BY CH White Coastal Little Blue Avatar

Lucky's  beautiful daughter Peppi visited Belorussia in the end of February and came back with BY CH title. BIIIIIIIIIG concratulations, Peppi, we are very proud of you!!!

Winter

By estonian national calendar, 2 weeks ago the backbone of winter was broken and now every day brings us closer to spring. So it's definately too late to have "merry Christmast" posting up here :o). We don't have very exciting news to tell you, but some things need to be told and so it comes a summary again - of what we have done lately.
Starting with the good news that we finally have the winter outside I was dreaming about since October 1st :o).  Dogs don't need to be washed several times every day and all streets are covered with motivation for Lucky - snow :o). There's absolutely no need to put "candies" for dogs to my pocket, Rocco is very obedient anyway and there's no food in the world that would motivate Lucky better then snow balls:o). Not that he's eating them, just chasing :o). I have tested him in the situation where he was out of leach and there were 2 small babe's ( = nice little bitches) walking in front of us. We passed them playing together without him even looking at them :o). And if he run's free and sees something interesting I only need to mention I have a ball and he turns back in a second. So life is easy for me :o)
Then -  there's one more very special gift Lucky and I got from elves:

 Now I have it on the office wall so Lucky is with me at work too. Biiig thanks to Karin.

What's not so good about winter is that Rocco doesn't much like to join us on our walks. Weather seems to have big impact to his joints and cold or wet weather isn't good for him. So sooner or later I need back-bag to still have him with us on our walks (if any of you have seen such thing, I'm really thinking about it, please let me know too). Additionally Rocco had a strange thing under his skin in the end of last year. We showed it to vet and luckyly it's only a lipoma, nothing bad. I tried to get advantage out of that - told to Rocco, that this is what happens if you steal from puppy's (= Lucky, he always remains puppy in our home :o) ) bowl. But obviously he doesn't care at all :o), if nobody sees, he can't pass Lucky's bowl without emptying it :o). Well, let him enjoy the last opportunities, because in case he want's to travel in back bag in the future, he goes to diet :o). Only carrots and cabbage :o)

And then a good way to entertain your dogs - skiing. I bought ski's year ago -  after about 25  years brake . And my trying to learn to ski again is sooooo funny for Lucky. Last weekend we tried to choose the trail with less people getting part of the fun :o) and let Lucky run free. He ran next to me barking all the time, then went to chase daddy and then back to me again. I had my fancy sport watch, and looking Lucky running free, I thought to test it on Lucky too. So next day we took the same route and Lucky weared the watch. Result was, that when I skied 8.5 km with speed 8.65(now you know why Lucky is barking and laughing next to me, I'm snail slow:o) ), Lucky covered 12.13 km and his average speed was 9.67.  Lucky's speed maybe isn't very accurate, because we met a friend and of course had to chat, which is no good for statistics. But we can test again and I'll tell you, if we improve our results :o). Here's a photo made last weekend:

And this photo is made year ago, on 25.03. This was definately the best skiing trip I have ever had. Days were warm and sunny but nights very cold. Snow was melting at day time and freezing at night time, so it was strong surface to ski on and skis run very fast. We skied on shore of the river, where it's impossible to access in any other time of year and there was nobody else then us. Well, we didn't see, only the footprints - of wolf. Many times bigger then our Jossu's foot prints. And beavers "building" higher then me. This really was great experience.

Merry Christmas

This Christmas has been very different compared to last year. Last year at the same time I was wondering how we get the car out of snow next morning to go to work (well, we didn't, we walked 2 km in snow to main road and borrowed daddy's dad's car :o) ). This year, beeing very optimistic, I can say at least we had kind of white Christmas :

But reason to worry about how we get the car out tomorrow we still have - because of storm today, that has broken the trees to the road. Living in country you really feel the power of the nature :o). Today electricity was disconnected before we woke up in the morning and hasn't come back yet. Wouldn't it be Christmas, I would say the weather has been wonderful today, +9C, full sun. And wind, 35 m/sec that's braking the trees.

But still, Christmas was great, and thank you very much, my dear friends, for wonderful Christmas Cards:

And the sweetest photo I have ever seen - the tricolour of course is Lucky. It's made by Linda, owner of Lucky's sister Foxy and so I post it here with greetings from Linda and Foxy:

Merry Christmas to you and your family

Head vana asta lõppu ja edukat Uut aastat! Kristina & Co

Säravaid saavutusi aastal 2012!Brilliant achievements in New Year 2012! Helle :)

Autumn summary

It has been quiet autumn in our blog. Mostly because we are living our usual everyday life and I don't have big news to tell you. This year it seems that autumn doesn't want to end.  The weather has been warm, but it's dark outside and thinking about bears who can go to winter sleep makes me jealous :o). Last year at the same time it was real winter outside, cold and 45 cm of snow.  Rocco seems to sense cold winter coming this year too, considering his appetite :o). Me too :os.  Together with him we are like vacuum cleaners, checking all the corners of the house for food every evening :o). But Lucky has summer in his heart all year long and that means no weather can't stop him from wanting to go to walk, to play and so on. Well, to make a compromise - we keep preparing with Rocco :o), but we don't go to winter sleep :o).

 But we really have had enough of the autumn now and so I make a summary of it here and hope the snow comes very, very soon.

As pictures tell more then words, I'll contribute to photos again

First a picture with Kelli and dogs and carrots that my mum raised this summer. Also the flowers behind are evidence of my mum's "green fingers". Cosmos flowers seemed really grow to cosmos :o)

One news, probably most important for me this year, about Kelli too - Kelli went to school!

 I had vacation in beginning of September when we walked Kelli to school in the morning and later came to meet her there to go home together. In the mean time we took a long walk on our beach with dogs. Next photo of  Rocco on his birthday. It's funny to think that just a month before this picture was taken, there was as many people on the beach, as sea shells on the photo :o). When we walked there, we meet maybe only couple of people

On the same day - Lucky just being Lucky :o)

Photo made by Karin on our beach on Rocco's birthday walk

And here some pictures taken on our weekend walks at country.

In the end of November it's Kadripäev (St.Catherine's day) in Estonian national calendar.  Day before it Kadri beggars go from door to door wishing good luck and asking candies. Obviously there are different traditions on Shetland, so please excuse the dogs for looking vary to our visitors :o).

We got one more very interesting visitor, on weekend, at our country home. An hunting dog came to take a break on hunting :o). He was very kind and if we first put a leash to keep him until we called on the number on his jacket, later he played with Lucky until his owner arrived and didn't want to leave even then :o)

And last one - photo of our walk last weekend.

There's one very special friend on this photo I haven't wrote about much here - Riki. Riki and Jossu are both living with daddy's parents. And both were stray dogs as a puppy. Riki we found  more then 10 years ago on our walk. He was settled under a tree and we thought his owner is somewhere near. When we walked same route week later, he was still there. We took him food there several weeks hoping he finds his way back home or his owner finds him. But he was so loyal to the place under the tree, never left from there. As it was about same time of the year as now and same weather, getting colder and colder, daddy's parents agreed to take him. And Riki has been loyal. Their garden isn't fenced, but Riki knows the border and hasn't ever crossed it allone. Riki is first dog Rocco met, when he came to us, as Riki was for sure kind and patient. And now he is kind and patient with Lucky. Riki was so much asking to come with us last weekend, that we just couldn't say no to him. And we took the route we used to walk when he and Jossu were young and Rally with us. And later  Rocco, who still thinks Riki and Jossu are sheep and he is their sheepdog :o). 3 old friends were walkig nicely with us and only Lucky flied around like they used to 10 years back. It was sweet to be in same places again, and to think back on "old" times. Wonder, if they remembered their younger years too 

Elves

We got wonderful early Christmas gift:

Biiiiiiig thanks to Lucky's daughter Peppi and Kati, her ovner

Rocco's birthday vol 2

10 years is respectable age, so don't be surprised about one more birhtday posting.

On wednesday we celebrated Rocco's 10 years birthday with his breeder, Inna Tolli.

Thank you, Inna, for this amazing dog, thank you for beeing our friend and shareing your experience for last 10 years.

Summerfun with friends

Summer is time to do a lot of fun and meet friends to collect warm memories for cold winter. Same comes to dogs and here are some photos of Lucky and Rocco and their friends having summerfun

First a walk with Kaire and her Cavaliers Winston and Morris. We definately have to take it one more time, the real 30 C summer wasn't arrived then yet and because  of rain we had to hide our cameras and don't have much photoevidence to show you :o)

Look at little Morris flying

Then a beautiful sunny day with Karin and Inna and 7 Shelties.

Here's the slideshow of photos made by Karin

and bigger pictures you can see here

Then a wonderful day with Free Soul Dachhounds Lotte and Annu (Luna was left home this time) and their family

We didn't get 4 dogs on the same picture this time, because it's very cruel to waste huntingdog's time with your camera if the world if full of smells :o). But here are Lotte and Annu before they escaped to chace mices and other prey animals fields and forests are full of :o)

And we managed to catch Annu for one more picture

But a proper Dachhound has more hobbies then hunting, here's Lotte, doing her 10 points diving

1. And should you blame my innocent Shelties - no, it's not because she's escaping Lucky and Rocco :o)

Then, visiting Helle and Uno and Cheddarhill Welsh Springer Spaniels in their wonderful summer home, photos are taken in the bog near to it

Next to Lucky and me is witches broom :o)

And now we are back in town.

I have wonderful pictures to show you of our walk with Karin and Fancy and Pippi on our beach, look at this link.

But here one photo made by Kelli on the alley next to our city home

We very much miss a day with Kristina, Kendzi and Joker, but summer isn't over yet, hopefully we have time to fix this.

Celebrities ;o)

I have reason to be happy and proud again: first of all for Karin and Fancy, because Karin's photo of Fancy is on the cover of America's next year Sheltie calendar!!!

And Lucky and Rocco are in too!!! Pictures are taken by Karin on our last summer Sheltiephotoday. I'm sure you recognize Lucky (well, just in case - he's the tricolour with sweetest face in the world) and Rocco is the one standing tall in the lake.
Real celebrities, aren't they ?

:o)

Lucky and Fancy the “cover kids”

I’m so proud - Lucky and Fancy are on the cover of Netherland Sheltie club magazine! I’m proud of my beautiful little Lucky and his beautiful little friend Fancy and my talented friend Karin who made this photo. Miracles just come out from Karin’s camera one after another, it's great that we have had possibilities to be part of them.

We are back again

Greetings from Lucky and Rocco after the long brake in our blog. It seems I'm very capable to keep myself very busy and as I definately won't steal time from my daughter and dogs there's just computer left to steal that time from :o). But all my big projects are over for now, so I hope there will be more life here again in the future.
To write here all the things we have done in between would make this posting too long, so I'll try to make it short:
Starting last autumn - we started agility trainings with Lucky.
Our trainer is Kristina, my friend and ovner of Lucky's friend Joker and Rocco's friend Kendzi. Years ago, when we run agility with Rocco, I admired cooperation between Kristina and Kendzi and Kristina's handler skills. Though Kendzi is retired now, they still are my favourite agility couple and probably always will be. Thank you, Kristina, for teaching us!!! And I just have to mention that Kendzi is Estonia's first International Agility Champion and this far the only one . Talking about our training - Lucky loves agility. He loves all the training, but running he loves even more then treats and toys I offer him on the agility field. We competed up to highest class with Rocco, before he had to retire because of his arthritis, but with Lucky I feel like I hadn't ever run agility before - Lucky is just so fast. But he is fast in everything, even barking 10 x faster then Rocco :o). And Rocco is agility tourist now, waiting in the crate and eating candies for that. Here's couple of pictures and I'll keep you updated with our progress



About winter there is a few postings already, but just to summarize : it was wonderful . With so much snow, that most roads to our beloved walkingplaces stayed closed almost until the middle of April and everywhere else you could think about walking the dogs were skiing trails and walking and dogs were prohibited. Well, still I hope that Rocco & Lucky don't have reason to complain, here's some photo evidence for you. Starting from the most beautiful I have - here is a slide show of photos made by Karin Põiklägu and bigger pictures you can see here.

Then a new experience for me - driving on the ice road. I'm not sure if dogs appreciated the new experience, but it was interesting for us. And dogs got a walk on island.


Then spring. Again I have many beautiful pictures made by Karin to show to you

And now it's summer. The weather has been amazing, sunny and very, very hot . Dogs enjoy their summer freedom at our country home. At the evening, when I get home they greet me well rested and waiting for me to entertain them :o). Lucky has most sweetest "back-molar-hi" for me :o) It means he jumps up on me and if I give him my hand to lean on (because he want's to be taller to say hi properly) he'll chew my hand and kiss me alternately :o) . There's so many things he would like to do (all those things include speed :o). ) and he is confused to choose which one to ask. Rocco, just the opposite, knows exactly what he would like - to go swimming. He is real Shetland beaver - first one to go to water and last one to come out. Swimming 30 minutes without resting is no problem for him and considering it's good for his joints + it makes him happy, I haven't really limited him. Lucky doesn't see any point in just swimming, he complains when we go in and only sometimes joins us, if it seems to him we have too much fun without him. BUT... he could chase water splaches endlessly. If I stop the splach-game and turn my attention on something else, he'll look my leg in water for some time, beeing very concentrated and then scrapes me very pollitely to remind about discontinued game:o). And if we go out of the water too early (well, it's always too early for him) he just stands there and won't go out :o). He can go swimming too if we throw something valuable there - like wooden stick :o), but then he still first tries to walk on water :o). I haven't understood why retrieving from water is so fun for him. He very seldom retrieves on land. His favourite game at home is football. Me and Kelli play with his soft ball and he chases it back and forth and barks all the time :o).
Now, link to summer album and that's all for summary. If I have forgotten something important , I'll tell about it later and I'll post some "new" news too and try to keep the track in future ;o)