The Rainbow Bridge

Well the day has come as I knew it would. The day that Lacey said it was time to go. She had been a bit unsteady on her feet all week and wasn't quite as eager for her breakfast, then she was sick a couple of times, and finally she had diarrhoea on Wednesday night and on Thursday mornin she looked at me and asked to be allowed to go to the Rainbow Bridge.

Our vet just said,"Well we knew she would tell us when the time was right" and we gently sent her to sleep for the last time. I carried her out to the car with tears rolling down my cheeks, we took her home and let the other dogs see that Lacey was dead. They all went up to her and sniffed her then walked quietly away.

We buried her in the garden alongside all the other rescued Griffon we have said "goodbye" to. Our Grandson picked primroses to strew on the grave and said a little prayer.

We will miss Lacey, she was very gentle and maternal. We rescued her about 10 years ago, when she was six. Her owner/breeder had died and left four black rough Griffons with no one. So we took them in, I wondered whether we would be able to tell one from another so I asked if they could come with labels, saying who was who. Lacey's label said "I am Lacey, I am a sweet little girl but I don't like men." I don't know what she made of my husband because within an hour she was standing on his lap with her paws around his neck, pressing her face against his. We found that this was something she liked to do and we all had lovely Lacey cuddles from then on.

When she was about ten she started to get mammary tumours and had ennumerable operations to get rid of them, but they always came back, until she couldn't have any more operations. Then we had to watch as the tumours grew and spread, became ulcerated and finally took away her life. Dear Lacey, run free at the Rainbow Bridge.

Contest & challenge - Help the animals

Cindy at Contests and Challenges blog read my previous post about the Animal Rescue site needing help, and she has started a contest to band all of us animal loving bloggers together for the sake of the animals. Even if you've had this widget on your site for a long time, you can still enter the contest. All you have to do is leave a comment on Cindy's site. Here are the details of the contest from her site. If you enter the contest, please be sure you leave the comments on her site, as she is running the contest:

"Because I feel that this is an important cause this will be the first contest I sponsor. Since it's my first and because I don't have any experience hosting contests, it's going to be a real easy one.

First, a brief introduction and then we'll get to the contest part.

On a visit to Wild Cats Three this morning, I found the following post:I received word from a friend of mine who is a foster mom for Lil Paws Rescue that the Animal Rescue site is experiencing a low number of clicks, and therefore is not getting enough sponsor money to buy food for the rescued animals.

If you have a website or blog, and would like to help the Animal Rescue Site by displaying their clickable widget on your site, click here. Once on the page, look in the upper left corner for "Link to us." That will take you to the page where you can choose your widget, and get the code to paste into your template.

This is such a worthy cause. It costs you nothing, but can go a long way in helping feed the rescued animals until a permanent home is found for them.

I'd like to see this widget on thousands of blogs and web pages all over the internet so here are the guidelines for this contest.

1.) Get the widget and place it on your blog or web page. (the instructions for doing this are in the italicized portion above)

2.) Leave a comment on this post linking to your post and telling me that you've placed the widget on your page. Please, and this is important: include your e-mail address in your comment so I can reach you if you're the winner.

3.) This one's optional, but it would help spread the word. Write a post like the one I copied (above) from Wild Cats Three and include the appropriate links.

That's it. A winner will be selected randomly thirty one days from today (February 29th)from the list of comments.

The prize is twofold.First the winner will receive this pin.

It's all gold in color (camera made shadows) and that's a real pearl in its' paws.

and second, a donation of $20 worth of pet food will be given to our local chapter of the SPCA in the winners' name.

You may comment once daily throughout the contest for multiple chances at winning."

Looking Forward

We all had a quiet Christmas which was good for Leo's knee. Now the girlies (Buffie and Fifi) are in season. This means I have to have eyes in the back of my head, as not only do I not want them to get together just yet, I also don't want Leo to put his knee under any extra pressure. I've written to the Kennel Club asking for permission to show Leo now that he has had this operation and I expect they will get in touch with Mike Shaw our vet.

We don't have a show until the end of January but I don't expect we will have heard by then so Leo won't be in the ring. In any case he still has a very light-coloured rear leg as the hair is still very short and pale where it was totally shaved for the op.

Maybe, at Fifi's next season in mid summer I will let them mate and we will have our first litter of puppies. I am so excited about this, I just hope it goes well.

My Furry Friend

It's not easy to keep a dog resting (see previous post). It wouldn't be so bad if he was the only dog in the house, but there are eight others, and they all want to sit on my lap too! By the way Leo is behaving at least one of the girls is coming into season as well!

There is also poor Lacey who has terminal cancer and is very near the end of her life, she needs lots of TLC and she wants to sit on the nice soft cushion that I have just put down for Leo. So I have two cushions but then the other dogs are all trying to get on them, it's very like a game of Musical Chairs, only with cushions and nine dogs.

At night I put Leo's cushion on the bed next to my pillow and wrap his lead around my wrist so that I know when he is going walkabout. This morning I was dreaming that someone was trying to pull me over a cliff and I was desparately trying to pull them back, digging my heels into the turf etc. Then I woke to find Leo was nearly hanging himself by trying to jump off the bed!

I have to take him everywhere, to the loo, to fetch my grandson from school, to church, to the hairdressers etc. Last night it was so cold that I left him with my husband and son while I went up to the gate to meet my grandson, who was staying the night, I could hear Leo screaming from the other end of the garden and when I got in these two grown men were trying to stop this tiny dog, who only weighs twelve pounds, from leaping about.

At least I'm busy on the computer printing the church magazine and producing copies of our Pastor's new CD, so I can sit and cuddle Leo. That is until one of the young girl Griffons gives him the eye!

Leo the patient

Leo is laying across my lap with a blanket over him. We picked him up from the vet this morning, yesterday he was admitted for an emergency cruciate ligament repair.

To those who don't know what a cruciate ligament is it's the stringy thing that holds one bone to another under your knee-cap (patella) and allows your knee to bend up and down but not side to side. Leo's had broken and needed a quick repair so that he could be free from pain and able to walk on four legs.

The vet told me after the op that he had inserted a new ligament made of plastic with metal clips to the bones, and had tidied up the cartiledge in his knee. Leo was kept overnight as he needed morphine to cope with the pain.

He is to have absolutely strict rest for 4-6 weeks and then very limited movement for another 4-6 weeks, with physio-therapy to keep his knee from stiffening up.

Whether we will ever be able to show him again remains to be seen. We will have to ask the Kennel Club for permission to show him as you do after such an operation.

But that doesn't matter, I am just glad he's OK now