Aural Haemotoma's & training....

Our beautiful fury family, Mac, Maesie and Matilda, aka the "M's", aka our three Golden Retrievers, are all doing great. 

Mac and Maesie are now 10 and 11 years old respectively and Miss Matilda or Til Til as we call her, is now 18 months old.
What's been happening in their lives.....
First, let's talk about Mac. He developed an Aural Haematoma, basically a large blood blister in the underside of his ear flap. He was successfully operated on, but the stress of the operation and the anaesthesia, when combined with his age, really took it's toll on him.  It has taken months, but thankfully he seems his happy self. 
Let's now move to second....As if not to be outdone, Maesie decided, if Mac can do it, so can she.  She also developed an Aural Haematoma. 
OK, now I'm thinking I may need to explain just how these Aural Heamatoma's develop. When a pet scratches its ear or shakes its head vigorously in an effort to rid itself of an itch/irritation, it may unknowingly cause some damage to the ear flap. As a result, an accumulation of fluid can often build up between the skin layers and the ear flap, a blood blister, or as it is medically known, a Aural Haematoma forms. 
After our experience with Mac's haematoma/surgery/recovery, we were really hesitant to put Maesie through the same trauma, so it was a relief when our Vet suggested he would prefer not to operate, but to monitor her. Now several months and Vet visits later, Maesie and her ear are doing great. The blood in the blister has slowly been reabsorbed and apart from a little scaring to her inside ear flap, she is doing great. No trauma.
How I wish we were given the same option or that we decided against surgery with Mac's ear. Lessons learned though. 
Now on to Miss Matilda.....as I mentioned earlier, our dear Til Til is 18 months old. She is an absolute treasure, such a loveable girl, so happy with her life, her tail always wagging. It's great to see her with Mac and Maesie, she adores them. She has learnt so much from them, picked up many of their mannerisms, mostly good. 
It's beautiful to watch them interact, amazing to see how much they have come to rely on one another. 
Thanks to Holdfast Dog Centre, Til Til made it through to secondary school in her training. She absolutely loved going to her lessons, so much so, it became a battle to get her to come home after each lesson. No easy undertaking lifting her into my SUV, especially as she weighs 40 kgs.  
I guess you could say, it's been a good year for our fury family.

Fun at the beach....

Look out - I'm coming in....



Ok - had enough - let's head north!



Can you hurry it with the car - can't you see we're all puffed out!

Vlad's trick photography....

What would it be like to have 4 Maccer's sitting in our lounge room?
Vlad made it happen with a little trick photography.
Seeing this photo, made me think, could I handle 4 of Mac? He runs/rules this house as it is....everything revolves around Vlad's favorite boy.
I took a minute to think about it, yes that long, and the answer is a resounding.......YES!
He was such a beautiful puppy, and is now such a LOVING, GIVING DOG.
I also thought back to when Mac and Maesie had their puppies.
Mac was always a paws on Dad, right from the moment Maesie gave birth to puppy number 1, Archie. He stayed right there, alongside her until their 13th puppy, Maurie was born and she was finally done. She rested, but not Mac, he stayed, watching over all of them, with love and absolute fascination. He was a beautiful, beautiful new Dad.
As the puppies grew, it was such fun to watch him interact with them and they in turn, LOVED their Dad.
When the time came for them to go to their new families, I'm sure he missed them just as much as Vlad and I did.
Maesie, well she was well and truly over it all, she birthed them, fed them and then happily sent them on their merry way without even a goodbye lick.
They were good days.......starting me thinking, I might like a new puppy.....

I love you more than.....

A little together time for my boy and girl on our front lawn.

My Sock Thief

Found....One SOCK THIEF - so that's where the socks go!
Note to self: Do not leave clean/dirty laundry anywhere near Maccers.

My boy Maccers in the park

He's on to something.....

Happy New Year

We wish you health and happiness.....may all you wishes and dreams come true in 2011!

Happy New Year & playing in Photoshop

Here's hoping 2009 is filled with endless opportunities and more of the things that are close to our heart and matter the most!

My first photo of the year is a little different - it's Mac looking at one of the fish in our fishpond, created using Photoshop CS3.

Happiness is a new toy

Is that a smile?
A couple of two dollar toys makes for happy dogs!
Now if only I could be so easily pleased!

Mondayitis & Do animals comprehend death?

How wonderful was it not to be woken at 5:30 a.m. this morning by the alarm. Vlad is on annual leave - yippee! I woke at 8:20 - I don't think it will happen again tomorrow morning though. Our plan for today was we were going to take the dogs to the beach, but the weather was overcast and there was a fine mist of rain, so no beach. It was an uneventful day really, a typical Monday, spent winding down after the weekend. Mac and Maesie seemed quite happy to have Vlad home. Mac is definitely Vlad's dog, though I know he loves me, he lives for the attention Vlad lavishes on him. He followed Vlad around like a magnet all morning, every move Vlad made, Mac was right there, it's so funny to watch him. On a normal Monday, he usually sulks for most of the day, until he hears Vlad's car turning into our driveway, then he instantly springs to life. Traitor he is.
As sad as it sounds, I often wonder how animals cope with death. OK I know, I said it's sad, and it's bad enough for us to cope with, but we comprehend the finality, how does that work for an animal, how do they, if they do that is, comprehend the person they loved, and they do love, is never coming back to them. Do they sense our pain and somehow understand? It's a sad thought, but one most animal lovers would have probably thought about at some time in their lives. I recently read two fantastic books, one was "All My Children Wear Fur Coats, by Peggy R. Hoyt, and the other, When Your Pet Outlives You by David Congalton & Charlotte Alexander. I would certainly recommend each of these books to any animal lover.
I managed to spend some time this afternoon playing around on PhotoShop, for the life of me, I can't work it out, layers and filters and styles and adjustments and Noise, what is that? The list goes on - I did manage to make some blog templates though, so hopefully I will load one up in the next day or two, that is if I get time. I think Vlad already has my day planned for me tomorrow, let me see, how many days until he goes back to work............