OUR FAMILY

Taryn (that's me the writer) , Mick ( my husband) , Verity 15, Tantra 5 all live on a 60 acre farm in West Wales , along with our beautiful Deerhounds Monty, Hobby Amber, plus the biggest and soppiest Rottweiler Marley, and our Gloucester Old Spot pig Octavia.

We also share the farm with assorted hens and 'the' cockerel Major Trumpet. (I regularly threaten to make soup out of him as he is particularly stroppy)!

My love of deerhounds started when I was a little girl, living in the suburbs of London. I was walking with a friend and her mother (just in case anyone thinks that my mother was irresponsible and let me walk over open grounds along ay the age of 10 or 11) , in a place called Bentley Priory when a woman came over the brow of a small hill with the most unbelievably amazing dog. I went over and petted it ands was literally drooling over it when my friends other called and said that we had to leave then, without me having a chance to ask what breed it was. My friend's mother told me on the way home that is was an Irish wolfhound. When we got home I told my mother and asked if I could have one (her words where "when you get married you can have what you like) her love was Labradors, so that is what we had and I was very happy but never forgot that dog.

Well I got married to Steve (husband no 1) , we had children Danny 28 and Carley 27 and our lives did not have the possibility of having big dogs, so I continued the line of Labradors with Sasha a black Labrador who died last year at the grand age of 15 years. Steve and I parted after 20 years and I went on to Harry husband no 2, Mick (This is an ongoing joke as I am Mick's third wife and he wanted me to wear a dress with number 3 printed on it at our wedding)!!

Mick worked as an International lawyer and his work took him all over the world , as a dutiful and loving wife and his best marketing partner I accompanied hi, . It was truly terrible, Geneva one day, Bahamas the following week drinking lovely cocktails (Goombay Smash, name is exactly what it does), New York, South Beach - Miami (home of Gianni Versace), buying designer labels etc ands again there was no possibility of having ever a goldfish never mind a Deerhound. Along the way I became pregnant with Tantra (named after the Hindu goddess of love and also the name of a great restaurant in South Beach) Verity Mick's daughter from him previous marriage (no 2) came to live with us.

As I was NIM (Non Intrusive Mother) I employed a nanny/housekeeper Dorris, real name Theodora which I actually thought prettier but she preferred to be called Dorris. (I know it is spelt with one R but I am dyslexic and wrote it numerous times before someone pointed out the error, at which point I thought, so what, I can write what I wish).

My biggest dread was her time off each week - how was I going to go to Selfridges with baby!! Eventually Mick and I decided that this was not really the life that we wanted to live and we spoke about him semi retiring or retiring, having dogs and going to live in Spain where we already had a house with land. This is in a conservation area, close to the sea and was ideal for us and the dogs. We hoped to show and eventually breed (when we had enough experience)

We set off on our journey to find the dogs. It was only after I had seen a couple of litters of Wolfhounds, and each time commenting to Mick that these were not the dogs I had seen as a child (or maybe my memory was playing ticks with me) I looked on line at every breed that existed and came upon the Deerhound. That’s it I shouted and was so excited but I needed to find a breeder of this magnificent dog.

We saw the Kilbourne web site and I phoned Glenis Peach and spoke at length. I asked if we could come and look at the dogs (would this be possible today?) Yes as Mick was away on a stag weekend and she wasn't doing anything) I put the phone down, then rang my son Danny to ask if he could bring my mothering Sunday card another day, collected the children and off we set in our faithful landrover. The journey should have taken 3 to 3 1/2 hours but faithful broke down and we had to wait to see if it could be repaired or not (Hence many phone calls to Glenis reporting our status and then telling her the car was fixed and was it still alright to come) We had left home at 2.30 and arrived at her house at 10pm at night. I was sure she thought we were off our rockers and that she would never allow us to have a dog. Apparently was not exactly the case and we hit it off, and have been good friends ever since. We purchased who Deerhounds a dog from Glenis and a bitch from a different line, but had to wait three weeks, as we had booked our holiday in Spain.

I phoned her as often I thought I could get away with without her thinking that I had been let loose from the local asylum, to enquire of the puppies’ health. When the day came when we had to pick them up remember Glenis asking if I was happy. I replied YES, I was near to tears with joy.

Monty who was eight months at the time needed a little parental guidance. He was so loving and fun that it was hard to discipline him. Going for walks was very interesting - he was fantastic on the lead on the pavements, but as soon as he saw the open grounds that he was heading for, he pulled, jumped up and showed no manners at all. He was trying to chase the cyclists, horses or any small dogs but after a few weeks and some of his favourite treats (he will do anything for a tiny taste of butter) he eventually found his manners!!

Monty hated his nails trimmed or his teeth cleaned and refused to have his ears trimmed for the shows. Butter was the answer and lots of applauding by the rest of the family for being a good boy.

Hobby had a completely different approach to life, she was and still is the most obstinate little girl and telling her to do something was never going to work. She has to be asked nicely and made to think it was her idea in the first place - she has the most wonderful temperament and is kind and loving. Hobby only wants to be made a fuss of and will quietly follow us around all day gently nudging me if I have not petted her for a while. She was, and is still, very picky about what she will eat, and her favourite foods change from week to week. As she s such a poor eater I feel I have made the situation worse by cooking different meals when she will not eat what is out in front of her and hand feeding (she loves this and YES i I know I am barking)!!

Marley our Rotty - well there is only one thing to say about him, he has the kindest heart in the universe and took Amber our third Deerhound under his wing, sleeping with his head next to hers, letting her pull his tail and chew his ears, even letting her taste his food. His heart has been broken by Amber on her discovery of playtime with Monty. Marley cannot run as fast and cannot for the life of him understand why she would want to play with anyone but himself. I did try to make him feel more important by letting him sleep outside our bedroom door. He loved it but he snored loudly all night, passed wind which wafted under out bedroom door making our room smell like a public toilet, so he had to go back to sleeping with the others and his heart has now mended through his stomach - we always feed him first, this makes him feel very special.

Amber who is a complete delight is six months old. She bounds around happily showing me bits of furniture that she has chewed, a complete rectangular hole out of the plaster board wall in the breakfast room and is digging holes to New Zealand in the garden. She is really pretty and so gets away with murder, she rolls over on her back to get her tummy tickled (who can resist this) Well Mick could when she has taken his shoe our of our bedroom. Mick has remedied this by putting a bolt on the outside of our door but it is only a matter of time before I am locked in (accidentally of course).

Our London house had been put up for sale, but the market was very slow and hardly anyone came round (by the way the house was in pristine condition, not completely chewed up like the present one) The only place that was good for exercising the Deerhounds was open ground outside Wormwood Scrubs Prison. I have to say it was not the best place to be and I often linked up with other women exercising their Lurchers and we accompanied each other back to our cars.

We had been told by various estate agents that some Muslims do not like dogs, and if they know that we have some they would not consider buying the house. So every time we had a viewing all dog equipment had to be hidden and I would take the dogs out to the Scrubs until I got the all clear from Mick, sometimes this would take hours. People would turn up late and stay for ages. I remember one time it was freezing cold, pouring with rain and I thought they would never leave. After that I told Mick that I did not care whether or not they bought our house, we had dogs because we loved them, this was our house and if they did not like dogs, or thought them unlucky that it was their problem.

Because of personal circumstances we could not go to live in Spain permanently and so made the decision to sell Spain and find somewhere with lots of land. Mick was born in North Wales and so I suggested living in South or West Wales which I liked very much. The hunt began and after seeing 70 or more houses (one could not really be described as a dwelling house; it had no windows in the front of the house, a river ran underneath plywood flooring and a 'batty' but sweet owner telling us that a few houses had been lost in the past due to collapse and dry rot throughout)

We eventually found the one which we are currently living in and moved in Christmas Eve, had dinner on Christmas day in a local restaurant with all the other folk who had no where else to go, we decorated 5 rooms in the next two weeks. A month after which all our work was destroyed as we had rising damp and had to put in a new damp course. This meant stripping all the plaster off the walls. We had a new kitchen put in which meant us living without one for 8 weeks etc etc. Despite all the above every day when I walk the dogs around our patch of heaven I think how lucky we are to have such a place.

Quick update; Major Trumpet no longer is. He finally went just too far attacking us and had to bite the bullet!! He has been replaced by the Kilbourne Trumpeter; a kindly and gentle, but determined Wellsummer Cock.