December in a nutshell

On December 4th my nephew Bart graduated from University. Here Frank and Bart at the diner celebrating this.
The hollidays were nice and quiet, Frank worked a lot the last two weeks of December.

At the end of December the cold came. On December 31st the garden looked great with the frost:And a picture of Gladdich.
Gladdich is finally doing better, we are slowly increasing his walks and his knee is healing well.We went for a walk that afternoon and I took this picture of a willow.

November

The biggest part of November we were busy with Gladdich after his second ACL surgery in October.This time Gladdich had some bad luck, so we had to start his revalidation from start over again.
At first one of the stitches inside started to itch and Gladdich managed to open up the wound overnight. Our vet removed it and we got some honey-ointment to prevent infection.
It seemed to go well, but it became infected. A second round of antibiotics, this time for 10 days.
This cleared the infection, but Gladdich was not doing well, afraid of everything and everyone. We suspected medicine poisoning and immediately stopped with his painkillers. Since then he is slowly, but steady improving.

On November 23rd we had some snow here a few pictures of the garden that day.

Shiba puppies

Yesterday we visited Ben and Ilone in Klaaswaal, to see their Shiba pups. All four are adorable and extremely huggable.
I forgot my camera, so here a photo from Ilones weblog with Ben and the pups: Demi (Xin-Feng's Demeter) was happy to see us again. Ilone had a nice surprise for us, a photo of Demi in chocolate, in honour of becoming a Dutch Youth Champion: I was unaware that this was possible with chocolate! The (Dutch) creator of it is Chocolaterie Robbertsen.

Gladdich is an uncle now

When I checked the website of Royal Club Chow Chows today, I noticed that Gladdichs sister, Parfait d'Amour of the Royal Club, had a litter: three pups in three colors.

Dutch Youth Champion

At the show in Bleiswijk Demi (Xin-Feng's Demeter) got her last point and became Dutch Youth Champion!Congratulations Ilone and Ben (her owners) and Ien (her handler)!

the garden in October

Flower season is over, the Dahlias, Fuchsia and Bougainvillea went to their winter quarter just before the first frost at night.

Remaining flowers on the Hortensia:
The leaves of the blueberry turn red:

Chimays birthday

Today is Chimays birthday and her littermates Cajou, Ginger, Cheina, Chow and Castro are now 4 years too, congratulations everyone!

So here some photos of our birthday girl:

poor Gladdich again...

Gladdich had ACL surgery on his left knee last wednesday.
He was a trooper again, the vet-techs liked him very much and even tried to keep him overnight, but we could not miss him any longer.

Luckely Gladdich is a very happy Chow, yesterday his tail was back on his back and wagging again. Although he hides more often in the garden, but that is probably because of the weather...

the garden in September

Less flowers in the garden this month, the last roses blooming:
and the Dahlias go on as long as the weather is warm enough
Many berries on the firethorn this year

But the eyecatcher this month is the Pampas Grass:

the pups of our D-litter celebrate their first birthday

Today one year ago they were born: Demi, Desna, Bobbie, Dante, Dao and Demi, congratulations to all :-)
This is the first photo of them. I hope they all have a great day today!

Chimay

A nice picture of Chimay snoozing in the garden

a visit to our Chow family on Texel

Today we went to Nel and Henk on Texel.
Noes (Xin-Feng's Anouska), from our first litter, lives there with 5 daughters and a granddaughter. Last July she had her 10th birthday and still looking great:
The owners of Radja (Vita Texla Radja) spended this day on Texel too, and dropped by. Radja is a brother from Callisto and Susie, from Noes' first litter. You wouldn't give him nearly 8 years ;-)
I took pictures of all the Chows for the Vita Texla Chow Chows website (in Dutch).

Here a picture of Nel and Laika together on the couch.
It was a good day, just a bit too much three visits in 10 days time. But I was happy to see Noes and she was very happy to see Fank and me, not only her tail, but her whole body wagged.

the bike

Today arrived Franks new bike:
You can see he is very happy with it!

Gladdichs birthday

Today we celebrated Gladdichs second birthday at Ben and Ilone's place. They breed Shiba Inu's and Chimay's smooth daughter Demi (Xin-Feng's Demeter) lives there.
They have a big fenced pasture next to their house, a private place to walk the dogs, so there Gladdich could run off leash and he LOVED it!
Sadly Gladdich does not like other dogs, so when he was tired we put him back in the car and Ilone got Demi and mother and daughter could be together for a while. Demi looks great!

Then we went to Rotterdam for dinner at a nice place.
We all had a good day with Ilone and Ben, thanks!

See all photos from Gladdich, Chimay and Demi.

A walk on the Knardijk

Once in a while we walk near the lock in the canal on the Knardijk.
View at the canal through the lock
Chimay and Gladdich on the bridge over the canal, next to the lock
a nice picture of Chimay
and one of Gladdich

D-litter at the Young Dogs Day of the Dutch Chow Chow Club

Every year in September the Dutch Chow Chow Club organises the Young Dogs Day. This is not an official show, but all attending young Chow Chows (from 3 to 24 months) are reviewed. For some Chow-owners it is their first step before entering a "real" show.

Four of Chimay's puppies were there and her sister Ginger (Xin-Feng's Charming Ginger). The four "D's" attending were the smooth female Demi (Xin-Feng's Demeter), the rough females Desna (Xin-Feng's Desdemona) and Demi (Xin-Feng's Draupadi) and the smooth male Dao (Xin-Feng's Dao).

Ilone, owner of smooth Demi, took this photo of them all, from left to right: Desna, rough Demi, Ginger, Chimay, smooth Demi and Dao

And here the photos I took today: