The ups & downs of the Teeter

Yeah, I know this blog title is totally corny. And I also know that I take super craptacular pictures in the poor lighting of my basement. Oh well.

Secret made great strides in her teeter angst yesterday. We started with it at the same low setting and she didn't hesitate to approach or perform it at all. Yay! It was a great start, so I went ahead and raised it a bit. Still awesome, so I raised it a bit more. I'm pretty sure that's all I did in that session, as I had to go work the late afternoon shift at the shelter.

We went back downstairs before dinner when I got home and started where we left off. Still no hesitation -- Yay! I think we have this nailed! So I raised it again, pretty much to what I consider "full height" for my weenie 10' plank, and she was still doing great. So we quit and left it at that.

Once back upstairs, however, I got it in my head that I needed a picture for the blog posting I was obviously going to write to document this stupendous occasion. So after I finished cutting up treats to be used for our run-throughs this evening, we went back downstairs armed with the camera (okay, so I use my cell phone for everything...).

Secret was in the middle of going, "Yay, Teeter!" while riding the plank down and moving into her two on/two off position when all of the sudden there was this loud CRASH from the top of the stairs. The boys had knocked over the kid gate I have in place to keep dogs upstairs. Sigh.

Secret was certain that once again the teeter was to blame for this horrifically frightening experience. She flew straight upstairs and wanted nothing to do with any of this. *sob* Not square one AGAIN?!

The good news is that, with MUCH coaxing and MUCH cheese, I finally got her to touch the teeter again. Then I got her to do her bottom position. Then, with about another pound of cheese, I got her to go up & over at the full height. Several times. I took my silly pictures and we were done.

So that is why you might notice that her tail is tucked under herself in these photos. Because she was still, more or less, mostly freaked out by the gate crashing incident. Again, Sigh. BUT, she overcame her fears and still did the teeter, so that's a great step in the right direction.

I suppose the next step (possibly after a few more proofing sessions) is to find something to weight my teeter so that she learns to deal with the rebound. What the heck am I going to use....? I've been trying to come up with an idea and am coming up blank so far. My main issue is that I don't know how much weight I need, so I suppose I just need to experiment. I know I'll need more than "usual" because the crappy PVC base seems to add some tension and it doesn't pivot as freely as, say, a metal base. We'll see.... Time to break out the duct tape for experimenting.

Tonight we go to agility run-throughs at Family Dog Center! Secret seems pooped today, so who knows what to expect.