What Is Sleep?

We were very sleep deprived yesterday, thanks to not being able to have a wink of sleep due to Queenie behaving oddly all night. In fairness to her, I think something had spooked her and she was unable to settle in the completely dark house. So, like living with a toddler, we had to leave a light on last night for her and it seemed to work. We may need to invest in a doggy night light.

I wonder if being deaf but with a bit of sight, having that little bit of sight works against her at night as I think, because she is aware of it being dark, she gets scared in the complete blackness. She can't find her way around when it is completely dark and gets lost. I think that perhaps if she was 100% blind her instincts would be better tuned for the dark and she would be less scared.

It doesn't help that when she's scared she makes a little puddle and when Ian picked her up and surprised her, she weeed down his leg!

I took Dumpling and Millie's collars of them yesterday as, when they get off things, they are inclined to leap up rather than just drop down. I was worried about them getting their collar caught on something when they did this, so, as we don't really need their collars on them, I took them off to be on the safe side. I then took Pixie's off too. I think she would be better with a harness when she goes for a walk anyway.

Poor Wilbur

By Wilbur's standards, that's a happy face. Oh the joy of having a poodle sat on you.

Crack Open the Cava!

We've had a special bottle of cava in the fridge since earlier this year ready to crack open when we got a jewellery sale. Sadly, it's remained there.

However Ian got a statement from the Extremadura Artisaños people yesterday showing that we have sold a couple of things. They appear to report three monthly - or at least Ian received a three month statement, I guess that could be because we are new. I think that we sold a couple of acorn earrings and a silver necklace in the last month. The total was about 100 euros, but we will only get half of that after tax and the commission is taken off. But at least it's a start, albeit slow.

I intend to sell it elsewhere and still plan to spend my next break from classes getting this sorted. I think I will break for a couple of weeks at the end of June between the end of school and the start of summer classes. I'm starting to take names now for summer classes. I'm not sure how many I'll have this year. Some of my students come from other villages so I am guessing they won't continue in the summer.

It is a nuisance for both of us when I have so many classes as Ian also is pretty tied to the house. It isn't so much of a problem with the older children, however with the young ones I cannot leave them unsupervised. They once let Sam out into the road - by mistake - but when I was talking to a parent and a child didn't shut the door Sam wandered out. I also left a couple of the young ones unsupervised a couple of weeks ago to get them a water, only to return and find that they'd managed to do something to the computer! So poor Ian has to be on standby too. Oh how good it will be not to have to give classes any more...

I noticed when I looked at the video that Ian took of Millie that she quite obviously does limp when she runs, I hadn't thought that she did. However that's not really important as regardless of her running style, she is certainly getting pretty nimble on her paws!

Round and Round She Goes...

...where she stops, nobody knows.

This isn't her most impressive session of running around the table, but it does give an idea. At full tilt, her back legs slide out on the corners and yesterday she also had to contend with a badly positioned log that she was jumping like an entrant at the Horse of the Year Show.

Rain

After a run of hot weather we had rain yesterday. Not a lot, but enough to bring the dust down, and to cool things down a bit.

The back garden is looking good, with the pomegranate flowering, the honeysuckles and jasmine doing well and the climbing rose going crazy. The prickily pear is going to look quite a sight soon as it is big and all the pads seem to have flowers on them. Ian had a bad experience with the tomatoes when a rat got to them in the barn, however only a couple were completely eaten and a couple more are in intensive care. The two new jasmines on the patio are doing well too, helped no doubt by the concrete block security wall that Ian built around both.

We've had Milly for a month and she really is a different little dog now. When she came, I was really very concerned as she could hardly walk and she wouldn't eat. I was concerned that she may have had other injuries which we didn't know about. However after the vet said she'd be a normal little dog, but blind and with a fused back leg, I was reassured. And now to see her bounding round the kitchen table, it is difficult to think of her other than being a proper little dog, full of energy.

She bounds round the table using both her back legs and her bad leg doesn't seem to effect her, we wouldn't know whether it did or didn't, however, as she goes so fast she is just a blur! She bounces into things, but her instincts are very good, and being small, she is not quite so bumper-car-ish as Wilbs.

She gets on her back legs too to try to get out through the windows in the kitchen. She can't do it, though, as she doesn't seem to be able to jump and climbs, and the step is too high for her. I do wonder though if she'll be jumping soon.

One think we have noticed is that sometimes she doesn't seem to be able to get her bearings - similar to Dumping. We wondered if it was where the house is quite echoey.

We're still unable to put Queenie's doggles on her as her head is still not big enough. She doesn't seem to mind the sun, but she appears to take herself into the shade when she can.

The Only Good Rat is a Dead Rat

Yesterday I moved most of the tomatoes out to one of the barns. This morning I discovered that rats or, possibly, mice enjoy tomato plants. They completely beheaded one plant and reduced another to a single leaf. Hopefully the latter will recover, but imagine it's a bit too much to expect anything from the other one. It's all very difficult this gardening malarkey!

A Lack of Respect

Wilbur fears that he isn't afforded the respect that he deserves. He and I both!

Gosh

Can't believe that it's been over two weeks since I last wrote a blog. Good job Ian's been on the case. The weather has turned hot, and the floor is warm when I stand outside at night with Milly who gets taken outside in theory to spend a penny, but in reality to run around (her, not me). She is a changed little dog, and speeds around like a little bee. She doesn't run in a straight line and often stops to turn around a few times, which is why she makes me think of a bee, flitting from flower to flower. She obviously has a bad leg and I don't think anyone would ever think otherwise, however she certainly moves quickly. I don't think she is very strong on her back legs, and I think that this will be a problem for her going up steps. She can get down steps (gravity helps), but she has to clamber up them. And there is certainly no problem with food, I think that her hesitance before to eat was definitely down to nerves and stress at being in a new home.

We're getting a better idea of Queenie's sight issues. Undoubtedly she can see albeit limited, however she does seem to have a bigger problem in the bright light. I was sat inside, in front of the window and she kept running past me unaware that I was there. I think because of the bright light coming in through the window she was blinded. She also has problems at night with the dark, she doesn't recognise me when I come in through the barn into the patio, as I am in the dark.

Unfortunately, because Queenie is putting all her effort into growing her ears and nothing else, her Doggles still don't fit her.

Alfie has been put on a diet. Ian trimmed him and found that it he didn't have quite such a big thick coat as we thought, instead he was developing a big, thick waistline!

I realized that after writing about how our Spanish dogs were less interested in food than our English dogs, I had forgotten that Dumpling has the spirit of Bob with her. While admittedly, we haven't found her yet on top of the fridge or climbing the cat tree, she has his optimism - Bob was always convinced that while he NEVER had breakfast, this was simply a temporary measure, and that one day we would remember that he should have breakfast and give some to him, so he'd always be outside and ready for the breakfast that never came. Dumpling is much the same and wanders round hopefully while the morning eaters get on with their breakfast. And, while Ian has never ever forgotten to feed her in the evening, she feels that throwing herself at the garage gate at tea time is a good way to remind him!

I didn't have classes over Easter week and spent the time preparing some new rubber stamping tutorials for About and making greeting cards to sell on Etsy. About.com are planning some changes to the way the site looks - bringing it up to date - and they are going to be putting more emphasis on photos. Which is good for me, as rubber stamping is a pretty visual topic. So I've been putting some extra effort into making some tutorials which will photograph well so they look nice in the site's redesign. I bought some lollipop sticks so expect a few project featuring these!

I've been making card to print for the Etsy store - https://www.etsy.com/shop/AwayWithThePixels . These are not finished cards - people buy the digital files and then print at home or at a printer. This is something I've been talking about for a while, so I spent a few days at Easter putting these together. Ian did a few too - you will be able to tell Ian's. We thought about offering printed cards as well, however the cost of printing and delivery makes them unviable, but it is something we'll continue to investigate.

I'm also planning selling my jewellery on Etsy. I don't know how things are going with the Artesaños de Extremadura people, but I guess that as I haven't heard anything nothing has sold. They did warn me that things would be quiet until now though (Mother's Day and then First Communion are in May) so we'll see. Ian is currently photographing it all and I plan to spend the next free week I have getting it all written up and on the Etsy site.

While I didn't have regular classes, I did have a lady come to me from Bienvenida who wanted to prepare for an exam. She has just had a baby and is using the time to study English at home. She says she practices talking by talking to the baby in English - I wonder if her baby's first words will be English or Spanish!

Whasssat Then?

Queenie poking her nose at something that's infinitely more smart than her!

More Jasmine

After the combined canine/feline team scored a comprehensive victory in the first leg of the jasmine cup, I like to think that we've come back strongly in the second leg. Only time will tell just how deluded that I am!

Flappy Ears

If Queenie were an elephant, Disney would make a film about her.