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Elbie, Hoover, Dodge & Friends!


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Ooh, you live very close to me :thumbsup:

Oh wow really? where are you? I am in darra :rolleyes:

We're at Acacia Ridge - pretty much just down the road from you then!

KTB: I'm glad the service went smoothly and that so many people who loved your father were able to attend. I have only ever been to one funeral, my grandmothers, but I understand what you mean by it being comforting hearing stories you'd never heard before about someone. It's lovely to hear how someone important to you has touched the lives of others.

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Hey KTB - I can't even imagine. But hugs. It sounds beautiful and sad. It makes me sad to even think of being in the same situation, hugs again.

Wuffles. Your Ava is without doubt the prettiest dog I have ever seen.

Kyliegirl - sounds like you're doing all the right stuff ( even with the vegetable enthusiasm - ha!). We have tried our dog-gone hardest with Max - but one thing has let us down - and that is visitor's coming to the house. We just don't get enough of them to be able to establish a no jump rule. He will settle after a bit, but at the start he's just so happy to see new people in the house! When my Mum came to stay he nearly died. He loves my sister, but truly - a deep everlasting love. She can be here for three hours, and after that time all she has to do is look at him and he melts and waggily bums over to her. My Mum, it was love, but not quite as much - same deal with my Mother's sister. Very strange. But he was really sad when she wasn't there to go say hello to every morning!

The other thing we haven't done right.... baths. So Max got it in his head at about 7.5 months that he doesn't like baths (we'd only do it once a month before that) - and we had a bit of a traumatic experience in the backyard. Poor dog got soaped up, then escaped, then we couldn't catch him to rinse him. Teeth were bared, dog was unhappy, and didn't want to know us for a couple of hours afterwards - with the end result being we left him to dry off soaped up and just took him to the lake the next day. Bad. I know. So today we tried something different and took him to a hydrobath. The poor poppet. Was so so so so so exciting - dogs and dogs and lots of bags of dog food. Then came the water. He screamed and screamed and wailed like a 2-year-old that's just had his ice-cream stolen. A man standing behind us said 'sounds like he doesn't like baths'. I was like 'no s(%t sherlock'. But we had success and gave him lots of treats and let him sniff all the dog food bags - and while he was a bit upset with us afterwards, I think we've found the winning way to bath the poor guy - with a free bath for us thrown in. And I can guarantee the shampoo doesn't sting when you get it in your eye. Poor little puppy.

So our new Akita is going to come to the park as often as possible - which is great! I think Max and this Akita are quite taken wiht each other. Its because Max runs - so she can chase - and also because they both have the same greeting style - I think ie walk up to each other, sniff, sniff, swipe with the paw, take off. Its especially good that they're continuing to come because of a little incident that occurred. So our Brittany is quite shy. A princess. A few days ago the group was already in the park and she was approaching with owner, but she was off-lead. The Akita and Lab came up to say hello, she freaked out, and not getting any safer by hiding behind her owner's legs took off... out of the park... down the street... back to her house. Eeeeks! With the Akita in hot persuit! Eeeeeks! Not even near to having your dog shirk out of his collar and run amok at the obedience club Christmas party (can I ever go back?) - but close. All's well that ends well though. The Brittany was marched straight back to the park to be sure everything was okay, and the Akita is just being kept a little closer eye on.

In other dog-related news, I saw in the flesh two Neopolitan mastiffs today. Yikes yikes yikes. They are so big, so so so so so big. They are huge. And they stunk. They truly stunk. There were two, they came over and walked straight into the lake, and the owner was joking saying 'its like National Geographic'. It truly was. I think they're almost a separate species to dogs - they seem closer to bears!

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:rolleyes: Hee hee Max, your post made me laugh. I wish we had some dog park buddies, but alas, there is no dog park in my town ;) There's an off leash section at the adventure playground, but not quite the same.

I don't bathe Roo all that often :thumbsup: Only if she's been swimming in the dam at my brother's. MDTL said Roo didn't want to swim in her dam when she took her out, but then there weren't any other dogs out, and Ruby has only swum with other dogs.

Koala, big hugs. I'm glad it was a lovely day and as you said, more happy memories than sadness. I'm sure your dad would have been touched by everyone's kind words.

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koalathebear - I haven't been in there in AGES, this thread moves so fast that I can't keep up with all the posts. I'm sorry for the loss of your dad and am glad it was such a beautiful day for his service.

Minxy and Kyliegirl - I live in Moorooka very close to both of you :birthday: I hope your survived the floods like we did. You guys both have big dogs and I'd love to meet up for a walk one day (with the risk of sounding like Cesar Milan). Asti really only socialises with little dogs and doesn't like big ones - especially when they're big and fluffy, it'd be a great way to kick start this part of her training. I find it hard to join in with people on their afternoon walks without having to explain 'can we just walk together for 5 mins, just ignore asti'! If you're interested in a walk let me know.

:birthday: to everyone else in here, i promise to check back more regularly!

Asti says hi too!

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Would love a walk sometime Sammie. Kyojin could do with meeting some more smaller dogs too, as when we take him to the dog park we like at Annerley, there's a big dog section and a little dog section, so he usually only gets to meet GR's, GSD's etc.

He seems fascinated by the two SBT pups that visit next door every weekend.

Beautiful photos of Asti!

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Would love a walk sometime Sammie. Kyojin could do with meeting some more smaller dogs too, as when we take him to the dog park we like at Annerley, there's a big dog section and a little dog section, so he usually only gets to meet GR's, GSD's etc.

He seems fascinated by the two SBT pups that visit next door every weekend.

Beautiful photos of Asti!

Hey! We used to go to the Annerley one as well - is the one you to go on Shaftesbury Street? We stopped going as the small dog section gets so crowded and there's two rotties (one is called Sam) that walk the fence between the two dog sections and Asti alwas has to backup the other little dogs that bark at them! :birthday: )

It would be a great training experience...

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Yup, that's the one. The little dog section has always been PACKED when we've been there. The big dog section does seem to be a lot more under control, though it's always been really busy when we've been there. The little dogs bark a lot and seem to rile each other up. We've only been a handful of times though.

I think a walk would probably be a great idea. Especially as Asti isn't very familiar with bigger dogs, and Kyojin isn't very familiar with little dogs - they could meet and get to know each other without it being too scary for them.

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Hi Lovely Peeps!

I don't profess to have caught up on the last two weeks worth, but I am back!

Phuket was nice, but I am in no hurry to go back and glad to be home. One thing I was amazed at was the sheer number of random dogs in that place!!!! They were everywhere! They would lie around on the side of the roads, stand (yes, I repeat STAND) on the back of scooters, be hooving around for food, walking around.... They seemed harmless enough, but didn't look well cared for. A lady told me that the Thai people don't care to greatly for dogs as they believe that they are ex murderers reincarnated!!!! I am not sure how much truth is in that, but if it is the case, there must be a lot of murderers in Phuket!!!

I missed Genevieve terribly, but she was very well looked after in our absence. I wrote out a huge essay on all things Genevieve, complete with commands, instructions, do's and don'ts etc. She managed to eat our house sitters specs though.... :birthday: Don't like my chances of having them come and stay again!!!

Here are a couple of pics from yesterday...

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Apparently Genevieve likes tempting fate. I swear she is going to eat herself to her death.

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Being a sooky dog!

We have a great couple of shots of her from when we were setting up the nursery. They are on Simon's camera though, so once they are uploaded I will put some more up.

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Hi Sammie! Good to see you again, and the cutest Frenchie doglet, Asti :)

Hey, Wizzle. Good to see you back too. Miss G has been a naughty girl, hasn't she? :D :thumbsup: Hope Wee Wizzle is treating you nicely and not making you throw up anymore ;)

I went shopping today and bought Roo a trampoline bed for lounging outside. It took me forever to put it together (I'm just not handy), and typically, Miss Roo is lying NEXT to it on the grass, but not actually ON it. Oh no wait! I just peeked out the window and SHE IS!!!!! Yay!!!! Must go get camera....

ETA- Bugger! I was too slow- now she's on the grass again :D Ah well, at least I know that she has been laying on it! :wave:

In other news, I bought Ruby her first bag of adult food today. So much conflicting information about when to change over, but I figured, she's 8 1/2 months old now, and lots of people on DOL stop feeding puppy food to their dogs before they're even 6 months (so I read). Anyway. We'll see how she goes. I just hope she likes it as much as the puppy version :)

Edited by lilli_star
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Hello!

Lilli-Star - I am in the process of weaning Genevieve to adult food too atm. I mixed a bag of puppy food with adult food and the plan is when she has gone through that, she will move straight on to adult food. She hasn't seemed to notice! I notice some brands change them over at different ages too...

Wee Wizzle is being much nicer to me these days. Since I was about 14 weeks the morning sickness eased (though I did have food poisoning in Thailand which was probably worse than ms!). It has started moving around a bit now and we have a scan next week so will hopefully find out if it is a boy or a girl. I can't believe we are half way already!

Some pics of the rebel fur child as promised.

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Genevieve trying to chase a bee! Thank god she hasn't been stung because I am allergic to the bloody things! I do have the polaromine on standby though!

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It's OK Mummy, really, it is!

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Umm.... who's pregnant here?

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Incidently, she barks at me whenever I go near MY fatti-poomba pillow!!!! I have since taken it away and hidden it in our room. As the room is off limits to her at the moment, she hasn't worked out it is in there. I am pretty sure if she knew it was, she would be whining constantly. She likes hanging out in the nursery though. She just lies on the floor watching us move stuff in and out. Last night we were reading in there and she fell asleep under the cot! I wish I had got a picture of that!!!

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lilli_star: I hope this week is better for you - let's put our week of shocking days behind us :wave:

Canberrans - Australia Day AM Doggy Date sounds great. Will it be at BDOC? I'm so keen to get Hoover and Elbie running around a large field with other dogs. Hoover might run until his heart explodes :D

KA: Elbie's starting lunging at cars, which is not cool :D We have an appointment with K9 Steve next month for training tips so I'll definitely be raising this then. I'm not sure why cars have suddenly became so interesting to him - he was never really that enthralled before. ;) Yet another reason why L.B. is never going off lead outside of a fenced area ...

As to barking dogs, OH said that the other day, the dogs were barking like loons. Why? The neighbour thought that it would be a good idea to stand by the fence and hold up one of his dogs and say: "Look at Elbie and Hoover". :thumbsup: The dogs on both side of our house bark a lot and we're just lucky that Elbie and Hoover seem to have become desensitised to it and don't bark back. There have been so many times when I've heard Elbie barking, run to the door to yell at him, only to discover Elbie's sitting right next to me inside and that he's been framed by a neighbour's dog :rofl: Once I went to the door to look for Elbie only to discover that Elbie was standing next to me also peering out the door to see what I was looking for :D

wuffles: gorgeous photos of Ava. She seems to be getting more black pigment - perhaps she wants to have even more Dramatic White contrast :)

kyliegirl: The soft crates are huge and our monsters have one crate each! We've been training them to hop into the same one though in case we ever need them to share a crate :) Echo's paws look huge in that carrot photo. Soooooooooooo cute. I am such a fan of huge paws. I don't think our two have ever eaten carrot - must try it. They've developed an addiction to ice cubes, though. Every time I'm at the freezer getting ice for my drink, when Hoover hears me twisting the ice cube tray, he comes and stands next to me with "feed me" eyes. It's very cute.

Our two are ok with bags and bin bags but the sound of the neighbour wheeling his bin back and forth makes them bark a little bit sometimes - probably because the sound is amplified and it sounds like it's actually in OUR driveway

Max#1: I thought Elbie would never learn to sit for pats but he's almost there. He will actually stand for pats although he puts his ears back and he gets a very desperate: "Please pat this pitiful seal" look on his face and if you don't pat within 3 seconds, he might jump up :D

SammieS - welcome back. I always love the photos of Asti! Soooo cute, funny and expressive.

wizzle: that is so hilarious! I always think of cavs as being soooooooooo well-behaved but little G has such a naughty little face ...

I, too am trying to transfer our two doggies onto adult food but OH is holding out. I think he's offended by the thought of anything we do being influenced by DOL :)

Also, if anyone wants to report me to the RSPCA for cruelty to my dogs, the number is 6287 8111 but given their limited resources, I'm sure they've got better things to do :D

Hope everyone had a great weekend. It's been very toasty here but it's cooling down a little for the evening ...

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KTB- I am glad the ceremony went well, it is a very emotional time but at the same time very special. It sounded like an amazing send off.

Minxy/SammieS - I would love to have a walk with you both one day, I do remember the dog park in annerley being very busy too. I dont think I could risk taking Echo to a dog park, I do not want to sound snotty but I would prefer he does not get into the habit of playing with random dogs, I worry about him going nuts everytime we pass a dog. I am however more than happy to walk with other dogs! Echo isnt quite leash trained yet, I had stopped walking him as he was regressing so I decided to go back to square one with 0 distractions. He is now 12 weeks and has been showing signs of fear so I will see how his confidence goes for the next few weeks :) I am sure my OH wouldn't mind dropping me off at Annerley for a walk one day! btw gorgeous photos of Atsi! I just love frenchies ears!

Max- thanks I am glad you think so :D Some days I feel like we are failing, but he does small things which remind me that he is doing just fine for his age :D I wish you luck on your akita! when will your akita be arriving? How exciting!!

Wizzle- welcome but :wave: at the electrical cord damage! I would Die if Echo did that! Good thing it wasn't plugged in!! Genevieve has a very expressionable face :)

lilli-star- wow they grow up so fast, its both a good and bad thing lol, good that they mature, but bad because you miss the cute puppy stage (but not the horrible teething stage LOL) I dont know if Echo's diet needs changing at adult stage.. he is on a barf diet so I guess the only change would be to up his meat intake from 40% meat 60% bone to 50% meat 50% bone.. not too sure, I might need to consult to my breeder.

Echo had a big day of play today, I gave him a good 2 hrs play this morning, then me and OH gave him 1 and a half hrs this arvo with attention in between! we also train him while playing, so we have a good game of tug, then will ask a behaviour or wait for him to offer one before playing again, lately I have been working on extending his "sit" (he know knows the command WOO!) with distractions, "leave it" "drop it" "lets play" and his release command "free" for his sits, so far he is doing great, I also began to lure the down behaviour today and rewarded heavily for successful downs, I only did this 3 times before going back to a game of tug to reduce boredom and keep attention. We have also tried to teach fetch, but Echo seems to forget the toy and runs back to us lol.

I am now able to shake his toys around and he will hold the sit and wait for me to say "free, lets play!" before going for it, I also had success in "leave it" with a gardening glove he wasn't allowed to have (he really wanted it) but he did not touch it when I said leave it, I even tested this by moving it a bit to increase temptation and he sat down and didn't touch it :thumbsup: He has a lot more attention now that I have made training a part of in between play, he also loves to play chasey, first he chases me, then I chase him. He especially loves to play chasey after I let him win tug, so I chase after him for the toy, if I stop he will always run back to me and I trade him some mince for the toy with a "drop" command to seal the deal, never failed!

some pics of today!

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side shot of his body, I think he is looking pretty good I think!

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Edited by kyliegirl
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Echo looks great, Kylie! He's so shiny :D

Well, Ruby ate all of her biscuits tonight at a ratio of about 2/3 puppy, 1/3 adult. I gave her an adult biscuit when I opened the bag and it was huge! Poor little poppet just nudged it with her nose to start with, but in true Labrador style, she soon scoffed it down :thumbsup: I just hope they'll fit in her Buster cube :wave:

I'll post some photos soon.

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Max#1: You are hilarious ... I'm not a huge fan of Dominos but OH is Canadian and it's the closest we can get to the pizzas from The Great Frozen North :thumbsup: Honestly, I am not in favour of leaving dogs alone in hot cars but the while pious, holier-than-though sanctimonious 'tude makes my fur stand on end sometimes ... DOLers are not all the perfect dog owners All The Time that they claim to be and the occasional bit of Not So Good dog ownership doesn't instantly consign one to one of the Nine Levels of Dog Owner Hell. Actually my idea of Dog Owner hell is being stuck with a few of the more rabid DOLers for eternity .. yoicks ...

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Max#1: You are hilarious ... I'm not a huge fan of Dominos but OH is Canadian and it's the closest we can get to the pizzas from The Great Frozen North :) Honestly, I am not in favour of leaving dogs alone in hot cars but the while pious, holier-than-though sanctimonious 'tude makes my fur stand on end sometimes ... DOLers are not all the perfect dog owners All The Time that they claim to be and the occasional bit of Not So Good dog ownership doesn't instantly consign one to one of the Nine Levels of Dog Owner Hell. Actually my idea of Dog Owner hell is being stuck with a few of the more rabid DOLers for eternity .. yoicks ...

Pizza Pizza with the garlic dipping sauce *drool* So good. I bet he whinges about the donuts here too ;) :D

Snark away KTB...we've missed it :)

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Photos- there's lots ;)

First we have old kibble/new kibble (and a peg for size reference and my camera case for no reason at all really)

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Then we have Ruby with her new toy- how could I go to Petbarn and NOT bring her back a toy? :D This is Penguin- on sale for $4. Any bets on how long he'll last? I'm thinking 2 days max :) Sorry it's blurry. I think it may have been the same one Hoover and Elbie destroyed at Christmas???

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Here is Ruby on her new outside bed- if only she would lounge inside in her Very Expensive Dog Bed. Sigh. I'm working on it. Incidentally, outside trampoline bed was not cheap either :)

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This was how I found Ruby when I went to bed on Friday night

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Edited by lilli_star
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It was raining last night when I was toiletting Ruby before bed, so naturally, out came the towel to dry her off. Some success- she let me dry her with minimal attacking of the towel, then let me drape the towel over her like a blanket without trying to attack it/run away with it/ eat it etc :D . So naturally, I had to take 20 photos. Here is one

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Here is another

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Then she sooked on the bed

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And gave her best seal impersonation

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This is how I found Ruby's best dog friend this afternoon

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They're determined to dig a tunnel under the fence to each other :) They played bitey face for ages this afternoon under the fence :)

Edited by lilli_star
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