Auguri, Viggo!!!!

Today's Viggo's 6th birthday!!!!
We'll treat him with a very long walk, lots of cookies and lots of hugs & kisses! This evening he'll have some 'doggy lasagna'! Once an Italian boy, always an Italian boy, so Italian food it is! :)
We want to say Happy Birthday to Viggo's brother and sisters: Happy birthday, Noè, Noelle & Iris!!!

Viggo at 12 weeks old when he joined our family! 

Viggo 12 weeks old

Viggo, 12w old, in search for COOKIES!!!

Beautiful Viggo, 12w

Viggo & Aaron
Viggo, 1y old
"Can we get something to drink, please?"

Viggo yesterday at 6y old minus 1 day ;) 

Grooming and Crazy Gracie

It's been a while since I've updated this blog. I apologize! From now on I'll post more often, I promise!

This weekend the weather was wonderful in Belgium, so we decided to groom our three doggies.
These are the results:

Mona after grooming

Mona

Grace after bath, blow dried but not yet groomed

Grace

Viggo
He didn't want me to take some
other pictures so this is the only good one... :s

Sunday, Grace got into the Rabbits' residence...

Grace saying 'Hi' to Viper

Grace in the Rabbithouse 

And today our beloved Grace decided she wanted to look more like Viggo and turn into a black & white Newfoundland... She bumped her head into the freshly painted mailbox and now she looks like this: 

Of course I couldn't end this message without a picture of our Shaggy...

Can you guys find him anywhere? 

Ooohhh, there you are!!! :) 

Grace at school & Mona at the vet's

Grace at school


Thursday, Grace went to doggy school for the first time! We waited so long to send her to school because of her kidney and knee, but now we couldn't wait any longer because little Miss Gracie thinks she's the boss of everyone here at home! Time for change! :)
To my and my mum's surprise she did amazingly well! She obeyed like she's never done before! Other great thing: as I practiced yesterday what we had learned the day before, she did everything right from the first time! :) She's an A student, which means she can already start a more difficult class next week! We are so proud of our little Gracie!

Mona at the vet's

Friday morning we noticed that Mona was limping, so in the evening we went to the vet to check her right paw. Apparently she bruised two of her toes. So now she has to rest and take some medication!

Grace takes Viggo for a walk!

This movie shows you how our Gracie takes her 'dad' for a walk! :)
We wanted to take Viggo for a walk ourselves, but Grace thought she should do that...!
Viggo is being very easy as you can see! :) His little jumps are sooooo adorable! :) And Mona doesn't really know what to do! :)

Happy Birthday, Mona!!!

Today's Mona's birthday!!!! 4 years old already!

To celebrate her birthday properly, we decided to take her for a walk to the weekly market in the center of our village. She always loves to do that, so that was her 'present'. She behaved amazingly well, she had a lot of attention for the children playing at the playground and she passed every dog without any problem. We are very happy and proud of her that she behaved this way, because after her pregnancy she was always anxious. Clearly this fear 'for nothing' is gone now! We're so relieved!

After her walk she ate some birthday cookies and as diner we made her and her friends birthday pancakes!

The recipe is very easy. 

For three dogs you need:

- 3 eggs

- a cup of cream cheese

- +/- 200g of meat that is easy to mix (ground beef, for example)

- some flour 

You just mix it all together and you've got the dough, to make the dough smooth you can ad as many flower as you wish. Than put the dough into a frying pan or the oven and you've got your dog(s) some pancakes! 

Mona, Viggo, Grace and Shaggy enjoyed it! 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SHAGGY!!!!

Today we celebrate Shaggy's adoption day! 

Because he's a shelter cat, we don't know when he was born exactly, 

so we decided to celebrate the day he came to live with us! 

He's been living with us now for 2 years 

and he was still a youngster when we got him 

so he will be 2 and a bit years old! 

Happy Adoption Day, Shaggy! 

Enjoy your birthday meal! 

Shaggy, youngster, when he just arrived at our place

Shaggy, adult macho cat! 

Is what the dogs are saying! 

Grace is growing... growing fast!

Hi!

It's been a while since we've updated this page, so here we are...
First of all some bad news: most of our puppies suffer from kneeproblems; some of them have already had surgery, others are already put down...
Grace also has that same kneeproblem, but at only one of her knees, not both. Most likely she will undergo surgery when she's over 18 months old, that way she will be fully recovered from her kidneysurgery and bladderproblems. The most important thing is get her through that first and than we'll start thinking about the other surgery, because she isn't really in pain with that knee. After she gets of antibiotics for her kidney and bladder, we'll start giving her some meloxicam tablets. Thanks for this tip to our dear friend and breeder of Viggo, Iwonna!

Okay, enough with the bad news!
As I hear from my brother and mum, Grace is still the little pig she's always been. She wrecks everything she finds and teases her mum and stepdad. She's also copying everything Viggo does. Viggo's still the overprotective stepdad and Mona... Mona looks great, she's finally gotten over her pregnancy and motherhood. For a while she really suffered hormone swings with becoming incredibly thin and without any joy for life, she really looked horrible for some time and when she stopped eating, we were afraid to lose her. But now she's all over that stuff and found back how to be a great Newfoundland! She's not being the 'teaching' mum, because she allows everything little Gracie does, but she sure as hell is a very loving mum!

So to sum up, I really don't have to be afraid to come home to totally different dogs (I'm living in Italy for 6 months to go to school there):
Viggo is still the great, big dog he always was. Loving and carrying for Grace and Mona.
Mona is back her joyous self she always was. Playing and being completely crazy.
Grace is a playful, curious and 'love-to-learn-something-new' puppy.
Shaggy became a beautiful cat, he'll be celebrating his 2nd birthday soon. Also still loving and carrying for Grace and playing with her.

Some pics my mum sent me:

Sleepy Shaggy

Runnnnn!!!! Viggo - Grace - Mona

Like mother like daughter
Viggo - Mona - Grace

"Runnnnn, Mummyyyy!!! Dad's right behind you!!!" 

Beautiful Grace