Saturday 14 February 2015

Toby's first week in his new home

Our lives have been turned upside down by our new furball, but we've loved every minute of having Toby and feeling very lucky to be able to provide this lovely boy with a home. In the space of seven days he's been everywhere with us, in two different cars, to the pub, to a busy reservoir, played in snow, played in rivers, mud and fields, met two new playmates AND a trip to the vets! Safe to say he's been a gem and settled in fabulously well, so pleased.

Some pics from Toby's first week...



Sleepy
Surveying the Tarn
Toby-luvvin'
First ride in the Disco...
Sleepy (again
The above picture is from today, we introduced Toby to Echo, a rather petite German Shepherd belonging to good friends of ours. Echo is also a rescue GSD and very vocal with other dogs. After initially barking her head off around Toby we went on a long walk to tire them both out with the intention of letting them both off once on neutral territory in a nice big field. Sure enough both dogs got on pretty well considering Echo's excitement tendencies, Toby took it all in his stride and we felt confident enough to let Echo in the house. After initial sniffing about the place both dogs settled down beautifully, very happy owners!!

Here pups! Great recall :)
With his new lady friend Echo
Toby has also been introduced to Maya the Malamute, another great success! So two new (lady) playmates for Toby = yet more exercise for our new pup :D A Valentine's week indeed!

The house feels complete with the addition of our canine friend...though I fear we may never be free of fur again...

Just a few spare hairs!

Wednesday 11 February 2015

A new dog, a ringing tick and the last of the puffins!

We've had an exciting few days recently, welcoming a new addition to the family...Meet Toby-Wan Kenobi, well just Toby really - he's a white "champagne"  German Shepherd.


We've rehomed him and he seems to have settled in very well much to our relief! He's very, VERY furry. This was after 40 minutes work on him...


...and we appear to have a spare dog! This is mostly his undercoat, amazingly soft, the birds will make good use of it for nesting material come spring :)

Having had a German Shepherd before and knowing what fantastically intelligent and loyal companions they are, we had to have another. Toby certainly doesn't disappoint. Here he is on a walk today.


In other news, I've got my first ringing tick of the year, a mighty fine male Coot. Such strong birds with amazing legs and feet! He naturally left me a nice rich and green present on my leg as a thankyou for the silver bling ;)


And finally I'm able to show you the last updates on the progress of my Atlantic Puffin portrait as it is now...drum roll please....FINISHED! I only started it a year ago... Plenty of hours have gone into this piece of work I can tell you, worth it in the end I hope you agree. It's been a lot of fun bringing these quirky little sea parrots to life!


Seeing puffins in my sleep...

And here's the finished artwork, all framed up!
And for something a bit different, here's a short video of me in action, working on the puffin colony...


That's me for now, catch up again soon!

Meg x