Puppy Dog..

I just had to share these pictures I took today, over at our friends place.
This is Tyler a beautiful bouncy Border Collie puppy. He has the most wonderful little face and is such a clever little chap.
I love all the Puppy kisses he gives me.
I also took some lovely photographs on their land, but I'll share them later.
On the home front we've had a poorly Pony. She's been losing weight and looks awful. She is eating but not very much. We've been trying to get her to eat, by enticing her with some tasty high protein feed, little and often. We had the Vet out yesterday, who checked her over, took her temperature, checked her teeth and took some bloods. He thinks she may have had an infection, but the blood tests show that she's now getting over it. He's given us some Electro Lights to syringe feed her with and he's going to check her again on Monday, just to keep doing what we've been doing. But the good news is that she is eating a bit more. We are also on Foal watch now, as three of our Mares are about to give birth. I'll let you know as soon as a baby arrives.

A Traumatic Day..

I've had a very traumatic day today.
For those of you that don't know I had to go to the Hospital today for a CT Scan.
Now I got to the Hospital was taken to the changing rooms, put on a gown and within a few minutes, a nurse came and got me.
She helped me onto the scanner, put pillows under my head and a wedge under my knees to make me comfortable. All great so far, then the fun began or not in my case. I've told you before how I absolutely abhor needles. Well to have the Scan, they wanted to set up a drip of contrast dye which is pumped into you while your having the Scan. I warned this poor Nurse how bad my veins are and she tried to be gentle, but lets say after numerous attempts I ended up in tears. She said she'd stop if I asked, but as the dye makes the scan more detailed I let her have one more go. Thankfully, she got a vein in the back of my hand on that last attempt, which they flushed with Saline first, as they didn't want to start the dye and the vein collapse, I felt the Saline going in, so they then attached the drip. Then the Scan began, the Nurse came back in about Half way through and said that they were about to start pumping the contrast dye through and I would get a hot feeling first in my head, then throat, then through my body. It actually feels like you've wet yourself. Its the same feeling you get when you have an Angiogram done.Anyway all went well Scan was completed and again the Nurse was so kind, helping me sit up and making wait before getting up. She then took me back in the waiting room, where Mick was waiting and he knew by my face something was wrong and of course he knew and said "Needles", where I nodded and promptly burst into tears. What the poor people in the waiting room thought I have no idea. We left the Hospital and Mick took me into a local Supermarket for a cup of Tea, can you imagine me sitting in the Cafe, drinking Tea with tears pouring down my face. When we got home, Sandra one of the Cardiac team rang to say she was going to pop into see me this afternoon, which promptly set the flood gates open again, so we decided that it would be better if she didn't come today. Mick has since rung her back and explained exactly what had gone on today.
I am not normally like this, it's normally the stiff upper lip, but I think I've been worried by what is happening, I'm not sleeping very well and I just don't feel right and I certainly don't look right. I just want an answer one way or another..
Sorry to be full of gloom, but just wanted to get it all off my chest.
On a lighter note, I took these pictures of my big baby Merlin this afternoon having a snooze. Notice all the dirt on his nose?. He's given me lots of wet slobbery kisses today.
I did manage to sort out a tiny box of miniatures late this afternoon, I'll be back later with some pictures...

The Big Freeze...

Another day of the BIG FREEZE...
The boys were supposed to go back to school yesterday, but all the Schools here are closed. I've just checked the School website and I think they will be closed for the rest of the week.
We've just watched the news and it looks like we are due another lot of Snow in the early hours tomorrow. Their now saying this could go on for another couple of weeks. One of the gritters from Ceredigion ended up on its side after sliding on the ice. Severe Weather Warnings are still in place here and the temperature's are set to drop to -10 tonight.
Mick had to pop into Town today to pick up our prescriptions and he said it was treacherous. I've been taking photographs through the windows and from the safety of the veranda, there's no way I'm going out just in case I fall over.

Yesterday 5th January 2010

Yesterday morning we woke to rain, which very quickly turned to sleet and then to Snow. Outside our House is quite a steep hill that goes down into the village. We were watching the cars struggling to get up and down the hill, when down came a lorry and it started to slide, he was so lucky that he didn't jack knife. A few cars managed to pull into the lay by, but one just didn't make it and hit the grass bank. If you click on the pictures they will pop up bigger. We did the good neighbour bit and made the lorry driver a hot drink and asked the others in the lay by if they wanted a hot drink or to use the loo. Well you know what its like when its freezing and you need to go..
We rang the council to inform them of the problem on the hill and they told us to ring the Police, which we did. The Lorry driver eventually, after about 2 hours managed to straighten the Lorry up and get down the hill using the car tracks. Then blow me along came the Snow Plough and cleared the ice and gritted and then the Police drove up the hill. They were gritting and clearing the hill all through the night.
The only one in our Household who seems to be enjoying all the Snow is Merlin, he looked like a Polar Bear after rolling around the snow, then he promptly came indoors and shook himself. The floor and walls were drenched.
Merlin really makes us laugh, Harry throws Snowballs to him which he either eats or if they hit the ground he digs for them, he just doesn't realise they've disappeared into the surrounding snow. Bless him he's not the full Shilling..
I'll be back later with some more pictures that I took today..

A Challenge From Kim..

I received a challenge from Kim over at It's A Miniature Life.
The challenge was to:-
1. open the 4th file where you store your photos...
2. pick out the 4th photo & publish it to your blog...
3. explain a bit about it...
4. pass this challenge to 4 other blogs....

Well here's the photograph, not one of my better ones I have to say. (If you click on it, it should pop up bigger).
It shows Merlin our Newfoundland, Jasper our Border Collie and Moses and Storm as puppies. I think Moses is hanging off, of Jaspers leg! Looking at the photograph I'd forgotten just how much work we've done here. Just in front of where the Dogs are sitting, is where we have built the sleeper wall and to the right of the photo is where we had the JCB in to take out all the tree stumps and build the bank and level it on the top.
Now I have to pass this challenge on to four other blogs and they are:-
Sabiha over at Sab's Mini Interiors.
Mary over at Miz Mary's Minis.
Kate & John over at The Whittakers Miniatures.
And another Husband and Wife team over at Bearcabin Miniatures.

Lovely Surprise..

I had a lovely surprise today. Ben took my broken Laptop into school for me this week and gave it to one of his friends who is a genius with computers. My laptop went bang quite some time ago, which fried the mother board and I thought I'd lost everything on there. Ben's friend managed to extract all my photographs and documents and loaded them on to discs for me. Tonight we've sat and looked at the pictures, and there were quite a few on there that I'd completely forgotten about. Like the ones of Merlin when he was a tiny puppy, the house when we first brought it and the photo's of the Cats when they were really cute fluffy kittens. Moses & Storm when we first got them, and family photo's.
The photo at the top really gave me a giggle when I saw it again. While Harry was playing with the Dogs, Merlin pinched his jacket while he wasn't looking. I can't believe just how tiny he was, to the size of him now.

I Went For A Walk

It's finally stopped snowing, so I went for a walk up and down the fields with my camera..
The First photo is of the House from the Garden, the next one is the view of our bottom field and beyond, next photo was taken from the little paddock looking down into the back field. The next two photographs are of the top field. The next photo is of my solitary footsteps walking up the fields to the top field.
The next photo, is Merlin rolling in the snow like a big Black Bear and the last photo is of Moses and Storm pouncing in the snow...Needless, to say when I got back indoors, I had a steaming cup of Tea to warm up...

Jasper..

Wanted to share this picture of Jasper taken Christmas Day. He'd just eaten his Christmas Dinner. All the dogs have a Christmas Dinner of Turkey and vegetables, gravy and biscuits.

More Merlin...

Some more photo's of our once little, now big bundle of fluff.. Don't you just love that face drawl and all....