Weekly Chat (Non-Osprey), 7 February 2016

Last weekend I posted 2 pics of MissL & MissJ on flickr. You will need to scroll down and click on pic to enlarge.

Evening all:

Lindybird: Can't imagine how frustrated your OH must be!  Must agree that Bonnie might be safer and everyone else more relaxed if she were to go to a boarding kennel while you're away. Otherwise, you and our OH will fret about what she's up to and waiting for frantic call from S-in-L saying she's escaped!  At this point I'd be asking myself how much more I'd be prepared to put up with (sorry about dangling whatnots!).  So sorry your OH's family is another source of stress right now.  :-(

OG: Let us know how the change of treatment works. Amazed that you're still doing/organizing so much!  Date and ginger cake?  Yum!

Brenda: Here's to peaceful nights from now on. Too bad about the trees.

AQ: Will be interested to hear how many dozen red roses get delivered on Valentine's Day. We'll go out to dinner, but on another night entirely. Oh my, those twins look awfully energetic! Hope all the viruses have been corraled.

Margo: Special thoughts for you.

Diane: I see things are still pretty darn cold there.....do be good to  yourself.

It's been unseasonably warm (ugh!) here, but a cooling trend (for what it's worth) is on its way. Have spent the last two days checking on the irrigation hoses, etc., to make sure all the nozzles are working. Oh joy.

LINDY   sorry to hear you have problems other than Bonnie to contend with. We are thinking of the most economic way of getting down to visit OHs family next month. Think we will end up with OH driving. He is happy to do the journey in 1 at the weekend but during the week we would stop over somewhere. Off for a swim shortly.

Good Morning:    Dry here again, but it has been raining, even tho the forecast said not!

My OH has gone off to his golf game, and I am trying to catch up on HW this morning:  my Friend is coming this afternoon and we may watch a film again.

AQ:  Sorry you are coughing and suffering with a cold.  I'm afraid that this may happen often now, as my grandson has brought home colds from nursery on a regular basis over the last couple of years, and is now bringing others from school.  The whole family seems to get them when he does. :-(

Lovely pics of Miss L and Miss J:  they look full of beans!  Also enjoyed scrolling through some of your pics of the beautiful stained glass windows.

Brenda:  Worrying when trees look wobbly after high winds.  Glad you don't mention any near the house!  Hope your builder neighbours are going to be sympathetic about the noise and inconvenience.

I went to bed quite shattered last night, even though I had had a little zzz in the afternoon (after the glass of wine, LOL!).   MY OH spent the afternoon putting yet more wire netting above the new fence, so it now looks like Stalag 14.  He has also put bricks and netting below the fence, as she loves to dig......  I think I mentioned that as there is a small wall at the bottom of most of it, with the 3 foot fence it is nearly four feet high.  I was hoping that as she can't see through it now, she will not see strolling cats on the other side, who use our neighbours house as a cut through when they patrol all the gardens.  I doubt if there are many cats who dare to come over into our side any more!!

Our house is now divided inside into "front and back"  - in the front all is normal except that there are a lot of extra ornaments and photos which have been removed from the rear part - in the rear, it is like a prison cell only with pictures on the wall!  I'm only glad that I did not renew the old carpet in the dining room as despite our cleaning all of our feet regularly, it now looks terrible, plus Bonnie has eaten a large part by the door and also ripped it up near the conservatory.  The wallpaper is ripped in several places, but there is no point in repairing it only for it to happen again. We were prepared to put up with a certain amount of damage, as we know what puppies are like, but she is now over a year old.

Yes, OG, she was born just before Christmas and so is now about 14 months old.  I didn't mention but she has had her first season, at the end of January. The vet said that she could be spayed after that, and so we are going to go into the vets for her booster jabs and to discuss this, just after we come back from our holiday in March.  She was, as the books say, much more alert and 'touchy' during that time, and barked even when she only thought she could hear another dog barking.  We hope she might calm down a bit now, but goodness knows whether she will calm down generally as some people have told us it can take years with this breed.  (I only wish I had read more about them before we started!!)

Sorry about the above long post:  please miss this bit out if you're not in the mood for reading!

Good Morning Everyone. A cold frosty morning here, but it looks beautiful.

AQ, Gorgeous photographs of Miss L and Miss J. I, too spent some time looking at your other photographs again. Sorry about your cough and cold. I do hope you soon recover, although the cough does seem to linger for some time.

Annette, I don't envy you checking the irrigation home nozzles, but I do envy the fact that you can actually work in your garden. Our's is still far too wet, with a frost this morning.

Dibnlib, Very active, as usual. Good luck with your plans for visiting your OH's family.

Linda, Sorry about your dining room. I was going to stupidly suggest you place rugs over the eaten parts of the carpet, but obviously Bonnie would destroy them. Are you in touch with any of the people, who also chose pups from the same litter ? It would be interesting to know how those dogs are now behaving. The breeder, of my daughter's dog, has a website, where the new pup owners' post photographs of their pups and are able to ask the breeder any questions.

OG, You were right. As usual LOL. I see Linda has confirmed Bonnie's age and that she has already been in season.

A funny photograph of Penny to prove that she is enjoying Singapore.

Brenda that is just how Daisy relaxes.

Snow overnight but all dirty and slushy now so a muddy walk. Daisy was overjoyed to see men on the river bank as the fishing season officially started on our section of The River Spey today. Did laugh all be it quietly as Mr Moneybags got his line tangled in a tree.

Linda sorry about your trials with Miss Bonnie and my daughter could relate to you as she spent most of the first 18 months of Daisy's life in tears. As you know they took themselves off to boot camp where her life dramatically changed. She discovered her place in the house and she went from Queen bee to beneath the last human in the room. They also changed her diet so out went anything with e numbers in it and you will find even the so called science diets are full of them. She went onto an holistic diet of chicken and oats which stopped her being hungry all the time and stopped chewing anything in sight. Out went dog chews and good for you not teeth cleaning ones. Instead in came fresh raw veg. To her a carrot is a bone and Her dinner is half biscuits and half veg and she picks the veg out first every time. Last time in kennels John put veg in bottom biscuits on top and stood and watched her get the veg out first. The first time OH visited daughter down south after boot camped he told me they had a different dog. I had visions of a dog swop but it was very similar.

Hello all

Just heard that grandson Callum passed his driving test this morning. He is only 17, so of course now I will start worrying about him.....

WENDY - the Jack Russell next door eventually had training classes aka boot camp. He was absolutely dreadful for the first eighteen months. Howling, barking incessantly night and day at the slightest noise. Also destroyed their sofa when they were out at work.  If he heard my OH working in the garden he threw himself against the fence with very aggressive barking. I remember going around to their house once (in a very bad mood) after he had been barking for one hour solid in the middle of the night. Other neighbours also complained. Now we have a fairly peaceful life. Dog wise, anyway!