This we are:

ICY   -   GINA   -   WILLI  -  HELGA   -   MERLIN

we also have two cats, but they never want to be in the same photo with us:

MONA (Bozi) died 29.01.2012   -   LISA

We live in the south of Mittelfranken between the lakes "Rothsee" and "Brombachsee" on the 610 meters high Schloßberg, it's the highest "mountain" between Nuremberg and Munich.
Schloßberg is a district of Heideck and belongs to the county of Roth.

How it  all began:
Origionally we were looking for a third cat ............but then everything changed.
 

We always had several cats and when  Mona and Lisa were 3 years old, we thought
it would be nice to have again a little kitten in the house.
So we went to the neighbouring farms to select one. I was just about to pick up a pretty kitten when my husband spotted a lovely fluffy crossbreed in the opposite farm.
He said: "He looks so pretty, why not a dog?"

So the idea was born getting a dog.  
From the farmer we got the dog breeder's address and so we drove there. By chance the bitch just had puppies again but they looked quite different: short-coated, short-legged and black. "It seems that this time the father of the puppies was the dachshund of the neighbourhood." said the owner of the bitch.
So we decided not to continue looking for a crossbread.
We  brooded over books about pedigree dogs, pondered about the  advantages and disadvantages of the various breeds and in the end we always came back to one breed:

the  border-collie.


But of course we also red that a border-collie is not a dog for beginners and we didn't know, if we could meet all requirements. Especially the book of Rolf C. Franck describes in detail the behaviour problems of border-collies.
Half a year passed and we were still thinking about it, we were getting into touch with breeders and went to dog-shows. Then a breeder invited me to a dog-walk with her offspring and their owners.
While walking a young lady asked us:"And which one is your dog?"
We answered that we didn't have a dog at that time because we didn't know if we were are capable of doing it.
She said:"I felt exactly the same. I was even waiting for 3 years and in the meantime I know: it were 3 lost years!"

In the end this little incident made us decide on a border - collie.
Two month later Gina moved in and after another two and a half year my dreams of  a second border-collie with my favourite colour blue-merle came true: Merlin
  ....and now Icy arrived on the scene.
We never have regreted the decision for this wonderful breed.

............although  I think sometimes:
Before we had dogs, we were  happy and content too. We never missed anything because we didn't know it differently.
But it seems that these times are over once and for all.