Anniegirl

One of our friends has put a video on You Tube of our last race in the first final, with my Mellie bringing it home by inches. We are the team in blue (I am the box loader!)

Sirius with out silverware (well plasticware if I am totally honest )

We have just got back from competing in the European Flyball Championships in Belgium, it was a brilliant weekend with great support from all the British teams who entered. British teams won division 11 and 6, came second in divisions 2, 3 (our team!) and 5, and third in division one! We had two teams entered and the format is different from how we race in the UK. There was speed trial in the morning, with each team trying to get the fastest time for their placing in the double eliminator in the afternoon. This is a knockout competition, but you have to loose twice to be out of the competition. One of our teams, Alpha Ville, raced on Saturday in division 7, but we got knocked out of the double eliminator after three races. All the dogs raced well in high tempertures (and a bit of rain), including my Annie, who adores flyball but can sometimes get a bit too excited and go and see the dogs in the other lane. I am so proud of her as she helped us to win the one race we did win in the afternoon Annie Pumpkin - also competing in Alpha Ville Our other team, Alphas Abroad, gave us the most exciting flyball racing we have ever had. We won the speed trials in the morning (with a time of 17.68 seconds), and got through to the semi finals in the double eliminator. We were 2 nil down, came back to 2 all, but were beaten by a couple of hundreths of a second in the last leg. Therefore the winners, a Belgian team called K-otic Flyers Magic were through to the final, but as you have to loose twice to be out we had another chance against the other team that had also only lost once. We beat them which put us back in the final against K-otic. Again we went two nil down, the dogs were tiring and one of our youngsters got a bit spooked by the huge crowd watching us and ran out. We took him out and managed to bring it back and win 2-3. Unfortunately this ment that K-otic had only lost once, so we had to race them again after a short break. Again we had a some dog errors so lost 3 nil, but it was an amazingly fantastic final with great atmosphere both in and out of the arena. All the dogs were brilliant, and ran their hearts out in a difficult environment, it was quite hot and there were large crowds. I was especially proud of my Mellie, it was her first open competition and she didn't put a paw wrong I am already looking forward to next year when hopefully we will be off to Germany

We are going through huge redundancies in our public sector organisation at the moment, over 200 people will loose their jobs. If I am totally honest, they are not key services and an easy 'kill' for the government (and happened within two weeks of them getting in), but they are still hard working people with families etc who will be out of work . At the moment my side of the organisation is not being hit, but I am certain it will not be long, in fact I wouldn't be surprised if the whole organisation goes!

Sirius has been to stay and has been a great help to me when I was making the vodka babies, and he thought the complicated recipe should be shared First get three bags of jelly babies Put the jelly babies in a tub (try not to eat too many of them ) Get the vodka (Sirius thinks it is very important that you do try the vodka, just to make sure it hasn't gone off!) Drown the babies in vodka, making sure they are well covered Guard the babies with your life Practice post eating pose Sirius strongly advises NOT to take the vodka babies out of the cool box to put meat in it and leave the babies in a tent in over 30 degrees heat, the babies will die!! Sirius hopes you have found this post useful

He hasn't arrived do you think he has decided that he doesn't fancy vodka babies and flyball and gone somewhere more exciting

Address sent Sirius, and vodka babies ready for you

Just remembered I need to arrange for Sirius to come with us to the European Flyball Champs, I will sort out payment this week.

It was a pleasure to meet your gorgeous family, John is busy upstairs sorting out all the pictures

So very sorry

She raced again this weekend and did almost all the legs and was almost perfect - and blummin fast with it

Unfortunately poor little Elfin has already been renamed Effin but several friends after a friend on Facebook also misread her name

I was planning on being there and running, but a series of bad colds stopped my training (that's my excuse and I am sticking to it )

Elfie has been with us just over a month and has settled in brilliantly and is loving life At the weekend she had her first starters flyball tournament, she has had only two training sessions so I was only planning on doing some warm ups with her and get her used to the atmosphere. But, she did some complete run . She was slightly distracted by the dogs in the other lane, and also by my OH was running our collie, Mellie, in the same team. I am so proud of her and of Mellie, who ran like a pro, and it was only her second competition. Waiting to start racing And we're off And a couple of Mellie, so she doesn't feel left out Unfortunately, Elfie was sitting on my knee watching the flyball on Sunday and spun round in her excitement and gave me a very fetching black eye

Great article, and I spotted some t-shirts

She's coming home on Sunday

Definitely fruit bat in there somewhere , he is gorgeous, I have always wanted a whippet collie cross, so so excited about getting Spring. We do need a new name for her though

I am pleased to say the meeting went better than I could hope for and this gorgeous girl will be joining us after she has got over her spay

The best thing about Spring, is that she has the whuppety look which I love, but apparently her character is more collie, which suits us as was are experienced collie owners

After loosing Bertie last November, we decided to wait until we had been skiing before we considered another dog. We got back at the weekend, and my OH spent Monday and Tuesday sending me links to different dogs. As this new addition to our family was supposed to be my choice (he is responsible for the last two) I thought I had better start looking and came acros Spring She looks absolutely gorgeous and sounds like an ideal girl to join our flyballing household, so fingers crossed that tomorrows meeting goes well and all the dogs like each other. She is being spayed on Tuesday, and our youngest is also being spayed next week, so it will be a while before we could bring her home, but I am so excited about it all

NASA Satalite Image I love this image of the UK, just need so local chair lifts and I would be happy. Shame there is nowhere suitable to ski down for the Heights of Abraham in Matlock Bath, they could use their cable cars to get up that would be perfect

Stop dithering and do it, I could do with some moral support Went to the gym for the first time since 10 Feb last year (whoops ) but did a couple of miles on the treadmill at a fast walk and incline, and think I can get there if I stay motivated.

Fantastic news If you need someone to do your independent examination of the accounts just shout I would be happy to help (already do the Oldies Club)

I have been thinking about this all Christmas, I am over 40, short and at least two stone overweight, but I loved running when I was young and would love to get back into it. So I have decided that this would give me a good incentive to get there, so I am going to give it a go . In my favour, I have already lost over a stone in the last year, and we have started going out on our mountain bikes over the last couple of months and my fitness levels are definitely improving so I think it is possible - maybe

So very sorry, having been there a few weeks I go I fully understand the pain you are feeling at the moment - thinking of you