The (Foot)hills are Alive

May 2021

With seven dogs (well, six at the moment – one is on the road being shown), it sure is nice to live in a part of the world where they can go on a couple of nice, long off-leash walks a couple of times every day. The foothills just a couple of miles from our house are really nice at certain times of the year. They’re finally a bit green at the moment, soon to become dry and brown I’m sure. That’ll also mean no more walks until around October-November, due to all the cheatgrass that gets stuck in the dog’s fur. Last night I went with Mrs Whip and brought the drone along, to capture a sense of what a dream it is for the dogs (and us) to be able to roam free up there.

I was up there last week with them, and brought the more conventional camera along…

Happy Dogs

We just love spring around here. So nice to have longer daylight hours, actual colors in the landscape (other than just brown and gray). And of course, the dogs seem to love it too!

I’ve been on a few walks with Mrs. Whip and the pups over the last several weeks. Of course, I had to bring the camera along. Here are a few favorites:

Snow Day!

February 2021

In mid-February we finally had a big dumping of snow! Friday night and Saturday morning it just snowed and snowed and snowed. As usual, the dogs didn’t seem to mind! We (carefully) drove to Eagle Island and snapped a few photos, which wasn’t easy, since I had to keep a flexible cover over camera and lens to keep them from getting soaked from the wet snow falling from the sky.

Golden Summer

September 2020

Even with their fluffy fur coats, our dogs still find lots of ways to have fun when it’s hot outside. I’ve accompanied Mrs Whip on a few recent walks at Eagle Island or nearby parks, and shot photos of them enjoying playtime. I hope they make you smile!

Puppy Love

April 2020

Well, we recently had not one, but TWO litters of puppies, just a week apart. Fuzz had a litter of ONE (!), and Jelly followed with eight (!). So, nine cute little fuzzballs here at the Whip’s. Now that they’re venturing outside into the yard, I’ve been shooting a few photos of these irresistible little cuties.

Our Dogs Sure Love the Snow!

January 2020

We had our first decent snowfall of the season overnight, so this morning Mrs. Whip and I took a little walk at the nearby park with the furry grandchildren. As you can see, they always love to play in the snow! And it sure made for some pretty backdrops for their photos. As always, I hope they make you smile.

Cooling Off in the River

August 2019

Last night Mrs. Whip asked me if I wanted to brave the mosquitoes and bring the camera along to Eagle Island State Park, to shoot some photos of the dogs playing in the river. I really hate mosquitoes, but thought it would still be fun to try to capture some shots of the dogs enjoying cooling off in the water.

The water was pretty warm, generally about knee-high, and although the rocks at the bottom were slippery, I managed to avoid falling in and submerging my Canon. 🙂

Here are a few of the shots we grabbed:

Mikey’s First Walk in the Snow – and More Snacks!

December 8, 2018

Over the weekend we had our first snow of the season here in the Boise area, so of course that meant taking a walk in the foothills with Mrs. Whip and the furry grandchildren. Mikey (now six months old) hadn’t been in the snow before, so it was a new adventure for him. He quite enjoyed it! And of course the other five always love bounding through the white stuff. We’re fortunate to have some nice trails in the nearby hills where they can run around and play.

BTS – Along the ridge on the way back, I saw a great spot for a group photo. Mrs Whip tried to line them up – never easy without some snacks in her pocket as an incentive. Everyone was pretty cooperative – except Mikey, who hasn’t quite got the whole “sit” and “stay” concept figured out just yet. 

Later Saturday afternoon, we decided to shoot some more “snack” photos for a 2019 calendar Mrs Whip is putting together.

Oh sure, now Mikey decides to sit. 

Our Dogs Love Snacks!

October 28, 2018

Mrs. Whip sent me a link the other day to the fantastic work of German photographer Christian Vieler, who has produced some incredibly fun images of dogs having snacks tossed their way. I thought it might be fun to set up a little studio in my man cave and see if we could make some similar images with our dogs. They were very willing to help, and didn’t seem to mind when we had to keep trying and trying to get the timing and focus just right. 🙂

Golden Evening in the Park

October 25, 2018

The leaves in the trees have been just beautiful this fall, and our weather has been exceptionally nice the last couple of weeks. As I see the days getting shorter, and the forecast ahead looks to be getting quite a bit cooler (no surprise there), I decided to take off from work at 4 PM instead of the usual 6 PM, and enjoy one of these really beautiful early evenings before they’re gone.

My initial thought was to take a bicycle ride, but as I was driving home I noticed we had some clouds and decent light, so I called Mrs. Whip to see if she was interested in me coming along on her nightly dog walk, and shooting some photos. Not surprisingly, she said “absolutely!”

She usually either goes to the nearby foothills, or to Eagle Island State Park, for long, off-leash walks with them. Twice a day, every day – whether it’s sunny or dark, raining, snowing, windy or whatever. They go. And the dogs just love their walks. Almost as much as they love food. Tonight we chose Eagle Island.

As the sun descended, the clouds got thicker, so my camera got quite a low-light workout. Thankfully, it’s really capable of performing well when there isn’t an abundance of brightness. We started out in a big pasture, with a backdrop of colorful trees. We tried to get them to pose together for a group shot, but they weren’t very interested in sitting still.

Next we made our way over to the river, and of course Butter and Groovy found some small sticks to carry along.

Of course, the dogs had a great time splashing about and chasing rocks in the river.

A lovely evening for a walk!