CHT and other political BS

Well the CHT first race was GREAT! even though some individuals were offended by someone donating firewood. WOW I mean really grow the hell UP! let the past be the past and move on.

To quote some famous book "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone"

Everyone who raced this past weekend really looked like they were having a blast. I stood at the worst turn on the course and the only negative thing I heard was the ocasional "oH crap...this looks bad". I did not participate much in the CHT last season because I let egos and competitive crap get the best of me. I am not a competetive person because I believe competitivness brings out the worst in people. This season I plan on just ignoring any negativity a have a good time at the CHT races.

below are some photos from the now infamous drop kick corner...ENJOY!


Kyla charging uphill

Jon "cheating" ....he won didn't he? therefore he must have cheated. I think we need to measure his skijor line it looks longer than the allowable limit. Disqualify him...no better yet BAN him! (just kidding) but really where the hells are the dogs?

Darrel wonders if the drop kick corner is going to claim its first victim.

Aklakeno

Well enough posts and pics of those time sucking little back biters.....Here are a few photos of Aklak (my first dog) and Keno (the dog that has taught so much about relating with dogs). These two amazing dogs are the reason we called our kennel Akeno.

Crazy dogs

Happy dogs

Aklak tries to catch Keno but really she is just toying with him.....

This one is for LAURA

Well the next few pics are for a good friend of ours....Laura Lucas you will fine NO pics of Jon, no pics of Jons' dogs, no photos of him with his crazy hats, no look at me....and definately no pick me pick me.

This post is just for Laura.

The royal wave

the team on the way out for a run

On the way home

Quad run at Drag n' Fly

Cash and Lucky

Rico and Sadie

Our Puppies are now running short FUN 3km runs with Peat and Dust showing them how it is done. Dust, Peat, Rico, Sadie and in Wheel is Lucy and Cash (who is living up to his name of NO Cash for bitting people when being hooked up)

Peat and Dust

Thanks to Jim and Lee for leasing us these excellent dogs for the upcoming season. Dust and Peat will be joining the Akeno Clan this weekend and this will allow us to run out of our yard.

The Puppy Palace!

Ok, it's been too long since our last posting. Life hasn't slowed down yet, so I'm going to suck it up and start making time to blog again.

The Puppy Palace - Ahhh, a beautiful place of gathering. A place to sleep, a place to play, a place to cuddle, or a place to just be with the little dudes. It took a while to build, but it was worth the effort. We had plenty of leftover styrofoam insulation from the shop construction (or shop destruction, whichever), so we have a warm place for all to be in the winter. The palace floor is 8'x8' and the ceiling is about 5'5" to about 5' (it has a gentle slope to shed the snow and rain). It's easy to stand up in. It has both a dog door and a man door. The puppies took to it right away. And, they also started to eat it right away. Got to love wood construction and dogs. As you'll see in the photos, we found a way to prevent this.

The palace started off as just a shelter from the sun and rain. Since we already had 4 posts cemented into the ground and a roof overhead, we decided that this would be the location of the palace.

We had some help from our friend Stacey - Thanks again for your help!

We ran a wire for a light and the camera into the palace. The extension cord wired to the light constantly broke the breaker, so we had James (the electrician) wire in the light with proper heavy duty wiring - no more blown breakers! Thanks James :)

Did I mention the palace was insulated?

The little dudes helped us throughout the construction - they were great little helpers! (and they didn't get in the way very often!)

The last wall to finish!

The inside light.

As with all good wood construction in the dog yard, it is vulnerable to chewing.

We found a solution to the chewing - thin metal around the most vulnerable chewing areas.

The final doors.

The puppies took to the palace right away.

They all take turns lying at the door to monitor what's going on in the yard.

Happy pooches - need I say more?

There's plenty of room for all of us.

We wouldn't be out sitting in the snow at -30 doing this.

Tired Lucky.

Dopey Cash.

Good thing we have the Palace - it's getting cold out here!

The 6-Pack Update

Well, once again it's been a while since we've posted anything to the blog, so here are some of the most recent photos of the 6-pack. I can now officially call them a 6-pack because since we joined the 2 dog runs together, they play and interact like they haven't been able to before. They all run and play together now (even Aklak). It's great to see them all get along. I can only hope it stays like this.

So, below are a few new pics. I put a bunch together so I could post a lot of them. Just a test to see how it works.

I also captured some video of the 6-pack interacting and Cash talking....

Puppy Dogs

It's been a while since our last post. Time sure does fly in the summer - so much to do, so little time. But, at least I found some time to update the blog with some new puppy/dog photos. The little weeds have grown up so fast. Sure they're still puppies (about 4 1/2 months old), but they are becoming dogs in a big hurry. We have them tied out to eat from their own bowls now - no more running between bowls to chow down. This way we get to see who's eating what, and not to mention it gets them used to being tied up.

It took a lot longer than we thought to get the puppies into their new pen, but they've been in there about 3 weeks now and are loving it! Way more space for all. The only thing that they were lacking was shade, so we solved that problem (see photo below).

Sweet shade (above)

We had a heck of a time getting the gate square enough to swing properly, but we finally did it. Thanks to the advice of my mom, we put a turnbuckle (not sure if that's the proper term) in the center attached to 2 cables. We were able to adjust the buckle to 'lift' the gate so it was square. Sweet!

Chow Time (note puppies tied to the posts, eating from their own bowls)

Rico - not ready for the picture (note floppy ear)

Rico - posing for the camera - note radar ears! (or bat dog - either one works)

Sadie (she has similar ears to Keno, nice big floppy ears)

Cash and Lucky

Cash, Lucky and Sadie

It's been a while since they've seen the camera, so it was a bit difficult taking pictures of them this time. They were all quite curious and didn't want to get to far away (hence the closeups).

It's cool to see how their personalities have developed over the past few months. Cash is confident, curious and fearless. He was the first one to be tied up without any hesitation, and the first to be brought into the house on the lead without any struggle/hesitation. Lucky on the other hand is the opposite of Cash - she was the last one to be comfortable tied up for eating and she was shaking when I brought her into the house on a lead. She's a very sensitive girl. She's doing well, it just took a bit longer for her to adjust to new things. Rico is confident, but not as confident as Cash. He's quite the 'lover' when it comes to getting cuddled (they all are, but he has the most kisses to give). I see him protecting the pen when he hears the wolves or other dogs howl - he sticks out his chest and gives a 'burf', and runs to the edge of the pen and gives another 'burf' - not really a bark, but a 'burf'. Sadie is still the smallest - sometimes the sweetest, and other times the troublemaker. Depends on the moment with her. She's small and adorable. They all love playing fetch with the tennis balls, chewing bones and love it when Keno comes in the pen for a visit.

An Outsiders guide to Yukon construction

That is the "theme" for our entire house renovation project.
As some of you know we have been renovating our home with the help of our good friend Harley Henton (from Dauphin, Manitoba... the "outsider")

We managed to get Harley up here... bribed with beer, two boxes of Icy Waters charr fillets (Thanks Jon and Steve) and Gibsons whiskey for an some simple window exchanges. To his surprise we ended up doing the following:

1. changed 9 of our homes windows none of which were square to begin with...but thanks to Harley they are now!
2. put down road crush for our driveway
3. poured and new concrete pad for our front entry...bye bye old pad with coat hanger imprints and brass dog snaps embedded into it.
4. put up our new 65' x 65' fenced run for our new dogs
5. demolished our chicken pen
6. demolished our eye-sore of an outhouse (so we can build a new one)
8. reinsulated the East wall in our shop
9. installed three ceiling fans
10. installed 5 fluorescent lights in the shop along with 5 extra outlets
11. The he opened the can of worms!!!!!


Our shop attic will forever be know as the can of worms....
As shown in the photos to follow our shop roof was being supported by thin 1 1/2" spruce twigs!! and the rafters/ceiling joists did not go end to end some had been broken other stopped half way and some where just NOT there?!
I am sure if Harley could have gone back an NOT looked in the attic he would have... but to the mans credit he push on.
Thanks to Harley we now have a shop that not only will not freeze but is more like part of the house.