Mary, this ones for you!

One moment changed my life forever. No I am not making drama or being over-reactive...one moment really did change the direction of my life. My fourth grade son and I were in Central Point at an agility trial....Jake trying to run my separation anxiety ridden jack russell terrier...who kept running out of the ring to get to me! Not fun nor successful. And then we met Mary. A top agility trainer, instructor, judge from Seattle who saw "something" in my son and gave him one of her border collies. Our first border collie......Spark...From that one moment, my life changed radically. I now own and have trained countless border collies. I own a little piece of Heaven with sheep and a guard llama. I have a playroom full of border collies puppies.....I would never go back to a border collie free life! But how I wish I would have known sheep when Spark came into our lives.....he comes from very nice working lines....and now at almost 9......he "thinks" he is super cool when he gets to work the woollies....but I dream of what he could have been.

Mary, here's to you. Thanks for sharing your passion for this phenomenal breed of dog! And now, this ones for you:

Portrait:

Profile with her little Elle beauty mark:

Next view:
She's done being cute......Seize the day!!!!

Ooooh, the sweetest thing!

These puppies are becoming too cute for words. They are becoming very full of themselves....yet their bodies are not totally cooperating! I can't stop laughing at them!

Here they are saddled up to the milk bar......

Bella is getting just a little tired of their persistent, unending hunger.....

They are being socialised to "other breeds" but the Jack's aren't really sure what to think.......

Puzzle was being a snuggle bunny and would NOT leave me alone......

Riot wanted her mom to see her "smile"

And this pretty much sums up how I feel about life right now.....

The house, laundry, cooking, grocery shopping, and ranch are all suffering in the name of socializing the puppies.....somebody must do it!!!

Seize the day!!!!!

Bon Appetit

Today, I am going to do a little cooking.......ingredients are simple

Gerber Rice Cereal and Organic Goat Milk

Pour a bit of Rice Cereal into a plate that is nice and flat...the flatter the better.

Add a generous amount of goat milk.

I like the consistancy of my cereal/milk combo to be nice and creamy, more on the thin side. Microwave for a few seconds to take the cold edge off......

BON APPETIT!

I am so after a new camera...sorry this is blurry....

Here is Puzzle for the person who asked to see her collar:It will probably go away with time but it is one way I can keep tell her apart from her identical sisters!

Now, just for fun...some miscellaneous playing pictures!

This is the Black One......bold, adventerous

This is Vicki's Riot.....

And here is Charlotte helping to socialize my First Born......

Seize the day!!!!

Let's take a closer look......

Let me introduce you.....

Herriot.....or Riot for short.......

First Born....she opened her eyes first too.

Little Sista.....or Bella's Princess. She is just a wee bit smaller and a pistol! She has a tiny little beauty mark on her muzzle.
Here is my Black One.....she was born last but she is very bold. Out of the crib first....always exploring but always comes back for love!

This is little Puzzle......she has a little notch out of her collar making it look like a puzzle piece. These pups are so amazing....they are all very similar in looks...but also personality. We are having a lot of fun with them......new footing, new toys, new objects to maneuver around and over.

I must buy a new camera! These little spunky pups are not going to slow down....I need a faster shutter speed!!!!

Seize the day.....

Sounds Like Life to Me.....

They say that life is a Country Western song....and recently, I would agree. My life is being sung by Darrly Worley...."Sounds like life to me, plain old destiny. Yeah the only thing for certain is uncertainty"

It all started when Kathy Knox told me to put Nell up for a while....."give her some time off" and "now would be a great time to breed her"...said lovingly (I'm sure) to this OCD person who works dogs every day. Knowing that Nell would never come into heat...ever....I decided to buy a young girl to put some time on...take some pressure off Nell while keeping me busy. I am a better person when kept busy!

Introducing L&M Belle (who I call Bella because Nell and Bell just did not work!) Yep, that's right....she came with the "gift with purchase" option....just like a great Clinique promo! I wondered when she went off food......thought she might be stressed.....then she started puking in the car.....never have had a motion sensitive dog....but then she started "developing" and a vet friend palpated a couple "gifts" and my vet confirmed with an ultrasound. Not that time would not have told the truth of the matter!

Five beautiful baby girl pups......Bella the proud mom! Here is one pup the day she was born.....they grew....and grew.....

and they grew......now they are three weeks old today. Cuter than baby's butts and little lambs! Eyes are open....they are growling and playing and....well, I am sure life is going to get just a little more complicated here in the coming weeks!Time to make some lemonade......and my shameless promotion.

For sale: 4 ABCA border collie females from a litter by L&M Belle (Laura Hick's Nell X Michelle Howard's Imp Moss) X Deltabluez Caden (Diane Pagel's Tess X DelMar Scott). All are black and white and should be lightly rough coated. Belle is CEA DNA Normal and preliminary hip x-ray looked very good. DOB 10/11/09

These pups have tremendous breeding behind them. Laura Hick's Nell is the mother of Tommy Wilson's Sly (5th place at the 2009 USBCHA finals),Laura Hick's Jag, Diane Pagel's Nan while Michelle Howard's Imp Moss is the father of Scott Glen's Maid (10th place at the 2009 USBCHA finals) and is out of Henderson's ##Sweep; DelMar Scott is a grandson of Bobby Dalziel's ##Wisp while Diane Pagel's Tess 3rd dog to get ROM through ABCA and placed 6th in the nursery finals in 2001. For more information, please contact me at lora@rockingdogranch.com Located in Oregon.

I do believe these girls are going to make really nice working dogs! They certainly have the genetic make-up and are being raised to be well rounded dogs.

Off to clean up the puppy room and get my puppy-breath fix!

Seize the day!!!!!

Better Than Christmas......Really!

I've confessed I am OCD.....and that I have waited all summer for Nell to come into heat. My false proclamation of her being in heat and almost starting my trip to Missouri in early July....will go down in the history books of my friends as something to tease me about forever! In fact, I had sort of given up on poor Nell, thinking she must have some "female issue" and that she would never come into heat....ever! And then....miracles of Mary....she came into heat at the finals! Indeed....confirmed by all my nay-saying friends. Conveniently, Kathy Knox was right there with room to fly Nell home with her and so Nell went to Camp Knox. I won't talk about that fact that I sent my young, sweet (okay maybe not sweet) innocent girl to an old man who has children all over the continent. I'll briefly breeze over Kathy asking if Nell has any bad habits....me saying no...and then getting the call that Nell was practicing by herself on the young weaner lambs, sneaking under the gate to do so! The day finally came....my friends Cheryl and Lorri (plus Cheryl's husband who is my friend but won't admit it) flew out to the Knox trial and were willing to bring Nell home with them...if there was room on the plane!

I got the call at 7:30 in the morning....Nell was on the plane.....considering it is a 3 1/2 hour flight and a 4 hour drive for me....I jumped in the van and was off.....

I got to the SeaTac in the nick of time.....the plane from Kansas City was 30 minutes early....and I hit rush hour traffic in Portland. What a sight...there was Cheryl, and my Nell....who found me and just stared at me through her crate.....staring without a wag or whine. Man oh Man I missed that dog. I put her in the van and headed to Fido's Farm....where we took a long walk and then.....

we worked sheep! It was like she never left...but then she was more responsive...so the good was still there....but the pushing on me was softer....the month off was a good thing!

Yesterday was day 24 from the her last rendezvous with Jake.....so I took her to the vet to have a little lookie lou.....I was never one to wait till Christmas to open my gifts....ever. (Sorry, Mom, it's true...I got very good at re-wraps). The ultrasound was amazing.....6 tiny little nothings!!!!! This was so much better than Christmas. I asked the vet to sex them.....okay, just kidding but I am so excitedly over the moon. My Nell is having Jake puppies......

Seize the day!!!!!!!!

The Finals.....from a different view

I think I have recovered...maybe! Helping put on the 2009 USBCHA Finals was such a wild ride......better than Disneyland....surrounded by friends, border collies (a couple of shelties), sheep......what more could a woman want....other than to run my very own dog IN the competition. So, I thought I would share my view of the finals......

Here the first campers pulled in....I do believe that is the Helsley family and friends!

The trial committee met to discus the layout of the field......amazing how many top hats it took to make decisions....and how they all came to one conclusion.....only those on the committee would know!
This was my "home away from home" during the daylight hours. It was formally called the "information" tent. Not exactly sure how informative we were....those of us residing there day after day....but the view was great!

The set out pens were amazing! Designed by Ellen Skillings....they made the wrangling job so much more user friendly. On Monday, those in charge of the sheep.....kindly showed the girls around their diggs and gave them encouragement to "get used to it" sistas!The girls were released....four by four...and allowed to check out the field....grazing on the newly harvested alfalfa...what a treat!
And then.....it was on to the main event! You can barely see the fetch panels in the middle of the field....but this was taken from the set out looking back at the whole affair......What an amazing trial! I had no idea what all happens to put on an event like this.....and I was amazed at what a fabulous group of people pulled together to make it happen. Throughout the week, I did indeed get to see a few runs......but by Sunday....I went on strike and watched every single run...taking notes and dreaming of years to come! How does one put into words the beauty of the working border collie? I've left that to the other bloggers who covered the runs so eloquently.....as for me, for once, I have been left speechless!

Seize the day