Category Archives: Home

New Beginnings

  By C-Myste | March 4, 2012 - 6:42 pm | , , , , , , ,
17 Comments

Just when you think you have rocks in your head for taking on yet another puppy . . . a sunny day comes.

 Dora adores Huxley and follows him around, to his annoyance. She looks at him and thinks “big, black = mom!” And then realizes “Oops, no milk.”

Cuteness in a green beautiful princess crown.

Learning to be a dog, she takes her cues from the adults. Or in the case of Kady, from the teenager

Smaller than the flower pots.

Family rassle.  No dogs were injured during this photo-shoot.

Alice makes sure that Kady doesn’t play too rough.

So, you may notice that one dog-person is missing from the pictures. Last weekend Molly went to try out living with Vicki Bockes, who has lost not only Dancer to DM but now both of her old Pems Quest and Cochise. As much as I love Molly to pieces and miss stroking her soft warm fur in my lap at night, Vicki needs her even more. If for any reason it doesn’t work out, Molly will be back. Meantime she is learning to be an only dog and taking Vicki for nice quick walks when they are staying at the condo in Portland.

I spent a few sorry days desperately missing my turd-colored chocolatey goodness princess. Especially midweek when the days looked like this:

But spring is coming, and with it new life.

Kady’s BIG Brother (and uncles) come to visit

  By C-Myste | October 23, 2011 - 6:21 pm | , , , , ,
6 Comments

Kady and Fig

Kady was pleased to entertain guests this morning. (Molly was vocally happy about it too, but I didn’t get any pictures of her.)

Fig is an “easy keeper”. During Alden’s recent and final ordeal with her mother, she found it necessary to switch the boys back from raw to Taste of the Wild kibble. Piglet Figlet is now back on the weight-watchers regimen.

Uncle Watson, the Fig Butt, and Kady

Good ol' Duncan

Can you believe that Dunc is now 13½? He seems a little hard-of-hearing but is otherwise doing great for his age. What a grand old dog.  I have more than a few regrets that he only produced a single litter.

"How do you expect us to drink out of this?"

"Silly boy."

Shown right before Kady ended up in the water.

I feel more road trips coming on . . .

  By C-Myste | October 13, 2011 - 1:01 pm | , , ,
10 Comments

Ours!

We brought her home last night about 6:30. I drove ahead in the Element to unlock the gate. Just after I passed the neighbor’s driveway, a deer bounded across the road and over the fence into the pasture.

Where it joined four others if its species.

In all there were two does, two youngsters (spring fawns) and . . .

Yes, a legal buck. Notice him keeping his head down, trying to blend in with the girls. Not very bright, to be out in the daylight this time of year. Oh, but wait a minute: deer see a single car on an otherwise deserted road and jump in front of it instead of waiting until it passes.

I was just sure that the entire bunch were going to bound back into the road and up the hill just as Tom arrived and wipe out our new pretty! And in fact, four of the five did. Fortunately he saw them and had time to stop.

Our new little home-away-from-home.

Does this picture make my butt look big?

September Sunday

  By C-Myste | September 18, 2011 - 3:05 pm | , , , , , , ,
4 Comments

And a Sun Day it is.

The smoke has cleared and the sky is a deep blue, offset by the golds and greens of the grass and trees. A mild day on the cusp of autumn.

I had a request for new pictures of Audrey, so after doing some website work and helping to stack a ton of stove pellets I hauled out the camera and went to sit on the lawn with the pack.

Hi Hi, I'm Audrey!

At first it was difficult to get them away from eating pine cones sitting in the shade next to me. But then there came a “cat alert!” in the pasture.

"Look, over there: it's a bird, it's a plane, it's a . . . . CAT!

Molly and Audrey.  And yes, Molly did eat a big hole in her side but it’s growing back now.

Toot, dah dah Doo - Charge!

 

Bo-o-oring.

Audrey would like to be a stock dog please, because they get to jump in water troughs when their run is through. (I did add more water after snapping the picture.)

I also managed a couple of Audrey’s dad Huxley. Ungroomed but still handsome.

A mature man at seven.

Sunrise

  By C-Myste | September 12, 2011 - 7:27 am | , , ,
2 Comments

Willamette Valley 09/11/11

Sam's Valley 09/12/11

Thank you for the birthday wishes yesterday. I love you all!

Last week also marked my 18-year anniversary at “the day job”. Today we implement some personnel reassignment and task reorganization. I am hopeful this will solve some problems and take a load off of my shoulders.

So now on with the “first day of the rest of my life.”

September

  By C-Myste | September 1, 2011 - 9:07 pm | ,
4 Comments

A new season is coming, sooner than anticipated. This morning it was crisp and bright and in the upper 30′s.

The leaves are already starting to change, and not just from drought.

We should make some time to pick a few blackberries this weekend.

The fall webworms have been busily spinning. They’ve really exploded locally this year (see Mail Tribune article). Driving to work, I pass trees that are totally covered in web, giving them into a ethereal fairy-tale look.

Some trees are engulfed, others untouched.

It’s a beautiful drive in to the office this time of year, but I fear that I will soon be suffering from snowbird-itis.

Fair Game

  By C-Myste | August 21, 2011 - 9:58 am | , , ,
2 Comments

Tom is down in California visiting his mom for a few days. The dogs and I stayed home to catch up on some “work”. We were watched a couple of movies yesterday evening (including re-watching Temple Grandin which is a local favorite perhaps due to all of the moo-ing). At one point I happened to glance over at Tom’s chair.

Dad's chair is a good ear-washing station

Bestest friends

(Or maybe Kady is trying to fix Audrey’s ears in hopes that she can stay?)

"We do too both fit!"

Sweet girls.