Pet Expo & Play Time Pics

We had great fun representing the Central Iowa Kennel Club at the Great Iowa Pet Expo!

responsible breeder great dane

well bred great danesThe Des Moines Register took some photographs and of the 13 they published, 2 of them were of Heidi and Gigi!

Screen grab of the Des Moines Register image. Heidi on her back, soaking up the attention!
Screen grab of Des Moines Register image. Gigi getting a pat on the head.

Some recent pictures of play time at our place..

The teeth! This pic cracks me up! All three dogs (Gigi is behind Heidi, who is in the middle). Kizzy’s lips flapping in the wind.
Love Gigi’s play bow. Sometimes they look and sound so ferocious while playing.
Kizzy has always played by going after the back legs of the other dog. And she passed this “trick” onto her offspring as well.
Hot pursuit!

Simple Way to Support Great Danes

The Great Dane Club of America Charitable Trust supports Great Dane welfare and rescue efforts, educational programs, Scholarship Programs for junior handlers, initiatives to create great awareness of breed-specific health problems and medical research efforts to improve the quality of life of the Great Dane.

An easy way to support the Charitable Trust is when shopping on Amazon, simply access the normal Amazon website via this link: http://smile.amazon.com/ch/36-4436942.  The Smile program contributes 0.5% of sales through that link to the registered charitable organization.  It’s as easy as that!  Once you log on through that link, you can shop like normal, knowing that you are making a contribution for our breed at the same time!

Fun at the Great Iowa Pet Expo

Gigi and I volunteered at the Central Iowa Kennel Club’s booth at the Great Iowa Pet Expo this past weekend.  The kennel club was there with a mission for education about responsible dog ownership and responsible breeding.  Lots of fun!  Gigi loved all the new doggy friends she made.

Great Dane responsible breeder
Central Iowa Kennel Club booth and volunteers

 

Gigi, adoring Tiana. The well groomed Standard Poodle is “Piper”. She was there for Tiana to show off her awesome grooming skills.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Puppy Play

Down to three puppies…it seems so quiet!  The only time it would ever seem easy to have three puppies is when you’re down from nine!

Dickens does not get picked up for a little bit yet, but he is having a camp over with a friend, for extra socialization.  Here at home we have Gigi, Charlie and Heidi.  Charlie and Heidi are still looking for their perfect homes. Such sweet babies! They already know “kennel up” and are doing amazing with potty training. We’ve been taking trips to the park and around town, to get some car ride time, check out new places and meet new people.

Charlie is usually the first puppy to crash. He will climb into their shared crate and start napping. Gigi follows him in, although Heidi would much prefer a lap for snuggling.

Great Dane playing with her babies
Whoa, Mom!
Watching Mom zoom by us
Great Dane puppies running
Charlie (with the smooshed up face) and Heidi
Great Dane puppies and cat
Heidi and Charlie checking out our kitty, Oliver
Great Dane puppy and cat
Oliver does not seem impressed with this invitation to play..

Puppy Toenails

Keeping your dog’s nails neatly trimmed not only looks nice, it also is less stress on the dog’s foot.  No long nails to splay the feet out.  No long nails to jab into your foot either!

We start when they are just babies, getting them used to getting the nails trimmed and also keeping the quick nice and short.

Having nine puppies means LOTS of nails to trim.  I use a Dremel to grind the nails, which keeps them nice and smooth.  For more detail, check out this old post.

grinding dog nails

Kizzy is in a commercial!

Kizzy is a star! We filmed a commercial for Mediacom yesterday. Quite the fun experience. It was filmed in front of a giant green screen and Kizzy’s “acting” consisted of a sit-stay, with the actress holding her leash, and then a recall. She comes running, with the actress attached and flying along with her. (I don’t think the actress feigned the struggle to hold her on that first take!)

She was a hit with the production crew. She was such a good girl – so many people, cameras, lights, equipment and craziness and she took it all in stride.

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, so my only snaps were on my phone. 🙁 Here she is in front of the production studio’s sign:

Mantle Great Dane commercial
and waiting as patiently as possibly until the crew is ready for her part:
Mantle Great Dane commercial
Sounds like it will be several weeks before the commercial will be on TV.  I am supposed to get a digital copy and will post when I receive it.

Sad News

With tears in my eyes, I’m sharing that today we lost our Skyy – Ch Payaso Flighty Star Alliance RN CGC CHIC – to pyometra.  We had discovered a large hemangiosarcoma on her spleen in April, so I’m thankful for the great last six months we’ve had with her.  She was such a sweet, happy girl.  She was loved.  RIP, Sweetheart.  1/6/04-10/4/11

Harlequin Great Dane

A very happy ending!!

Guinness, the missing Corgi, has been caught and reunited with his owners!!!

We hadn’t had any Guinness sightings since we first saw him last Friday night.  Then, yesterday my mother-in-law was at our place and spotted him in our backyard.  We moved the live trap to the backyard and baited it with tripe (mmm) last night and were rewarded with a little Corgi guy in it this morning!  I was so excited at 6AM upon spotting him in the trap.

We carried him inside the live trap into the basement before attempting to get him out.  Weren’t taking any chances.  He was actually a pretty calm little guy.  In surprisingly good health after being on his own for almost two weeks.  He went happily into a Dane crate and scarfed up a bowl of his food.  Gave him a can of tripe a couple hours later, which he quickly gobbled up.  Then he seemed pretty content to curl up with his owner’s shirt and wait in the crate.

Called his owners at 6:30 and they were on the road by 7ish, here by a little after noon.  Not a lot of dry eyes during the reunion.  🙂

Some images from this morning:

Missing Corgi
Hanging out with the boys, awaiting owners
owners reuniting
Reuniting!
very happy owner
A very happy owner!
Guinness the missing Corgi
Us with Guinness and owner
Guinness going home
Going home!

A few additional images