You’re probably wondering how the huskies  are doing… even if you’re not, I’m going to tell you anyway

Kimo and Kitara are now 7 months old.  In the last week they have

1.  Destroyed Connor’s new flip flops… into teeny tiny little pieces all over my garden

2.  Chewed all my rose bushes… the old woody ones first.  I have one left that I’m hoping will actually survive long enough to flower.

3.  Tried to dig up a palm tree

4.  Tried to dig up a new Silver Birch tree that I planted on Saturday, and when that didn’t work, gnawed at the bark… in the middle of the damn tree!! Not sure whether it’s going to survive that.

5.  Chewed a few more socks.

6.  Jumped up and scratched my car door… again.

7.  And the piece de resistance… just this moment, they are both outside hiding under the kids slide… eating a bird that one of them caught.

Yes, they’re doing just dandy!!

And I was worried when Kimo didn’t eat food yesterday.. hah… they’ve been feasting on birds!!

Bradley did not have a good weekend.  First we had the dog attack on Friday, then he spent ages on Saturday mulling over attack (based on the number of questions I got asked about it) and then yesterday was the cherry on top.

We took the dogs for a walk in the park.  It’s a dog friendly park where most of the dogs are off-lead.  In general, the dogs are always relatively well behaved but they are all curious and go up to other dogs all the time to play.  My dogs went absolutely wild yesterday and didn’t listen at all… so much so, that one of the other dog walkers kicked Kitara to get her away from her dog.  Hmph! Apparently her dog has social issues… hmph wonder how she feels knowing that she kicked a dog of someone she actually knows and has to face at work today… but anyhoo!

So I was getting the leads back on the dogs after the incident, and I hear Bradley scream. A little overweight sausage dog (whose owner called stupid afterwards) ran up to Bradley who was running after me, and nipped him on the ankle!!

Oy!!

It wasn’t a good dog weekend for us.

Then we get home, and within an hour he has a raging fever!! His fever hit 38.5 very quickly… but thankfully we managed to get it under control.  So it’s back to the doctor today with a very sad boy, who wanted to go to school today to tell his teacher about his dog weekend.

OMW!! Just had the fright of our lives. The kids are completely shaken and so are the dogs.

I took the dogs for a walk around the neighbourhood this evening with the kids. We went for quite a long walk, and as we got to our neighbours house, I noticed that one of their 3 rottweilers were outside the gate.

He was standing right at the gate and looked quite scared. So I held the dogs back, and asked Bradley to walk very slowly and press their gate bell to try and get them to let the dog inside.

When he got back to me, I held the dogs tight on the other side of me and we went very close to the road to get past her.

I should have taken both kids and dogs across the road at that time, but the traffic was quite hectic. I blame myself completely for what happened next.

As we walked past him, he just let rip. He ran at the dogs and got hold of Kitara by the throat and wrestled her to the ground.  She was literally being shaken around like a ragdoll.

The kids started screaming and hugging each other and pulling on my shirt.

I let go of her so I could get the kids. Kimo then jumped on top of the rottweiller and grabbed his neck and Kitara managed to get away and she ran into the road. Thank God there weren’t any cars. I pulled Kimo away, and dragged him and the kids into the road to get her, and we went to the other side of the road.

My neighbour then opened the gate and another one of the rottweilers then came out. Hectic!! But thankfully both of them stayed on the driveway. My kids were now hysterical, and the dogs shaking.

Once the neighbours let the dogs inside, Lance arrived home and I took the kids and dogs home.

Both kids took quite a while to calm down. Connor eventually told me that he thought he was going to get attacked (

Kitara is fine. The dog’s teeth didn’t even pierce her skin amazingly.

Kimo is fine but very shaken. My hero ) I was very proud of him for protecting us.

I really think though, that the dog was scared and was just trying to defend his territory. I should have known better than to try and get the dog inside his property.

I hope that the kids don’t have nightmares tonight

Just have to add that thinking about it now, my neighbours are chicken! The dude across the road actually went into his garden and watched the commotion from behind his fence. And an awesome black dude that was running on the road ran back down the road to try and help me when we got to the other side of the road!! Thanks to that mystery man for asking me whether we were ok!
No thanks go to my neighbours!

I’m going now to crack open a bottle of wine!

I asked Bradley to take a few photos of me… and the dogs decided that it was play time… it’s utter chaos at home!!  I think the photos are pretty awesome actually, considering Bradley is 7 years old.  I’ve done no cropping to these photos, just used a preset to pop the colours.

I can’t believe the difference that only 6 years can make.

I read my mom’s blog post that she wrote yesterday about my grandmother.   I now have tears in my eyes.

It was Granny Sylvia’s birthday yesterday, and she’s living in a home in Somerset West.  When I saw her 18 months ago, she didn’t recognise me at all.  She had no idea who I was.   **I can’t actually believe it was so long ago that I went to CT, jeez! Just realised as I typed that sentence!  I have to do something about that!**

Just as my mom wrote in her blog post, I won’t remember my granny the way she is now.  To me, she’s a free spirited lady who always dressed impeccably and was always ready for action.  I remember her playing tennis and bridge and doing flower arranging and loving life.  I’ll always remember the birthday where she wanted to go white water rafting down the Zambezi, but went on a trip to London on her own instead.

And this photo that I took from my mom’s blog says it all… mucking in with playing with Bradley…

Granny and Bradley in 2004

Belated happy birthday Granny!

Oh and remember I told you about all the hair that Bradley had as a baby… check out the last photo on my mom’s blog post!

I feel so bad, but it’s gonna have to be done

My parents have had dogs most of my life.  I grew up with them in the house, and part of the deal is that in my family, dogs sleep in the kitchen.

However, having 2 puppies in the house is no laughing matter.

I love them to pieces, I do, but my God, that smell that greets me in the morning when I open the kitchen door has to be dealt with!! I cannot handle it! 

Exmi and a few other guys on Twitter have told me to crate the dogs at night.  Apparently if you put them in a box that they can’t climb out of, they’ll be forced to call if they need to wee.  The theory is that they won’t mess their den.  The problem with this is the following:

1.  Finding a box that’s big enough for these dogs.

2.  Our bedroom is upstairs, and it’s not going to be practical to run downstairs every time they cry… and it’ll take too long to take them downstairs and out the door if the box is upstairs with us.

So, tomorrow Lance will be going to find a kennel to put in the garden.  They should be fine, they’re huskies for crying out aloud… right?! Their genes are supposed to be used to the cold… right?!

I’m already dreading the half hour tomorrow morning that I’m going to be spending cleaning the mess and trying desperately to get rid of the smell

Then why do I feel so guilty?!

I got an email on Monday with the most cute photos of 2 Siberian Husky puppies that a colleague’s neighbour is sellling.  After chatting to Lance about it, we decided to take the boys (who were so extremely excited) to choose a puppy tonight.

However, this is proving to be a problem.  We can’t choose which one to buy, in fact we might end up getting both.

There are 2 available, neither of which have been named yet… which is a little odd in itself… how can you live with puppies for 8 weeks in your house without naming them?!

So, now the big thing is… choose a name… and a puppy… and collect it tomorrow.  But we can’t decide on a puppy or the names… so please help…

First up is the little girl…  she’s kinda quiet and gentle and she’s smaller than the male.

So far our names we’re thinking about for her are :

Kitara (from Avatar on TV)

Saskia, Anouk or Anushka (suggested by Camilla)

Next is the little boy… he’s gorgeous with pale pale fur and a stripe of pale grey/beige going down his spine.  He’s very playful.

So far we have the following names:

Hulk - as suggested by Connor ‘cos he wants a superhero name

Kent, Alaska, Kimo (suggested by Camilla)

Seriously, please help… we’re kinda useless with names!!

I’m not in a good space today.

Bradley’s been acting up a bit at home and school recently, he’s not concentrating and the teacher says he’s being disruptive in class.  Yes, the same child that’s normally a star and got merits etc etc.  Oh and he was bullied by a girl the other day in class, she called him names, so he hit her on the shoulder so he got into trouble for that too!

Anyhoo, Lance asked Bradley last night whether something was bothering him.  It took him a while, but eventually he spoke to Lance before he went to sleep, and said that he misses playing with us.

We don’t play with him anymore.

I suppose he’s right.  I’m forever working.  I’m either at work, or editing or at photoshoots.  Lance is always pottering around on his laptop.We’re not really spending time just playing with them.  Lance plays cricket with them in the afternoons, but that’s instructions again, and organised play, it’s not play!

It’s not fair.

Something is going to have to change.

And this blog is getting boring, and seems to me like I’m always moaning lately

I did actually go to work today, and while I was there I was quite productive… but I also did the following:

1.  Delivered photos… well, not personally… Lance printed photos for me and delivered them to a client (it’s handy to have him at home at times like this)

2.  Donated blood.  I haven’t donated since the HIV incident, and now that I’ve been the clear for so long, it’s safe to donate again  The blood service actually comes to our offices every 6 weeks and sets up stations for donations.  In fact, to remind their regular donors, we also get reminder emails and phone calls from the SANBS a few days before. It’s very handy, because I used to always forget.

3.  Trekked to the other side of the world to visit Nicole (my SIL) in hospital.  The trip home took forever in peak hour traffic, but I’m very glad I saw her with my mom, and she had some company for the hour that we were there.  My mom and brother have blogged about her hospital stay.  She’s been in hospital since last Thursday.  At first they suspected swine flu, but she didn’t respond to treatment and the blood results came back negative.  Thankfully, she’s doing slightly better now, even though they have no idea what’s wrong yet.  She’s not in high care anymore, and she’s now in the cardiac unit undergoing test after test.  Even the hour we spent there today, tired her out a lot, and she needed to go back on her oxygen canula when we left.  I really hope they get to the bottom of the problem soon, so she can go home.

4.  Saw Bradley ride his bike without training wheels for the first time with help!  That’s HUGE!  I’m so glad I was home to see it.  He’s hates not being able to do something, and it was frustrating him, but today he got it right.  OK, he’s not flying around on his bike yet, but at least he can go a bit without help. I reckon he’ll have it sorted by the end of the week, and then we can take him riding on the road again.

5.  Took the boys to get pizza.  It may seem tiny to you, but I’ve been getting home so late in the last few months that I’ve just got supper on the way home.  The boys love going to get pizza, and watching the guys make it etc, and it was nice to spend some time with them too.  One day I’ll get a job where I can leave the office before 5pm again, these late evenings kill me.

So, all in all, it was a good day

Lance had supper ready by the time I got home tonight.  And he’d been to the shops!! And the homework was done! Wow!

I told him this evening, that I could get used to this house-husband thing.  If I made enough money for him to stay at home, I’d be fine with going to work and doing my photography on weekends.

He was horrified!! LOL! Which is hilarious considering that’s what he’s been joking about doing since we got married!

I think the last few weeks at home have cured him of that illusion.  He now reckons he’d sweep streets rather than stay at home all day