So you know the name. You know the story. Now it’s time to introduce the characters.
Heidi
African Ice Emerald Queen
Born November the 11th, 2004 and named after good old Heidi in the Swiss Alps, our baby girl travelled all the way from Durban with her siblings, all of them being dropped off at their new homes.
With me being only eight years old, she was the first puppy we owned in my life time. Heidi arrived fluffy-eared, doe-eyed and full of… ticks?? You can imagine how upset we were, especially since she came from such a reputable breeder. Poor Heidi spent the next few hours standing on our kitchen table being picked at by my parents. Don’t worry, she was completely healthy and happy!
My mom used to bring her to my school when she picked me up in the afternoons, and everyone thought she was a wolf (picture fluffy cloud + pointy ears and you get the cutest wolf ever!). You can imagine all the friends I made after that.
The first time we took our dogs to the beach was a few years after we got Basti. Heidi and Basti were so excited and ran straight into the ocean. To Heidi’s bitter disappointment, the waves started going out and her feet sunk in the sand. The look of utter panic Heidi gave us was priceless. She could not (or rather, would not) move. My dad had to go climbing in after her and carry her out. From then on, our sandy angel would just stand by the water’s edge and watch her crazy family dive in and out of the waves.
My cloud angel was always so delicate but her hips were always a problem (the most heartbreaking shepherd trait). However when hooligan Beanie popped into our lives, Heidi became young again and the two of them played like children. She was also so so smart and would fetch the cellphone when it rang, pick up keys, carry groceries from the car and everything.
Near the end of 2016, we saw that her age was beginning to get to her, especially with hooligan Beanie wanting to play all the time. Beanie noticed as well and tried to limit her crazy plays a little. We went to the Vaal Dam for Christmas, and we took our angel with us. Can I just say how much of a different dog she became for that week? Wow! She came out of her shell, ran around, swam in the dam and just loved every second of our holiday. It was so amazing for all of us and it’s a holiday I’ll never forget.
The beginning of 2017 saw the downfall of our girl. Heidi always had back and hip problems, but they got really bad in March last year. She was on a lot of pain meds, which also made her very drowsy. And her body was just letting her down. I was visiting a friend in Pretoria when my mom called and said she’s going to let Heidi go the next day. Well, we drove all the way to Joburg just so I could say goodbye. Turns out the vet had other ideas. He gave her an injection in her spine and that really helped with the pain. So much so, that Heidi made it all the way through winter and right up to the end of October!
Those last few months were a struggle for all involved. Only every now and then would Heidi get up and walk outside. Most of the time she slept because even though she was on pain meds, her back legs gave in all the time. But she was a happy girl and would give us the sweetest smile when you came to pat her. Eventually we decided it was time, she looked at us and we knew. So on the 30th of October 2017, we let our darling girl go, my cloud angel went home.
Sebastian
Kalifi Magic Maestro
Ah my boy. If there was ever one being in your lifetime that you were deeply touched by, he would be that to me. Born 27 October 2005 and named after my favourite musician, this little cinnamon roll was the child every mother dreams of: perfect from day one. Basti never chewed shoes (but he did chew all the wicker off our coffee table… it was delicious!), was potty trained within two weeks, slept peacefully through the night and only used his teeth for food.
With Heidi being my mom’s girl, this golden boy was mine. We began training them together and the bond just got stronger. For a Golden Retriever who absolutely cannot live without food, at training, Basti refused any sort of treat or bribery. But he didn’t need it. Besides pulling on the lead and sometimes selective hearing, this boy was a dream.
With Heidi not loving the ocean too much, Basti adored it. I threw balls, he fetched them and swam back with the waves, his jowls floating on the water. The most amount of exercise Basti ever did was during that visit to the beach. We were all relaxing, soaking up the sun and enjoying the views, when a cocky seagull flew very low to the ground and was a bit too tempting for our five year old. Basti sped off at a speed I had never seen him move before, trying to chase this seagull, who was a cheeky bastard and kept flying low and slow, mocking our boy. I had never run so fast in my entire life before after Basti (who was running towards a busy road, so obviously we were panicking). Eventually he decided he’d had way too much exercise for a decade, slowed down, turned around and gave me the biggest grin. He was so proud how far he’d gotten (maybe 30m haha).
Basti’s whole life revolved around food. From the day we got him, he wolfed down his food in record times (I used to time him for fun and no jokes, his fastest was 12.6 seconds for a whole bowl). So we got him those cool bowls that make you eat slower, this only worked by about 8 seconds because he was a smarty pants and figured out the puzzle. And with this love for food came a whole lot of begging… and the most amount of drool! It was disgusting.
Basti used to love getting dressed up, from Santa to my childhood bikini, he could pull off any outfit. I was once making Basti, Beanie and Bailey some bandanas but I had run out of time to make all three and only finished the girls’ ones. We went out to Walkhaven for the day (Basti couldn’t come because of his breathing — I’ll explain this now!) and when we came back, Basti was all mopey. So I finished his bandana and put it around his neck and man oh man was he chuffed! He had the biggest smile while he pranced around our house, wagging his tail and showing off his new bandana. He was the cutest thing ever!
As Basti got older, so did his body, more specifically, his throat. His breathing became raspy and often he was short of oxygen simply because his esophagus was becoming paralyzed. To help him not get into a shock and not be able to breathe at all, we had to stop taking him out and try keep him as calm as possible. He was doing well, until something else happened to him.
He always had a lot of fat lumps all over his body that were never anything serious, and by the time he was older, we decided that even if one of the lumps was bad news, we’d rather leave them instead of hacking him up just to find out which lump was bad. On the 2nd of June 2018, I was relaxing with my babies in the lounge and Basti suddenly ran up to me, panicking, unable to breathe and fell to the floor. I thought he was going to die right there. After a bit of rest, he seemed okay, but he couldn’t walk or stand for longer than a minute or two. He had suddenly become so weak.
After the next 36 hours of trauma, we realized that this was probably his end. We planned to take him to the vet on the Monday afternoon. We spent the day with him, home from work, lying in the sun and just loving him. And that afternoon, on the 4th of June, we took my boy to the vet and found out that he was actually in heart failure, possibly due to age or a bad lump on his heart. There was nothing the vet could do. I sat outside with my boy on the grass, one last time, and all he could do was smile. From the very beginning to the very end, Basti was happy and full of love. And he shared this happiness with everyone, even when his body was dying.
He’s the love of my life and I live everyday to honour him and his pure love for anyone and everyone.
Beanie
Rose
When you think midlife crisis, you think fancy car, holiday house, secret lover. But no, a tiny little cream Golden Retriever called Beanie Rose was my mom’s midlife crisis. Born May 14th, 2015, and eight weeks later, this hooligan showed up at our house over night. My whole life, my mom has always said that she will never have three dogs, so when she saw puppy Beanie and decided to bring her home, you can imagine how much flack she got from us haha! But this precious baby stole all our hearts.
Unlike our other two, Beanie’s name wasn’t a deep or thoughtful decision. I enjoyed the name Beanie (and it was winter so!) and my mom wanted Rose. So we compromised (as in I got my way)!
Beanie absolutely loved Heidi and Basti, she kept them young. But man, did she have third child syndrome: the naughtiest, most untrainable, hooligan dog we’ve ever had! Buuuuut she’s a sweetheart. Every night she has to have her ‘dummy’ to hold in her mouth when she goes to bed. This started out as the blanket we got her in and is currently the blanket that Basti slept with in his last few days.
Beanie is also an extremely sentimental dog and when she lost Heidi and Basti, she mourned just as much as the rest of us — which made it worse for us.
Since her two OG’s have gone, Beanie has taken over their roles of begging, barking at the gate in the late afternoon for hours, curling up like a cinnamon roll and learning new tricks (for quality treats). She’s also a bit of a slut when it comes to tummy rubs. If I come out of the bathroom or stand in the kitchen, Beanie will walk up to me, throw herself on the ground and roll over. On top of this, she’ll often take your hand or sleeve in her mouth and lead you to the couch or bed so that she can get a tickle.
But out of all of that, Beanie’s absolute favourite thing to do is swim. No matter the temperature, colour of water or weather. If she gets any chance, she’ll rush out our back gate and down to the pool area, and if we haven’t remembered to lock the gate, she’ll get right in the water and have a grand time. Also, only Beanie decides when Beanie is done swimming. If you tell her it’s time to go inside and start walking back to the house, she’ll stand on the pool step, look at you and then turn around and dip herself back into the water. So nine times out of ten, Beanie is left to swim by herself (don’t worry, she is very capable of not drowning and we do check on her every five minutes).
Beanie is definitely the heavier out of the two hooligans, and when her and Bailey play (like hooligans), Beanie uses her weight to her advantage. She runs and throws her whole body at her sister and knockdown! But Bailey is nimble and gets out of the situation quickly, just to pounce on the lump that is sweet little Beanie Rose.
Bailey
Miranda
The story about how we got Bailey is one full of tension amongst certain family members, so I won’t go into all that. But on the 9th of November, 2017, the second hooligan of the house entered our lives. And yes, she’s named after Chief Bailey from Grey’s.
I was very nervous about getting Bailey, simply because I’ve never had a rescue before, and I didn’t know how she’d get on with the other two. The first night was strange, Bailey was very possessive of my dad so she growled at Basti and Beanie. She also didn’t know what stairs were; you know when the floor feels unstable and you try and hold on to gravity for your sanity, yup, that was Bailey, freaking out with four legs going everywhere. It was adorably funny.
The second day was better and I sneakily watched Beanie and Bailey from behind a wall. Beanie really wanted to play with Bailey, but they were both so unsure about each other. After about an hour, they were the best of friends and play like they do today. It made my heart so happy.
We got her from the Sandton SPCA, and that is a story in itself. They said she’s a “pure bred golden retriever” who has never had puppies. Unfortunately neither of those were true. The vet assumes she’s a collie with maybe a dash of golden, and he reckons she has had puppies (try not think about what happened to them! We don’t know but we like to assume they’re all alive, well and happy, otherwise we cry). The SPCA also said she’s three or four years old, but she’s more around the age of 2. So that was all fun.
The first few weeks we had her, I decided to bake and try out a new icing technique. I was so proud of my perfect cake, that I ran to fetch my mom so she could come look. Two seconds later, I return to the kitchen to the same cake, but with a whole corner nibbled away and Bailey standing there, wagging her tail and licking her lips. Clearly my cake looked far too good for her temptations!
Bailey’s quite a cheeky little bugger but wags her tail 24/7, even when you’re shouting at her. So it’s difficult to stay mad longer than one second. She used to have a very dominant side and often told other dogs who’s boss, especially poor Basti who did nothing to Bailey at all, but got hurt anyway. Looking back, we think it was a pack mentality issue where she was trying to weed out the old and sick to keep her pack strong. It was a very stressful time but we got through it and it’s sunnier now. Today, Bailey enjoys playing with most other dogs and doesn't have a problem with them when they steal her ball. She is still a little uptight when me and my mom give attention to other dogs or when she's on a lead and other dogs aren't, b she has come so incredibly far since we first had her.
Bailey is the sweetest little soul and lap cuddles are her favourite, yes, she knows she's a big dog, but that does not hinder her one bit. She will crawl up to you in the morning and snuggle her very cold nose under your chin, rolling around until you give her a tummy rub. We are so lucky to have her and I don't regret getting her one bit.
