K9 Kindercare

When Barbara goes out of town she takes me to stay at a really great place called K9 Kindercare. It is a small kennel run by a very nice woman named Terrie. Terrie loves dogs and takes excellent care of all of us when our people go away. I love going there. I miss my person, but I usually make so many new friends that I enjoy myself enormously.



When I arrived I had to sniff everyone and of course they had to sniff me. Terrie has a great group of dogs staying this weekend and she is good putting compatible dogs together so we get along.



I've made a new Brittany friend. We spent a lot of time sniffing all the good smells in the play yard. We are sporting dogs and we must hunt.



Of course my favorite type of playing is splashing around in the baby pools. We have 3 pools to share.



Here I am in control of all the pools!!!



Barbara is at a board meeting of the Association of Pet Dog Trainers. They are spending two days discussing things like the best way to educate dog trainers. Now I know this is a very important topic but it must be sooooo boring! She has to sit in meetings all day long and I bet the board doesn't get a chance to play in any baby pools!

I Received an Award!!

Holly and Zac, my Border Collie friends from across the pond, have given my blog the Arte y Pico Award! This is my very first award so I am thrilled. Thanks so much and here are the details about the award:

"This award was created to be given to bloggers who inspire others with their creativity and their talents, also for contributing to the blogging world in whatever medium. When you receive this award it is considered a special honor."

The RULES!You have to pick FIVE blogs that you consider deserve this award for creativity, design, interesting material and also contribute to the blogger community regardless of language. Each award has to have the name of the author and a link to his/her blog to be visited. Each award winner has to show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given him/her the award itself.

Award winners and the one who has given the prize have to show the link of the "Arte-y Pico" blog so everyone will know the origin of the award.

I've chosen the following blogs to receive the Arte y Pico Award:

The Life of Royal. Royal is a young Australian Shepherd who is one of my boyfriends. He's learning a lot of new skils and blogs about his training.

Momo and Pinot because they have such lovely photos of their beautiful faces on their blog.

The Association of Pet Dog Trainers conference blog where you can learn all about this important dog training conference.

Dogstar Daily blog which is Dr. Ian Dunbar's site. Lots of excellent dog trainers post there.



So thanks Holly and Zac for the award and for enjoying my blog.

Frosty Paw Failure

I like ice cream so I was very excited when Barbara said that she was going to make me homemade Frosty Paws which is a frozen dessert for dogs. I sat right next to the counter while all the ingredients went into the blender.



I watched very carefully as she poured the mixture into the paper cups hoping that Barbara would spill them on the floor.
Then they had to go into the freezer and I had to wait.



You can see that I am very interested in the little cup when it cam out of the freezer.



I am licking my chops in anticipation of frosty paw deliciousness cooling me off on this hot, humid day.



Here I am turning my head away in disgust. She must have done something wrong because it tasted awful!!! It was supposed to be delicious and it was a revolting mix of bananas and yougurt! I am crushed.



My person is supposed to be a good cook but you would never know it from that yucky mess.

Freestyle Practice

This week I got a chance to practice Rally and some Tracking. This morning we got together with some of our friends to practice our Canine Freestyle routines.



I had a bath yesterday (UGH!!) so I am looking particularly shiny today. I am waiting for my turn to go in the ring. We are finishing up the choreography for my routine and we've added a zig zag where I switch back and forth from heeling on the left side to heeling on the right side. It is not that hard to do and I get lots of string cheese while I practice, so I enjoy it. Unfortunately, Barbara forgot to give her camera to someone to take photos, so there are no pictures of me working!



This is my new friend Rhiannon. She is a 2 year old Chesapeake Bay Retriever and is just starting freestyle. She and her person are heeling around the ring while we all try to figure out what would be the best music for her performance.



I like freestyle because I get to show of how well I move and get to do some fun tricks too. Once the routine is finished, and I've practiced it, we will post a video.

Selkie's Anniversary

Today is a sad anniversary. One year ago today my big sister Selkie died. It was very unexpected as she had seemed very healthy up until she woke us up at 2 in the morning in great distress. It was a horrible thing called a spontaneous pneumothorax which meant her lungs collapsed. Even though Barbara rushed her to the emergency vet and then to the vet school, they could not save her.




Selkie was a very special Gordon Setter. She was smart and silly and very confident. She loved everyone she met especially little kids. Selkie was very opinionated and was in charge at home. I was only allowed to play with her toys if she let me (which wasn't often) and sometimes she stole mine. But she was fun to play with and was excellent at chasing.



Selkie and Barbara did Rally and Freestyle competition together. They had a great bond and I know Barbara still misses her very much. I do too.

After Selkie died our friends in the Drill Team made a donation to the NC State College of Veterinary Medicine in her memory. There are two bricks there dedicated to Selkie and you can view them here

Another Boyfriend

A girl can never have too many boyfriends. Royal is a very handsome young Australian Shepherd. I think he is very cute. I've known him for awhile but it was nice to have a chance to hang out with him in the dog park.



We had a good time sniffing each other in rude places and of course I behaved in a very flirtatious manner. Barbara thinks that I acted like a brazen hussy but I was just having fun. I did not post some of the more risque photos since impressionable puppies may be reading this blog and I do not want to shock them with R-rated material!!!



I love to be chased and Royal was happy to oblige me by chasing me around the park. You can see that we wore each other out.



I hope I get another chance to play with Royal soon.

Lake Fun

It has been so hot here this week that we haven't been able to do anything fun outside. We go for walks but then I run back in the house to get air conditioned. This morning Barbara got me up really early. I did not like it first because I need my beauty sleep but when she said that we were going to Jordan Lake I was very pleased. We had to get to the lake early before the jet skiers took over the beach we go to.

Here I am inspecting the beach for interesting junk. Sometimes if I am lucky I find a nice smelly dead fish. No such luck today.


I race through the shallow water as fast as I can go.



Even though it is 7:30 am the sun is strong and it is already getting hot. Fortunately the water is lovely and cool.



I like to go out to get sticks and bring them back to shore.





It was a fun way to start the day and use up some energy. We got back to the car and Barbara realized she had forgotten to bring a towel to dry me off so I dripped water all over the car on the ride home. HAH!! I had a big breakfast, played with my stuffies for awhile and am now ready to go back to sleep!

Cows etc.

The only interesting thing that happened this week was the flood on our patio. I thought it would be nice to wade in the cool water since it has been so hot but Barbara was not happy because a pipe had burst. I was very disappointed when the plumber came to fix it. So my life has been very boring. Today it cooled off in the evening and we went to Fearrington on one of my favorite walks.

Our first stop is by the pastures. What great smells!!



Here are some of the Belted Galloway cows. I always try to make friends with them. They are very big and they stare at me so I glad that there is a strong fence between us.



They are always very curious about me when we visit. I wonder if cows have blogs the way we dogs do?

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I have never met this donkey before. Usually the baby donkey puts his head through the fence so we can sniff but this one is looking at me very disdainfully so we did not make friends.



After visiting the farm animals we walked around the ponds but it was very hot. I got a chance to cool off in the stream which felt great.







Then it was back home to eat dinner and hang out in the air conditioning.

Wow!

I've been totally bored lately because it has been too hot to go tracking. So I was very excited to find this box on the patio this afternoon. I knew it was for me because it had a paw print stamped on it.



"Hurry up and help me open this box!"



It was my International Goody Exchange package from Skye and the Moondance Huskies!! Yeah! It was wrapped all nicely with tissue paper and there was a beautiful card of a wolf from the Huskies and their kitties.


Look at all these terrific goodies! All kinds of great cookies including peanut butter, fillet mignon, berry flavored and iced cookies with sprinkles! I wanted to try every kind immediately but Barbara only let me have a few of the berry flavored ones which were delish.



There was also a squeaky bone and a wonderful stuffed rabbit that squeaks. I am in heaven because I love stuffed toys.



I can't thank the Moondance Huskie Sled Dog Team enough. This really made my day. To Skye, Lakota, Dave, Angel, Velvet, Jasmine, Blaze and Becky and their kitties Misty, Starr and Diana, I will think of you every time I squeak my new rabbit or chow down on those cookies. Thank you.

Dog Park Silliness

I finally got out to the APS dog park this afternoon. It was hot but I really needed to run all the silliness out of me. And I made a new friend while I was there! This is Tibbie a 2 year old Bulldog. Her person adopted her from Bulldog Rescue.



We had a great time playing together. I can run much faster than Tibbie can on her short little legs. I did laps around the dog park and Tibbie would try to catch me as I ran by her.



So I would throw myself down on the ground and Tibbie would "get" me.





I think I tired her out a bit. Isn't she cute with her smushed in face?



After all our silliness we had to cool off in the baby pool. It is very small so we had to take turns.



What a fun afternoon - dog park silliness and a new friend!!

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Portrait

Barbara is not a very good photographer. And I'm not such a good subject as I really don't like to sit around and pose for pictures. There was a professional photographer at the Canine Freestyle workshop that we went to in April and Barbara decided to have him take a picture of me. I think I drove the poor man crazy as I wiggled, panted or drooled every time he took a shot. Finally I sat still and here is the result.







I am very excited about the International Package Exchange that is coming up! I understand that the drawing is tomorrow and I can't wait to find out who I get. And then of course I get to go shopping!!!!

Friends

I've been doing lots of fun things in the past week or so - practicing my freestyle and working on my tracking. Unfortunately my person forgot her camera so none of my work has been recorded for posterity! I thought I would post pictures of some of my friends.

This is my new friend Minnie.




She was recently adopted from the Animal Protection Society by a nice guy who is now her special person. Minnie is a lot of fun. She runs very fast and likes to chase. We would stand very still and stare at one another and then just take off running. Such fun! She is also good at chew face games which I love to play. I am so glad that Minnie has a home and her own special person to care for her.




Here is a picture of one of my many boyfriends, Ralph.



Isn't he a handsome guy? He is a Retriever/Collie cross and he was also adopted from APS a couple of years ago. Besides being handsome, he has a sweet disposition and is very accomplished. He has his Canine Good Citizen (CGC) and just last month he passed the Delta Society's Pet Partner Evaluation so he can go visiting at nursing homes and hospitals.

There are lots of great dogs waiting for homes in shelters and adoption centers.