Holiday Blog Hop for Pets winner and sharing happiness...

On Friday November26, at 9PM AEST,we drew the winner of the Holiday Blog Hop for Pets - it is  (drum roll...) :

Caren Gittleman

Congratulations Caren, we hope you enjoy our book !

And for those of you who don't know her blog "Cat Chat", we invite you to visit at http://opcatchat.blogspot.com/ , we found it thanks to this giveaway and think it is fantastic !

Remember, if you didn't win, you can get the book for the special price of AU$18.50 free of shipping :
send us an email at westiebella@gmail.com  and we'll send you a paypal request (don't worry if you don't have a Paypal account, Paypal accepts credit cards).

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Thanksgiving isn't celebrated in Australia, but we thought about all our friends who were celebrating yesterday and hope that you had a great day. It's so important to give thanks for what we have and one way of doing that is to share what we have. We wrote about it last month (see here), when we donated some books to cheer up children in hospitals and many of our friends shared with us what they were doing :

Tessa is a service dog who looks after her Mom and helps her by getting her medicine or picking things up for her; her Mom makes small quilts for doggies in the animal shelter.

Bunny, Morgan and Blueberry visit nursing homes

Many of our friends donate books, food, clothes...

Deborah has started a card and t-shirt company in the name of her best friend Penny who has stage 4 squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue and tonsil and who is now fighting for her life; $1.00 of each card sold and $1.50 of each t-shirt sold is sent to the SPOHNC organization: Support for People with Oral and Head and Neck Cancer. We bought some of her cards and we love them !

We met someone from Soidog, an organisation which helps homeless, neglected and abused dogs and cats in Thailand.

Our friend Cooper  helps children in Kindergarten read and visits residents of assisted-living facilities; he doesn't have a blog, so here is a photo of him at work : 

He was also on the cover of the 2010 West Highland White Terrier edition of the Popular Dog Series (photo by Diane Lewis)

Well done to all our friends mentioned here and all the others who every day share what they have; it starts with little things like a smile or a tail wag, which may seem little to us but mean so much more to those who receive them.

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My friend George is celebrating his birthday on November 27; he loves steps so he asked all his friends for a photo with steps; here is mine :

Go and say happy birthday to George here :

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A dog owns nothing, yet is seldom disssatisfied
Irish Proverb

Take care my friends and have a great week-end !

...and don't forget to hug your loved ones every day :

Happiness is ... playing with a well loved toy,

We found this well loved wooden horse and had a lot of fun

Hey Ollie, it's my turn !

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Dachshunds Rule !

An Australian artist, Bennett Miller, proposed to replace the 47 members of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) by dachshunds, saying that "the diversity of the doxies represents the diversity of the U.N. -- they can have a smooth, wirehaired or longhaired coat in a variety of colors", and they certainly get on better than the human representatives. Unfortunately, the UN didn't agree, what a pity !

Read more here

"I think all dogs are born equal and should have three walks every day"

"And what about treats ?"

"Let's vote for treats four times a day !"

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To be alive, to be able to see, walk... It's all a miracle. I have adopted the technique of living life from miracle to miracle
Arthur Rubinstein


Take care my friends and have a great week !

My new dresses and news on exciting events

Mum got me two new dresses; I love them, but I can't decide which one suits me the best, can you help me, which one do you prefer ?

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Mum and Dad will be at a craft market on Saturday morning in the Cheltenham Presbyterian church hall (8 Park Road, Cheltenham) to sell my book, but also to sell some of my Mum's beautiful craft creations. She has been working all week to make some beautiful things; my favourite are the wreaths, here is a sample, but they are all diferent :

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We are participating in the Holiday Giveaway Hop for Pets and are giving away a copy of our bok "Paw Steps to Happiness"; click here to enter our giveaway but also to see how you can enter all the other giveaways - there are more than 50 !




 
Thank you to Two Little cavaliers, Life With Dogs, and Dog Tipper for organising this awesome giveway event.

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Be glad for your talents, whatever they may be' They make you absolutely unique and they were given so you could make your own special contribution to this earth.

Jon Peyton

Take care my friends and have a great week-end !

Ollie is the best pillow in the world !

You know, I've tried many pillows, but Ollie is really the best !

Ollie, it's time to sleep !

It's so nice to sleep together

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Yesterday Dad and Amelie went to Dymocks Book store at Southland shopping centre to sign our book.

We couldn't go so they brought our "Mini mes" instead

Dad made everyone at the shopping centre laugh with his dalmatian hat (made by Mum 10 years ago) !

Mum and Dad are really young at heart and they make us laugh :)

Thank you so much to Jerome, the manager of Dymocks Southland who encouraged us and gave us this fantastic opportunity of selling our book in his shop and Alice who did a marvellous job of organising the book signing. If you go to Southland, make sure you visit Dymocks and say hello to the team there, it's a great place for book lovers !

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Approach life with a generous heart and everything you receive is a bonus
Comissa Fischer





Coming soon :

As cute as a baby seal...

Mum and Dad say I look like a baby seal

What do you think, am I as cute as a baby seal ?

 

 

They also say Ollie looks like Batman :

Where's Robin ?

What about you my friends, do you have any funny or cute look alikes you want to share ?

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Yesterday we remembered all the men who gave so much to defend our countries; for Mum and Dad it has special significance because their parents and grandparents lived in France during the two world wars and they are very grateful for all those who came from so many countries: Australia, Britain, Canada and USA...
Lest we forget.

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Love is a fruit in season at all times and within the reach of every hand.
Mother Teresa

Sleep well my friends and take care

Happiness is a true friend

Since we started our blog, we've made lots of friends from around the world, and we are very grateful for this. Closer to home, we've found a very special friend, Linda; she's Cinnabar's Mum and she is very kind, she is part of our family now, we call her Aunty Linda.
It's only one hour's drive to her house but Dad got lost and it took us 2 hours  (the day after, Amelie bought Dad a new street directory !). I was a bit sad that Cinnabar wasn't there because she's not completely healed (her platelets are up but she is still very tired) so she was resting at her grandparents' place; but then again I had Linda all for myself which was great !

What's that Aunty Linda, a treat just for me ?

I buried this yummy treat under the carpet so I could savour it later.

Thank you Aunty Linda, this is yummy !

I feel right at home at Aunty Linda's place; when can we come back ?

Lovely portrait of Cinnabar made by a friend of Linda



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On Sunday we celebrated 2 birthdays : Matthew (turns 12 on 9 November) and Amelie (turns 21 on 11 November - she's the one holding me) :

Let me blow the candles !

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To our friends in the Melbourne area : Mum and Dad will be signing my book at Dymock's book shop, Southland shopping centre, Cheltenham on sunday November 14 between 12 PM and 2 PM. Unfortunately dogs are not allowed so I won't be there, It's totally not fair !!!!

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Many people will walk in and out of your life, but only true friends will leave footprints in your heart
Eleanor Roosevelt

Celebrating our first blogaversary !

We are really blessed to celebrate our first blogaversary; so much has happened in the past year that we thought we would look back on some of the highlights :

This was my first post :

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I'd love to be an artist, so mum got me everything I need and I'm ready to start !

She's an artist herself, so she's going to teach me.

I'll put all my artwork on my blog so you can all have a look.

What do you think I should paint ? Cats are nice (my mum made a really nice drawing with some cats), but it's going to be hard to get them to pose for me, every time they see me they run away, but all I want to do is play with them !

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Jazzi, Derby and Julep are some of my first followers and best friends :

I read some great books

I travelled around the world

I had a great tea party

I was in a newspaper and a magazine

I had lots of cuddles from my family

I had some great fun with my friends :

We had a pajama party 

We had a great hat parade !

We had a Fantastic Festival of fabulous Flowers 

We dressed up in the latest fashions

My brother Ollie arrived in our family, I love him so much !

We celebrated our Our 100th Post :

We published a book "Paw Steps to Happiness" to bring happiness around us

We've made so many friends since we started this blog and we are really very grateful for this; in our next post, we will tell you more about how my Mum and Dad made a dear friend thanks to our blog.
We are blessed to have a loving family and so many friends and we wish you all the happiness every day.

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To celebrate our first blogaversary, we would like to offer the postage to those who want to buy our book.

So if you want to buy our book, send us an email at westiebella@gmail.com and then we'll send you a Paypal request for the sum of $20.00 (Australian Dollars) per book, wherever you live which means you don't have to pay for postage ! Once you've paid, we'll send you our book. If any of your friends are interested, you can tell them too.

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Find out more at Jake and Fergi's Blog

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Happiness cannot be travelled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace and gratitude.
Denis Waitley