the world and then pretend it's true. Humans really do seem to believe that saying something a lot is what makes it true.

If only they really followed the dog method, which is to read the pee. That tells you all you really need to know about anything. Or at least they could follow their own scientific method.

Anyway, we're glad to have my person back 'cause the other person was getting pretty worn out walking, feeding and playing with all of us each day and she needed some time to do her important reading that she does every night while we let her share the couch with us.

So the title of my entry today is "my bubba and my person". You've heard about my person. My bubba is Hamish. See the toddler girl in Florida where my person was for so many long days calls her older brother "bubba". It's kind of cute in that way that Southerners are (not that I'm patronizing or anything--really, some of my best friends are southerners), and so I decided that's what I'd call Hamish from now on. Sort of poke fun at the people for giving him such a haughty, British name. So, here's a very sweet picture of Bubba.
He likes to take my person's shoes and just lay with them. When he was a pup, he'd chew them all up, but now, he just likes to have it with him--kind of like a security blanket. Sometimes, he tries to make it look like somedog else took them. As in the picture below
See, it looks like I'm the culprit with the shoe, but really, Bubba brought the shoe there and I just happened to be on the bed at the same time. Really.

And last, here's why I love my bubba-boy. What other dog would sleep with his sister curled up against him like that? I bet you wish you had a bubba-dog too.

Work. (Guest Blog)

Rafe here.

I'm a working dog. Play, sure, but work is what it's all about. Don't have sheep every day, yet, but still find work.

Those pups Hamish and Kyzer, don't know about them. Here's what I'm talking about:



See how I stay on task, chewing the bone:



Back to work now.

Woof,
Rafe

Hmmm. (Guest Blog)

Rafe here.

Morning reconnoiters this week. Puzzling. Object between sidewalk and street, on second block of walk. Gave it a wide berth first two days: walked a curve into house lawn, bad manners but necessary. Third day walked up to it, carefully.




Here's a close-up:



Sources report it's a Dried Hydrangea Blossom. Curious, a DHB in the snow, middle of February. More curious, next day:



Gone.

Any other DHB sightings out there?

Woof.
Rafe