Six

Babe’s 6^th birthday was this weekend and celebrate we did. I asked her, “What do you want to do for your birthday?”. She responded with “WooWoo Hoo wooodie”. Which I interpreted as “Let’s go car camping”. I think I got the translation right!

Babe continues shedding her shyness. We walk in a room she’s in and her tail starts pumping, if we give a “Good Girl” for that she’ll talk to us and if we approach her she’ll roll onto her back for belly rubs.

Recently she has become a big snuggler. At night, in the tent, she sneaks in between Nicki and I. In the house, she snuggles while I lay on the floor, or sidles up for pets while we are in the easy chair reading. She loves to lay her head on us, and if we don’t pet her slaps us till we do. When she’s done with the pets, she’ll finish with her back pushed up against us.

Were amazed at how far shes grown, we never thought we'd get much physical attention out of Babe at all. Its shown us the power of a malamute.

Happy Anniversary

We can’t believe it, how times flies. Two years ago Valley showed up from North Carolina at our home, saved by the North Carolina Malamute Rescue. Everybody knows Valley was shy when she arrived in our home. Her original assessment out of rescue scored her a 9.5 on a scale of 10. But that was then and this is now.

While today you’ll still see that shyness promptly, you’ll also find her living the good life like a malamute should. She can be found in the living room with Babe and Ganik, at the table begging during meals, bugging whomever is reading in the recliner for pets and attention even to the point of slapping them with her paw, and out on our walks sauntering up to strangers asking for attention. She even rolls over on her back for pets in the morning and sleeps next to me when I lay reading on the carpet in the living room.

That’s all great but what sends my heart soaring like a hawk is her bouncing up and down when I get home from work, greeting me at the gate with a tail wagging, a single gentle Woo (not a WooWoo) and a little lick on the face to show me her love. We’re happy to see her tail wave when we say “Good Girl” or have her plant herself against our leg with tail wagging.

She’s still a 9 and a half out of ten, but not on the shyness scale, instead now it’s the sweetness scale. A girl so sweet she’s been easy to live with. We’re happy to keep taking the little steps because we know how much they mean and how big they really are. I know we'll continue to grow our acceptance and trust because we mean so much to each other. Thanks Valley, thanks for a great two years, thanks for sharing yourself and trusting us, its only going to get better.

Season Opener Hiking

We still have plenty of snow to ski on but it doesn't support the dogs all the time. So rather than injure them we decided to get some exercise on our trails.

Of course they'd rather be skiing but what the heck, running around on logs or hanging out by the creek taking a break is alot of fun too.

Start of Our Corn Harvest

First day of corn season. Corn on the South Side, hard pack, maybe breakable crust on the West and Powder on the North. Definitely great skiing still out there.

On this particular day, Ganik found a marmot hole out of the snow. He guarded it like a Polar Bear would a seal hole in the ice up in the Beaufort Sea. Luckily we came down the way we skinned or he'd still be their waiting for his prize.