Valley View Yorkshires Blog

progress is made.

Sun, 27 Mar 2011 19:43:30 -0600

We are making progress on the house. The tile was grouted last week. We did the first coat of paint in the main floor of the house on Sat. Just one more coat and we can start staining the trim and doors for the main floor. Things seem like they are really starting to move along. We are hoping to be back home by June. Fingers are crossed.

The dogs are doing well but are anxious to get home as well. We have 5 puppies that are ready to go to thier new homes and I just reduced thier price to $295. If you or anyone you know has wanted a puppy now is the time to get one. You can check out thier pics on our website. Just click on the available puppies page.

I am having a writters block and can't think of anything else right now so will catch up with you all later.

Have a great night.

Flood of Sept 2009 and where we are at now in March of 2010

Wed, 23 Mar 2011 13:51:06 -0600

Well,,,, Those of you who have checked on our website know that our home was flooded in Sept of 2009. We had to evacuate all of our dogs with a canoe!!! No one ever thought that the water would get that high. The problem for us occurred when the Oronoco dam broke. If that hadn't happened our house would have been safe!! Ahhh Well life happens. To bring it into perspective, the imiges of the tusami in Japan closely resembles what happened in Hammond. We were luckier than them though as quite a few of the houses can be fixed but they had to be completely gutted at least up to the ceilings on the main floors. Some had to be gutted on the second floors as well. Several houses can not be rebuilt and had/have to be torn down. We were fortunate in that we are able to rebuild.

I need to make a special mention of the Luther college swim team out of Iowa. They arrived in a bus and really really helped with all of the work. Another special mention goes out to Nachama Disaster Relief Services. They arrived with tanker trucks to clean and sanitize the homes once they were gutted. They helped with the gutting as well. Americore also sent many people to help with the gutting and other work. Lutheran Disaster Social Services stepped in to help advise us on the processes and things that we needed to do. A big shoutout goes to the Red Cross and the Salvation Army. They were extremely helpful with serving hot meals for workers and supplying some gift cards so that we could meet immediate needs. And big thankyou goes to St Patricks in West Albany who had just had a rummage sale and thankfully was still set up. They opened up and let all flood victims come in just days after the flood to take whatever items we needed free of charge. We also have to put out a big thank you to Jenny's Green House in Zumbro Falls. She opened up her green houses and all the items from St Patricks was moved there and then they opereated as a donation spot for people to drop of clothes, furniture, and other necessities like shampoo, laundry soap, razors, and everything else you could think of. They kept that open for about 1.5 months after the flood and then had a huge garage sale and donated the proceeds to the disaster releif efforts. Holiday Inn was very nice and opened up thier wherehouses in Winonna and sent us bed after bed and dressors and amoirs. When Jenny had to close the donation center St Johns Lutheran Church in Hammond offered us the use of thier sanctuary as a donation/food shelf. St Johns has been allowing us the use of thier hall since shortly after the flood to use as a comand post and place where we could have meetings and serve food. There are several ladies in the area that are cooking daily lunches during the week for people working in town and there are several churches that are helping out with lunches on the weekends when we have been having alot more people to serve. Lutheran Social Services/Disater Relief has been coordinating the volunteers and has a case worker who helps us with paperwork and other things. LSS has been indespensible to us since the flood. Woodbury Lutheran Church has been very active with volunteers and donations. St.Phillips has been awesome helping us with the rebuild process. They actually hit thier 50,000 volunteer hour while working on my house. WOW. I am sorry I can't mention everyone who has helped so please know that everyone who has been here has been instrumental in rebuilding our community and we thank you mightily.

Here is a timeline of what we have been doing.

On the first day of the flood we had to evacuate with the dogs. We were only able to get the dogs. There was no time to try to salvage anything in the house. We took the dogs to my mother-in-laws house in Grand Meadow. She has a 2 car garage that is heated and insulated that she gave up for our dogs.

The 2nd and 3rd day after the flood we weren't able to get back to see what was left. We spent those days just trying to cope with the shock.

On the fourth day we drove to Hammond where they escorted us to our house for 5-10 min on the backs of 4 wheelers so we could see what the damage was and pick up essentials like wallets and medicines.

On the Fith day we were allowed in for 30 min to grab anything we could salvage that was of immediate need.

On the sixth and seventh day we were allowed to bring 2 people with us to start the serrious business of salvaging. We were then able to dismantle our kennels and bring them to Grand Meadow for the dogs. That was our top priority!!!!

On the eigth - tenth days we started trying to salvage our personal possessions and started to catalog and throw out the things that couldn't be salvaged. There wasn't much that could be saved. Just last night I figured out what the loses were to our personal property and it is very close to $35,000. Its amazing how fast the numbers start to add up. And we did not have any flood insurance as we weren't in the flood zone. Ugh!!

For the next week were were able to bring additional family members in and some friends to facilitate the process of sorting and cataloging the loses. My Stepfather helped us out tremendously by draining the oils and gases out of our power equipement. He managed to save our riding lawn mower, generator, preasure washer and push mower. My Mother, Sister, Sister in Law, Neice, and a cousin helped with cleaning out the house and garage and sorting through the salvagables, cleaning and sanitzing tools and other things.

On the Third week after the flood some volunteers started arriving to help us start gutting the house and the rental house that we owned right next door that was also damaged. The volunteers were so awsome!!! There is no way we would have been able to even get started without them. It was so depressing looking at all the damage and work to be done. It took us a long time to get all the gutting done and then the houses had to dry out before we could go anyfurther.

Once the houses dryed out we were able to start the rebuilding. Each house had to have all electrical redone, all plumbing redone, and the all heating and air redone. We then had to insulate and put up poly. Then it was on to hanging the drywall. The volunteers have been a tremendous help doing insulation, and hanging drywall. Once that was done on our house we were able to get a company to do the mudding and tapping. They are also putting in all my tile floors. Soon we will be able to start painting then we will have to finish the upstairs it needs some new drywall hung and mudding and tapping and new flooring, etc. Then we will be able to start installing the cabinets and getting the plumbing fixtures installed. We are hoping to be back home by June. (crossing our fingers) We finished the hanging drywall last weekend on the rental house and the subfloor was finished yesterday. Volunteers are starting on the mudding and tapping today. (crossing fingers that everything goes smoothly.)

This has been a really difficult last 6 months and we really really appreciate all the prayers, volunteers, and donations that have come in to help our community rebuild. Hopefully this time next year our town will be mostly rebuilt. I understand from those who went through the Rushford flood that it takes about 3 years for a community to start to really show recovery from something like this. I really feel for those who are in Japan right now. I know exactly what they are going through and its mind-boggeling all the things they are going to have to do to recover and on such a larger scale than our little town of Hammond.

Whew finally got all those emails uploaded.

Sun, 8 Mar 2009 15:51:06 -0600

Whew, that took me quite awhile to get done. It takes a long time to upload all the great pics that I got. I'm sorry if the pictures got a little distorted. I have to resize them manually. I did my best but you know how it goes. I hope you all enjoy these emails as much as we've enjoyed getting them.

email from Sheila

Sun, 8 Mar 2009 15:43:38 -0600

September 22, 2008

Hi Colleen,

I thought you might enjoy seeing a couple of photos of Isabella fully grown. She’ll be two in January and has been holding 5.5 pounds for about six months now. We’re pretty sure she won’t get any bigger. Patton is her 95 pound big brother…he worships her.

Is, as we call her, has a feisty streak and a real instinct for rabbits--which sometimes gets her in trouble. She likes nothing better than to hop in her travel bag and head off to work with me whether on an airplane or in the car. She’s a regular at work, as she has been since she was since we got her, and enjoys her little paradise of toys and chews scattered about under my desk.

When she was about six months old, my husband called me frantic because he couldn’t find her anywhere. He had searched inside the house and all around the neighborhood. I came home to look for her and immediately found her inside her travel bag which was sitting smack dab in the middle of the living room! She had jumped into it and the top flap went back to its closed position. Unruffled, she was waiting patiently for someone to let her out!

All the best,

email from Becca

Sun, 8 Mar 2009 15:44:18 -0600

December 24, 2009

Hello

Killer and I wanted to wish you a very Merry Christmas and Safe and Happy New Year.

Please take a look at Killers myspace page. You can see his pictures.

He's such a joy!!! We love him so much. He does something everyday that keeps us laughing! He's such a silly boy sometimes!

Take care

Becca

email from Kristi

Sun, 8 Mar 2009 15:44:50 -0600

January 12, 2009

Hi Colleen. This is Kristi and Sue. We bought our 2 dogs from you in April 2008. Ruby is my dog and Cody is my mom's dog. We are so happy they are apart of our lives. They are fun to be around and they get to see each other everyday because my mom and I live very close to each other. Cody is so much bigger than Ruby we always laugh because his legs grew so long. Ruby is small she is probably 5lbs. We are very happy with them and love them so much! They will be a year on Jan. 26! :)

Thank you!!

Email from Sherri

Sun, 8 Mar 2009 15:45:17 -0600

Feb 26, 2009

Hello There!

I purchased Jackson from you Last June, I just wanted to send you some photos. He is an amazing little guy. He is almost a year now, and is at about 8 lbs. He has really long legs and a long body, so he looks bigger than he really is. I have spoiled him rotten, and he owns me. He always sleeps with me and bosses around the big yellow lab at home. He is living on the farm now, and loves it!!!!! He loves running through the field with the big boys.... and he can keep up! It is amazing!!! Its good he has those long legs to help him keep up! Jackson is the love of my life, and I get TONS of compliments about him. I have yet to see another Yorkie as beautiful! His ears never did stand up, but that is ok. He is so cute this way. Besides, his ears are really big! So far he has also kept his black fur, but has a few gray sprinkles. I think he looks just like his mommy (Dolly). Well, I have attached a few photos for you!

Thanks,

Sherri

email from Jason

Sun, 8 Mar 2009 15:45:47 -0600

March 3, 2009

HI EVERYONE,

My name is Jason, and I was fortunate enough to add one of
Colleen & Keith's puppies to my family. His name is Prince Archiball.
at first we just called him "Archy", until we realized that he carries
his favorite ball with him everywhere he goes, so we felt that adding
"ball" to the end of his name was a perfect fit.

I have to say, at first I had some concerns about Archy, thats
only because of his extra-small size. I was a bit worried that my
other dog Quincy ( who is a Beagle) might play to rough and
unintentionally hurt little Archy. But nothing could be further from
the truth. Yorkies are like giant, athletic dogs, that are wrapped up
into a small package. And Archy has absolutely NO PROBLEMS handling
himself while he is wrestling with Quincy(by the way Quincy weighs
more than 4-times as much as Archy). I was very surprised to find out
that yorkies are really high-energy, little tough-guys. It also seems
that yorkies are so unbelievibly smart, they are very good little
problem solvers. However, they don't realize how small they are, they
are not afraid of anyone or anything, which makes them great
watchdogs. No matter how big their opponent is, it's like they just
don't understand how small they are. And these are all things that
Colleen had talked to me about before I had even purchased my yorkie.

I guess to some up my thoughts on what type of breeders Colleen
and Keith are is simple, they are the good kind. They breed because
they have a true passion for this breed. Colleen kissed and hugged
Archy while talking to him for a few minutes, just prior to me
bringing him home. I could tell that she was quite choked up to see
Archy leave. Now if that doesn't speak about this womans incredible
character as a loving, caring, and compassionate breeder, who believes
that the well-being of these animals always comes first, no-matter
what, then I guess I don't know what else to say. Not to mention,
Colleen had said several times, that she would gladly take her puppies
back if anyone couldn't properly care for them any more. Her
commitment to her puppies is absolutely second-to-none, and I
recommend if your looking for a loving and caring yorkie, buy your
puppy from loving and caring people, who just happen to be breeders
(Colleen and Keith).
I'd also like to add that my personal vet had said that "Archy was the
epitome of what a purebred Yorkshire Terrier should look like, and
that Archy was well bred with an absolutely ideal temperment. And when
people think about Yorkies, Archy could be the posterboy for exactely
what a Yorkie should look and act like." I was a little speechless
after hearing that from a Vet, so I went home and looked at other
Yorkies online to compare to mine, and realized the vet was right.
Even though I had no idea at the time I bought Archy, the vet was
right that I had gotten a very well-bred dog, basically what my vet
had called "THE BREED STANDARD".

Attached is a picture of Archy, all 6.8lbs.of him. And the other
picture is of Quincy, my super-duper tracking Beagle.

THANKS COLLEEN & KEITH,

JASON, ARCHY & QUINCY

Wow its been awhile

Sun, 8 Mar 2009 14:04:26 -0600

Hi all. I'm finally back on to the blog. As all you who know me know, this is the last thing I get to. I prefer to spend my time playing and cuddling with the babies. Its been so long that I have a bunch of emails and pictures to share with you all. They won't be in chronological order but they sure are nice. We'll get to those in a minute.

We've had quite an eventfull time these past several months. We've had several litters of puppies and currently just have 2 girls that are ready right now. We also have 4 litters that were all born in early February. They will be ready in Mid-April. It sure if fun to have them all here. Opps I'm getting paged again. bark bark. lol. brb.

Ok I'm back. I better move on and start uploading emails or I won't be able to get to them. Until next time you all take care and lots of puppy kisses to you all.

Mischief a foot

Thu, 31 Jul 2008 08:42:56 -0600

I can't believe how fast this summer is going. Tomorrow is Aug 1. Wow, June and July sure went fast!! We've placed all the older puppies now and are ready to start placing Marnies litter. I can't believe they'll be 10 weeks old in just a few days. I actually placed Marnies little boy yesterday so we just have the 3 girls left. It'll be another month before the other litters are ready. The puppies grow so fast its amazing to watch them. From the time thier born about the size of a mouse to the time when they are ready to leave. They grow and experince so many things. Ther first time they nurse, The first time thier eyes open, The first time they can actually get all four legs under them to walk/wobble, The first time they come out of thier kennel/den to meet and mingle with the rest of the house, The first time they go outside to play. All of these first times really make you appreciate life. They sure keep me hopping though. With every litter they find new mischief to get into. lol

Well there is mischief afot and I need to go check it out so I'll catch up with you all latter.