Our Havanese, actually we should say "dogs in general" are our one and only hobby.
Or better said our passion!
A hobby, a passion só many-sided, that all our spare time goes into it.
Our first dog was our Golden Retriever, Queenie.
Because of her our first passion became to learn as much as possible about dog behaviour and how to best raise dogs.
She achieved everything possible with obedience training,
and when there wasn't anything "new"' to learn for her anymore
René started to compete with her in obedience trials,
which finally resulted for her to be selected for the Dutch team of the four best dogs in The Netherlands
that paticipated for the World Championships in Vienna in 1996.
A happening we will never forget.
In 1992 we got our first Havanese. And we were so thrilled with this breed that we decided very fast to get a second Havanese.
From that moment we were totally devoted to this breed
and fanatically zealous.
There is so much to a hobby like this! More about this later.
Like said before, we are interested in everything concerning dogs.
René has been the president of the Kynologen Club Grensstreek Noord Oost Nederland (de KC-GNON) for six years.
During this time we both got two "instructor diploma's".
We are really proud that René was made an honorary member of the KC-GNON,
when he decided to stop his work for this club in 1998.
By that time he was also a member of the board of the breedclub called the Pekingees- en Dwergspaniel Club (PDSC) ,
the breedclub the Havanese belonged to those days.
He wanted to have more time for the breedclub.
For several years now he is the president of that club, the PDSC
In 2001 he decided together with Jo Nelissen
(also a member of the board of the PDSC and owner of the kennelname "of Romanijo's Joy",
you will see that name in many pedigrees)
that is was time to leave the PDSC and start a breedclub for only the Havanese.
That's how after lots and lots of work, time and energy by Jo and René
the Havanezer Club Nederland in October 2002 was founded.
René is also working in the board of the FCI group 9 (this is the group for all the toys),
and for this group he is the councillor for our Kennelclub the "Raad van Beheer".
He also writes columns for the "Kynologen Vakbond Nederland".
So, he is very busy "working" for all dogs, totally voluntary and unpaid of course.
And now....about our Havanese!
Our biggest passion!
Havanese are bred to keep their people company. Obviously they live with us together in the house.
We don't have "kennels"! Our Havanese are around us all the time.
We need their company as much as they need ours.
They are always happy and cheerful, love to hug and have lots of sense for humor,
therefor we never have a dull moment with these little clowns around us, they make us laugh and their cheerfulness is so contagious.
We live in a beautiful part of The Netherlands, called Drenthe, with woods everywhere close to our house.
And we have lots and lots of space for our hobby.
We have a huge fenced yard, and our Havanese can go there whenever they like to by using a doggy door.
Here they can run and play as much as they want to.
Our dogs love to play fetch and carry.
We have two huge apple trees in our yard
and every summer lots of apples fall from those trees
At first those apples are still small and not ripe yet
which make them great to retrieve.
They just love to play this game over and over again.
A small impression:
When there are no apples on the ground,
Jojo knows where she can find them!
They also love to eat an apple now and then!
Great for their teeth!!!!
We think it's important for our dogs to live the "real" dog's life.
Therefor we go for a walk in the forest every day for at least an hour, that is if the weather allows us to.
It's not only good and healthy for them, but for us also!
Without our dogs we probably hardly ever would go to the forest.
They don't need to be on leashes, as they don't run away. They watch us all the time and stay rather close.
They enjoy everything they see, love all the excited new smells, and just run run run.
With our typical Dutch weather,
they look often like this when we come home:
We ourselves do not change colors because of this.
It's just a matter of letting them dry, brush thouroughly
and they are clean and beautiful again.
November 3, 2009:
Drenthe, the part of The Netherlands where we live, is beautiful.
In autumn it's even more gorgeous, with all these splendid colors.
The dogs enjoy it too.
The forest smells great.
And from all these (falling) leaves they get "wild butts",
it's one long racing party in the forest every day!
You want to enjoy too?
Take a look at this small impression:
December 18, 2009
WINTER FUN!!!
With one of our first Havanese René also competed in obedience matches
but on the first level (Cynophilia G&G 1),
while our Golden Retriever competed on the highest level.
Our Havanese did really well.
She was placed quite often, leaving the so called "working breeds" behind her.
With Jojo and Turbo we've done agility training.
They learn so fast and really like this sport very much.
So far a short impression of our daily life with our Havanese.
It's time to tell about our hobby: breeding Havanese.
MOTHERLOVE
We cannot immagine anything sweeter.....
When dogs are your hobby, so many things come to it.
Reading, reading, reading, learning, learning, learning, you just never know enough.
Reading about the best food possible.
Our dogs don't get kibble, we feed them "real" dog food, raw food.
That's much better and healthier.
Reading about dog behaviour and how to raise dogs.
There are new developments all the time, and to keep ourselves updated not only our dogs profit by that,
but it makes it also possible for us to guide our pup buyers in this.
Reading about healthproblems.
What can we do about it? Can we prevent our dogs for getting certain diseases?
Which diseases are genetic? What does this mean for our breedingprogram?
Reading about genetics.
We put much effort and time in studying bloodlines and pedigrees.
Over the years we've done as much as possible and everything we could afford to better the breed.
Mirabell heeft twee keer een studiereis ondernomen naar Amerika, om daar havanezerfokkers te bezoeken
Naast onze passie die we hebben voor onze honden en pupjes, vindt Mirabell het erg leuk om deze website bij te houden.
Mirabell onderneemt af en toe een poging om onze havanezers te tekenen.
En als dan het moment daar is dat we een nest gaan fokken, dan komen de vele contacten met de (toekomstige) eigenaars.
Kortom,
honden, (onze) havanezers.....we raken er nóóit op uitgekeken of over uit gepraat.
How are things inherited? How do you deal with this knowledge?
Not the easiest thing to understand, but it makes our brains work to the optimum 
We do show our dogs, as we want to hear what judges think of our Havanese when helt against our FCI standard.
Our show results speak for themselves.
On shows we also meet other breeders, and most of the time we really enjoy ourselves.
In Holland you can never earn any money on the shows, it's all about the honor only.
We appreciate the many contacts we have with breeders not only in The Netherlands but abroad as well.
Mirabell has put lots of knowledege in a data base,
and because of this she often knows a lot about the background of many Havanese.
This way we can try to make well considered breeding decisions.
Of course we support for 100% the aim of the Dutch breedclub:
"to keep, guard and promote the health, character, well being and typical qualities of the breed the Havanese".
To achieve this we've imported over the years no less than 11 Havanese:
from America, Cuba, Canada, Belgium and Germany.
Sorry, the last part in only in Dutch. The English translation comes later:
De havanezer populatie is nog jong en klein, en om het ras gezond te houden
is het belangrijk om daar waar mogelijk nieuwe bloedlijnen toe te voegen en zo de genenpool te verbreden.
Helaas bleken niet alle geïmporteerde havanezers geschikt om mee te fokken.
Zelfs uit de allerbeste bloedlijnen kunnen honden zich anders ontwikkelen dan waarop je gehoopt had.
En als ze bij nader inzien niet voldeden aan onze hoge eisen en normen,
hebben we nooit geschroomd om deze duur geïmporteerde honden niet in te zetten voor ons fokprogramma.
In ons fokprogramma staan gezondheid en karakter namelijk voorop!
en de havanezers op de Amerikaanse "Specialty" te bekijken, te praten met hun fokkers en seminars bij te wonen.
Ook is ze een keer om dezelfde reden naar Engeland geweest.
Ook geniet ze van het maken van foto's, heel veel foto's.
Zoveel, dat die lang niet allemaal op de website kunnen.
Maar daar profiteren wel onze pupkopers van,
want zij worden werkelijk overspoeld met foto's van het nestje waar zij een pup uit krijgen!
En er is nooit iemand die dat erg vindt 
en ze is de ontwerpster van het "HCN logo"
Hoe dat gaat, en hoe wij onze pupjes laten opgroeien, kunt u uitgebreid lezen op onze "pup-pagina"
Ze geven ons zóveel!
Een mogelijkheid om mee te praten en denken over de kynologie in z'n algemeenheid
Een reden om heerlijk te wandelen, en dus onze conditie op peil te houden.
Een reden om te lezen over veel verschillende onderwerpen:
gezondheid, voeding, gedrag, opvoeding, genetica.
Ze brengen ons veel contacten in binnen- maar vooral ook het buitenland,
contacten met fokkers, maar ook met de kopers van onze pups.
Ze zijn een geliefd "onderwerp" om te fotograferen
en onze creativiteit op uit te leven
Ze zijn de reden om met heel veel plezier deze website bij te houden.
En natuurlijk brengen ze ons heel veel lief
en af en toe helaas ook leed met het op de wereld zetten van een nestje Mucho Bravo havanezertjes.
Zó veelzijdig kan een hobby zijn!
