New Toy! December 6, 2011

Now I have no excuse to get some film of the progress of training! Dave got me a new camera for my birthday! It has checked out to be a very good camera and HD!

I am looking forward to using it for Rowan’s classes, for my students and to record Newt’s progress.

Check back for video soon!

Irish Pride, oh how you worry me… December 4, 2011

Pride scared me this weekend… I thought for sure our trip to the vet today would be her last car ride. She has had a quarter sized cyst at the base of her ear for several years. It sometimes shrinks sometimes grows… and this weekend it burst internally. Within a short number of hours white blood cells started attaching the area and the whole side of her face was swollen. Thank goodness one of the vet clinics in my vet’s network was open. We got her some antibiotics which helped right away. And BIGGER thanks to Diane who came over and used a voice of reason and added some perspective that it may just be an infection … not the end of the road for the old girl.

All of us with animals knows what’s it’s like to reach the end of your pets life and get to the point to make “the decision”. I remain thankful everyday that I am able to help my animals, with my vet, to pass on and not cause undue suffering. But it is never an easy decision to make as to when it’s time.

A good friend who had had a dog the same age as Pride had to let her girl go this weekend – 13.5 years is a long run for a boxer. When it’s time for Pride to go… I know that she will have lived a great life as the three-legged an urban legend and kind soul who has filled our home with mischief and sweet snuggles.

Mr. Personality December 4, 2011

Newton has many nicknames at this point and I would imagine that more will develop as time goes by… Newt seems to be the one I come back to every day.  Newt, Newtron, Newtor, Newts-magoots, Nougat, The little Fig, Newtown, Newton Pippin, Little Man….

Newton loves:

• food – pretty much anything
• canvas toys
• work for food toys – because it combines two of his favorite things!
• shoes, mostly the right one
• people – period
• to carry things

Newton could live without:

• bubbles in the bathtub, they are scary
• Rain
• His coat (which makes the rain no better)
• being pushed away with a foot… where his response was to look into the face of the person who did it and had he been able to talk he would have asked, “Why did you do that?”

It’s so fun to have him learn and watch him grow right before my eyes – it seems! He was 13 lbs at the vet about 7 days ago.