Designer dogs - are they good value?

Designer dogs aren't free but a good dog breeder puts in lots of hard work long before you adopt your puppy. It is important to find out from the breeder what your pup's parents are like and also how your puppy will be raised in the 8 weeks before you adopt him or her.

As you can see from the photo, Annie and her family also handled the pups a lot, so they were able to get used to people from birth.

We think that Annie's dogs are excellent value, especially considering how much time and care she takes with them. Some designer dogs can sell for up to $3000 - according to a recent SMH article!

Butterscotch at 6 weeks of age

This is Buddy when he was about 6 weeks of age. He was a bit bigger when he came to live with us, about 8 weeks of age.

Some places will sell dogs this young, as little as 6 weeks of age. But that is one of the things we liked about Annie, that she keeps her pups a little longer, giving them extra time with their mum.

Being with their mum and littermates longer helps a pup to learn how to be a dog and helps them to learn social skills. Annie usually keeps the puppies with their mum until about 8 weeks.

Peppy the poodle

This is Butterscotch's dad, Peppy. Buddy looks heaps more like his dad than his mum.

Annie told us that Peppy and Peggy's pups are usually about 8 kg when fully grown, although sometimes one ends up a little smaller. Annie wondered if the smaller pups could mean that Peppy might have some toy poodle in his background somewhere.

When we picked up Buddy at the airport, his sister Lucy was also being picked up. She was very much smaller than Buddy, and very sweet too. She obviously takes after the poodle side of the family.

Butterscotch - 10 days old

This is Buddy at about 10 days of age, he hasn't opened his eyes yet but you can see how big and strong he is.

It was great that Annie sent us regular photos of our new pup, so that the kids could follow his progress.

We also felt like we bonded to him and got to know him through the photos. And of course we started to notice that our puppy was the cutest one :)

Meeting a cavoodle

September 2006

At a Cafe one Saturday morning we noticed this adorable little guy. By the look of him, we thought he might be a cavoodle, so of course we had to say hello.

The kids fell in love with this gorgeous, friendly pup, and his owners put us in contact with Annie, the breeder.

Cody was so sweet, he was the best advertising a dog breeder could hope for! But I still wanted to check Annie out for myself. I emailed her many times and also phoned her several times. I wanted to feel confident that she was an ethical, responsible dog breeder.

I was more than happy when I spoke to her and felt that she had genuine a love for her dogs and would take good care of our puppy.