Every now and then someone unexpectedly wonderful comes along and changes your world.

Edwina is such an entity.

She arrived at the farm a little while after I had lost my beautiful Wilbur (Australian Shepherd dog) to cancer. His death was very sudden, very unexpected and extremely upsetting for me. [I will write about Wilbur another day as he deserves his own story.]

I didn’t need another dog but for some reason four is the golden number.

I was helping out a friend who was looking to buy a puppy. I started checking out breeders and then landed back on the breeder who had sold me Fred (Border Collie) some years earlier. She had two pups left from a litter. They were horribly expensive (three times the price I had paid for Fred!). She sent me the photos. This little critter was irresistible.

I told my friend about the pup but she was non-committal. Was thinking now of a Kelpie.

I was already in love and so off I went to bring home this little girl.

I dubbed her ‘Edwina’ (aka ‘Eddie’). No idea why. It just seemed to fit.

She was a rascal from day one. Ever-present. Determined to keep up with the bigger dogs when we went for a walk. Determined to be loved and one of the pack.

She adored Fred from the start. He is her cousin and maybe she just knew…

She would sit directly in front of him (still does) and lick his mouth. He growling the entire time but never more than this. She unmoved. Just carries on licking.

When I return home after a time out she runs up to Fred (and then me!) and jumps around like a crazy thing. So excited that she needs to share it.

She also adores Betsy and I would sometimes find them asleep in the same bed. And Monty gets a mouth lick every now and then too.

Every morning she carries a little gift in her mouth for me when I come out of the house to start the day’s chores. A bone (chewed), a plastic bottle (chewed), a stick (chewed) and quite often a piece of cow pooh (see earlier story ‘Pooh is a not a dirty word’) (chewed). She drops each item and then re-collects it after it has been acknowledged with a ‘thank you’.

She also does this when a visitor arrives.

Her favourite visitor and one of the founding members of the ‘Weekly Walking Group’, Uncle Bill is a frequent recipient of such gifts. She adores him and nearly jumps out of her skin when she thinks his vehicle has arrived. I have had to tackle her more than once when it was not Uncle Bill but another unsuspecting visitor.

As a young pup Edwina suffered a rather bad injury. I came out to greet the dogs one morning and was met with a pool of blood and a young dog with a huge flap of skin hanging off her shoulder. She had flayed herself on something in the garden.

It took more than five weeks to heal. She was pretty much inside the whole time and with me (and the cats). She now identifies as an inside-Border-Collie. Her expectation is to be inside as much as possible, that is ALL the time.

Her favourite things are puddles, dams, creeks, horse troughs, anything with mud, anything with water, anything with mud and water. She also likes a lick of milk in the mornings.

She is also fond of sitting opposite me when I am sitting on the toilet. Sometimes she is joined by Mitzy. Occasionally Monty drops in as well. Betsy might swing past. It can get pretty crowded sometimes.

She is adorable. A delight.

I love her and I frequently tell her that she must never leave me……