The Truth Is Out There!!!

Just like my mate Muppet I've been working on cultivating a reputation for myself. While Muppet is striving to let the world now just how naughty he is, I am going for the other end of the market and encouraging people to believe that I am the best behaved labrador puppy in the world. And so far it's working ;o)

I've learned to retrieve (rubbish), I have not killed (m)any toys, I don't bark (much), I am (mostly) doing as I'm told, I've been letting Mummy take lots of photos of me and I'm being nice to Flora (although we'll not talk about the incident where I decided to see if she'd give me a piggyback the other day and she bit my winky - yowch!).

I have been sharing sleeping space with Flora and she is happy for me to plonk my gigantic bum on her head and everything. I'm a bit bigger than her now so she usually has to curl up quite small so that I can have enough room to spread out...

Sometimes, though, I forget how big I am now and my head falls off of the sofa and my nose gets all squished up to the floor!

Sophie was all poorly yesterday so - being the best behaved labrador puppy in the world - I let her share our sofa.

Now, however, I find that there is a bit of a flaw in my plan >:o( Mummy took a video of me and Flora playing this morning and I'm not convinced that it shows me in my best light. Well. It certainly doesn't show me being the best behaved labrador puppy in the world....

Ah well. I suppose I'd better just admit that I'm not the best behaved labrador puppy in the world: I'm just a labrador puppy and I like being naughty ;o)

Me and my winnnnnnnnnnnky...

Betcha weren't expecting that one were you?? Mwahahaha!! Well that Christmas stuff was lots of fun! I got paper to chew on and toys to kill and lots of food and Nanny and Grumpy slept at our house and we slept at Nanny and Grumpy's house!! It was brill!!!!

On the day before Christmas, Mummy spent a lot of time trying to get me and Flora to be quiet but we were VERY excited and wanted the kids to play with us so we rarrred and bounced and boinged a lot.
....until Mummy got realllllllllllllllllllllly cross and threatened to put us to bed early and we wouldn't see Nanny and Grumpy. Spoilsport. So we decided to be nice. Or as nice as we ever are ;o)

In the morning, the kids made *lots* of noise and everything was veryveryvery exciting and happy and bouncy and we got "presents"!!! I was a very clever boy because Mummy was trying to get me to open my own presents. As if!!! I have a slave that can do that for me.... Flora loves opening presents so I let her take all of the paper off of them and then I stole whatever was inside it. She was so excited at opening presents that she didn't even notice that she never seemed to get anything out. I did have a quick go at opening my present from Auntie Wendy, but it was too much like hard work so I let Flora take over after a bit.

Mummy had entered us into a Secret Santa thing with her friends on The Refuge and I got a present from my friend Louie and his mummy, Amy. They got me lots of things but I loved the little elephant the best and didn't even start taking the stuffing out for DAYS after Christmas.

Flora had a Secret Santa present from a lovely lady called Brenda who sent us lots of treats as well! Stupid Flora was so excited about opening the presents and checking the bag that she got her head stuck!!

We got lots of presents from Mummy and Jacob and Sophie as well and some of them are even still alive! Mummy has said that we are very ungrateful though because we have killed most of them and she might not get us any presents next Christmas. Oops! They were lots of fun while they lasted though ;o)

We got these brill honky toys - a duck and a goose. They made great noises, not like any other toy I've played with, and we thought they were fab! The ducky is still alive and making noises, but the goose doesn't honk any more and is quite a lot thinner than it was in this photo :o(

Granny and Bamp came to visit us and then we went to Nanny and Grumpy's house for lunch. We got turkey and potatoes and lots of yummy things! This Christmas thing is great!! And then we got very excited when Mummy told us that we weren't going home but were sleeping at Nanny's house. So excited that we started wrestling again!

Mummy was so excited that she had to have a sleep. She looked very comfy and was right by the radiator so me and Flora decided to keep her company...

Mummy got a new camera from Father Christmas so we've had it stuck in our faces quite a lot, but she has managed to get some photos that make us look very gorgeous, even if I do say so myself.

When we woke up at Nanny's house the next day, Mummy said that we were going to have some special fun with the car and some turkey and no Flora. We played a very silly game where Mummy got into the back of the car and called me and dangled turkey through the guard thingy and I jumped into the car and ate the turkey and Mummy told me that I was a good boy then told me to get out of the car again. It seemed a very silly game to me but Mummy seemed to be pleased. She was very lucky because normally I can't be bothered to jump into the car and make her lift me in. Then we changed the game a bit and she stood next to me and put her arm in the car whilst holding turkey and told me to "hup". I don't know what she was on about but there was no way I was going to jump into the car to get the little bit of turkey in her hand when there was a big bag full of turkey in her coat pocket right next to me! Eventually, Mummy started using some naughty words and we went back into the warm house. What a silly way to spend a morning!

The next very exciting thing to happen was that we went to see Auntie Fi and Auntie Wendy, Wiggle and Sir Henery came in our car with us!!! It was lovely to see my Barn friends again but there were lots of tiny little dogs there with not much fur on their faces. They looked silly - like little old, wrinkled dogs! Mummy said that they were puppies and had had mange so nobody wanted them and they'd been given to Auntie Fi to look after. She also said that when their fur grows back, they'll look just like me. That's silly. Those dogs are very little and I was never that small!! Just look how much bigger I am than the little dogs...

I barked at them to try to make them play with me, but they didn't take any notice at all. Boring! There was one puppy there who looks he has potential to be lots of fun to live with and Mummy called him Bug (short for something rude,I think!). Auntie Fi phoned today to say that he has gone to a new home with a new family so they'll have lots of exciting times now!

On the way home from Auntie Fi's, us dogs were all snoring in the back of the car when we suddenly stopped. It was very dark and Mummy and Auntie Wendy jumped out of the car and there was smoke coming out of the car and a funny smell. Auntie Wendy got Jacob and Sophie out of the car and stood by the side of the road but we all had to wait in the car and just looked out of the window to see what was happening. A big yellow lorry turned up and made lots of noises and then suddenly we were moving but not moving and Mummy, Auntie Wendy, Jacob and Sophie weren't in the car!! A funny man in a yellow coat looked in the window and we all barked at him to leave the car alone, but he got in and sat down so that was alright and we stopped barking and smiled at him instead :o) The man in the yellow coat got into the lorry and then we were where Auntie Wendy had left her car so she took Wiggle and Henery out and drove to her house in her car, but we carried on doing the strange moving/not moving thing until we could see Nanny! Then we had a ride in Nanny's car - Nanny and Mummy and Jacob and Sophie and Georgie and Flora and me - back to our house. I haven't seen our car since :o(

And then Mummy and Jacob got poorly and that has been soooooooooooooooo boring! I haven't been able to go for walks or anything so I have been keeping myself very busy killing those naughty toys.

Mummy was feeling a little bit better today but a man was coming to mend stuff in the house and we still couldn't go out for a walk until he'd been, but Mummy let me play in the garden with her and a tennis ball for a while and then she got her new camera out again...

Aren't I looking handsome and grown up today? Can you guess what I was looking at in the next photo?

Those pesky cats all jumped up on to the windowsill to tease me!! Mummy wouldn't let me chase them or anything :o(

I have to go now because we're going to the park! Yipppppppeeeeeeeeeee!!!!

It's Chrrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiisssssssstttttmasssssssssss

But I have no idea what that means! 

Strange things have happened to my house:

1. There is a tree growing in the computer room with bright lights on it and things underneath that smell GOOD! I got told off when I tried to have a closer look at the nice smelling things so I have decided not to try that again. I am hearing lots of "good boy"s now  :o)  I love being told that I'm a good boy.

2. There are cards alllllllllll over the place and boy are they yummy! That's my noo trick but nobody seems to be very impressed with it. I've been practising it for ages. It's just not fair. I love cards.

3. There are lots and lots of nice smelling foody things in the house and I am managing to persuade everybody to give me little bits of them now and again. Mummy says that I will need to be going on a D-I-E-T after Christmas because I am a lardy bum, but she isn't worrying about it at the moment because she is sad that Bearthecollie isn't here for Christmas whilst being very happy that I am. I think she loves me a little bit. I love my Mummy almost as much I love the food.

Very exciting news is that Nanny and Grumpy are coming to stay at our house tonight. I love Nanny. And tomorrow night we are all going on holiday to Nanny and Grumpy's house! I love Nanny's house.

I got a present!! Mummy says that it's an early Christmas present and it must be from Santa because there was no label on it. It wasn't even covered in paper or anything! I found it sitting in the middle of the park just waiting for me to find it. It is a football. It is a bit flat but I can carry it easy like that. My very own football! Aren't I a lucky boy?? I love my football.

Ooooh!! I hear crisp packets!! I have to go, but I hope that you all have a very lovely Christmas.

Love from Bran

xxxx

and love from Flora

xxxx

Hide the treat

When my mum went shopping with Sophie and Auntie Wendy last week, she bought a very special present for me and Flora to share. It was supposed to train our brains. So far, I've managed to convince her that I am a Very Clever Puppy so she thought that this toy would be nice for me to play with.

Well I don't like it!

What sort of a stupid game would have your mum showing you a yummy smelly treat and then hiding it from you never to be seen again??! How is that fun??

And Flora just laughs at me because she thinks it's easy-peasy :o( She's even got to play with the Other Side which is even harder and is so hard that Mummy won't even let me try it. Good! I don't want to try it because it's a stupid game!

This is what the stupid game looks like...

Flora gets all excited just when she sees the box! She's just a show off.

On one side the yummy smelly treats get hidden under pegs. Torture, I tell you, torture!

On the other side it has slidey things which have more yummy smelly treats hidden under them.

Mummy took some videos of us on her mobile phone this morning (so the pictures are a bit rubbish!) to show how we play with it. Flora got lots of "good girl"s but I just got lots of laughing and even Flora was laughing at me from the crate!

So that was Flora's "brilliant" attempts. She is quite fast isn't she? For a bulldozer anyway!

Here are my goes - I will go and hide my head under a blanket now. Don't laugh too loud!

Well did YOU see where the stupid yummy delicious treat went after it left Mummy's hand?? I couldn't find it at all! I thought i could still smell it but then I couldn't see it! See? I told you it was a stupid game.

Anyway, I got tired of listening to Flora laughing at me (there are another 4 videos of me trying to find the treat that Mummy has kindly not put up to "save my dignity") so Mummy let her out of the crate and she found the treat straight away! Do you think it might be some sort of magic that they don't tell little boy dogs about? She can remove all 7 pegs - one after the other - AND eat the treats in just 20 seconds!! That is quite impressive isn't it? I couldn't find even one treat in 7 minutes!

Stupid game...

The Shame!!

My mother is horrid :o(

We went to my nanny's house on Friday and there was lots of dressing up going on. Jacob and Sophie and Georgie were putting lots of different clothes on and kept putting strange things on their heads.

So my mum decided that it would be a great idea to put strange things on mine and Flora's heads >:o(

Don't I look like a plank??? I *may* have got Flora to look up the number for the RSPCA - just in case.....

And this all came after she'd been telling me what a veryveryvery good boy I am because I have stopped weeing in the house! This is after I've been good! Just think what she would have done if I'd been naughty. She might have dressed me up like my mate Muppet's mum did to him....!

Can anyone explain what happened??

Hello everybody. This is Bran. Usually, I let my mum do the typing because I am farrrrrrr too busy annoying....I mean....playing with my big sister, but yesterday I had a very very strange day and my mum couldn't tell me exactly what happened so I thought I'd ask you nice people if you knew.

It all started when I went to bed on Monday night. I'd had my tea and everything, but when I went to bed I did not get any chewies. I ALWAYS have chewies when I go to bed. I thought that my silly mum might have forgotten (she had had some of that yummy wine stuff) so I shouted to remind her, but she just told me to be quiet and did not bring me any chewies. I was very sad, but I went to sleep anyway.

When I got up yesterday, everybody was already up! Mummy and Jacob and Sophie were awake as well as me and Flora! I was very happy to see them and did a little dance before going out for a wee. I came in and waited on the mat for my special big cuddle from Mummy - as usual - which is ALWAYS followed by my breakfast. My favourite bit of the morning :oD I got an extra special squeezy big cuddle from Mummy. It was very nice but I nearly couldn't breathe!! So then I ran out to my bowl and sat waiting for breakfast to appear.

But guess what?

It didn't!!!

I shouted at my silly mum again and said "Excuse me, but you appear to have forgotten something" (I am a very polite puppy ;o) ). She just looked at me and shook her head and said "not today, Pickle". I was a bit cross and a bit sad and VERY HUNGRY so I said "I am sitting nicely. I am waiting. WHERE IS MY BREAKFAST???". Mummy laughed at me and told me that I couldn't have any and that we were going in the car soon.

And so then me and Mummy and Sophie got in the car and went on a nice little drive. When we got out of the car it was freeeeeeeeeezing and I shivered. We went for a little walk and I didn't know where we were going so I checked in every garden that we passed, just in case that was where we were going. Mummy kept saying "come on, Beans, you're having breakfast out today at a very special place" so I was very excited and thought we were going to a new house for breakfast!

We stopped outside of a big door and we all shivered, but then a nice man let us in and told us we could sit down in the warm.

It was a Very Strange Place. Mummy and Sophie sat down, but the room was all echoey and there was nobody else in there and it was a bit dark and it smelled funny. It sort of smelled like other dogs and cats and another thing - but I didn't know what - and like clean all at the same time.

After a bit, the nice man who had let us in opened another door and called my name! I was very excited and ran in to see him. He smiled at me and sat on the floor so I gave him great big kisses. He stood up to talk to Mummy and said something about my being there for "cats-at-the-station". Silly man! I wasn't there for cats-at-the-station! I was there for a special breakfast :o) The man took my collar and lead off and put a not comfy (or handsome!) collar and lead on me, then Mummy and Sophie gave me great big kisses and cuddles, and then they walked out of the room!! I was a bit worried but then I remembered that the nice man was going to give me breakfast so I walked nicely with him.

THEY LIED!

THERE WAS NO BREAKFAST!!

AND THEY PUT ME IN A CRATE!!! And the crate didn't have my duvet in it. Nor my Nylabone. And no chewies. What was going on??

After a little bit, a nice lady came to make a fuss of me and I gave her big kisses. She put the not comfy collar and lead on me and took me to see the nice man again. I gave him more kisses! I like giving kisses. Even though the man had told Mummy that I was too big to go on his table before, they lifted me up and put me on this table! People are very strange sometimes. The nice lady tickled my ears while the nice man did something to my leg.

And then I was back in the crate..........!

I cried a bit then because I wanted somebody to tell me what was happening. And I hurted a little bit. And I wanted my mummy to give me a cuddle.

The nice lady came and gave me some water and then took me outside for a wee and told me that I was a very good boy. Tut. Like I didn't know that. My mummy tells me that all the time. Then she took me back to my crate and said that my mummy would be coming to see me soon and that I could go home. That made me happy so I bounced on her and made her laugh and gave her a big kiss.

Another nice lady came in and put my handsome collar and lead on me and took me away from the crate and back into the funny smelling place and Mummy and Sophie were there!! I jumped up at the door and wagged my tail very very very fast and everybody laughed.

So anyway. Then we went home and Flora bounced on me and it hurted a bit and I cried, but I don't know what hurted or why. I just felt a bit wrong. Like something was missing.

I had to stay in my crate allllllll night which was rubbish, because Flora was playing with Jacob and I wanted to play. I moaned and nagged and nagged and moaned for a long long time and eventually Mummy let me out and I was SO EXCITED that I ran as fast as I could around the room and on Flora and on the chair and on Sophie and on the sofa and on Jacob and into the hallway and then Mummy caught me and put me back in the crate and told me that I had to rest! Rubbish, I tell ya. I did get a very yummy tea though and Mummy called me "a brave little soldier".

But I don't understand. Why am I brave? What is missing? I've checked all over me and everything looks normal, but it still feels like something is missing. I have been bouncing and running lots with Flora today and Mummy keeps telling me to "slow down" and "be careful" and "not so rough". And how did I go from the table with the nice man and lady to the crate? Was it magic?

I tried asking Flora but she looks sad and says that she remembers when it happened to the gingers and now she has to check them every time she sees them to see if they've grown back, but she won't tell me what happened to them or what isn't growing back!!

Sometimes, it's really rubbish being a puppy!!

More Lovely Walks

Yesterday we went for another lovely walk at Barton Country Park in Bradford on Avon with Wendy, Wiggle and Sir Henery, Elaine with Amber and Freddie, Amy and Louie, Lynne and Todd.

We had hoped that our friends Ange and Minnie-Moo were going to join us as well, but Minnie's dad had a car accident and although, very happily, he is ok their car really isn't :o( We missed them though :o)

The weather was meant to be very cold and very wet, but luckily the sun shone and we only had a few short showers. The dogs couldn't have cared less about the weather anyway! They smelled the fresh air, saw the water and grass and mud and had a wonderful time!

Before heading off on the rest of the walk, we stopped at the river to let the dogs have a splash. Flora and Wiggle made the most of it, but Bran was rather more sensible and didn't go in too far this time.

And then it was time to head off through the fields. Rather precariously, there were lots and lots of fishermen out and the dogs were very interested in what they were doing - or perhaps it was the contents of their tuck boxes that interested them!

Amber trying to keep up with Bran and Flora

Sophie with her bestest friend - Sir Henery - and Amber

Bran and Flora racing

Bran displaying a view that, unbeknown to him, will be changing forever tomorrow!


Group shot

We then stopped at the pub for the humans to warm up on coffee, hot chocolate, mulled wine, chips, whatever... The pub is a very lovely, dog friendly place called The Cross Guns. Last time we went they told us that the dogs would be very welcome inside the pub by the fire, but, as this time, we chose to sit outside and enjoy the autumn sunshine. We sat right beside the river and it was just beautiful. We couldn't have inflicted so many filthy, dirty dogs on a public house anyway!!

Bran giving his Auntie Wendy a sneaky snog

Bran and Flora looking not very clean at all!

Todd tried to convince his mum to feed him scraps using his telepathic powers


Wiggle and Sir Henery looking very handsome

Freddie and Amber the beautiful, barky bassetts

Louie very sensibly decided to get rid of the bulk of his mud by wiping it on his mum!

The dogs were sooooooo dirty by the time that we got home, that they both had a nice (I'm not sure that they would have chosen that word to describe the torture that they endured!) bath, were put into snuggly jumpers, and curled up in their beds with chews before having a nice long sleep.


After such a long walk where she did so much running around, Flora's hips were very sore this morning and Bran didn't help matters by trying to bounce all over her, so I decided to leave Flora at home in the warm and take Bran to the park by himself to try and tire him out a bit. I also decided to take his puppy dummy with us to do some work on his retrieving. Just recently he has become more and more interested in playing with balls above any other toy - which can only help with the whole retriever thing - and so I took a tennis ball too.

He loves the puppy dummy! I do have a brand new one but Wendy sent us one that used to be Dolly's so it obviously smells much much nicer than the new one ;o)

He was very keen to chase after it and brought it back with no trouble at all and for no reward other than a big fuss from his mum :o)

To try and keep the excitement with chasing after the dummy, I replaced it with the tennis ball after a few very fast and excited retrievals. Again, Bran raced after the ball and brought it straight back to me to hand over.

Whilst off fetching the tennis ball, Bran spotted what looked like a discarded carrier bag from where I was. He kept looking at it suspiciously and then started bouncing at it and barking! Rather than ignore his confusion, I walked over to the "carrier bag" with him to give him a bit of moral support whilst he bravely investigated his find.

"What's this funny thing, Mum?"

"Oooooooooh! It smells like a different ball!!"



"Yay!! I can play "fetch" with this one too. Look! Aren't I a clever boy?"

We then had a bit of a modelling session amongst the autumnal backdrop. Bran was very distracted by the wind blowing the leaves around and there seemed to be an awful lot of interesting smells about today, but I got a couple of lovely pictures.

I love the colours in this photo, even if he is looking the wrong way

And this photo just shows how grown up Bran is becoming. He is beginning to lose his puppy looks and looks almost like a real lab now.

He is still my very handsome, baby boy though xxx