New friends

Rocco and Lucky have new friends to introduce to you – Bosse and Bessie – the kittens :-). Not that we planned to take more cats, but ... their mum just moved to us as Kitu, Miku, Atsi and Tikker during the 25+ years we have had our country home - she just appeared on autumn and didn’t leave any more. Only exception is, "good people" have supplied us with very social male cats this far, but this one was girl and totally wild. Which brings us to second exception - she brought us 3 kittens this spring :-) (and our Tikker is neutered, so he can’t be blamed :-). ) She hide her babies between first floor ceiling and second floor floor, so it was quite a job for daddy to catch them. But unavoidable, considering mum + 3 kitten would make ... house full of cats in no time :-(. Of course nobody of us had heart to make the hard decision for them..., so I built baby-box for them to our bedroom and their mum moved in after them. By now, one kitten has moved not far from us and though we wanted to find new home to one more - surprise,surprise, :-) world is full of kittens at springtime so we have 2 of them at home. And wouldn't give away neither of them now, such sweet and funny friends. Rocco has new TV serial running around the house 24/7 and even better then rat-TV, as he can participate in movie too :-). Additional bonus to Rocco is that there are sweet little bowls on the floor that he no way touches... until we close the front door behind us :-) - then the bowls are washed in a second. Lucky too likes kittens, he sometimes even plays with them - nice innocent playmates, won't bite his precious coat and also definitely no takedowns :-). But then again, Tikker, Rocco and Lucky agree, that there is no peace in the world any more, you can never know when they come and turn their noses to your bowl or mouth when you eat; try to sleep on your aura and so on :-).

And one more new friend. But first I have to tell you sad news too. Our weekend-dog Jossu was diagnosed cancer just couple of weeks before Christmas and doctor said he won't see Christmas. He did, he even saw spring, but then he left us. And now, last week, Riki too. They were both around 14 years old, so a lot of memories to think back. Jossu was found wondering on streets with his brother as a puppy. As days went by and there was no sign of them having a home, Jossu came to live with our daddy's parents and his brother to daddy’s brother’s family. Jossu chose daddy to be HIS person, and just as Rocco always follows me, Jossu was agree with everything daddy wanted to do. He has been with us on our trips in Estonia and Lithuania, slept under our table in restaurants, visited us at our 6th floor city home, all that with no socialization as a puppy. He had his kennel and chain at home, but when visiting us on weekends, he was running free and never left the territory. Just the opposite. Last summer he suddenly appeared to our country home, piece of his chain still hanging. The distance is 4 km and there are other dogs on the way and road to cross over.
If you really know the dog, there's always something unforgettable in him. Jossu too had one unique habit - he never wanted to turn back :-). When we turned around and wanted to go back, he came to us jumping up on us and giving a lot of very wet kisses until we turned around again and continued our walk. And of course, when dog thinks up something by himself, you have to support it. So we tried to sneak back on every opportunity and always let him be happy about changing our minds. And that's even when we came from nice long walk and couple of steps before home turned around - he also came to kiss us and ask not to go back... and not because he very much wanted to go home and get chained :-)
About Riki I wrote a posting some time ago. Him we found on our walk here at country, under a tree next to road. We walked by with daddy's parents old german sheperd, teenager Jossu and my old Rally with us then and thought he is with someone, but next weekend he was still there. We took him food but as we only went to country on weekends, weather was getting colder and colder and he didn't leave anywhere, one weekend we invited him to come with us and he did. At that time we only started our "own" life so we didn't even consider taking second dog and Riki stayed with daddy's parents hoping we'll find his home. But nobody missed him and he stayed there. As loyal as he was to his tree the weeks he lived in forest, he was to his territory in new home too. There was no collar or harnesses that he wouldn't get rid of, but he never left from home alone.Now both old friends are gone and we miss them very much.
But back to more positive news and to this new friend I promised to tell about. This is Hannah. I promise I'll post better photo when she will learn to stay on one place for a second :-)

Hannah is from Tallinn shelters. In old age Jossu and Riki  gained a lot of privileges from daddy's parents. Including living inside the house, a lot of attention, walks and so on.  Hanna came so they would still have the reason to go walking and to have a happy soul in the house who wouldn't let their life get too boring. And Hannah gives her best by eating computer cables, shareing the bed and sofa, being the first in the car and so on :-). Fair dog life this far, I would say :-). In countryside it's very usual, that "watchdogs" are living outside chained. By my opinion, security company's home surveillance agreements are cheaper and work better. And additionally to security company's agreement those people could rather take a  pig - then it's not only feeding it 2x per day but then they could eat it later :-). So should she gets chained we'll change her to pig and everybody is happy :-). But for now she is free and very happy. We had Rocco and Lucky with us when we went to pick her up and she loves them. Trying to be most friendly Duracell rabbit when she meets them and do everything to please them. She has too good batteries by Rocco's and Lucky's opinion, so they don't much appreciate her trying. Lucky, who doesn't like pushing puppies is doing his best to teach her Murphy's Sheltie law :-) :
If it's mine it's mine,
if it's yours it's mine,
if I like it, it's mine,
if I can take it from you it's mine,
if I am playing with something ALL of the pieces are mine,
if I think it is mine it is,
if I saw it first it's mine,
if I had it then put it down it is still mine,
if you had it then you put it down it is now mine,
if it looks like the one I have at home it is mine

Lucky herding

Starting to read this and knowing Lucky I’m sure you have as high expectations as I had. But I don’t have much (good) to tell you.

I had loooong planned to introduce to Lucky sheep, so we participated on Sheep and cattle dog club’s herding day.  Isn’t it very romantic to think about Shetland isles and little Shelties herding there? To add there  couple of documentarys like Lassie and Babe :-) it’s almost all I knew about herding before. Well, reality was a little different. When I was child my grandparents had friends who had sheep. Every time we visited them, we had bag full of bread for sheep and sheep
loved us. I expected something similar to happen so we bought bread so Kelli could get the same sweet memories from her childhood. But guess what, sheep didn’t want bread. They were afraid of dogs they saw walking not even near to them. Not to be surprised, considering part of our Lassie’s and Babe’s were more or less agressive (which was called good herding instinct???). So when it was our turn with Lucky, the sheep were standing like glued to the fence and we just couldn’t get them moving even one millimeter. The trainer told to make dog to go between the sheep and fence and here’s the part I’m shamed about – I tried to do that. I went with him, but still, forcing isn’t what you do when your Sheltie is supposed to like what you want from him. Thinking back on it (better late then never, as I obviously didn’t think at all when we were there)– 5,8 kg dog should push himself between 5 animals (at least 10x his weight) he saw first time???... Well, after that Lucky lost all the interest to be there :-( . I’m

proud Lucky isn’t agressive to other animals so if that means he has no herding instinct, then OK, very good. But still, I have seen him with different animals and to me it seems he could have that Lassie or Babe kind :-) of herding instinct and I would like to see it. Other Shelties were in better situation, the sheep was moving when it was their turn and it was really nice to look at them there. And how should we find it out with Lucky now? Considering we have my 2 dogs, Kelli’s rat, Tikker + kittens at home, why couldn’t we take 2-3 sheep too? :-) :-) :-). Well, I won’t go home asking it, because after that I could be homeless with my dogs :-). But who knows, maybe we will think something else up some day :o)

Spring summary

I thought I can write about our ski hiking until the midsummer :-) , but it ended up very fast. Just like we had only some weeks of real summer last year, we had very short spring this year, summer came almost right after snow left. Next to that spring was short, it was very, very beautiful, which I hope explains and excuses my posting being late again – I just haven’t met my computer very often. And as spring was short I’ll make spring summary very short, just some photos.
First 3 are taken just 2 weeks after last posting

Walking with friend :-).About this little black and white friend I should say, that I wouldn’t suggest to take rat as pet to a child. I have had hamster and guinea pig myself, and when I agreed taking the rat I thought he will be something similar, only smarter. We built him agility equipment and hoped to train him tricks. But it turned out we got a very dominant specimen, who wants to mark his territory and fight for it. I tried to proof him I’m bigger boss,but it ended up with my hands being covered with band aids :-) and now he is a little prisoner in his crate and we only let him run free outdoors, where he is very hypermodest, with no aim to conquer the world. Outdoors the world is full on signals of danger and if he can’t hide anywhere, the safe place is between Rocco’s paws, that’s why he is running after the dogs on the pictures

Lucky playing noseball :-)

Another walk with friends - Karin and her girls

And then some more walk photos, made on our beach. Kelli bought a flying kite and by delegating the opportunity to assist her to daddy, I got some spare time to bother Lucky with my camera :o).

And just 4 more spring photos

Rocco posting this time. And a little bit skiing too :-)

It was easy to keep blog alive when Lucky was puppy and growing and changing all the time. Now it’s much harder to find interesting news to share with you. How many times you want to hear we had wonderful sunny weekend with wonderful long ski hiking to wonderful places :o). Because we did. Again :o). I love this kind of weekends and Lucky even more and the rest of my family too, so probably that’s what is going to happen next weekend too...and next, and next...as long as there is snow :o).   At least I have couple of new photos, made with my soap-box camera, big improvement I would say :o).  And that’s better then season summaries, right ;o)

Let’s see how I manage in the future, but for this posting I have material – my dear old friend Rocco hasn't been mentioned very often lately, so I'll write a little about him.
I have told you Rocco  is suffering joint problems. It was scary to think that this will happen some day, but now it has - he walks with Lucky and me on the mornings but on the evenings we only take small tour around the house and leave him home when I go walking with Lucky. Good thing is Rocco looooves food :-)  He is very worried looking at our preparations to go out – but because he thinks I could maybe forget to give him candy :-). His good appetite is really an advantage, as long as there is possibility to earn (or very politely blackmail  :-) ) candies, he is really really happy. Smile on the face and tail waving. He has agreed the candy tradition with my parents, at the end of every breakfast he goes to my dad and pat him with his paw asking for cheese. They always have the same conversation too. And if my dad is not home, then Kelli or my brothers son replaces him and tradition is the same (including the conversation :-) ). After the breakfast he goes to my mum telling her "hi" so happily like they hadn't met for years :-). And of course get's candy.
He has very sweet way of reminding me it's dinnertime. When I watch TV he comes and lays down in front of TV and looks at me until he gets eye contact. If I then ask him what does he want, he jumps up, waving his tail and trying to tell me. Describing what he wants is usually a long talk :-) so I ask him to show me instead and he does, very clearly, by going to kitchen and showing his food bag (or watching nose up should we have something better on the stove)  :-). He is such a good conversation partner  :-). "Rocco what do you want" topic is his favorite, on his younger years there was many answers, now it's mostly candies :-) . But there's one more conversation we have with him - our Friday conversation. On Friday , when I come home from work and we go out, I ask him if he knows what day it is. And Rocco tail starts to wave. If I ask several times he answers too, in doggy language of course. Then I ask him if really today is already Friday and he answers in more words, tail waving even stronger. Next question is  Where does Rocco go on Fridays? And as an answer I get loong talk already :-) and tail waving so hard, that almost touching his nose. Next is my turn to be surprised that Rocco goes to country :-) and so it goes on with questions like who is waiting for him on the country and so on. I'm not sure how much he really understands me, probably as much as I understand him, but he is so happy, really waving tail so strong and wriggling so that tail touches the nose :-).
Lucky takes part of our conversations too. He still has language barrier :-) but just in case he first wants everything too... but later.... well, a man can always change his mind, right. When I'm cooking, Rocco sleeps on kitchen floor hoping I'll drop something when jumping over him :o), but for Lucky cooking is booooooring, he sees no hope I could play with him at same time and goes to another room. Instead of calling him (then he would first think if he wants to come or not) I whisper very quietly to Rocco "let's not tell to the puppy we are ... (f.e eating candy)" and Lucky is back in a second :-). If there's something we don't tell to him, he must know it for sure..

Rocco is very very kind dog, not at all dominant but in our pack he is still big boss. Lucky just so much admires and respects his bravery .... in battle with vacuum cleaner :-). I guess vacuum cleaner has stolen some dry food kibbles Rocco has left on the floor or something else valuable, because Rocco just has to keep eye on it during all the cleaning process and bark and at the end bite the tube :-). And Lucky is so impressed :-) ... He's much smaller and therefore very vary, as he's not sure that vacuum cleaner won't eat him :-) But he is learning to fight with it too :-).

One more sweet thing that needs to be told about Rocco's and Lucky's cooperation. When Rocco was young, his favorite job at country was to help bringing water. We have old type well and drinking water we bring in pail. Rocco anticipates when the pail is empty and very much wants to help to bring new water. It's hard to describe his "helping", so here's a video for you. You can also see there, that there's a little bit of Sheltie in every dog or then barking is contagious :-) . 

As this help consist barking and jumping mostly, then to save his paws we try to manage without him. Here comes Lucky to "help". He too thinks bringing water is very fun, but because of Rocco's contribution. If he sees the empty pail and Rocco is not there, he comes to find him to tell him what is going on. When Rocco is left inside the house he jumps up on the door so he can see in from the window and tell to Rocco what his happening :o).

Adding here, that he has his rat-TV; we built stairs for him, so he still could climb to the bed :-) and he can always join us when we go by car, then even Rocco isn’t glad to be left out from all our activities, his eyes are still shining and tail waveing and he is happy with his life.

Photo by Karin Põiklägu, made on Fancy's & Lucky's birthday party

Easter holidays

Office rat like me loooooves 4 days working weeks. Would be only fair, if Friday would be weekend too, specially if it's so nice spring outside. OK, not so spring yet, but it's definitely coming, here's some evidence of it. On the left snowdrops that have very appropriate timing, Kelli found them when we went looking for spring on 20/3. And on the picture on right is a little bit hope already, that snow will melt some day. Around the rowan tree is little mountain of sunflower seed shells. Bird dining house has been very popular this winter, several dozens of visitors every day.  

Below are before and after pictures of a snow lion from our snow zoo. We built it with Kelli in February, it was so fun to build our zoo exhibits that we spent half a day in the snow and finished in dark, when temperature was below the zero already and we had to use water to retouch last details :o).

                

Main fun of Easter holidays was skiing. Yes, I remember, couple of postings back I said I don't like skiing. But it was more like hike on the skis, we went to explore new places, out of official routes where we didn't meet any dedicated skiers who want to ski over my child and dog and myself too :o). Actually we met nearly nobody. Only saw couple of fisherman's from long distance and couple of more hikers. The weather was just wonderful and landscapes we saw too. Only as my cameras life isn't insured, it won't come to ski with me :o). I'm the one who's able to fell even on flat land, but on mountains (even tiny ones) definitely :o). So I only have couple of phone photos to share

Fancy's and Lucky's puppies 1 year old

We have one more very special birthday to celebrate in March - Fancy's and Lucky's puppies got 1 year old today. 

photo: Karin Põiklägu

We had all the family members living in Estonia together yesterday:

Photo: Karin Põiklägu 

Our party took place at Simba's home. With real birthday cookies Simba's owner Mae baked for them. 

Even mentioning Fancy and Caily to Lucky makes him very happy, so we try to meet them as often as possible. But last time we saw Simba was in June, he was just a little puppy then, but now.... amazingly beautiful Sheltie boy. Lucky tried to make up for lost time and teach him some important things :o), at least all the time there was quiet chatter between them and Simba listened so patiently, kissing daddy's nose time to time. Such a good little boy <3.  I think mum and dad must be very proud of all the puppies, they all are so very beautiful.

Too bad distance is too long for all the family to get together, but at least we have internet and so we can get part of the 3 puppies in Finland celebrating their birthday with their friends:

Leya and Lily, photo Sirpa Saari      and      Nemo with his friend, photo Merja Kivelä

Winter summary :o)

It has been spring outside for one day already, so it's last time to write winter summary. Actually I started it long time ago but wanted to fulfil and old promise first and now it's done, there's more then this posting, I wrote 3 more to last summer – Lucky’s 3^rd litter, Lucky’s show and our Sheltie vacation with Karin and her Shelties. At least 4 items deleted from my list of things-to-do-when-I-some-day-will-have-spare-time-for-it :o). Considering I have there photoshop, photographing, html, all the books I have ordered but haven’t read yet ... well, plans are still much bigger then my possibilities. Not to forget that Kelli and dogs will always get the time they need.   But to the point:

I’ll start with an interesting event from December. We visited dog show in Finland with Karin and Fancy.  First the most important part of it – Fancy was BB2 with CAC and CACIB, she is FIN CH now. And Fancy’s and Lucky’s daughter Lily was best puppy day before. Congratulations Fancy and Lily!!! It was so nice to see dear “old” friends – Lucky’s daughter Lily and son Nemo and to meet people I know from FB but have never really met before. And additional bonus to all that was ... shopping :o). We had a lot of time to search through all the corners of shopping area :o) and my personal saboteur (don’t blame my innocent dogs, I mean 2-legged saboteur :o) ) wasn’t with us,  so couple of very necessary findings I did. Like fancy winter jacket for Lucky. Not that I would underestimate his coat, definitely not. But we have agility trainings in building that has same temperature as outside, where, for the time his trainingcompanions run, Lucky is in crate and to keep his muscles warm, wears the jacket now. And as Fancy was kindly helping to find right size we call our fancy jacket Fancy-jacket. Couple of pictures too of Lucky in his new Fancy-jacket ( that I promised to take for Yana – thanks Yana, for keeping us company in Finland, it was really nice to meet you.)

Then Christmas. As every year, dogs had school vacation with Kelli and spent the end of the year in country. We had nice real Christmas with a lot of snow, very cold weather and all the Christmas traditions. As every year, we took hey and carrots to forest. We haven't noticed big demand of what we have taken there, but it's something different from our everyday life,  it's tradition,  it's just Christmas. This year, I have to confess, we adapted our tradition a little, as weather was really cold, we used the sleigh you see on picture background instead the real one :o).

I’m sure I don’t even have to mention Rocco and Lucky have been good boys for whole year, you know yourself. Well, Santa knew too and this year brought them dog bed. It's very popular, shared between 3 – Rocco, Lucky and Tikker (Tikker is our dear old Tiger, but when Kelli was smaller, then due to her spelling changed his name. Tikker is sweet name too, means Gooseberry :o) ).

I had couple of days free between Christmas and New Years Eve, so I got long holidays too. Our good trainer Kristina warned us not to eat too much ;o),  so to be good students, we took this very seriously :o) and went skiing every evening. Skiing in dark or in moonlight is nice, nobody else on the trail and speed feels much higher. Lucky was happy to run free between me and daddy and cheer us both. I put my sport watch on Lucky and used mobile app myself - Lucky's distance was 1,5 x longer then mine :o) . We stole time to go skiing on new years eve too and hopefully my family doesn't read it, but it was best time of the evening. The starry sky was much more beautiful then the fireworks at midnight.


This winter has been generous with the snow but not with the sun. According to  Estonian Meteorolgical and Hydrological Institute  during first  81 days of the winter  there was 49 hours of sun.  Certainly too little and most of it probably on workdays . All the pictures I have made are dark and grey. But there was a cold and sunny day in January on weekend. To be as much as possible in the sun, we decided to go to bog. To save even a little of sun for following working week, I took camera with me. It wasn't easy to get to the bog, first we had to dig out a car that was stuck on our way :o). Our good car and good driver took us safely to the goal, but still there was quite a long walk to the bog. Temperature was below -20 C so I gave up my good plan to take good photos to tempt Karin there at wintertime too :o). But without trying at all I just couldn't leave, so couple of snapshots I got  and one of them for you to see here too.

 Then a topic that can’t be skipped  is of course skiing :o). After trying it for 2 winters I have decided I don't like it :o). But then again, my calories don't like it too and Lucky likes it very much, so we'll definitely continue :o). Of course there's one more good reason to continue - it's that skiing is so popular in Estonia, that you can hardly find opportunity to move any other way then by skiing :o). Ski trails are everywhere and they are overcrowded.  When we go skiing at country we meet much more people then when we walk in forest and on beach near to our city home on evenings :o). And when in town people walking, running, skiing are OK for Lucky, then in country he just has to bark on every single person he meets in forest. I have to see someone coming first and keep Lucky in contact with me until we have passed the skier.  So if Kelli doesn't join us,  with daddy we have changed to ski on car roads:o). Small country roads are covered with snow and cleaned to the level that makes them good enough for skiing.  We have met only couple of cars there and anyway cars are less dangerous then dedicated skiers :o). Or we go skiing later, when dedicated skiers have returned to their homes. For Lucky skiing is fun :o) He hops next to my ski tips barking or runs after daddy and back to me, still barking all the time. So his vocal chords are in as good physical condition as he is, very sporty :o). Skiing gives him good opportunity to use his energy, which, though, seems to be endless. Kelli participated on President's hike, it's 10 km on skis and about 2500 participants including Lucky, me and our daddy :o). Not to give Lucky opportunity to bark on all 2500 skiers he was on leach and pulled me all the way as real sleigh dog. This was our first time to ski on leash and included mountains and slalom between other people. Huh, though. This winter we  have collected quite a lot of kilometers on skis. But still, every morning I run to to window to see if snow has melted :o).  But no sign of melting yet, and as  this week is school vacation and my vacation too, and we are in country we have no other option then to collect more kilometers. With daddy late in night with beautiful moonlight and starry sky, or with children at day time, when I have opportunity to be a sleigh dog for my brothers son :o) .Soon, I hope, melting at daytime and freezing at night will create the hard surface on snow we can again go to river banks we have skied previous years. This is real fun, can't wait. As I'm still not good at all in skate skiing (shame on me, Kelli learned in 2 try), I don't carry camera with me and so I don't have photos for illustrating. So just one more to end this posting, made of first snow last autumn.