Hi and welcome to our "what's happening" page at Mirriyuula.

July 3rd 2010 : Orion & Trinity both win their baby classes and compete against each other for best baby collie with Orion being awarded the honours. He then went on to be awarded Best Baby Puppy in Group.

June 12th, 13th & 14th 2010 : A long weekend of showing, laughing, drinking and eating with good friends and lovely company. The babes did us extremely proud for their debut, whilst not actually winning any major awards, they excelled with their attitude and deportment, one would have thought they have done it all before. Trinny did manage a lovely 3rd placing in baby sweepstakes from a class of 32 under Collie specialist Carol Mulcahy (Kazjs Collies) and made even more special with her very proud breeder Audrey looking on, thanks Audrey for sharing this moment.

May 2010 : After many months of planning we finally fly out of Australia destined for 3 weeks in Italy, with a stop over in Poland on the way. The purpose of this trip was to finally meet Malgorzata and collect Zuch, but unfortuantly some issues warranted that Zuch was not to be travelling back with us to Australia. It has put our PON breeding program back slightly but I am sure, that in time, things will turn around and the future of the PON will flourish in this country. Although the disappointment of not getting Zuch was palpable, Italy certainly fixed the "blues", nothing better than coming home with lots of excess baggage. Whilst we were away, our newest additions to the Collie family holidayed with their breeders, Chris & Audrey Bird (Ladevale Knls). Orion & Trinity will be making their showing debuts during the June long weekend in Canberra, we expect a fun weekend.

April 24th 2010 : What can we say ? Following on from our trip north, and whilst still in the area, we entered the Nambucca Agricultural Society All Breeds Championship Show, only this time without Leila, but it was Bazia's turn to shine. Bazia created breed history today by being awarded BEST EXHIBIT IN SHOW  under judge Mr K Iggledon (Qld) qualifiying  her for her Australian Grand Champion title. Our thanks to Mr Iggledon for seeing her outstanding qualities and to her many fans for their support and cheering along the way.

April 16th 2010 : After a fun weekend in Melbourne over Easter, we travelled up to Queensland for Toowoomba Royal taking with us Leila, Truly, Bazia & Connor. Leila  continues to fly the flag by being awarded Best of Breed, Runner Up in Group (Group 2) and Intermediate in Group, returning the following day for specials where she was awarded Best Intermediate in Show. Leila is now having a holiday in Queensland with Cecilie (Highclere Collies) who will be showing her for us whilst we are in Poland collecting Zuch and holidaying in Italy.

April 3rd, 4th & 5th 2010 : Happy Easter. We travelled down to Melbourne to catch up with family and friends and to fulfill our needs for a "nana fix". Accompanying us were our showies Connor, Bazia, Truly & Leila, and of course Tyler. We entered three shows whilst there and all our kids did us extremely proud coming home with 3 Best of Breeds with the Collies, two for Leila and one for Truly, and two Best of Breeds for Connor and one for Bazia, with Leila also being awarded another Best Intermediate in Group.

March 5th 2010 : Bazia continues her winning ways with another Runner up in Group award @ Boorowa Show Society under judge Mr R Ellis (NSW).

February 25th - 28th 2010 : WOW is all we can say, what a "Royal". Canberra Royal is the first of the "Royals" to be held each calender year and it is always a great time to catch up with friends from other States/Territories. Our judge this year was Mr E Mincey from Canada, a lovely gentleman who really enjoyed his judging over the 3 days. We entered 2 collies and 3 PONs so were kept busy for the day and the rewards payed off. Leila was awarded Collie Rough Bitch Challenge and eventual Best of Breed whilst her older sister Truly was Reserve CC/Runner Up Best of Breed behind her. But the award of the day went to our PON Bella. At her first major show, and at just 9 months of age, she was awarded Bitch Challenge over Bazia but then topped that by being awarded BEST OF BREED beating her father for the top honours. A huge thankyou to Shane & Angela who allowed her to fly over from Adelaide for this special day.

January 25th 2010 : Daisy decides that being pregnant for 60 days is enough and delivers us 4 beautiful babes, 2 boys & 2 girls, all sable. Updates on puppy page.

January 1st 2010 : Happy New Year.

December 30th 2009 : We are Grandparents. The long awaited arrival of our beautiful Granddaughter Mikaela Mary Hood, only one day late and weighing in at just under 9 pounds, ouch, glad it was Rachael and not me. Both Rachael & Doug are doing well and Mikaela is making her presence known.

             Just edible                                                                5 generations, all girls !                      Proud parents, Grandparents & Aunty           She's mine, no she's mine, no she's mine ........

December 29th 2009 : Daisy is in whelp. We expect Sable & Tri puppies end of January 2010, so keep watching.

December 19th 2009 :  We travelled to Sydney  for the Dogs NSW Xmas Show, its always a great show and even better atmosphere, expecially when Santa arrives in his sleigh being pulled by 8 Siberian Huskies. The squeals of delight from the children just make the arrival that extra special.  Madison also competed in her final Junior Handlers competition for the year and cemented her position as the #1 under 13 years handler in NSW.

October 31st - November 2nd 2009 : We travel up to Sydney for Maddie to compete in the Australian Nationals of Cheerleeding held at the home of the Sydney 2000 olympics,  Sydney Olymic Park, Homebush.  Over 1900 competitors making up 170 teams from all over Australia competing for the opportunity to represent Australia at the International Championships to be held in Las Vegas, Nevada USA in April 2010. Canberra City Chaos, Canberra City Chaos Force and Canberra City Mayhem all performed their routines beautifully with Chaos (Maddies cheer group) being placed 3rd overall, her stunt group, Force, also performed one of their best ever routines but just missed out on a placing, better luck next year in Melbourne.

October 24th 2009 : What a follow up weekend of showing. Connor makes it a PON hat trick by being awarded Best Exhibit in Group (Group 1) @ Junee Show under judge Mrs Betty Stepkovitch (NSW), unfortuantly by the time General Specials was on Connor had had enough and was hot and bothered and didn't want to play shows any more, he found the ground far more interesting LOL, that's a PON for you :-)

October 9th 2009 : News from South Africa, Justin (M. Juz Outa Oz) receives his fourth and final CACIB to be awarded his International Champion title. Justin is only the 4th Australian bred exported Collie to be awarded such a title.  He is now to be known as Sth African Champion, FCI International Ch Mirriyuula Juz Outa Oz. He continued on his winning ways the following day by also being awarded Best of Breed and Best in Group 3rd.

October 2nd - 5th 2009 : The Canberra Canine Carnival celebrated its 25th year Silver Anniversary with a 4 day weekend of shows. A weekend worth celebrating @ Mirriyuula with bottles of bubbly. Just to prove that her last outing was only just the beginning of a fabulous show career, Bazia, who turns 2 on the 6th October, again showed just what this breed is all about. She celebrated in style by being awarded 1 Runner Up Best in Show, 2 Best Intermediate in Show, 2 Best Exhibit in Group and 3 Best Intermediate in Group.  She is now celebrating her birthday at home with her best friend "Tyler".

To make the weekend complete, Madison  also competed in 4 Junior Handlers competitions and also winning all four. She handled 2 Australian Shepherds, a Samoyed and Connor (PON).

September 6th 2009 : Bazia makes breed history in Australia. At ACT Junior Kennel Club under judges Mrs M Hickie (NSW) and Ms B Daines (NSW) Bazia was awarded Best Exhibit in Group (Group 1) and Runner Up Best in Show. A HUGE thankyou to these 2 judges and also to the crowd that watched and cheered when the placings were announced. I believe that judging stopped in the remaining rings when the cheer went up for her Group placing :-)

August 22nd 2009 : Angela and Bella make an awesome team together in Adelaide. I had the pleasure of being with them on their first solo outing together in the "big ring" and they didn't fail to please. Bella was her normal gregarious self, sometimes with that little mischief maker in her, but Angela held it together and they both continued to charm the pants off everyone they met. We wish you great success girls and will be watching with pride.

August 6th 2009 : Leila is awarded her final points towards her Australian Champion title taking Best of Breed and Best Intermediate of Breed under Mrs D Bessoff (NSW).  Leila is our lucky 13th Champion to be titled here at Mirriyuula and makes her the 4th champion from her sire "Brannigan"

August 2nd 2009 : If you look up into the night sky tonight you will notice a brighter than bright star, one that sparkles more than the others, it seems to twinkle and smile, this is the night star of our beautiful Diva Doo. Diva was with us for the shortest of moments but gave us miles of memories that will be treasured for a millenium, her life cut short by the most aggressive of cancers, that of Lymphosarcoma. She will be greatly missed by our extended family, of all who knew her and loved her, but most of all by us as we will always feel cheated by not having her not nearly long enough. Her legacy will live through her two beautiful surviving bubs Bella & Leszek. We will be forever grateful to her breeder Mim for allowing Diva to come and live with us on the other side of the world and enrich our lives, and who has also felt the loss of our goddess Diva, now for the second time. Run free our little Diva Doo and we will always be looking up at your smiling star.

July 18th 2009 : The first of our babies leave the family nest today to begin his new life with his beautiful family in Melbourne. As you can see from the pic's "Leszek"  has already become a limpit in Nicholas's arms, his mum and sisters are going to have a battle in the cuddle stakes. Nicholas named him after their Great Uncle who lived in  Poland during WW2 and was responsible for the rescue of orphaned and displaced dogs, unfortuantly Uncle Leszek passed away at a young age not long after the end of the war. We wish you well baby Leszek in your new home and I'm sure we will see more of you as you grow into a handsome man. 

                                                                                                                          Kate & son Nicholas with Leszek, we are just wondering whether

                                                                                               any one else in the family has had a cuddle yet ??????

May 24th 2009 : A very sad day here at Mirriyuula. Our beautiful baby boy #2 passed away today at 13 days old to what we believe was a twisted bowel. He is now another shining star in the night sky.

May 11th 2009 : Exciting news, Diva safely delivers three beautiful, healthy pups;  two boys and one girl. One boy is a natural bob tail and the other boy and girl are short tails. Pictures have been uploaded onto the puppy page.

April 25th ANZAC Day. Today, we in Australia and New Zealand, as nations, stop and remember our fallen hero's, the "diggers" of the Great War, who on this day at dawn in 1915 landed at the cove of Gallipoli on the peninusula of Turkey. It turned out to be a horrendous and bloody battle with over 8000 troops lives being lost in just under 8 months of battle. The legend of the ANZAC (Australia New Zealand Army Corp) was born and on every anniversary of this day we celebrate and thank our brave men and women for fighting so hard for us to live in these two  beautiful country's as we know them.

We also had a wonderful day of dog showing where Bazia earned her final points to be granted the title of Australian Champion taking out Best of Breed on two of the days over the weekend.

March 18th - 30th we packed up the car and trailer loaded in 6 dogs and off we headed for a combination showing/holiday event in Queensland.  We had promised Maddie a visit to the theme parks in Surfers Paradise but before we got there we had a three day show circuit at a beautiful place up on the north coast of NSW called Murwillumbah, situated on the banks of the lovely Tweed River. It was lovely to exhibit on grounds that actually had thick, lush green grass, much different to that here in Southern NSW where we are still experiencing a very long dry spell with not much grass at all.  What a country we live in, the bottom half in severe drought whilst the top half has experienced record breaking rains and floods.  Leila and Bazia both took out CC's and a best Junior in Group to each of them and Maddie handling a friends Collie, "Hulky", to Best of Breed Saturday & Sunday.

We then headed up to Queensland where we stayed with our good friend Cecilie Kemp (Highclere Collies) as we were also competing the next weekend at the Toowomba Royal.  Juzzy came out of retirement for this and did us proud by taking the bitch CC, Cecilie and her boy Hulky took Best of Breed and were eventually short listed for the Group, Leila was also awarded Best Junior in Group under the judge Mr Les Morrison (Sth Africa) unfortuantly by the time that general specials were being judged the following day Leila had decided enough was enough and ten days of behaving was it so she decided it was play time in the ring, no matter how I tried, I could not get her to run without chewing my leg, oh well, as they say, never work with kids or animals !!!!! :-)

Our time away was not without incident as Truly had come down with an open pyometra (which is an extremely serious condition which literally poisons with toxins from within the uterus) After spending 2. 1/2  days on a drip and in a very serious condition at the vets she was able to be released, mainly due to the fact that we were heading home the next day. The next two days were touch and go with her as she wasn't eating or drinking which meant half hourly syringes of water and glucose into her mouth plus daily injections of hormones to expell any toxins that may have still been in her body. Luckily, and miraculously, Truly has made a full recovery and we hope to mate her again when she next comes into season.

Its been a quiet start to the new year,  January & February is when we usually take our "time off" from the dog show circuit due to the weather just being way too hot, and besides it's much nicer to be relaxing out by the pool, drinking cocktails and enjoying the barbeque. Our one and only show in January saw us supporting one of our local Agricultural Clubs at Bungendore (basically at our back door). Our next adventure for 2009, and heralding the return of our show circuit, was in Sydney on Valentines Day 14th February. Leila picked up another Best of Breed and Junior in Group but the day belonged to Connor. Today  Connor made breed history by becoming the very first Polish Lowland Sheepdog to be granted over 1000 challenge points to earn him his Australian GRAND Championship title and he did it in style by being awarded Best Exhibit in Group (Group 1) and Best Open in Group. A huge thankyou from us at Mirriyuula to all his supporters and his rapidly growing cheer squad that have rallied around him and been there for his awards. Our greatest thanks go to those judges that have recognised him and his qualities and for rewarding him so highly. And YES, we did celebrate with a bottle of Moet WhiteStar's champagne.

December 20th sees the last of our shows for the year and heralds a 5 week break for us and our four legged family members, just enough to do some serious sun baking out by the pool. The best part of this show is that Santa arrived being pulled in his sleigh by his team of Siberian Huskies, and they looked fabulous in their costumes of antlers and jungle bells. Every child (and as it seems a certain PON) was waiting with high anticipation for his or her turn to meet Santa and receive their special gift.

November 21st - 23rd 2008 : Spring Fair in Sydney. A wonderful weekend of showing in Sydney with a typical mixture of weather that only Sydney can offer in late Spring. Friday we found ourselves looking for frozen slushy ice cones and shady trees, Saturday was almost ideal with a slight breeze and Sunday we were battering down the hatches and running for cover from the torrential rain, we even has snow on the nearby hills !!!!! The highlite of the weekend was the final of the New South Wales Junior Handlers competition in all 3 age groups, 7 years to under 10, 10 years to under 13 and 13 to under 18 years, to qualify each junior must have won 3 first placings in their respective age group at selected NSW All Breeds Championship shows held throughout the year. Madison qualified in her age group of under 7 to under 10. After being asked certain questions and activities by the judge Madison was eventually awarded the title of Champion Handler in her group, a very proud moment for us and one Maddie will certainly treasure for life.

Thank You to Kim Tressider for allowing Maddie to "borrow" Steffie for the day.

November 2nd - 4th 2008 : Melbourne Cup circuit in Sunbury. After a well earned 4 week break from showing we headed down "the highway" to Melbourne for the Sunbury circuit of shows. The three shows that form part of this circuit are second only to the Melbourne Royal and equal to the Sydney Spring Fair later this month for total entries, well in excess of 2500 exhibits on Tuesday (cup day) alone. This circuit is very special to Victorians as it is also the day that at Flemington racecourse, only minutes down the road, holds one of the richest horse races in the world and literally "stops the nation" for the 2 & 1/2 minutes it takes to run the race, the "cup" this year was valued at over $5 million, nice to win that one huh ? :-) even at the dog show we have a "bookie" on hand to take our bets. But getting along with our news, even though we didn't bring home the 5 mill, we had a very pleasant and wonderful weekend. At the Victorian Working Dog Club show on Sunday Leila, still in puppy class, was awarded a very nice reserve challenge and Bazia took out her first Best of Breed, Monday saw Sasha at her first show for well over 18 months awarded bitch challenge & Best of Breed in another strong entry of collies with Diva receiving the Best of Breed PON and then to even things out on Tuesday, Connor is awarded Best of Breed.  A very nice way to spend the Melbourne Cup circuit shows.

We also have a new member to our show team, even if it is only temporary. Anoda, who is owned by Karin in Tasmania, has come to play with us on the mainland for a few months, she may even go to some shows whilst here. Hopefully, when she is next in season, we will be able to consumate the marriage between her and Connor and have our first litter of Polish Lowland Sheepdog puppies to enjoy.

October 3rd - 6th 2008 : A four day show circuit held in the beautiful Riverina area of New South Wales saw us scoop the pool in the puppy class Best in Group awards. Friday & Saturday saw Bazia take out the honour whilst on Sunday and Monday sees our Leila not only take out the Best Puppy award but also picks up another 3 Best of Breed awards taking her over half way to her Australian Title and still only 9 months of age.

September 21st 2008 : Diva attains her Australian Championship title at Melbourne Royal, Australia's second largest All Breeds show. Congratulations to our daughter, Madison, who has handled Diva to her well deserved crown.

September 12th 2008 : Hello Adelaide. After a road trip of 1100 klms we arrived at Adelaide (South Australia) for their biggest show "The Royal". With 6 dogs in tow we eagerly anticipated the judging day and we were not to be disappointed. ALL our dogs being awarded in their respective classes. Connor wins Challenge/Best of Breed but was pushed very tightly by Bazia who was awarded Challenge/Runner Up Best of Breed and Best Puppy of Breed. Diva wins her class (Junior) and Reserve Challenge, Leila wins her class (Puppy), Daisy is placed 2nd in Junior class and Juzzy holds a very respectable 3rd in her class at the age of 8 and coming out of "semi retirement" for the trip, her first show in 18 months.

September 5th 2008 : What a show today turned out to be. Connor takes out Group 2 and Best Open in Group, Leila takes out Challenge/Best of Breed and Best Minor Puppy in Group, Daisy follows with Reserve Challenge/Runner Up Best of Breed and Best Junior in Group and to make the day even more special, Bazia, on her VERY FIRST show, is awarded Reserve Challenge and Best Puppy in Group. We look forward to a very exciting career for this gorgeous little girl.

August 23rd/24th 2008 : Diva is certainly starting to make her presence felt in the show ring. Saturday she was awarded Best Junior in Group and following it up on Sunday with Best Junior in Show. Huge thanks must go to judges, group specialist, Mrs Val Morrow (NSW) and Mrs Betty Stepkovitch (NSW) for recognising her qualities and awarding her so highly.

July 13th 2008 : We have  a new Australian Champion here at Mirriyuula. Steadwyn Dark Treasure (Imp Swd) "Treasure" acheived his final points today by taking out a 15 point Best of Breed. He aquired his last point after having to wait for 4 weeks whilst we relaxed on holiday in Thailand. A big thank-you to his fan club and especially to his breeder Anja Ejersted (Steadwyn Collies, Sweden) for allowing us to have this wonderful boy.

July 10th 2008 : After a wait of almost 18 months our two girls Anoda & Bazia finally arrive into Australia from Poland. These two girls, along with Connor & Diva who have already taken the breed to renewed interest, will certainly ensure that the PON breed flourishes and regains it's popularity in Australia as it has elsewhere throughout the world.

June 2008 : After a relaxing 10 days in Thailand Maddy & Aileen headed back to home and waiting for us was news that Justin had won Best in Show @ Working and Herding Breeds Association of the Golden Reef with an entry of 331 exhibits. The judges critique "The Akita is the "showman" but there are 1 or 2 things I would change about him but the Collie I would change nothing." Terry headed off to Poland to finally meet Barbara (Banciarni Knls) and Bazia & Anoda and to escort them back through to Australia, we eagerly await their arrival. 

May 2008 : The day finally arrived when Diva was released from quarantine. Within 48 hours she was in the show ring and was being awarded her first Australian CC/RUBOB. Not content to be happy with this award, Diva then struts her stuff in the Group lineup and is proudly awarded Best Puppy in Group (Puppy Group 1). Making the double at the same weekend Leila, proudly handled by Madison, is also awarded Best Baby Puppy in Group. Meanwhilst, over in Sth Africa, Justin is continuing in his winning ways. So far this month he has picked another 5 CC/BOB's, certainly making his was into the breed history books.

April 23rd 2008 : Diva arrives safe and sound into Australia from America. Her first day in quarantine shows she is a happy well ajusted PON. She is full of fun and personality, our greatest thanks to her "Mom" and breeder Mim Frost for allowing us to be owned by this beautiful girl. Look out for this gorgeous bundle, she will be making her debut shortly. 

April 2008: The 5th of April saw the debut into the show arena of the latest babies from Sasha & Juzzy. How proud are we as breeders that M. Shes A Devil owned, trained & handled by Elizabeth Regan to be awarded Best Baby in Group from a lineup of 8 babies. "Taz" had strong competition from her sister M. Beez Neez "Honeycomb" who will soon be residing in Queensland and half sister M. Juz Again "Leila" .  Meanwhilst, up in Darwin on the same night, "Truly" M. Juz Truly Blu, was awarded Best of Breed and Best Australian Bred in Group for Graham & Trish Fitzallen, well done guys. Truly is having a little play up north for a short spell before returning home. Truly is a full older sister to "Leila".

March 2008: Fantastic news from Poland.  Anoda, Batuta & Bazia cleared their rabies titre test so all now have clearance to fly to Australia. Anoda & Bazia are expected to arrive in Sydney in July. Batuta is Bazia's litter sister and is expected to stay in Poland with her breeder. Anoda will be residing in Tasmania with Karin Maxwell, whilst Bazia will be here in New South Wales being exhibited alongside Diva and Connor. The PON invasion has begun. Terry, Karin & I are so excited at the prospect of having 4 of the best Polish Lowland Sheepdogs being exhibited in this country.

February 2008 : Daisy has her first show on the 17th after coming back from an almost disastrous injury to her foot. After giving her 4 weeks off to recuperate I finally get her on to a lead and into the show ring.  She had a ball. Jumping around, not once having 4 feet on the ground at any given time, even the judge commented that "she was having a good time". If this little lady was to make it in the show ring some serious training had to be done. All the next week Daisy was practiced moving on the lead and pretending to go around the ring. Guess the training paid off, because the following week was the Canberra Royal, the largest show on the Canberra/Southern NSW show circuit. Daisy did us proud by being awarded Baby of Breed under Mr James Reynolds (Canada) then she followed this by being awarded Best Baby in Group against a class of 10 under Mrs Patricia Alsina (Argentina). Our little girl is again showing that spark and promise.

All our puppies from our last 2 litters have been placed in loving forever homes, you may be lucky enough to see some of them in a show ring near you. Mirriyuula will be represented in Queensland, Victoria, ACT & New South Wales.

January 2008 : Our Collie family has been further increased by safe arrival of both our planned litters. Sasha presented us on the 4th January a beautiful litter of 8; 4 sable girls, 3 tri girls and 1 tri boy. Many thanks go to our friends Kate & Chris Baker (Carluke Collies) for having Sasha and allowing her to have her new family in their home. The next day (5th January) Juzzy presented us with a healthy litter of two, again both girls, 1 tri and 1 blue.

NEWS FLASH  "Justin" has been officially awarded by KUSA as the #10 All Breeds dog for 2007, not bad for someone who has lived in the country for 11 months and only 18 months of age. A huge congratulations to Pat for the presentation and love for this handsome boy.

What a whirlwind time we have been having here at Mirriyuula over the past 3 months. Firstly we started off with an unexpected addition to our Collie family. Fame had a chance meeting with Brannigan and in early September presented us with a lovely little tri girl we have named M. Oopsa Daisy "Daisy", she will be making her ring debut late January 2008. Early December saw the last of our shows for the year as Christmas approaches and the summer heat starts to feel it's effect. News from Sth Africa that Justin has qualified for the "Supa 7's", an invitational only event where qualification requires a Best In Show win, he has qualified in both the Puppy and Open events, judging takes place 19th January 2008 so we wait with baited breath. It is hard to believe that just 12 months ago we escorted Justin over to his new home in Sth Africa. He began his show career there the next day with a Best Puppy in Show, he has not looked back since. Justin finished his first year of showing in KUSA's (Kennel Union of Sth Africa) top 10 All Breeds and #3 Herding Dog with 43 CC's and 33 Best of Breeds.

September 2007 : Spring time. What a wonderful time of year here in Australia. The birds are singing, the trees are blossoming, the daffodils are showing their golden heads and best news of all, our PON family has increased. Yes, Connor has a wife, or two ! We can formally introduce you now to our, soon to be latest arrivals from America and Poland, Diva (USA)  & Anoda and Bazia (Poland). We expect to have these girls home mid 2008.

Justin has completed the first 2 weekends of the spring show circuit in Sth Africa in fine style.  August 31st Group 3, September 1st Group 1, September 2nd Group 3. We felt this was an extremly big effort for a boy of 14 months of age but he wasn't going to rest on this.

Justin has been awarded BEST IN SHOW.

On the 8th September he was awarded the ultimate accolade, topping off a wonderful weekend where he was also awarded  Group 1 at the AM show as well as the following day (Sunday). This now gives him a total of 3 Group 1, 1 Group 2 and 2 Group 3.

July - August 2007 : Well it's been full throttle here at Mirriyuula, both locally & internationally. Firstly, on the local scene. Connor has continued to shine on in the ring, advancing on his march towards his Australian Grand Champion title, and picking up more admirers on the way.  August saw us travel south of the border into Victoria to compete at one of the States largest shows the Lillydale Pot of Gold, with total number of exhibits over the 2000 mark. Connor proudly strutted his stuff and in doing so was awarded Reserve Exhibit in Group (Group 2) behind the eventual Best in Show winner. On the International front, Justin, in South Africa, has also been flying the flag high. Continuing with his success, adding more Challenge/Best of Breed awards to his name. August also saw Justin invited to compete at "Special Dog of the Year" competition representing the Collie breed. Entry to this is strictly by invitation only and has the top winning dogs from all breeds. Justin, proudly at 14 months of age, was selected in the final 42 exhibits, an effort well and truly exceeding expectations. Justin has yet to be beaten for Dog Challenge since his arrival in Sth Africa January 2007.

June 2007 :  Justin competed at the Working & Herding Group Championship show held on the weekend of 23rd/24th  June in Johannesburg taking out yet another Best of Breed. This entitled him to be awarded the "Top Collie of the Year".  Not bad for a puppy that was only shown in the country for five months and  to have beaten all the opposition with having a full year of showing up their sleeves !!!!  This show was followed by the KUSA "Working and Herding Puppy of the Year" show for which Justin had qualified with having won Puppy in Show awards. Firstly,  all the puppies were examined and then reduced to a final cut of 15...... Justin made it through the cut. Then the final selection began. A very tense moment was to be had as the judge passed him over for 4th placing, then 3rd placing,   Pat being extremely pleased to think that Justin had even made it through the preliminaries.  Then the announcement for Reserve Supreme Puppy, the award went to Justin and with a lovely UK imported Great Dane being awarded Supreme Puppy. January 2008 will see him compete against all other #1 Puppies for the title of South African Puppy of the Year. Justin turned 12 months of age on the 14th June. An exciting "Open" career now awaits him.  

May 2007 : May has been a wonderful time for us here at Mirriyuula. Connor has continued to shine in the ring with being awarded a further 6 BOB's and 2 Intermediate in Groups and run for Best in Group on a further 2 occasions. News from South Africa tells us that Justin is now the #1 Collie (Rough) also #1 Collie Puppy and #1 Herding Puppy in the Country, he is also in the top 10 for Best Puppy All Breeds. Since being in his new home land (5 months) he has amassed 17 CC's from 17 Championship Shows. This has included 10 Best of Breed, 6 Runner up Best of Breed, 4 Runner Up in Group (Group 2), 8 Best Puppy in Group and 2 Best Puppy in Show. These wins now qualify Justin for the Super 7's Supreme Puppy Competition to be held in January 2008. In order to qualify you must have won at least 1 Best Puppy in Show (All Breeds). We look forward to Justin celebrating his first birthday in June.

January - March 2007 : After a most enjoyable 10 weeks holiday encompassing 3 continents it was with great pleasure  and relief to be finally back home on Ozzie soil and no longer living out of suitcases. Our adventure began in Sth Africa where Justin (M. Juz Outa Oz) is now comfortably residing with his owner Pat Guild and his new best, and inseperatable friend, Kola the Siberian Husky. Justin has started his show career on a high, awarded his first Best of Breed/Puppy in Show 2 days after arriving in the country. Justin has since been awarded a further 2 CC's, 2 BoB's, 2 Runner Up in Group (Group 2), 2 Puppy in Group and  1 Puppy in Show and this little boy has only just turned 9 months of age. Following Sth Africa we headed to Zurich then on to New York for Westminster where our greatest surprise was left for the breeders of our Polish Lowland Sheepdog Aust Ch/Am Ch WhiteStar's Its All In The Family "Connor", Merrilee & Geoff Cirtwell,  who had no idea we were there until Aileen walked up behind them in the benching area and said "Gidday", to say that this was a shock to them both would be an understatement, but not as great a shock when we told them that we were also going to stay with them for a few days !!!!! Then down to Florida. Another surprise for friends Jenny & Steve as we also ended up spending 2 weeks with them and what a great time we had, too much to fill in on a web site, but if any of you get the chance to go to Orlando Florida be sure you visit Lee & Ricks oyster bar, it's something out of another generation !!!!!! Onto San Fransisco and then home to Canberra, whew, what a trip. Whilst we away we were fortunate to have friends show Justin's litter sister Truly (M. Juz Truly Blu) and our Connor.  Truly is now well on her way to her Australian Champion title, also having been awarded numerous In Group & In Show awards.

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