Teddy at nine weeks.

Teddy is now 9 weeks old. Friday, not only did Teddy go shopping but she had her first visit to her vets. She weighed in at 12.3 lbs and had her second set of vaccines and worming. She was such a good girl that she was allowed to pick out a new toy at the feed store. I kind of think they put all those toys in the basket low to the ground just to tempt pups who happen to be walking past. She had a choice between Squeaky Hare, Squeaky Rabbit, Squeaky Duck and Squeaky Fox. Squeaky Fox won paws down and we had to listen to him squeak most of the way home.

She looks older than she is in this photo. Look at her happy face!

When I'm out and about with Teddy people often tell me how good Australian Shepherds (Aussies) are. A man we met shopping told me all about his incredible Aussie, Andy who is 15 and he loves dearly.

Teddy enjoys being with the other pets. Here is Bobby going out on patrol with Teddy, who wanted to tag along.

Teddy doesn't go far from home yet and so Bobby continued on without her.

She really gets along well with Tommy Two Tone. Where Tommy goes...Teddy is sure to follow.

Here is Tommy with Teddy right behind.

They have a lot in common. Tommy likes to follow the chickens around and so does Teddy.

Tommy teaches Teddy to eat grass. Here they are grazing in the the shade of the birch tree.

Teddy didn't understand the reason for the grass eating, but thought if her hero, Tommy does it then it must be a good thing....so she continued eating the lawn.

She had a little difficultly chewing it. She tried to keep an eye on her pal Tommy.

Tommy was an inside cat only till about 2 months ago. I started letting him come out with me while I gardened. He kept really close until the day he discovered a mouse. Our sweet little Tommy Two Tone became a serial killer! The lawn was littered with his murdered victims...mice, voles and gophers. Sometimes he'd pile the corpses up outside the back door. Our other cats are pretty old and would rather sleep than hunt these days and Muffin is more into birds...so there was a job opening for a good rodent hunter around here.

Teddy suddenly thought of a more traditional game she could have with Tommy...

Cows at work.

We have been making our cows do work for the last 6 weeks or so. Brad and William are going to plough up the meadow and re-seed it and to make the job easier, the cows had the job of mowing down the grass.

They took on their assignment with great eagerness and dedication.

They quickly organized themselves into a hard working group, only taking short breaks for cud chewing, feeding their young, naps and romance with the bull.

Thanks cows for a job well done.

Summer Solstice

My favorite day of the year.

Summer Solstice

Through the Spring, the Sun
Rises slowly toward the azimuth
Until at last, the apex reached
Night and day teeter in the balance

Soon to begin its slow decline
Foretelling the decent in Fall
But for now we shall enjoy
The warm days of Summer

Capturing every precious moment

Savoring the long, lazy days

That will sustain us through

The Winter that's sure to follow

I took these photos in the garden as the sun set.

And then Teddy leaped off the retaining wall and belly flopped onto the lawn, in what William calls, 'The Full Superman'. For a moment she looked like she was off to save her home planet.

Herding dog meets herd for the first time.

The cows were near the house and so I took the opportunity to introduce Teddy to the herd.

She ran away.

But she came back.....

Deer stalking, shopping with Teddy..

and cows in the mist.

Sometimes when I see deer in the garden - I stalk them. When they come out from behind a tree.. there I am with my camera. I enjoy seeing the look on their faces. It's usually early in the morning and so I'm in my bright yellow robe (dressing gown) and slippers, but the fright they get might be from what I look like first thing in the morning!

This guy came out from behind the tree and I was waiting the other side.

I was walking up behind this fellow as he snacked on my crab-apples. I got very close.

He never looked around until he was in the field and then he bounded off as fast as he could.

Teddy has been doing a lot of shopping with me. Here she is in the garden center at Lowes yesterday.

I have to be careful because if I push the cart too close to the plants she will bite them.

When we caught up with Brad and William in the boring hardware section, she was fast asleep.

I took Teddy to as many stores as I could and walked her around people in an effort to get her okay being around strangers. A little girl petted her and some other people spoke nicely to her. I wish I could give people bits of cheese to give to her. I took her to a scrap yard where there were a lot of men in hard hats. She was a bit frightened at first so I cuddled her and she relaxed. At the irrigation store, where Brad and William were getting irrigation stuff, two ladies who work in the office, kidnapped her for awhile. She's super good about being in the Jeep or pick-up truck now. I take her puppy food and water and she drinks and eats when she needs to and also takes potty breaks.

Teddy was born on April 23 2011, and she learned to sit on command a week ago. She also knows 'come' and 'stay'. That's pretty much all I know about training dogs so I'm going to have to learn more because she's very smart. She is almost completely house trained already! She has started asking to go out!!!! Are all Australian Shepherd's this smart? Do I have a pup genius? Have all the other pups I have had been slow learners? So many questions.

When I'm gardening Teddy helps me do everything...weed...dig holes for new plants and she will run all over the place with the empty plastic pots in her mouth. I bought a nice Angle Face rose and dug a hole for it, when I came back with the rose Teddy was in the hole furiously digging her way to China. After I managed to plant the rose and was watering it in, Teddy was trying to dig it up again, so I squirted her with the hose and she didn't seem to mind too much, in fact she was covered in mud and was so happy about it. When she's not gardening she likes to herd the chickens and ducks. She quickly learned that if she moves too fast moving our two ducks they will fly away. She doesn't chase the birds but herds them all over the place. They don''t seem to mind too much.

Teddy gets around.

Teddy is meeting the animals on our farm. Here she is saying hello to Echo.

I took Teddy to work with me and Blondie. She curled up with Blondie in the bed that I put in a laundry basket. Blondie was glad of the extra warmth.

Friday we took her shopping. She sat so nicely in the Ranch and Home (now Big 5) shopping cart as I shopped for toys, puppy food and a new bed. Surrounded by her new stuff, people came to talk to her which was what I wanted. I want her to enjoy going places and being okay with strangers.

Here she is shopping for plants in the Home Depot. I put her new bed in the cart and she was asleep most of the time.

I've never had a pup that was so good about not doing their business in the house as Teddy. She spends the night in the down stairs bathroom and after spending 6 nights here she has only done two puddles in the bathroom over night and that was the first two nights. She sleeps all night as well. During the day, as soon as she wakes up from her frequent naps, I carry her out to the lawn and she hasn't gone in the house since the first few days!

She's becoming a bit of a terror and has already ripped Brad's pants when she grabbed them when he was walking. She thinks it's funny. She ran into my legs this morning and I think she may have learned a lesson from it because I accidently stepped on her paw. Poor little Teddy ran off holding her paw up and I felt like a puppy beater.

I have bought her lots of chew toys. Some of the toys were in the bathroom and she went and got them one by one and bought them into the living room. Bobby respects her stuff but Blondie will steal her treats. There was a raw hide chew on the floor that Teddy had walked off from and Bobby stood over it with her head down just staring at it. She loves them but knew it belonged to the 'baby dog'. She sat next to Brad's chair with her head over the arm rest and just cried. Blondie doesn't give a hoot, she'll sneak up and grab Teddy's stuff.

Here's Bobby with her first toy ever. Bobby is 9 and has never been interested in dog toys. She prefers to spend her time chasing Rock Chucks (marmots), but she has joint problems now and so I called this squeaky pig a "Rock Chuck" and she's been 'killing it' on a regular basis.

Notice the hair on her face is worn off from shoving her head into pipes and rock holes after Rock Chucks. Needless to say she hasn't quit hunting the real thing.

Teddy is home.

Sunday we drove to Idaho and got our 6 week old Australian Shepherd pup. Her name is Teddy. (Blondie comes when I call "Bobby" so I wanted the puppy to have a name with a distinct sound..problem is now Blondie comes when I call Teddy's name).

On the way home I took her for a few little walks on a leash and she surprised me by following behind me. I took these pictures today in the garden.

Henrietta was horrible to her. She pecked her nose and then jumped on her. Teddy is not allowed to go near Henrietta again. I don't know what got into that one eyed hen. Here Henrietta is stalking poor Teddy.

Our rooster, Jetlag wanted nothing to do with either of them.

Teddy thought these flowers looked good enough to eat.

Here Teddy wants to climb up a rock to come to me, but her legs are too short.

So she tries to eat a leaf that she thinks is handy.

I'm really pleased with her, she comes when I call her and follows right behind people, walking into their legs even. She is such a happy pup. Everyone, except for Henrietta, loves her. It's been nine years since we had a pup in the house and I almost forgot what fun they are.

William is home.

William came home. His plane was delayed hours on the run way at JFK in New York because of very bad weather and he missed his connecting flight in Seattle to Spokane. The airline paid for a nice hotel suit for him, even though the flight delay wasn't their fault.

William explored New York City and was walking 150 blocks a day as well as riding the subway. He was in the audience on the Letterman show and was on the plaza for the Today Show. I asked him what time he was there because I never saw him and he told me it was when they did the segment for the dogs needing to be adopted.. well that explained it...I was busy looking at the dogs and not the people.

William, being a hard working farm boy, walked all the way around the outside of central Park and zig zagged across it several times. He went to the river to go to the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space museum, but walked to the East River.. realizing his mistake, walked all the way back across town to the Hudson River. I wish I could still walk like that! He even explored Harlem and declared it his favorite part of NYC. He didn't much care for the rest of the city. I enjoyed hearing about his adventures in NYC and wished I could have been there. The first time I went to New York was when I was 19 and that was 38 years ago. The city has changed a lot since then, it's cleaner and safer now. It doesn't bother William to travel and explore alone. While he was in the UK he took a ferry over to Northern Ireland to do research in Belfast. He went to London to visit the museums and do more research. He travelled to Glasgow, Leeds, Manchester and other cities. He declared his favorite city that he has visited on his travels so far to be the city of York...the old original York, not the new one.

The first thing William did was take a walk around. Echo was sitting down and when he saw us all coming he leaped to his feet. I thought for a moment he was going to snort and run off, but he came trotting across the pasture to see his long lost friend, William.

He wanted to give William a proper kiss but William just let him kiss his cheek.

Echo likes to give people kisses. If I ask him if he wants an apple, he'll give me a kiss. He's very gentle and not at all pushy. Here he gives Brad a big kiss.

Because I'm shorter, Echo can give me in a real big hug. He puts his head around me and squeezes me in tight. I have never known such an affectionate horse.

He follows close behind us when we take a short cut through his pasture. Today was his first day of being turned out without his breakaway halter on. Needless to say, he's very good about being caught. His training hasn't progressed very far. I just groom him, feed him treats and give him lots of cuddles and kisses. That will be his job in life...being a pet.

William is home for awhile now. He plans to work on the farm for a year and then hopefully start Law School next year. I can't tell you how happy I am to have my boy home. He's already making himself very useful working with his dad. What would be perfect is if Keegan, Nicky and Amelia were living here as well... a mother can only dream. :)