After terribly cold weather in April, probably the coldest all winter, May has been perfect growing weather, milder, enough rain to save me watering and the vege plants are at last growing.Everything is out of the green house now apart from tomatoes ,peppers and chillies and we are eating radish ,lettuce and rhubarb. Broad beans will be the first to crop I think and the peas and mange tout will be soon after.I love it ! 

Chris has been really busy building a toilet in the garden . We only have an upstairs loo so as the agility and behavioural training has meant more folk up here at Catherton so we were getting a little fed up with people wondering through the house to the loo. So the dog runs have gone and combined with an old stone shed a new toilet is now in situ. Well almost , just the window to finish and decorating. The room is also going to have a doggy shower in it and useful storage cupboards.The one slightly sad consequence was an old Ash tree had grown rather huge close to our house and when the footings were dug for the loo it was obvious how the roots were going under the house, therefore it had to come down. The upside is we have a huge amount or logs to burn.The photo is of half the quantity of timber . We are also using some as a table , Chris is using it to rub down the window . 

 The horses are looking really well and Chris has managed a dressage competition on Pepper, Johnson and I have had some lovely hacks ,but I think he may have a touch of rheumatism, he has shown slight lameness intermittently ,the vet is coming to see him and we can decide the best management plan for him . He loves his rides and I adore him so if we can keep him going without pain for a few years that would be brilliant . If anyone has any experience of keeping our older equines, especially supplements and anti inflammatory medication, do get in touch.

 Kite has been for her hip and elbow x-rays we went to Malpas with Karen and Hugo , so we are both awaiting results, can’t  wait to find out the scores ,Kite will hopefully be mated next year and I am hoping to be able, for the first time, to use a dog that I have bred. Very excited !!! 

It has been a long time coming but after a long gap we have a litter of GSD  puppies. Ruby adored both Cassie and Jas’ litter so I was confident she would be a good mum. Friday night she gave birth to 3 pups 2 girls and a boy . We had her scanned at 28 days and could only see 1 puppy ,we followed that up with another 1 week later and saw at least 2. I was concerned because numerically small litters tend to be big pups ,this can obviously make things difficult for mum and I was worried she may have to have a ceserean . I need not have worried the pups were bonnie all of them 700gms or there abouts, the biggest pups born I have experienced , but Ruby had no difficulties. 

I can’t wait until they are a few weeks old they will be real fluff balls as both Ruby and the father Edmond are long coats. He has the same colouring as Ruby so I am hopeful for the same rich red colour.

My next show will be Blackpool so look forward to seeing folk then .