Happy New Year to you

Gunther and all of us here wish you a very

Happy New Year!

He's in the spirit

Gunther is in the holiday spirit

Picture 1: 4 months
Picture 2: 1 year 4 months

Scooby & Family

Finally we have been able to get around to getting our holiday lights and decorations up. A couple of weeks ago I pretty much shattered my right knee cap. I tore and ripped anything and everything pretty much in the knee area. That was the minor emergency I mentioned in the post about Gunther's annual check up. So I haven't really felt like or been able to get the holiday stuff taken care of the way I wanted to this year. Anyway, today was a perfect day to get the lights out to get my new decoration out. Check out my Scooby that is over 7 foot tall. LOL. The others with the Scooby is Sara, GT and of course the Gun-Man.

Last night I attended the Great Dane Club of the Mid South's Christmas party. I'm not much a party person, but I have to say that last night I really had a good time. We had a board meeting before the party and the whole thing was a lot of fun. Tons of food, lots of laughs and one of the funniest gift exchanges I have ever been a part of.

Gunther is really enjoying the warm weather we are having here in Georgia. I can't work with him like I had been but I still go outside with him and toss the ball around the yard with him. I hope that I can get my knee better in time for some of the Rally competitions in January. I really wanted to start him at the first of the year. It's been a little frustrating that everytime I go to sign him up, something "big" comes up and I can't. Oh well, everything has it's time and it's just not ours yet.

Blessed be.

Annual Check up

Sorry for the delay in posting Gunther's results. I had a minor emergency that has taken up a little bit of my time.

Anyway, let's talk Gunther. He did so good at the vet. When we walked in he did his usual, get up on the bench and sit down. It was no time before all the vet techs were either out there us petting on him, or coming to the door to look at him. They loved him and he loved the attention. Before we knew it, it was time to go into his room. He went right in. This time they used a little bigger room and he was a little more comfortable with it. He got straight up on the scales and did his show stance. Again, all the woman were charmed about how cute he was and how manly he looked standing there. LOL. It was just too funny. So on with the check up. Everything went fine, actually better than fine. The vet was so kind and gentle with him, and could not get over what a beautiful coat Gun-man has. He said Gunther's teeth were perfect, that his heart and lungs were wonderful and that he wished all the dogs that came through there were in as good of health as Gunther. He even complimented me on keeping his ears with the "European Look." That was really cool. So after all that, Gunther's weight (which he said was ok to go up and down the way it does) was 120 lbs, his height at the shoulders is 35 1/2". Gunther got his blood test for his Heartguard and didn't even make a noise or noticed that they took blood, then he got a little shot in his butt, and again showed no sign of getting stuck.

What I really liked about this check up, was that the vet took so much time and checked everything about Gun. He checked his paws, pads, ran his hands over his legs, etc. When he got to one of those spots that Gun likes to have rubbed, he actually stopped and rubbed Gun's ears and right above his tail. He made an effort to be friends with Gunther and that means the world to me.

So like all little kids who do good at the Dr.'s office he got extra goodies and a new toy.

Eukanuba National Dog Show

Did you see that beautiful Great Dane leading the Working Group dogs out onto the show floor during the Eukanuba National Championship Dog Show on Animal Planet over the weekend?

Well, if you didn't you missed a fantastic dog, and handler. Of course everyone around Georgia is proud of the them because they are from here. Shannon Soafer and Lance are quiet a team. You can read her story by clicking here.

Also below is one of the headlines from the Great Dane Club of the Mid South's website.

FLASH! Shannon Soafer #1 Junior & GDCA Best Junior
GDCMS Junior member, Shannon Soafer won Best Junior against a very competitive group of juniors at the Great Dane National specialty. Congratulations Shannon!!!

If you would like to see pictures of Lance, Shannon and her sister Kylie (another up and coming Jr. Handler) Click here.

We're back and I have new pictures

It's been awhile since I posted and I apologize. It's been a wild and wacky time at my house. Hopefully things have settled down until the first of years and I can get back to regular posts and pictures of my sweetie.

We have been in TN. (Sevierville, Gatlinburg) for the past week and so this mornings Gunther was ready to get out in the backyard and play and just go nuts. The pictures below are of a naked Gunther. (no collar). He loves to be naked. LOL. Actually I think it makes his neck look longer and his chest a little bigger.


Gunther, being the keen squirrel hunter he is, seen one of his friends running across the privacy fence. It made for a great picture. This could be one of my favorites of him.

It wasn't until I took the above picture that I noticed that Gunther is starting to look more like an adult Dane and less like the crazy puppy he is. Well, before we know it he will be a "big boy". ;-)

Puppy News: Gunther's breeder has placed all of the puppies. According to his website all of the babies have new homes. I am so excited for those people. I know that if their pups are like Gunther they will have the perfect addition to their families. I believe that Friday the 17th, some of them were going to their new homes (how great is that, they are going to have their first Thanksgiving with their new pups). Hopefully I will be talking to Jay in the next day or so to see how many have gone and if any of them went out of town/state.

Ok, there's laundry to fold and lunch to fix. Gunther and I are busy today so we'll close for now.

Time has flown by

This morning I realized that life had once again taken over and I was too busy for my own good. LOL. Sometimes it just happens before you know it. Well that's where I'm at. We've had birthdays and training and extra work and wow here we are the 2nd day of November. So I'll catch you up with the latest and greatest of Gunther news.

We have been working daily on Rally. I purchased the cones that are used in Rally and set up similar courses to practice on. I've even been working on things that will be expected of him in the next level of Rally. He is just so smart and catches on quickly. He is doing really well and I think once we get into actually competing he will do wonderful. The only thing that may get him, is not being use to being in that atmosphere. Dog shows are a whole world of their own, so I plan on taking him to a few and just walking him through and exposing him to it. Then in January we'll start.

I had planned on starting him in tracking classes, but that has gotten put on hold since I just had $600.00 worth of work done on my car. With the holidays coming up, I'm guessing that will have to be put off till the first of the year too. The good thing about all this is that we have something to look forward to.

It's not often that I post without a picture of my Gun-man, but today I took some pictures and they just turned out terrible. So I promise that I'll get some over the weekend. You might be surprised how much he has grown since the last set of pictures.

Gunther's parents had pups about 4 weeks ago and they are amazing. To see them click here. You can't go wrong getting one of these pups. They are sweethearts.

We got to see the puppies!

OMG, we got to see the pups this afternoon and they are wonderful. This is such a cute litter and I just wanted to take them all home with me. :-) . When we got there Jay was cleaning the box so he had them in their basket. (which would have fit perfect in the back seat of my car. LOL) Oooohhhhhh, they were all snuggled up and just being little sweethearts. If you are interested in these Great Dane pups please contact Jay. These pups are healthy, the parents are right there and I have to say I know a lot of breeders and Jay is a responsible and ethical breeder. You won't go wrong with one of his pups.

Short and sweet

Time is flying by. Part of it is because I have been under the weather. Finally today I'm actually feeling like a person again. I don't want to ever be that ill again. But, while I was out of the loop I found a really cool web site dedicated to Natural Eared Great Dane Champions. Check out the web site.

Hopefully I'm going to get a chance to see Sarge and Jazz's puppies in the next few days. I'll be posting pictures of them as soon as I get them. I can't wait to see them. If you are interested in or would like information about the litter please contact Jay.

On a sad note. Today is the one year anniversary of the passing of Shadow. He was my last German Shepherd. What an awesome dog. He was probably the best Shepherd I'd ever had. He was smart, loving, and if he'd been a human could have probably finished my sentences for me. Here are some pictures of him.

Gunther's New Collar

Check out Gunther's new collar! I met Anita (the designer) at the dog show and she makes these beautiful collars. Here is the link to her collars. Blue Moon Designs. All you have to do is click on the size you want and a page comes up with a variety of fantastic collars. Here is a link to her Great Danes. Anita is a very nice lady and very talented, check out her web sites. I will add these links to the sidebar for your future reference. I know this is the first of many of these collars Gunther is going to get. LOL.

Dane Humor

We had a beautiful weekend here in metro Atlanta. Since it was so nice I wanted to get Gunther outside as much as I could. Well on one of the trips out to play I took my camera and really wanted to get some nice pictures of the Gun-man. So at one point he has stopped running and I told him to stay and if you look at the top picture, that is what he did when I told him to stay. He gave me the raspberries. I laughed till tears ran down my face. He is a nut case and I love him to death. The other pictures turned out pretty well, but my favorite is of course the top one. 

1 year ago today

Today is another special day in the life of Gunther and us. We brought him home a year ago today. The pictures are what he looked like that day. (picture one is Gunther in my arms and his daddy saying Bye, the second is Gunther in my lap in the car. We had stopped at the bank and of course I had to hold him.)You know, I knew he was going to grow and change, but actually seeing it, is amazing. We were in Petsmart this morning and a lady was just so excited to see a big dog and wanted to know all about Gunther, so as we talked I realized that I must really be use to his size because a large size dog looks small to me. LOL.

Our home and our lives totally changed for the better when Gunther was born and then when he came home to live with us. I can't imagine life without him. He's so smart and so loving and he is the greatest company in the world. If a dog could be a comedian, then the Gun Man is it. He's the best and besides he's got the cutest little face in the world.  

Gunther's Look-A-Like

This is Cash. He looks loved doesn't he? Cash's mommy emailed me a few weeks back the nicest email. She mentioned that Cash and Gunther looked a lot alike. Boy was she right. ;-) Other than Cash has a little more white on him, he looks a lot like Gunther. I think this is so cute. I'm so glad that Jessica and Cash visit the blog and I hope to keep in touch with them. Great Dane people are so wonderful. (I tend to think our dogs bring out the best in us)

Have a great evening. 

A year ago

I don't know about you, but there are sometimes when it's good to go back and look at the baby pictures (this works for both children with skin or fur). Today is one of those days. LOL. Gunther and I have been working on two new commands and for some reason, he's forgot just about everything he knows. It's actually been funny. So I told him, "fine, we'll work on this stuff later, clearly this isn't a good time for you." Later this afternoon we'll try it again, only after going through all the stuff he all ready knows.

The picture by the way was taken a year ago this week. So that's my Gun-man as a little guy. He looks like he's pretty confident and in charge.

Mommy's Boy

Gunther is a BIG mommy's boy. Everyone around me knows it, and if you read this blog regularly you know it too. LOL. So here is another story to prove it.

The light in my kitchen had blown so I got the light bulbs a chair and was changing out the first bulb, suddenly I had a little helper. Yup, Gunther at first only had his front feet up in the chair with me, when I asked him what he was doing he climbed the rest of the way in the chair and kind of did a gentle lean. To humanize him even more I guess I could say he was holding me so I wouldn't fall. LOL. I changed out the second bulb and told him we were done, he got down out of the chair and stood there waiting for me to get down. Of course he got extra treats for all that. I had to, he was just too cute to resist. ;-)

It's a sad day.

For the past couple of days one of my best friends has been going through hell. I have felt terrible for her. She has been taking care of 4 Great Danes by herself. Now that would keep anyone on their toes if all 4 were healthy but 1 of them has had a stomach problem so she has come home from work to clean up messes from him, plus being up at night taking care of him, and cooking him chicken and rice so he will eat, so that was a load to face and then on top of that she has 2 Danes that are sisters that have had special health needs. Well yesterday I get a call that one of the sisters is seriously ill. She had taken a fall and that seemed to have triggered a chain of events that lead to her passing this morning.

Gracie was soon to be 6 years old. She had neurological problems all her life. Her picture is below. She is the one in the front.

The only good to this is that Gracie is not ill any more. That she is happy and healthy and waiting to see her "mommy" once again.

Updates and Stuff

First off, I would like to thank everyone who has asked about Gunther's face. He is doing wonderful. In fact I tried to get him to slow down today long enough to get a picture of it and that didn't work. LOL. Hair is growing back and he is good to go.

While at the dog show over the weekend, (congratulations to all my friends from the Great Dane Club of the Mid South, who's dogs did so well, and to Candance getting her collie's RN, great job). I picked up a few things the Gun Man really needed from the vendors there. The picture above is of Gun modeling his latest coat. It's one of those that you can dampen and it will keep him cool. Ok, it's almost Fall in some places but here in GA it's still in the high 80 - 90's. Also Gunther got microchipped. He was a little nervous so the only way we could get him to relax was to let him jump up on me, and have his front legs on my shoulders, with the help of my friend Connie and my son, GT, Gunther relaxed and didn't make a peep when he got the chip. The doctor said that was the first one he had ever done like that. LOL.

You know, dog shows are a whole different world. Gunther not being use to them, just could not understand why people weren't coming over and petting on him and giving him attention. So a few times he went over and stuck his head under peoples hands and got their attention. Unfortunately some of the people he did that to didn't find it as cute as I did. Oops. LOL.

Before I close I have to tell you all about this great email I got today. A lady sent me pictures of her beautiful black dane. I think he is beautiful, and he looks so much like the Gun that they could be twins. I'll ask her permission if I can post a picture of him up on the blog here so you can see. It's really something.

Ok, Gunther and I are out the door for our walk, take care and may your day be filled with lots of love and big juicy kisses. 

Gunther's face injury

As you can see from the picture, Gunther got a pretty good scrape on his face. Bless his heart, he can go from macho to puppy in a heartbeat. We were out in the back yard and he was running full speed having a great time. Then he came around a corner where I was standing and since he was going too fast he didn't make the corner and steam rolled right over me. The bad thing was I was standing next to my garden fence, which is where he scraped his face. He was pretty upset. This is only the second time he has ever been hurt, and he just didn't understand. He also was worried because he knocked me flat. I can't even describe the look in his eyes right after it happened. He was so sad. But the hit happened so fast that before I knew it I was on the ground. Now that part is funny. I got the Gun-man in the house and got his scrape cleaned and medicated and he is doing a lot better. He hasn't been itching it, so that's good and I'm hoping that the hair will grow back nicely.

I took him out to the same area of the yard the next day, and let him run, and he was a little more careful in that area, in fact it took him about 15 minutes to go over to the area. With a memory like that, there's more excuses. LOL.

This coming weekend there is a Dog Show in the area. Gunther will be getting micro chipped on Saturday. Plus he'll get to see some of the show. We'll have a great time.

Gunther's new toy

Today while I was buying Gunther food, I noticed there happened to be a buggy with marked down toys. So being the good doggie mommy I am, I started going through it with a vengence. Finally toward the bottom, there it was, a large toy with noise and many legs. Perfect for a Dane. So I got it for him.

The first picture shows you that he loved it so much he took it outside to potty with him. The next picture shows you what a happy Great Dane looks like coming at you. (by the way, he wasn't even at full speed at that point, those pictures didn't even turn out. LOL) Don't you wish everyone got this happy when you did something special for them? 

Gunther's new crate

Friday we had a new arrival. No not another puppy. Gunther's new crate. It's huge and it's great. He loves it. I have pictures of my kids, my teenage kids sitting in it. Gunther knew it was his immediately and was trying to get in it and sniff around while we were putting it together. Since we were moving things around the room we decided to do some living room rearranging so that's the mess behind his crate. Hopefully we'll get everything the way we (I) want it this afternoon.

I guess I am going to sale his other crate. It's in perfect condition and big enough for a large size dog. What I'd like to do is get Gunther one of the soft side crates for travel. Time to start saving up again. LOL.

Birthday Pictures

Gunther had a wonderful birthday. The morning started out with 2 emails to him wishing him a Happy Birthday, then the day got better. He got a bath, massage, nail trim. Several toys and a whole lot of attention. Everywhere we went when people found out it was his birthday they wanted to tell me their Dane experiences and little kids came up and hugged on him. He was a star! Guther also got to pick out his own birthday toys. (I have a picture of them below) By the end of the day he was ssssooooooooo tired.

Sara got this for Gunther. He loved jumping up there and trying to get it.

This picture is for a friend of mine who hates pictures like these. He knows it coming at every holiday. LOL. I will include here that it took 20 minutes to get this picture because he wanted to eat the pom poms on it. LOL. The hat says "I'm One"

Gun's new toys

Gunther sleeping on his couch.

I'll be posting more pictures later.

It's Gunther's Birthday!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GUNTHER

Today my "little guy" is 1 year old. I can't believe a year has passed. We have a busy day planned. Guther is getting a special bath, massage and his nails done. Then we are going to a few of his favorite places. Starbucks where all the barista's think he the greatest and Petsmart so he can get some new toys. Maybe if I can arrange it Gun can visit with his dad some too.

Of course there will be lots of pictures so I'll get them up as soon as I can!

Patches are on the vest & other news

Finally I had some spare time and was able to get Gunther's patches sewn on his vest. He is so funny when that vest is on him. He went from running through the house with his "froggy" hanging out of his mouth, to the regal dog, with his head held high, trotting outside for his photo shoot. LOL. I love him, so much, he is such a great dog and Danes are a fantastic breed.

In the past I have mentioned a few times that I would like to work with Gunther along the lines of Mobility Service. So if you are wondering why the vest and patches that is why. I received in the mail today the training information and when I get back in town the first part of Aug. Gunther and I will start his training.

Yesterday, I got a wonderful call from Gunther's breeder. Jazz, Gun's mom is in season, and if all goes well, Sarge and her will have another litter of puppies. Now, if you are interested in one of these pups, PLEASE contact me, or Jay, who's information you can find on the sidebar. I am also going to set up a Yahoo Group for Jay, so that all of us who own one of his pups can chat, share stories and of course post pictures. This would be a great place for those of you interested in one of the (cross your fingers) new pups to get information and ask questions. More will be posted soon about the Yahoo group.