Not a Breeder

Posted on October 27, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Casey laying on our kitchen floor

I got an email this morning that Casey is being spayed and will enter training as soon as she is recovered. Of all the breeder evals that went back on the truck with her only one is still being considered and that one is a golden. I think Casey has what it takes to be a very good guide dog for someone with a calm kind of life. I can imagine her with someone older, kind of like my neighbor, Virginia, who Casey just adores. Now I just have to wait for her to show up on the weekly phase reports. It will be nice to get weekly updates on how she is progressing. Go girl, you can do it!

Candy Day 11

Posted on October 26, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Three wise men finished

To start off the day I decided that my work area was too big of a mess so I cleaned things up and laid down some clean paper to protect the work surface. I had to get all three wise men done today if I was going to have any chance of getting done what I needed to this week. It took close to two hours for each one but I got them all done! Yeah! Now I am more than half through with the figures. I’ve still got Kris Kringle, an elf, a reindeer to do on the figures. I’ve also got to make a big dent on the things that go under the tree this week to.

10 Weeks Old

Posted on October 25, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Yakira in Bill’s lap

Our little girl is 10 weeks old today! She is really starting to catch on to relieving. She has reminded me several times that she was ready to go out. We are transitioning to say the “do your business” command to just before she starts relieving. So that is a big milestone. Yakira still doesn’t make it through the night but that will be coming very soon.

He cold is pretty much better. No more runny nose and she only coughs once in awhile now. She has lots of energy between naps and sometimes it is hard to keep her from making me her chew toy. Yakira loves to snuggle in our laps when she is ready for a nap.

Candy Day 10

Posted on October 25, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Finished Mary

Today I worked on Mary. I had a false start on what to use for her dress and had to rip the candy off because it was just too bulky. I’ve learned that at this scale I really have to be careful about the bulk of the candy I use on the people. But I got her done though not as fast as I had hoped. The wise men are all ready to go for tomorrow. I’m thinking it should get faster as I’ve learned things from the first two figures and the rest of the figures are simpler in that they go on the tree so that their backs don’t need candy on them.

Wise men ready for candy

Candy Day 9

Posted on October 24, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Finished Angel

Today I got really serious about moving forward on my people. No more procrastinating. It took me a while but I got the angel done! Yeah! I was hoping to get Mary done too but it took me too long to get the angel figured out. I hate it when I glue a bunch of candy on and then decide it doesn’t work and I have to figure out how to get it off again. Between that and just figuring out how I was doing the basic structure for my people at this scale it all took too much time. I did get Mary’s body all ready to put candy on. I need to go get some chocolate licorice for her hair. I just don’t have any candy that will work for her hair.

Mary ready for candy

Big Little Girl

Posted on October 23, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Yakira chewing on a big nylabone stuck in the middle of a Goughnut Max

Yakira doesn’t seem to know that she is a tiny puppy. She loves to take on anything no matter what the size. When she is in one of her “I’ve got to beat up on something” mood I pull out the jolly ball and she pounces on it. She will take on the Goughnut Max and even the biggest nylabone that we have, left over from when we were raising Apex. She is a fun loving girl and ready to take on anything.

She hasn’t been perfect on the relieving but she had another dry day on Saturday and we are down to one trip outside each night. Not bad for a 9 and a half week old puppy.

Candy Day 8

Posted on October 22, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Green and yellow gift box

I didn’t get as much time to work on this project today as I thought I would. Yesterday I started on another box for under the tree. It is bigger than the red box and the pieces take precision to put in place so it is taking awhile to get it done. I’m past the half way point. I really love these little star candies. In between the green stars are yellow tart n’ tiny candies.

Close up of green stars and yellow tart n’ tiny candy

Candy Day 7

Posted on October 21, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Candy cane with bow

My goal today was to make the candy cane and the mistletoe. The candy cane was easy. I had a bunch of candy canes in my candy stash and I picked on of the traditional sized ones. I really don’t like the proportions of the little ones. They are all hook and almost no staff part. I ended up making two bows. The first one I decided would be better for the mistletoe so I made a second one that was more like a bow on a package. I think it worked better.

Mistletoe

I’ve been thinking about how I would make the mistletoe for several days now. Yesterday I stopped by the store and picked up some more green licorice belts. While there I search to see what else they might have that could help with the mistletoe and I found some licorice whips in red, green blue and yellow. So I used the green whips for the stems and cut and shaped belts for the leaves. The white berries I made out of gum balls with a tiny snip of yellow whip. I was happy with how it turned out.

Red package with blue and red bow

With my goals for this week finished I decided to put some time into the extra packages under the tree. I covered the red package with mini red gummy bears with red and blue licorice belts for the ribbon.

Candy Day 6

Posted on October 19, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Holly leaves and berries

On the docket for today was a poinsettia and holly. I didn’t find any green candy I wanted to use for the holly leaves so I went with rolled fondant. For berries I selected 3 small red gum balls. The holly didn’t take long to finish. I haven’t decided yet just where the holly will go. It could go on the yule log, a package or on the tree. The poinsettia took a bit longer. I found some gummy lips that I liked the color and texture of so I cut them apart and used them for the red part of the poinsettia. Green Swedish fished became the green part and a few yellow nerds in the center finished things off. Just like the holly, I’m not sure where the poinsettia will end up in the final project.

Poinsettia

First Dry Day

Posted on October 19, 2011 by tellingfamilytales

Yakira on the stairs

Today was Yakira’s first day without an accident! Yahoo. On Monday and even Tuesday morning I was really wondering if we were making any progress on the relieving. She had not had an accident in her kennel at night since Sunday but she was still having accident in her x-pen and it was usually right after we had been out to relieve. No there is a little light at the end of the tunnel. Yakira isn’t sleeping though the night yet but getting up a couple of times isn’t so bad.

Yakira has mastered the stairs. I was amazed at how fast she learned to climb them. It only took a couple of exposures. Down was a little slower but that only took a couple of days. Now she can do them both ways and she is even starting to skip the bottom step and leap off. I had to take this picture because Apex use to sit just like this on the step. Yakira’s legs are so short they barely make it down to the lower step.