Running

Freja is now almost 16 months old and now that she has recovered from her heat we have taken up a new activity: running for part of our walks. I'm starting slowly mostly because I am out of shape and don't want to kill myself. Freja enjoys it. And, she is getting very good at listening when I say "walk" to switch from running back to walking.

Almost 14 months...

At almost 14 months of age Freja is experiencing her first estrus (heat) cycle. The first symptom I noticed was a rather obnoxious change in her behavior, but I didn't realize that behavior changes were part of her cycle. She stopped listening to me when she was loose in the yard and would not come when called. I thought perhaps she was going through a teenage phase. It didn't occur to me that she was going into heat until I noticed drops of blood on the floor in the house. I thought perhaps she cut one of her feet on something on our walk, but when I wiped her feet there was no blood. That's when I realized that the blood was not from her feet...

This will be Freja's only estrus cycle. In April Freja will have a full check-up with her vet and we will decide on a date for her spay operation.

Fetch the Stick

This afternoon Freja and I went out to play in the snow. Earlier this winter Freja was very unimpressed with snow. She did not want to walk in it at all. Now she has finally embraced the fluffy white stuff and actually enjoys playing in it.

Here are some photos:

Freja sniffs my footprints in the snow. She loves to "track" us in the yard.

Pretty girl looking at the house.

Notice how her ears are more proportional to her head now. She is growing into her ears and her feet.

She has a leaf stuck in her ear feathers on the side of her head.

Freja stands "guard" over her stick. This is just before she started play bowing over the stick, so that I would come over and throw it for her.

Taking a break from stick fetching.

Freja sometimes carries sticks very daintily. She holds the stick by the very end. This makes it awkward to carry as you can see.


Freja puts her stick down in the snow after I tell her to "leave it."

One Year Old

Freja in the snow in our back yard. December 25th, Christmas Day, is her birthday and she is now one year old. She is 27 inches tall and weighs 81 pounds. She may look like a dignified grown up dog in this picture, but she is still a silly puppy girl.