Tani's Cake

Gašper made a doggy cake for Tani's birthday yesterday. It was filled with salmon, duck and fresh vegetables. The dogs loved it!

Happy Birthday And Merry Christmas :)

Exactly one year ago, my biggest Christmas wish came true. Far away in the Pyrenees, a little star was born. She was named Désirée because she was the most desired little princess in the whole wide world. She spent the next two months on the beautiful propriety of the Loubajac kennel, playing with her sisters Razz and Rayas, her brother and her parents Pecquelette and Victor and other dogs. She was also surrounded by sheep and geese.



When I first met my playful little puppy, she looked like a little furry racoon :) She decided right away that we belong together and followed me everywhere I went. She was very happy to find out that we have another dog, her beagle sister Xsara. They soon became inseparable.



Today she is one year old. A lot has happened since then. She now responds to Tani, a cool name that derives from the name of a sport motorcycle Suzuki Katana. She became a wonderful young dog, learned tons of new tricks, discovered that there is a very fun game she likes to play which is called agility, found out that sheep run really fast if you run after them and bark hysterically and learned that world is her personal playground :) I hope she will become even more snobbish and self-centered in the years to come. Happy birthday, my little Tani! I promise I will do my best to keep your tail wagging all the time. A very happy birthday also to Razz and Rayas and, of course, a merry merry Christmas to everyone!

Our improvisation of a Christmas tree - here by the sea it's Christmas pine tree :)


Yeeeeees, it's a real sheepskin tug!!!! She stole one just like this from a pyrshep on EO, but had to give it back ... Now she has one of her own, ordered from CleanRun!


That was for her birthday, and now the Christmas present


A whole pack of her favourite balls!


And last but not least ... CONFETTI TIME!!!!

11 Months

Tani and her sisters RAYAS and RAZZ have 11 months today. I cannot believe that the next time we'll celebrate it will be one whole year already! Tani is defenitely NOT grown up yet, she is just as playful and carefree as she was when we first met. I hope she stays my crazy little clown :) I love her brilliant ideas and how she makes me laugh all the time. I love how she looks up to Xsara and how she waits for her to wake up in the morning, trying to hypnotize the part of the blanket where Xsara sleeps until she shows her pink nose and sleepy eyes. I love how she makes confetti out of every piece of paper she can find and how proud she is of her work when it's finished. I love how she smiles at me with her tongue hanging out of her mouth, I love the crazy look on her face and the huge brown eyes following my every move. I love all the wet kisses, how she shows all her mental and physical capabilities when trying to steal coffee and how excited she gets when she jumps out of the car to find out we're on an agility course. I love her egocentric and snobbish attitude and I love how she thinks I'm the coolest person alive. This list could go on and on forever, but to sum it up - I just love you, my little Tani!

New Photos

Yesterday we went for another walk with Polona and her toller Wi. Polona took some new photos of my dogs, they are all amazingly beautiful like all of her photos. As you can see, there is no snow left, only rain (but we were very lucky because it wasn't raining during our walk). Here are some photos of Tani in autumn colours:

Sheepdog Video And Tani's First Real Snow

Here is a video of Tani on CANT. Of course, this is not all she had to do, just one of the exercises. I think she did very well, specially considering that this was our third encounter with sheep so far. She sure showed that she has drive and interest for the flock, no doubt about it :) Our next appointment is in 10 days and the countdown has already begun!



On another note, we had the first snow of the season yesterday. This was Tani's first real snow with me, other than snowy left-overs we had in February when she came to stay with us and those that we saw in the mountains. Since the temperatures are still to high for snow, it only lasted one day and is already gone today. But yesterday everything was nice, clean and white! Tani loved it, of course, she ran up and down the fields trying to catch snowflakes, rolled in it, tried to eat it, played with it - she did it all, preferably at the same time. My fingers were freezing, but I did manage to take some photo-evidence of it:

CANT

I really have to brag today :) Tani and I had the test of natural attitude for herding dogs in Italy (called CANT). She did extremely well and made me incredibly proud. Her results are (options are: very good, good or insufficient):

Natural attitude:
Resistance: very good (very fast)
Jumping: very good (agile)
Recall: very good (immediate)
Behaviour with owner: very good (attentive)
Behaviour with other people: very good (comfortable)
Behaviour with other dogs: very good (playful)
Behaviour with unknown objects: very good (indifferent or playful)

Pastoral attitude:
Interest for the flock: good (interested from 30 to 10m)
Approach to the flock: very good (approaches the flock as soon as released by the owner)
Conduct with the flock: very good (interested, agitated)

Result: Suitable
(options are: suitable, the test has to be repeated, eliminated with no option to repeat the test).

I will add the video as soon as I recharge the battery on my camera.

After the test we had a lovely running contacts training, and we are also celebrating 10 months today, so we have many reasons to party :)

First Sheepdog Lesson

Tani and I had our first Sheepdog lesson in Italy. This was her second interaction with sheep (we did the puppy instinct test at 4 months). She behaved very differently from the first time, and was much more excited and nervous now than at 4 months. She really liked working with sheep, so we will continue to attend these lessons. Our next meeting is on Thursday.

I only have the video of the first time she entered the pen. Her second round was actually better, and I'm a little sad that I don't have any evidence of it! One sheep (the biggest one) wasn't listening to her and tried to wander away. Tani wasn't going to let her do that, so she worked really hard to bring her back. She earned the nickname "hot pepper" for her energetic and somewhat spicy personality when it comes to work.

Tricks Class And Tani's New Friend

I haven't done a new video for Tani's 9 months, shame on me! Instead, I'm posting the video of Silvia's summer tricks class (featuring Tani and her friends). Pretty amazing, huh?



Xsara and Tani got a cairn terrier cousin yesterday. Miki will be the best friend to my younger sister Katja. I'm sure they will make each other very happy! Tani and Xsara like him very much, which is very important considering that we live in the same house. Miki likes my girls as well, I think he will fit into our family very nicely.

Happy 8 Months!

Tani and her siblings are 8 months "old" today! To mark this event, we finally made the 5th part of puppy tricks, learned in Silvia's tricks class :) Enjoy:

Summertime

Time sure does fly, specially if you have a Pyr Shep puppy :) I simply cannot believe that my little bundle of fur and joy has almost 8 months already! And I also cannot believe how long it's been since her last tricks video. Of course, she can do tons of new tricks, and I promise I will do my best to make a video in the next few days. In the meantime, I'm posting one funny picture - this is what happens if you leave a friend with poodles in charge of your dog for 5 minutes:


On European Open in Holland, we saw many relatives of Tani in action. All of them are wonderful dogs with wonderful families. We took pictures of some of them:
Tani's niece Page from Luxembourg:

Tani's step sister from Norway:

and, of course, Tani's fantastic 3/4 sister who needs no introduction :)


We're now staying at the seaside until the end of the month and we are having a lot of fun together. I'm posting a couple of pictures from our vacation so far:

A Walk With Polona And Her Gang

Yesterday we went for a walk with our agility friend Polona, her super sweet and super smart toller Wi and Bamm Bamm, who is staying with Polona while his mom is on vacation. Polona took some amazing pictures of my girls, so BIG thanks to her. Here are Tani's pictures at almost 7 months:


We had a lot of fun together so we already agreed to go for another walk when we return from EO.