A heartbreaking day

Namu at a show

Today it is very very hard to write a post, but our policy is to always be honest and so we will be and we also feel it is easier to write this now so people know than to later have to explain.

Last nigth we lost our Namu. We have many dogs and love them all, but of course some are special to our heart. Many years ago I saw a little puppy I really wanted to buy, but the breeder did not want to sell her to me. When I saw Namu starting to move around 3-4 weeks old I saw that dog and I knew I had to keep her. People who know me know that already when Namu was 4 weeks old I saw just her. She was a special one. Few puppies could move like her. She was small, some said don´t keep that small puppy, but I had no doubt I wanted my Namu.

Namu 3 months old

Namu grew up a beautiful little lady with a wonderful character. She looked just as that dog I saw many years ago and in my mind I thought what will be wrong with her. She had A hips, was optigen clear and had healthy eyes. People know I was joking and saying what will go wrong, it can not be a dog this great has everything rigth. Last nigth it went wrong. At dinner time we heard barking outside and Jesper ran out. Some dogs had started fighting. Our dogs don´t normally figth and they were only four girls out together who are normally good friends. We don´t know what happened. Two days ago the wolf was here and upset the dogs a lot. He was only few hundred meters from our house and the dogs were of course really upset. Yesterday we saw the footprints again in the morning. Maybe he was there again and upset them? Maybe it was the stress with moving and a new place and new routines?  Maybe it was because Pilvi started her season two days ago and Namu was coming into season too? I don´t know.

Namu 1 year old

Anyway fighting they were and Jesper told them to stop and brought Namu inside as she would not walk on her leg. I looked and saw a wound and called the vet. He was not here, but 150 kms away and said if it was a bite wound and the dog was otherwise healthy we could wait till next morning when he was back. He calmed me down and said normally a bite wound is not that bad it looks worse than it is. And first we thought to do so - to wait. Namu was happy, looking up, eating treats, licking our hands. I washed her to clean to wound and see if there were other wounds I had not seen and she enjoyed it, licked my face each time I was bending over. But she would only lie down, she would not stand up. It worried me. After half an hour Jesper and I agreed to call to Falun as they had vets on call. I wanted to be sure she could wait and even if it was now 8 in the evening, minus 18 degrees celcius outside and overtime for the vet our gut feeling told us we had to go. 

Namu 1 year old

And so we did. We arrived at the clinic in Falun where we had never been before and have to say the staff was so kind and proffesional. As us first they thought it was not that serious. A bite wound, some penicillin and some pain killer and we would be amazed to see how quickly dogs recover. Namu was lying on the table looking around, licking everybodyes hand looking happy. But after ten minutes the vet as us started to wonder why Namu would not stand up. He tryed to pinch her toes. First a bit, then harder and harder. No reaction. I could see in his face that this was not good. We decided to do an x-ray and the heartbreaking news, Namu´s lowest part of the back was broken. She would never walk again. My beautiful little girl who moved like nobody else. There was no choice for us than to say goodbye.

Namu 1½ year old

It is not possible to describe how bad Jesper and I feel today. So unfortunate that destiny could make this. She could as well had just had a wound and been okay. We feel so guilty, we blame ourselves, we think what could have been done differently, but know we can´t turn back time. This is without doubts the worst possible way I ever lost a dog. As a breeder it is heartbreaking because she was a bright star for the future, a beautiful healthy dog who had so much we had worked for years to get and my Kiiski´s little girl. As a dog owner it is undesribable. She was my dog, my pet, my companion who loved to go for walks and I will miss her happy face and character and for always feel guilty for the way she had to leave.

Below here are the last photos of Namu taken at Christmas with her enjoying her daily walk in the snow in the forrest. This is how I try to remember her.

My sweat little Namumus I am so so sorry...

Back again

So finally a small update here from winter wonder land in our new place. The snow fell in the beginning of December and has been there ever since

The dogs are really enjoying themselves and we are too. It is wonderful to finally live by ourselves again surrounded by forrest and mountains. All dogs can run free all day and we can go for long walks in the nature from our own home. That is really a gift we enjoy every day! As seen from the photos below the dogs love it too :-)

Lapinlumon Yllätys "Totti"

Aslan

Lapinlumon Miamaia "Mia"

Lapinlumon Namupala "Namu"

Lapinlumon Xaana

Xaana again

Unfortunately moving to Sweden has proved more difficult than we thougth. This is the sixth week we are here and we are still waiting to get our Swedish social security numbers which seems to be the key to everything up here. This also means we can not get a tv connection, phone number or internet line set up. SIGH! So it has been hard to keep in touch and reply people. Hopefully you will have patience with us a little while yet. Besides from that we love it here and celebrated a lovely peaceful Christmas with the family as well as Valdemars first birthday.

But it was not all about realaxing. As we were already here we decided to do a show in Sweden and entered the Nordic winner show in Stockholm in December. It was a bit exciting to finally show our dogs among "real" competition, we have been in Denmark for so long knowing which other dogs would enter the ring and mainly competing against our own breeding so it was fun to meet completely different dogs. We have not had the chance to travel so much the last two years due to first our pregnancy and then the fact we had an infant baby so when we got the papers from the show and saw there were 86 Finnish lapphunds entered we looked at eachother and though okay, now our dogs will have to prove their worth! :-) Years back we did a lot of showing (and winning if we may say so :-) ) out and about, but the dogs we are showing at the moment had mostly been shown in Denmark.

But they did prove their worth! Well in Stockholm after driving through a horrible snow storm we saw in the cataloque that many dogs from Finland were entered and not just any dogs, but dogs who have won a lot there. Even the judge was Finnish, Saija Juutilainen. So naturally we felt so proud and humble and grateful when our dogs did as well as they did. With entry numbers like this each class had a number of dogs between 10 and 20 so just to place was great. But we did more than that!

Lapinlumon Elämänilo "Ilolas" won a big open class and even beat Finnish champion males in the class and we were so happy, also with the words we got from the judge about him. At the end out of all these dogs he finished as third best male rigth behind his dad Lecibsin Macce and he won the res. CAC and CACIB as well. Next up was my old favourite "ilo" Orso-Farm Ötömöttinen. In his days he was practically unbeatable and has won at both world and europe winner shows as well as at the breed specialty in Finland. however we did not show him for 4 years at official shows as he really could not win any more. But he loves showing and we decided he deserved to go again and so he did with style winning the veteran class and getting the title Nordic veteran winner 2011. Finally Lapinlumon Yllätys entered the ring again also after some years break doing it with style too winning open class bitches! She finished as 4th best bitch and she too won the res. CAC. WAW. To come here from Denmark at our first show here with such high entry numbers and so many top dogs there from Finland both males and bitches and then to win three classes each class with among 15 dogs in them was amazing. To make it even better the winner of the class of youth bitches was a puppy from Lapinlumon Elämänilo and Lapinlumon Davvebiegga and the winner of the junior class males was a puppy from Lapinlumon Esimerkki. So even those two winners we take a bit of credit for. 5 class winners with 86 entered dogs is not too bad....

We are excited to see what the new year here in Sweden will bring and we wish you all out there a happy new year and finish this post with a few more shots of our personal paradise.

NEW ADVENTURES

Sometimes in life you have to take a chance and dare to do something different.
As it became clear to us that we wanted to move and we could not find what we were looking for in Denmark we started searching across the border and found what should be the perfect place. We hope Sweden will welcome us and that our family will enjoy it there.

We start the travel tomorrow and don´t know when we will be up and running with mails and so on, but you can always write us on sarahbrandes@hotmail.dk if it is urgent, our Danish mobile number is also still working

WE DID IT!!!!!!!!!

So most of the year we have been in the lead of the competition for dog of the year in all our three breeds. However now after the last show this year it is official.
Lapinkoira: Lapinlumon Elämänilo
Lagotto: Lapinlumon Maximillian
Lapinporokoira: Lapinlumon Ensi-Lempi
all three bred, owned and shown by us are all dog of the year 2011 in Denmark in each their breed!
The "record" even made the frontpage of the Danish kennel club magazine hunden as you can see here:
http://www.hunden.dk/Hunde-nyheder/SeNyhed/?ID=629
(article in Danish)
We are PROUD PROUD PROUD and thankfull to all judges who thought so highly of our dogs.

NOT JUST A PRETTY FACE.......

Our little lapphund girl Lapinlumon Mustikka aka Lulu is a pretty dog being not only a junior world winner, but also having numerous CACs and best bitch wins despite her only being 2 years old.
However yesterday she proved she is much more than just a pretty dog. A herding test was arranged and we found it very interesting and decided to participate. And Lulu surprised us. We had the choice between sheep or cattle and I chose cattle as they are closer to reindeer which is the original work area of the breed. However I did have second thoughts when Lulu and I were let in a run with 4 big young bulls. They were BIG and Lulu suddenly seemed very very small. I was sure she would get scared. But she did not! She worked like she had been a herder all her life, rounding them up, gathering them, barking, going directly after their heads and not being scared at all. The trainer who was a proffesional trainer owning Australian cattledogs himself was impressed with her and said she was very promising and could make an excellent herding dog as she was very brave, but also very retained and not agressive towards the animals. She was firm and made them respect her, but didn´t bite or act uncontrolled at all. WAW! How great to experience that our breeding is not only beautiful dogs; they are actually also still capable of doing what they were ment to do and have a great character. Lulu had the time of her life and it is not the last time we tryed something like this. Her brother Lapinlumon Merirosvo participated with owner Martin and did very well too! Even if he was kicked by those big animals he just went on fearlesly. Below some photos of Lulu in action. We have some video clips too, just have to work out how to get them in here....

Gjern spitz specialty show 8th of October 2011

WHAT A DAY!!!
30 lapinkoiras entered and even with so much competition we won litteraly every single class we entered. Thankyou so much to judge Anette Bystrup for liking our dogs so much.

First class was baby males and Lapinlumon Xensaatio continued his winning strike and won this class to later also win BOB-baby. Next class was baby bitches and here the sister Lapinlumon Xaana once again won as well and only saw herself beaten as BOS-baby to Tio. Jesper had one of his rare ocasions in the ring and is pictured below showing Xaana and I have Tio

Next class puppy males had no entry by us, but puppy females did and the winner of this class and BOB-puppy and of 4 was Lapinlumon Villatukko with owner Dorte Sletting. Well done!

Then it was time for the grown up classes. First junior males which was won by Lapinlumon Tahmatassu who even finised second best male and won yet another CAC even if he is not even one year old yet. Second in the class was Lapinlumon Pakkasukko. In open class males the winner was Lapinlumon Xavier and he won the res. CAC too, congratulations Tina and Allan. In championclass males the winner was Lapinlumon Elämänilo and he also again won best male and BOB. Second in the championclass males out of five was Lapinlumon Quunsäde.

Time for the bitches juniorbitch class was won by Lapinlumon Tähtikukka and open class bitches was won by Lapinlumon Namupala who even won the bitch CAC. Second in the open class bitches was Lapinlumon Quunloiste who won the res.CAC, congratulations Kenni and Maria. Pictured below is Namupala in the lineup

We were really really proud with an entry of 30 dogs to win BOB-baby, BOB-puppy, BOB, BOB-junior and BOB-breedersclass as well as both CACs and both reserv-CACs!!!!! Also so happy for our puppybuyers who did so well.
In the afternoon it was time for the BIS competitions. Xensaatio has only been shown twice before and won BIS1 both times, so he had something to live up to, but he did making it a third and winning BIS again!!!!! What a boy, he really can move this little guy. Picture below is by Spidshundeklubben.

In the BIS-puppy competition Dorte and Lapinlumon Villatukko won a great BIS4 picture below also by Spidshundeklubben.

Lapinlumon Tahmatassu won an impressive BIS3 junior out of a big group of juniors, again picture by spidshundeklubben

And finally our breeders class won BIS3 as well.
Needles to say we were over the moon when driving back home. And even more so a couple of days later when we checked the list for dog of the year and saw that #1 ALL BREEDS IS LAPINKOIRA LAPINLUMON ELÄMÄNILO with only one show left this year. The title has never been won by a lapinkoira before. Indeed, Ilolas is something special ;-)

Shows 2011

The year of 2011 has been a great show year for team Lapinlumon so far. We had lots of good results and there won´t be enough space to mention them all here.
But for a start we can talk about our boy Ilolas - Lapinlumon Elämänilo. He had 10 BOBs this year and is impossible to beat for top lapphund of the year 2011. He is even as we speak 2. on the list of being top winning dog of the year in the club for all the spitz breeds. In the summer he was the first Finnish lapphund for many years to get a groupl placement at an international allbreed show when he went BOG4 at Vejen int. and he had BIS placements at 3 out of the 4 specialty shows held this year so far. Indeed very well done! Beneath here he is pictured Best in show 3 at the spitz specialty in Bredsten in May 2011

and under here is him on the move

Not only Ilolas, but also his kids have been doing well at the shows. His daugther our own personal little favourit Lapinlumon Namupala has won 2 CACs this year and is now waiting to be 2 years old so she can get the last and the title. She also won best bitch and BOS under breed specialist Saara Sampakoski at the inofficial specialthy in August 2011. She is pictured here underneath winning one of her CACs

Another Ilolas daugther Lapinlumon Qumina started the year as a puppy and as such won several BIS placings. She went into juniorclass where she at once won 2 CACs in a row as well. Pretty well done. She is pictured here at one of her wins.

Not only Ilolas daugthers could do well, sons could too. Lapinlumon Nasti owbed by Jordie Holtman in Holland has done his fair deal of winning down there and is here pictured also still as a junior

Lapinlumon Pakkanen owned by Silke Hollje-Schumacher in Germany also won several CACs and BOB already from junior class

and his brown brother Lapinlumon Pakkasukko won the European junior winner 2011 title at the European winner show in Holland 2011. Photo below is taken at a show in Denmark

Lapinlumon Nuoskalumi cream boy owned by Cathy Pollack and lynn Drumm in USA has already won his American championtitle not even 2 years old yet

And then there are of course the young Ilolas puppies taking their first steps into great showresults. Young boy Lapinlumon Xensaatio has been shown twice this summer and both times he won BOB puppy and BIS1! That must be said to do it with style. We really looooove this little boy :-)

His sister, the brown little rascal has done just as well getting two BOB puppies, one BOS to her brother and one BIS2 puppy this summer. The photo below shows her attitude "here I come"!

But it is not only Ilolas and his lovely kids who did well this summer. Our gorgious girl with her charming tipped ears, Lapinlumon Kaunis Kamma had a great summer and finished her championtitle as well and is now Danish champion as well as Danish winner last year 2010. It has been a way there as every second judge thought her ears were wrong, but she did it with style when winning her CACs under Finnish judges and other Scandinavians. She will take a break from the showring now as we hope to try and get her first litter.

Also our young boy Halla aka Lapinlumon Tahmatassu has been doing really well. He took several BOB puppy placements at the beginning of the year and went into junior class winning two CACs already not even one year old yet. He is pictured beneath while still in puppy class

Our juniorworld winner from last year Lapinlumon Mustikka had a great spring too winning several CACs and best bitch placements, but she took a break for the summer as she was not old enough to fnish her champion title yet. Picture beneath shows her enjoy the summer holiday at home in the garden :-)

In Laponian herders our girl Lempi aka Lapinlumon Ensi-Lempi has been fantastic. Only from juniorclass this year she has won 7 CACs and BOBs and is also Copenhagen winner 2011! She is in the lead for Laponian herder of the year 2011. What a great result for this young girl here in two snapshots from some of this years shows. She is not easy to get a good photo from!

Lempi´s brother Lapinlumon Elämänvoitto has not done too bad either btw winning 4 CACs from the juniorclass as well. He is owned by Dorte Suwala.

In lagottos we had a great year too. Our young boy Max - Lapinlumon Maximillian - is living up to his name. He started the year as a puppy winning BOB puppy and being shortlisted among the final 6 for BIS out of 70 puppies. He went onto junior class where he won BOB and CAC at his very first official show! He did not really look back and has already this summer won 4 CACs not even one year old and he is in the lead for lagotto of the year 2011! Picture below is taken when he was just 9 months old.

Also lagotto girl Lotta, Lapinlumon Karlotta, had a nice spring finishing her championtitle and winning several best bitch placings.

And the brigth reader may have observed what we are already thrilled about. We are in the lead for dog of the year in Denmark in all 3 breeds 2011!!!!! WAW. Ilolas is leading in the lapinkoiras and he will be impossible to beat. Lempi is leading in the laponian herders and Max is leading in the lagottos. We are really proud. And the dogs mentioned here are by far all the Lapinlumons who did well during 2011 so far. Many more around the world had great achievements and we are always so proud of our great puppy buyers who do so much with their dogs.