APD!

We did it! Secret got her last P2 Standard leg this weekend to earn her APD title so that we can move up to P3 for all classes now. I had hoped that we would get that last leg on Saturday, allowing us to move to the Masters ring for Sunday to avoid conflicts, but Secret decided she wanted to stay in her own ring, I guess.  ;o)

In addition to our snazzy new title bling, we also brought home a new harness this weekend! I've been wanting a Julius K-9 harness for Secret for some time now. Yes, I realize that EVERYONE has one and this does not make us special in the least, but I'm in love with the interchangeable patches and just had to have one. I love Kaiser's ComfortFlex Sport harness, but it doesn't have name patches. lol

I'd shopped around a bit online, but I wasn't entirely sure what size Secret would be. I guessed 0, but wanted to be able to try one on. I saw that Best for Pets was going to be vending at the trial this weekend and I was hoping they'd have a pink harness in our size. The last time we saw them was right after they'd vended at Border Collie Nationals and they were all out. This time we scored! I ran over to the booth before our first run, grabbed the only pink size 0 on the rack and asked Jason to hold it for us. It fit perfectly, so I bought it after that first run and we got to wear it the rest of the weekend! Secret did well with it -- it goes on and off very easily and she didn't have any aversion to it going over her head like she did with the collar/leash combos.

Secret's brother, Blizzard, was at the trial this weekend! Although I've kept up with him online, we haven't seen him since our little family reunion the summer after we adopted the puppies. This was the first time I've been able to see Blizzard run in person, so that was pretty awesome. He almost has his MACH already, but this was his first USDAA trial. I see a lot of similarities in the two dogs, that's for sure. If anything, he's not nearly as quirky as Secret.  ;o)  Blizzard is running Champion 26", though, so we won't be having any sibling teams any time soon.

Secret was up first with her P2 Gamblers run. Honestly I thought we had this one in the bag because sheesh, it's weaves that are 12' away. Yeah... Well, it was her first run in a horse arena in 12 months. The temptation of poop overpowered all and she stopped about four poles in to sample a morsel on the ground. So much for that.

Our opening was jump (right), a-frame, a-frame, jump, teeter, tire, jump, jump, dog walk, tunnel -- That's when the buzzer sounded and unfortunately Secret went right up the dog walk again instead of coming back to me. I couldn't get her to stop and she just kept going... Until she hit the halfway point in the middle and bailed off the side. Eek. Sorry, Secret. So by then we'd wasted a ton of time... And then the poop thing happened. Well, I guess we aren't guaranteed a move-up in Gamblers (she was one Q shy of that title).

Luke's Gamblers run was up next. I wasn't so sure about this one for him. I wasn't worried about him doing the teeter at a distance, but that backside was going to be very difficult, especially since he has a tendency to turn towards me on the contacts.

I was right. Totally didn't even come close to getting number two, or any of the other jumps in the sequence for that matter.  ;o)

His opening was jump (left), jump, a-frame, weaves, dog walk, jump, a-frame, weaves, then the buzzer went off when we were on the teeter wasting time. Oh well, good try, Luke.

Next up was Secret's P2 Standard run. I was really, really hoping for a Q in this run so that we could move to the Masters ring on Sunday. It would open up more opportunity for me to work ($$) and let me completely avoid conflicts since we didn't enter any Tournament classes this weekend.

Well, unfortunately it was not meant to be. Secret had a really lovely run; right up to the weaves, where she skipped a pole in the exact spot she had stopped to eat poop in the previous class. In Advanced you have two big opportunities for faults -- refusals on contacts and popping out of the weaves. You can blow the entry, but after that you are out of luck. Darn it. Oh well, stuck in the Starters/Advanced ring for another day, I guess.

Luke's Veteran Standard run was up next. What else can I say but that he freaking rocks?! That jump sequence after the weaves was tricky and getting a lot of dogs, but the big old moose sailed right through it. I pushed to the backside of five, rear-crossed to six, pulled in to 7 and then phew, breathed a sigh of relief. I praised him profusely when we got to the table.

We had a close call going from 17 to 18 when he nearly took the tire, but he had a great call-off and came back for the tunnel. Luke did a great job -- I'm having so much fun running him on these courses! And thankfully, I think he's having fun, too.  :o)

Next up was Secret's very first P3 Snooker run! I worked for quite a while in the morning to come up with a plan that would work for her. I knew doing a ton of 7's would not be the best plan for us considering the amount of yardage involved in the FOUR jump sequence. I did end up going for four reds, though, with a 1-7, 1-6, 1-4, 1-3 plan.

I knew that we had to get through five in the close to Q. Secret was DRAGGING on this run. We were plagued with issues all weekend that held up our runs. Timers weren't working. Equipment changes. Other various issues... Secret doesn't do well being held at the start line, that's for sure....

At any rate, the video for this run was almost painful to watch. I guess I didn't even realize how much she was trotting through this course. Sigh. Oh well, it is what it is. We almost had an off course, but in the end we made it through six in the close (the judge gifted us with that one as she was barely taking off for 6b when the buzzer sounded). It was good enough to earn us 2nd place in the P22" class, but we were one dog shy of having our own SQs, so we were combined with the 16" class and they got the 2nd one.

Jumpers was our last run of the day. After getting up at 4 a.m., my brain just wasn't in this run -- and apparently Secret was kind of done as well. We managed to stay clean up until I totally dropped her on a blind cross out of the number 12 tunnel. Then my brain shut off and also forgot to direct her after the number 14 jump. Maybe I need to just stop entering the last class of the day on these early starts... It wasn't horribly late; probably around 6:00, but it had been a long day.

Thankfully we redeemed ourselves the next morning when we got to START our day with Jumpers. I felt this was a very fun and motivating course for Secret. Despite having barely slept at all the night before (Ms. Prissypants did not like the sleeping arrangements -- the one queen bed was far too full for her liking and she kept jumping on and off all night), Secret was pretty up for this run and was running happy. I also abandoned the idea of a lead-out at the beginning, as I didn't think it was doing us any favors. The only thing I'm really disappointed about is that I totally chickened out on the blind crosses this weekend. Sissy handler.

Secret won the P22" class! She was a full two seconds faster than the second place dog, even! I was thrilled about this, until I was brought back to reality by watching the Masters dogs that were all coming in about four seconds faster than Secret's time. Sigh. Maybe one day I will just accept that she will never be THAT fast. That said, I was still thrilled with Secret's run and elated that she was happy to run again.

I knew that a Super Q was likely not in our cards for Sunday, but I was pretty confident in our ability to pull off another Q at least. This was a course designed to reward fast dogs with good weaves -- aaaaaaand we know that's not Secret. There is no way I could have attempted three 7's on this course and still had a dog willing to work with me.

I opted for the next best thing and kept a happy dog throughout the course. We did 1-7, 1-6, 1-6 and got all the way through the close. Secret likes a-frames, so I was very happy with this plan when I came up with it. I don't believe I saw anyone else execute my plan (well, mostly because almost everyone went for the 7's). That happened a lot this weekend, though... I apparently march to the beat of a different drummer in my Gamblers & Snooker plans, but they work for us so I have to try not to let that sway me!

My Snooker plan was good enough to earn us 1st place in the P22" class! Unfortunately 3 of the 16" dogs got all 7's, so both of the SQ's went to that class. Have I mentioned how fun it is that we are probably almost always going to be combined with the 16" dogs....?

The rings were much more off-balance on Sunday, so Luke continued to sit in his crate while Secret moved on to her P2 Standard run (after a considerable break, as they ran Steeplechase first).

I didn't think this course was quite the "slam dunk" that the previous day's had been, but I certainly thought it was doable. My only "worry" spots were what to do at the chute (I forced a front cross after the teeter) and getting the right end of the tunnel after the weaves (again, did another front cross). I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried about popping the weaves again, though! Thankfully it was a non-issue and we didn't have a problem.

Secret did have a space cadet moment at the start for some reason. Could be because our friend, Rich, was sitting in the other ring videoing our run as he worked the class and Secret LOVES Rich for some reason. Like groveling and almost peeing on herself loves him... I lost her as she looked around before 3 and then she spaced out at the tire. We were fine after that, thankfully, and still managed to come in about 8 seconds under time. I'm thrilled that we didn't have ANY "zombie moments" after the teeter this weekend! Secret's been having issues with spacing out for a few seconds after each teeter at recent trials, but I didn't see her turning around or worrying at all. Hopefully that is behind us.

At any rate, she made it through the course without any bobbles for a Q/1st, which finishes her P2 Standard title and makes her an Advanced Performance Dog! Hooray! On to P3 for everything!

After a very long wait, Luke finally got to run! His Veteran Standard run was up first. I thought this course was a bit friendlier than the one on Saturday, at least for the big guy. The only area in this course where I kind of held my breath was from five to six. I didn't know if he'd be able to get that angle, but he came in and sliced it nicely.

Luke's been doing a great job on the USDAA a-frames and fitting in a front cross after 7 helped me fit in a blind cross after the tunnel so that I wouldn't have to flip him over 9. After that it was pretty smooth sailing. The big guy got his second Standard Q! And I *finally* got one of his runs on video!!

I might be biased, but I think he is doing an absolutely remarkable job for a dog who has never done anything but NADAC.  :o)  I give the big guy a lot of credit for jumping right into these Masters courses!

Secret's final run, P2 Gamblers, was up next. I honestly considered scratching Secret from this run because she didn't need the Q and I really felt like she was done for the day/weekend. I wish I would have listened to my gut because I was right. She wasn't into this run at all. She did a good job, but it was pretty lackluster.

We went jump (center), teeter, jump, jump, a-frame, a-frame, jump, jump, chute, jump, tire and then the buzzer went off. I elected to approach the gamble from the bottom, thinking that a switch would help send Secret out a bit better. Well, maybe, if she had any impulsion or if I wasn't stuck at the line. She paused in front of the tunnel, barked at me while I gestured towards the tunnel and then took the dog walk.

Yup, should have scratched, but I was being greedy and wanted to finish her P2 Gamblers title. Oh well.

Last run of the day! Luke did awesome. He was the first dog to run (being the only Veteran entered in this one) and showed everyone how it's done.

Luke's plan was chute, jump, weaves (although he decided he needed another jump before the weaves...), a-frame, a-frame, weaves, jump, and then the buzzer sounded when he was on the teeter. I saw Luke head-check me before each tunnel but he was a good boy and kept going. Yay for our second Veteran Gamblers Q!

Some day I need to decide if I want to go for the Veteran Versatility title with the big guy. I might try him in Jumpers one of these days, but I just don't think he would enjoy Snooker. We'll see. We've only done two USDAA trials so far and I'll give him a bit more time to get used to things.

If you have made it this far, kudos to you! I'm happy to report that I finally got video from a USDAA trial!! Somehow I didn't get either Gamblers run videoed, but seeing as they were both pretty crappy I'm not too concerned about that.

I did find myself wishing that I'd put Sunday's runs first since they were so much better, but if you wish to see them you'll have to suffer through Saturday.  ;o)

Up next is a NADAC trial in La Crosse the first weekend in March. There is also a USDAA trial at Think Pawsitive that weekend and I was very conflicted... We've still got a NATCH on the line (for both Secret & Luke), though, so I decided to stay in town and try to get that done. We'll shoot for doing one day of USDAA up in the Cities later in the month.

Today I ordered patches for Secret's new harness. No worries, I'll be sure to update when they arrive!

Oh -- and just for the Google search engines -- Our judges this weekend were Sandra Katzen (Masters) and Kirstie Dean (Starters/Advanced). I always Google to look for course maps before each trial, so if anyone is looking for course maps for either of these judges, have at 'em. I thought all of the courses were fun this weekend! Steeplechase had double weaves both days (ugh), but Grand Prix looked like fun. Maybe one of these days I'll actually enter Secret in that again...

Alternate Universe?

I'm not sure what to think here. Tonight Secret chose a tug toy over food...

Whoa.

With some warmer temps the last few days, that foot+ of snow we got started to melt. Unfortunately everything refroze today and the whole yard is a mixture of frozen slush and puddles that break when you step on them.

That means one thing -- basement!

I went downstairs with a pouch of food, planning to play with everyone on the Theraball before dinner. I figured a little core work never hurt anyone going into a trial weekend.

Imagine my surprise when I'm sitting there working Kaiser & Luke on the ball with food and Secret is going to town on a little furry tug (one of the multitude I purchased when attempting to build her toy drive as a puppy). Um, what? I expected to be shoving her out of the way during their turns.

When it was her turn I called her over and she brought the toy. She jumped up on the ball, took a piece of food and then grabbed her toy back. She slid off the ball and started tugging while I had food in my hand! I was a little surprised, to say the least.

This went on for some time and she would go back to chewing on her toy while the boys took another turn. Secret worked for her tug on the ball and even got into a pretty hardcore game of tuggy while on the peanut -- talk about core exercise, right?

She took food when offered, but continued to go back to the toy every time. Crazy. Who'd have thought the day would ever come when the toy would completely and totally trump the food?

I'm really looking forward to our trial this weekend! It should be loads of fun with two dogs who haven't done much of anything all week. Secret is finally going to the chiropractor on Wednesday, too. She is long overdue, so hopefully that keeps her happy & comfy all weekend long.

In other news, look what I made this weekend!  :o)  They are magically delicious. You, too, can dine on delectable unicorn poop if you feel like stabbing yourself in the eye with a fork. The recipe and instructions can be found at this web site.  They were a big hit at work today, which was the point of making them. They just taste like your basic sugar cookie, but they are super-duper pretty when you bite into them! And sparkly. We can't forget the sparkly.

My parents came over yesterday afternoon so that my mom could help slap these babies together. The dogs enjoyed their visit. Maybe a bit too much. Secret is weird....

Furry little nursemaids

I got hit with the flu on Saturday. Just when I thought it had passed (last night), it hit me again this morning. I have to say, the dogs have been wonderful -- Happy to lay around, not terribly demanding and super, duper cuddley. This morning I didn't even get out of bed until 11:00 (after getting up to feed the dogs and call into work at 6 a.m.). Secret may be thinking I'm a giant loser who needs to go outside and play in the above photo, but she hid her feelings well and stuck by my side (after taking herself out mid-morning, running laps in the snow and then bringing it all back to bed with her).

Even Kaiser has come forward for cuddle time, which kind of makes me wonder if I'm dieing... Today he positioned himself on my lap and must have stayed there for a good 15-20 minutes. They seem genuinely concerned when I have a retching fit -- probably because they worry about who would feed them if I fall over dead.

How miserable would it be to be home sick without my furry nursemaids?

We got lucky on the weather front. Well, I suppose it depends on how you define "luck." Last I wrote we were living on a block of ice with snow on the horizon. Snow came; believe me, snow came. It came in amounts large enough that it no longer matters that there is ice beneath it! Our forecasted 3-6" snowfall turned into more like 10-12" and then we've had what the weatherpersons like to call "clippers" the last few nights that have added probably another 3-4" by now. So yes, we have a LOT of snow. The dogs think it's grand.

The giant pile has once again appeared below the deck (the results of shoveling it clear) and that's the BEST THING EVER in Secret's head. She loves to play in that pile. Luke loves to eat it. Kaiser thinks it all kind of sucks, but at least now we've played enough in the yard that he can maneuver through the trampled snow. It was kind of deep for him!

For once I was thankful that we didn't have a trial this past weekend. At this point I'm even kind of glad we don't have one this coming weekend. But the week after that we'll totally be ready.  :o)

Last night of sanity for a while...

If you don't hear from me for a while, it might be because I had to check in to the loony bin.

This stinks. It must be Mother Nature's way of getting back at us for that wonderful, warm & snow-free winter we had last year.

Things have been a mess since the storm on Sunday. Everything packed down and froze just enough that the slightly just-above freezing temperatures weren't able to get everything melted over the last two days. Last night it POURED buckets of rain with a thunderstorm -- in January! We woke up around midnight to a big kaboom. Secret was totally taken by surprise and had a little freak-out. We'd (errr, I'd....) fallen asleep on the couch and she bolted for the bedroom when we heard that. The big crack of thunder was immediately followed by the downpour, so we had to wait a bit for it to let up before the dogs could go out for a final potty break; and then I practically had to shove Secret out the door. She's no fool, she knows it's not supposed to thunder in January.

Tonight the temperatures start to drop and rain is supposed to turn into 3-6" of snow. Then, as if that wasn't awesome enough, we are going to drop into the sub-zeros for a couple of days. Considering my yard is currently a swamp of standing water that will soon be a giant brick of ice covered by snow, that means *no* activity for the dogs for the foreseeable future.  :o(

Last night everything was still ice, so we were stuck indoors. Generally the day after a trial isn't that bad and we can lay pretty low -- but then I remembered that Secret & Luke only had two runs and were plenty full of themselves. We ended up utilizing the basement play room for the first time this year and spent a good 40 minutes down there just tugging and doing short fetches across the room. Everyone was panting and I succeeded in having a quiet night.

Tonight I packed the dogs up as soon as I got home and drove the block or so to a park with a big open area (hey, you try walking a block with dogs who are going bonkers over the Chuck-it and you'd understand why I drove, lol). I'd driven past the park on my way home to confirm that it did, indeed, have a large swath of dry land that we could use for running. Yay!

This is when I learned that Secret's brain falls out of her ears and she apparently does not understand the concept of fetching away from home. She saw the big open area and promptly went, "Wheeee!" She just ran after Luke a few times as he went after his ball, made a few laps for the fun of it and then set about to sniffing everywhere and wandering into neighboring yards (which got her yelled at). I did eventually get her to do several long fetches to get some good sprints in, but I surely would have preferred to run the snot out of her more than I was able to. When it was clear that her brain was completely fried, we packed it in and came home.

So, note to self: Work on your dog's fetching skills away from home....

Meanwhile, we'll be hunkering down and spending our evenings in the basement. Good thing I pumped up the theraball.

Well that was fun

Look! This is what the windshield of my car looked like when we left the trial today! The weather was so super awesome today... It started up mid- to late-morning and Mother Nature couldn't decide what she wanted to do. We experienced freezing rain, sleet and snow over a period of a few hours and it made everything a giant mess. I'm lucky that I live locally, as many of the people attending the trial opted to stay over an extra night to avoid driving in dangerous conditions.

Other that that little inconvenience, we actually had a really good weekend at our NADAC trial!

Secret was just WEIRD yesterday. I think she was abducted by aliens and had her brain swapped out -- with a dog who LIKES EVERYONE. She was in a mood yesterday, that's for sure. She whined & wiggled at nearly everybody she saw. Every dog was her best friend whom needed to be played with. In addition, she was also kind of needy with me and kept jumping up onto me for attention.

Her first run (Regular) was just nuts. She came out of a tunnel, took a sharp turn right and ran behind the tunnel to go visit the bar-setter sitting in the chair! Um, what?! Has she EVER done that? There were at least two other times on course where I thought I was going to lose her to visiting, plus she almost went and said hello again to her new favorite bar-setting friend when she came out of that tunnel again later in the course. Oh my goodness. Thankfully she was more back to normal in the second round of Regular and got a Q.

Chances was a total bust. Right as she started (hoop to a-frame) a ring worker knocked over the gate next to the a-frame, so she had a big-time spook and shut down. I could barely get her to do anything at that point. It didn't help that the course was HARD -- I should have scrapped the distance attempts and just ran with her to make her happy again. Oh well. No NATCH for us this weekend (she needed two Chances Q's).

Secret ran great in Jumpers. She surprised me with her speed right off the start line and she kept it up nicely throughout the course. Poor Secret had a major face-plant on a spot of the course that didn't even require a big turn. I'm not thrilled with how the turf is holding up at Family Dog Center. It is getting slicker and slicker and it seems like dogs are crashing left & right. Secret held it together, though, and still had a very nice time (two seconds slower than Kaiser, who was the fastest of all Elite dogs!).



I don't have any video from today, but today went well, too! I think I made a good decision to keep Secret out of Regular today. She wasn't feeling it in Jumpers this morning. She had a very nice run, but it was definitely lacking the zip of yesterday's run, especially for the first run of the day. Was she sore from her wipeout yesterday? Could be. Or it could be because she and Kaiser ran like crazy loons for about two hours last night after we got home...

Chances today was much more doable and Secret nailed it without a problem -- nice and smooth. That means just one more Q for her first NATCH!



Luke was only 1/4 yesterday, but nothing was really a train-wreck. He took the tunnel under the dog walk in the first round of Regular and I twitched in Chances to pull him off the tunnel just before he was going to enter it. Jumpers was my fault, as usual. Too much push, not enough notice of upcoming turns.

Today was great, though! He had a smoking fast & clean Jumpers run -- fastest of my crew and one of the top times of the day. The Chances course today was one of those that Luke can do in his sleep, although it did have the dog walk/tunnel discrimination and apparently those are optional for him these days.  ;o)

Luke would have preferred to have gotten to play in Regular today, but he seemed to be okay with sitting it out this time. I'm sure it helps that it's at the end of the weekend. I'm going to feel bad for him in Cannon Falls at the USDAA trial when his two runs on Sunday are the last classes of the day -- that will probably be a little harder for him!



Kaiser had a FANTASTIC weekend! Especially considering that he hasn't done a stitch of agility since our last NADAC trial in December. I am thrilled with how consistent he was throughout the weekend. He stayed fast and happy, was listening to all of my turning cues and he didn't get called on a single contact all weekend! I need to trust his dog walk more, too, and trust him to run to the end and stop. He did a GREAT job with that and we greatly reduced time wasted from stopping too high and creeping down. There were several times when he went sailing across the dog walk and I thought for sure he'd fly off, but he skittered to a stop and looked at me -- generally just above the line, but that's better than stopping at the top while I hover! Good boy, Kaiser.

Kaiser got ALL FOUR of his Standard runs this weekend! That makes him my only dog who is 100% qualified for Champs, since he actually has his games Q's, too (Secret & Luke have plenty of Regular, Chances & Jumpers, but zero Tunnelers, Touch-n-Go or Weavers since I don't enter them in those). If he keeps running the way he has been lately, that little fart may do really well at Champs this year (hence why I really, really want to go). He still has the speed that he had in 2011, but he's gained a lot more experience and consistency since then. If we can avoid the "Klee Kai moments" that we experienced in 2011, I'm sure he could make the finals.

Kaiser went 3/4 yesterday and 5/6 today -- No Q's in Chances either day, unfortunately. Today he should have had it, but I thought he was going to come back out of a tunnel on me and moved in such a way that he apparently thought I was rear-crossing. He turned the wrong way, then came back to me through the tunnel. The rest of the course was smooth sailing for him -- and with a dog walk, of course!

In addition to the normal classes, Kaiser also got an Elite Hoopers Q (strategy) and a Touch-n-Go Q for his Outstanding Elite title. He's getting closer to his V-NATCH. Guess we need to keep entering the games classes to get that finished off...

 

Everyone is sacked out now after our fun-filled weekend. We have the next two weekends off before our fun in Cannon Falls.

Secret may get to have a play date at that trial. Yesterday a woman brought her 14 week old (male) border collie puppy by the dog center in an attempt to find suitable playmates for him. Apparently her dogs aren't very nice to him and he hasn't had much exposure to other dogs. We didn't have many puppies at the trial this weekend, but I told her that Secret tends to love puppies -- and border collie puppies especially.

We took the two of them outside and Secret really was wonderful with him. She was play bowing and scooting away from him to try to get him to play, but little Tweed was pretty overwhelmed by the whole thing. He got better, though, and his owner felt it was a very good experience for him. It sounds like they may be at Cannon Falls and she asked if Secret could come "play" with Tweed again. Puppies make her happy, so why not?

I want a puppy....

Snow is gone, but BRRRR

Winter can't make up its mind this year. We had a couple days of high 30's/40's that melted away all of the snow and gave us lots of fun mud to deal with, but then sub-zero temps set in and we are freezing our butts off. The good news is that we also had a ton of wind when it was warmer, so thankfully most of the lakes dried up in the yard. We have one clear running path so the dogs can still play -- at least when it's not as cold as it is today. I'm off work for MLK day, but unfortunately we are stuck inside the house because it's too cold to do anything fun outdoors.

Thankfully I got off my butt and bundled everyone up to go walking yesterday. It was nice & sunny, which helped to take a bit of bite out of the windchill. It was about 14 degrees with a windchill around zero. The dogs certainly didn't mind it at all, not even Kaiser (who can't wear his coat when he is wearing his harness).

We went hiking on the bike trail between Sparta & Rockland. This big open field called our name about a mile or so down the trail. It looked more entertaining than sticking to the trail, so we went and walked the perimeter. May as well take advantage of the mud being frozen! We stayed out for almost a full hour and the dogs were so appreciative of their time out. It was a pretty quiet evening here, which was a nice change from the bouncing off the walls we were experiencing during the mud-fest.

One bonus to having more weekends available is that I can volunteer for transports again! This is something I've always tried to do whenever I can because, after all, Secret was brought up from Kentucky via transport. I feel like it's a good way to pay it back and help out, especially now that I'm not in a good position to foster anymore.  :o(

This handsome fellow is named, "Blue," and was transported to Midwest Australian Shepherd Rescue - MN on Saturday. He's younger, probably two or less, and was a very good boy. I made a day of it and went shopping in Wisconsin Dells with my mother before picking him up and driving him to La Crosse. My mom wasn't a fan of his blue eyes, but I find them very striking! I'm sure Blue won't be in rescue too long -- with his looks & personality I'm sure he'll get snapped up quickly.

Our nice long walk yesterday kept the dogs quiet for quite a while today, but by late this afternoon Secret was getting antsy. I bundled everyone up to go outside to pick up poop and see how everyone tolerated it and it didn't take long for everyone to pretty much say, "this sucks." Well, except Luke; he was all for playing, but in these temps (today it's 0 with wind chills at -15) it's not really even safe to run. Secret just sat there and looked at me, so we all came back in the house.

Kaiser is such a weenie about the cold considering he's a "Northern Breed." One of his favorite spots these days is to lay on the heat register while I'm on the computer. Silly dog. His coat is thicker than ever this year, too. You can just see how plush it is around his neck. He's like a mink!

I finally did trial entries this weekend. Our NADAC entries for FDC next weekend are done and our USDAA entries for the MAC trial in Cannon Falls will go in the mail tomorrow. Because they are both running a full weekend of USDAA in two weeks and because they are both so far ahead in Regular, I decided to cut out those runs on Sunday for Luke & Secret next weekend. That means they'll have four runs on Saturday and just two runs on Sunday. I hemmed and hawed about it (it's "only" $40), but ultimately I decided to save the money, especially since I did get a hotel room in Cannon Falls. Not only that, but Secret never really shines in those last two Regular classes on Sunday anyhow, so why not just do Jumpers & Chances and let her chill the rest of the day?

Kaiser is using the free day I won in the worker raffle and gets to run all 6 classes that day. I figure he deserves it since he doesn't get to play at the USDAA trials anymore. He will probably come along to Cannon Falls, though -- mostly because I apparently have issues and have a harder time leaving him behind than, say, when I ask my parents to watch Luke.

Since I was already spending so much money this weekend, I also went ahead and reserved my room down in Springfield for Champs this year. I really enjoyed staying at the Red Roof Inn last time and wanted to make sure we would be able to stay there again. I scored a King room with fridge & microwave again and put in a request for the first floor, all for like $275 for the entire five days. Not bad. Now I just have to not be totally broke when the time comes to enter.

Public Service Announcement of the day: Apparently you are supposed to clean the beater bar of your vacuum cleaner every once in a while? Definitely more than never, I would guess.

I never claimed to be a good cleaner or even somewhat knowledgeable about these things. My Dyson has been getting worse and worse in recent months -- I often have to go over something like 10 times before it gets sucked up. I just figured the thing is getting old (it's probably 7-8 years old now) and wasn't sucking as well.

A few days ago I noted a post on Facebook where a friend commented about cleaning all the hair out of the brush on the Dyson she just got for Christmas. I thought to myself, "Hmm, you are supposed to do that?"  (shaking my head in embarrassment...)  So today when I got the vacuum out to suck the dog hair off my bed I turned it over and gagged at what I saw.

Um, yeah. I guess you are supposed to do that regularly. I went on YouTube and found a handy little instructional video on how to do it and then got to work at hacking away the 2" layer of nastiness wrapped around my beater bar. There were carpet threads from the apartment wrapped around that sucker.

Imagine how that baby is going to suck now!  :o)

Remedial Tire Training

After having several run-outs at the tire at our trial this weekend, it became glaringly obvious that Secret would benefit from a little "Tire 101" work.

And no, that photo is not current. It's dark and snowy outside, which doesn't make for good picture-taking --- but what is a blog post without pictures? So you get one from September.

Being that it IS all snowy and blah outside, we can't really do much agility training at the moment. But we CAN pry the tire frame out of the snow and bring the wee tire (vs. the super stretched out 24" tire) out for a bit of fun in the snow.

I'm almost positive that the issue Secret has with the tire involves her brushing against it when she jumps. Be it top, side, what have you, she's just sensitive about that. What could be better than working through that issue than jumping through an 18" tire?

Sends and going with her were fine, but Secret showed a definite weakness on her recall, going around the tire on three separate occasions. She wasn't acting like she had any ISSUES with the tire, just that she didn't see any reason for going through it if she didn't have to.

Weather permitting (tomorrow is supposed to rain, followed by snow this weekend, so we may end up with just a whole lot of ICE), we'll keep touching on this in the weeks to come. I expect to have to fill the teeter bank now and then -- coming back to the tire was something I didn't anticipate. But oh well, we'll take it in stride!

This morning I had a brain fart and left the gate open to the big yard when I left for work. It was probably subconscious due to me wearing heeled boots and not wanting to fall on my butt on the slope of ice by the gate... It wasn't until I was on the drive home and wondering how I was going to open the gate in my boots that it occurred to me that I had never SHUT the gate this morning.

Oh my.

I've never left the gate open. Frankly, Secret is destructive enough in the small potty area; I'd be scared to give her full run of the yard every day. I can just count the craters she would dig and see all of the mud she would track into the house... So of course all of these visions were going through my head as I pulled into the garage. What damage would I find?

There was none. Good dogs! But I still don't think we'll make this a habit...

Today I made a hotel reservation in Cannon Falls for our USDAA trial next month. I've decided to do both days and ultimately driving two hours back and forth each day is a little much. I've done 90 minutes to Zumbro Falls, but those trials are small and don't start until 9 a.m. each day. I think this will work out much better, although we are going to be stuck sharing a Queen bed and I'm NOT looking forward to that.

Being awesome is exhausting

Yesterday was a LONG day. We got up at 4:00 a.m. to make the drive up to On the Run in Ham Lake, MN. I actually pushed back my alarm time a bit because I decided I didn't really care if I made it in time for the first walk-through. Luke's Veteran Gamblers run was our first run of the day and there were 60+ dogs to run before him. Considering it's Gamblers and I didn't have a whole lot riding on his USDAA debut, I figured we could wing it if we had to.

We had an uneventful drive up, though, and the trip was shorter than I recalled it being last spring on our first visit to OTR. It ended up being just under 3 hours and we arrived about twenty minutes before 8:00 a.m.

I hauled my crates in on the first trip, hoping to actually find a spot after everyone had already set up on team day the day prior. Yeah.... No such luck. I was hoping to be able to find a spot to set up Secret's crate and the playpen, but I couldn't even find spots to set them up in separate areas of the room! Come on people, can we please be a little more thoughtful about our crate set-up?

One woman did make room for me by removing her "reserved" space for her friend who was only coming on Sunday, but it was only enough space for two crates. Luckily I had planned ahead for this, but it meant that two dogs would be sharing crate space for the day. Kaiser normally sticks pretty close to Luke in the playpen, anyhow, so I didn't think it would be the end of the world. Sorry, Luke.

 

I did manage to fit a walk-through in before everything started, and I have to admit I was glad to get out there and get a feel for the lay of the land. This IS my first time running a Masters Gamblers course, after all. The courses I'm posting today are all courtesy of judge Greg Fontaine. I was excited to have him as a judge because I've been following his course blog that he started a while back. I like his design ideas and was looking forward to seeing what he would throw at us -- I wasn't disappointed; we had a lot of fun with these courses!

I didn't see a single soul do what I did with Luke in the 60+ dogs that ran before us, but I know my dog and I stuck with my plan. I started at the far right jump and went to the weaves, weaved back and then took the dog walk, making sure to shape his entry to make it "big dog safe."  :o)  Then we turned to take the jump to the a-frame. I let him exit the frame and turned him around me before sending him to the tunnel, as (sadly) none of my dogs have actually practiced the skill of turning or flipping into a tunnel... We turned back into the tunnel again and then went back up and over the a-frame. I was hoping the buzzer would go off right about then, but it didn't so we ended up taking the tire and the jump after it. I believe the buzzer sounded at that point and Luke took the tire again as I got us turned around in the right direction (by the way, he does fit through the 20" tire -- I was concerned!!).

I wanted to handle the gamble from the inside because handling it from the other side would run me right into the wall (the line where the gamble ends on the left was literally the wall in this arena). I was afraid that would kill our impulsion, so I stuck to the inside plan. Luke easily sent to number two and turned nicely back to me. He looked VERY strongly at the off course jump next to me (so many dogs took it) but listened to my "out" cue to take number 3. Thank god he has a good send on him because before he hit 4 I almost ran into the jump at the end of my gamble zone. A good many dogs probably would have stopped from how quickly my motion stopped, but Luke is a good boy and finished the line while I tried to keep from falling on my face over the line. He Q'd in his very first USDAA run! Yay, Luke!! Only about 25% of the Masters/P3 dogs managed to Q on this course, so I was quite proud of him. He ended up with 52 points (32 in the opening).

I knew I didn't want to follow Luke's plan with Secret because I typically avoid the weaves whenever possible -- especially at the very beginning! My preference was still to handle from the middle, though, mostly because it just felt better, but also because there were more obstacles to waste time on -- and since I apparently am fairly inconsistent in guessing how much time stuff takes for us, we ended up needing that.

I started with the jump to the right of the chute and traveled up the middle to the a-frame, then pushed her right and did the two jumps to the teeter. We had no hesitation going onto the teeter, but Secret did have one of her momentary blackouts that seem to be following her teeter performances lately. She does the teeter, she doesn't seem scared, but when she exits it she freezes and wanders a bit.

I got her head back and sent her into the tunnel under the frame. She came out happy and barked at me, so thankfully she got over the teeter issue quickly enough. I sent her back in the tunnel and called her up and over the a-frame when she came out. I fully expected the buzzer to go off right about there, but it didn't so we continued on the same track I took with Luke. Oh my lord, I thought the buzzer would never sound! Secret went all the way down to the jump above the chute on her own and then came back up and I think was through the tire again before the thing actually went off.

I wasn't set up the best I could have been, but thank goodness Secret is such an honest dog and continued on to the next obvious obstacle without much help from me. She jumped back into me nicely and I scooped her around the wing and sent her out to the last jump. Nice job, Secret! She got a Q and first place with 59 points!

Luke's Veteran Standard run was up next. Honestly, when I entered this I had no idea what to expect. Gamblers is one thing because I can design my own course and then he just has to do a small predetermined bit. A Masters Standard course is new territory for both of us, so I pretty much just went in on a wing and a prayer.  ;o)

Well wouldn't you know it, but my big 'ol NADAC dog did a pretty bangin' job on this course. I tried to shape that opening line the best I could and we managed to get through six without dropping a bar (somehow!). Luke did a nice turn from the tunnel up to the frame and I was able to fit in a front cross on his exit so that I would be able to shape the entry to the weaves. I praised him profusely when he nailed his table without thinking of bouncing off.

The next sequence is where I had hemmed and hawed during my course walk. What I *wanted* to do was to lead out to the landing side of fourteen and serpentine the sequence, wrapping Luke to the outside of jump 15. The angle from the table to 14, though, was set in such a way that I was concerned about having a run-out past the jump, especially since we pretty much never practice jumping into me. We also never practice wraps, which is why I was hesitant to wrap him to the inside like about 98% of my peers did.

I handled the sequence from the take-off side of 14 and did not time my switch/flip cue well at all. Luke stopped short after 15, turned around and back-jumped it. Oh drat, that was totally my fault. He finished beautifully with an AWESOME teeter (first in competition, mind you!), then a rear cross at 18 and finished on my left. Nice job, big guy. Very nice job.

Secret's P2 Standard course didn't have any spots that made me go OH MY GOD. The teeter was at the end of the course, which made me happy, as I feel she's less likely to refuse it when she's got some flow going.

We did have a hiccup at the tire, as for whatever reason she just decided she wasn't going to do it and ran around it. I stopped her short before she could take jump 5, causing her to bark and sass at me. I sassed right back and her and told her to take the darn tire, but our momentum was gone for the sequence and I ended up rear crossing on the landing side of 5 (ugh) -- I strongly dislike rear crossing on the flat, but it worked. I probably could have fit in a blind cross between 7 and 8, but I held up and sent her in to the tunnel before I crossed behind. I front crossed the bottom of the a-frame to help shape the weaves and she had a lovely entry. I'd say her weave speed was middle of the road; not the fastest, but it's certainly been worse.

Secret drove nicely to the table and plopped right into a down, but then pretty much instantly sprang up and barked at me. lol I got her back down quickly and she stayed there for the remainder of the count. Despite the fact that I totally hovered, Secret entered the teeter, again without hesitation. Just like she had in Gamblers, though, she had another blackout moment where she wandered for a few steps behind me as I front crossed her for the closing sequence. She snapped out of it and finished nicely.

Her time was 55.07 and SCT for this course was 56. Nothing like cutting it close! It does concern me slightly regarding what will happen when we move up to Masters. Obviously we had the time-wasting blooper at the tire, but we didn't waste THAT much time. It looks like our P3 runs will have to be pretty darn flawless. Well that's silly, really, because they have to be flawless to Q. No refusals in Masters/P3! This was Secret's second P2 Standard Q, so she just needs one more before we find out how we stack up against the big dogs.

Since Luke was done for the day, Secret was up next in P2 Snooker (although we had a super long break while everyone else ran Steeplechase and Masters Snooker).

I still struggle with strategy for this game. I tried not to obsess over it too much earlier in the day, but I really sat down and tried to figure out a plan while they ran the Masters class (the set-up was very similar).

None of the "safe" plans really appealed to me, plus I figured that if Secret Q'd in this run we'd be moving up to P3 -- That just seems overwhelming to me, so I thought I'd push myself to come up with something with a higher amount of points to see if we could do it.

I started on the right red and did the 7 sequence, then ran over to grab the lower left red. We went back and did the 7 again and Secret pulled very nicely between the a-frame and jump 6 (the judge was also in that small space.... but this probably actually helped because Secret looked at me, likely asking why he was in our way) to take the red up top. We took 5 on our way to the next red and then took 3 before we wrapped back to start the closing. I had debated taking 2 after the red and then back-jumping to start the close, but that's not behavior I tend to encourage.... I decided that doing a couple of wraps would be a better plan and Secret wrapped them nice and tight!

It was smooth sailing through the next few obstacles. I did a sort of cruddy blended front cross at 6b. Secret seemed all nice and happy until we got to the tire and she again skirted around the side of it. I thought, "oh well, at least we got through 6," as I fully expected the buzzer to go off on us. It didn't, though, and I was able to correct her and get over the last jump without the buzzer going off.

Somehow she was still 5.2 seconds under course time. TOTALLY didn't expect that. Secret's 53 point run was 10 points higher than the 2nd and 3rd place dogs in our class! Maybe we are ready for P3 Snooker after all! We'll find out, I guess....

Jumpers was the last class of the day and it was getting late. There were 415 runs at the trial on this day and I had predicted that it would get done around 8 p.m. It was about 7:15 when Secret ran Jumpers. I have to give her credit -- she was still on and ready to go, but my mind and body were failing me after getting up at 4 a.m.

A few dogs prior to our run a dog went potty on the start line. This is the only thing I can come up with for Secret's totally weird and distracted behavior before we started. I had her engaged and giving me "high 10's" before we started, but when the "go" sounded she started wandering and I thought for sure she was going to end up in that tunnel. Thankfully I snapped her back out of it and took off for the first jump. She was "game on" at that point and surprised me with how much speed she was giving me on this last run of the day.

I did a blind cross as she took off for jump four and beat her to six to get a nice tight turn to seven. I went with her to eight to shape that turn as well and then raced her through the tunnel sequence. Once she entered 10 I turned to start up the line to beat her for the front cross between 13 and 14. This is where my brain shut off and I completely failed to shape or support the next few jumps. Thank goodness Secret saved my butt and flung herself over them just in time.

I barely remembered my plan in time to get in place for my blended front cross between 17 and 18. I think I saw two other people do this plan, but I decided to stick with it because I figured A) Secret was sick of wraps after that Snooker course and B) the blended cross would help keep up her momentum better than a wrap because I would stay ahead of her. It worked beautifully and I actually heard a few people in the crowd make a remark about it. And THAT would be my problem -- I heard the peanut gallery and then my brain ceased to function. My body couldn't recover fast enough by the time my brain came back to life and somehow I managed to pull Secret to the side of the second to last jump. There was no point in fixing it and her momentum was back up so we just finished the last jump for an off course/E. I was bummed not only that I screwed it up, but that I didn't even get a finishing time for the course, as it was really a lovely run. Oh well, there will be others. I'm just thrilled with how up she was that late in the day!

There was a lot to be thrilled about, really! We didn't have any refusals on contacts, Secret had numerous gorgeous & tight wraps, and HOLY CRAP you should have seen her tugging before runs! Yes, she's still tugging for food, but I was getting some serious sitting-back grunting tugs from her. Happy, happy, joy, joy! She didn't seem stressed at all, and the waiting area at OTR can get pretty cramped with some very high-drive dogs playing all around her. Super awesome.

And I couldn't possibly have been happier with Luke. One of the best things people can say to me after our runs is, "You can tell he just loves being out there and running." Yes, yes he does. I'll be very sad if the day ever comes when you can't see the joy in his face or hear him barking when he runs agility. I wasn't sure how he would handle USDAA, but I feel he didn't think it was half bad, so we'll probably try again. I don't know yet if I'll push him for Jumpers or Snooker, but I don't see why he can't continue to play in Gamblers and Standard. He seemed comfortable jumping 16" again, too, so I'm not concerned about that at this point, either.

Poor Kaiser, he was a trooper. I took him out a couple of times on his own to give him attention, but he was not a happy camper when Luke got to run and he didn't. He settled down once Luke was done for the day, thankfully, and they did well in their cramped little crate. I feel confident in my decision not to jump him indoors at 12" anymore, though. There is just such a drastic difference in his whole demeanor at 8" vs. 12", and I need agility to be fun for him, not stressful.

I was so very thankful for my decision to get a hotel room last night instead of driving home that late. I knew it just wouldn't be safe driving that tired, so I booked a room at the closest La Quinta (yay for reward points!). We got to the hotel around 8:00 p.m. and everyone crashed after dinner. We had a lazy morning, getting up at 7:00 (that's lazy for Kaiser) and then took our time before leaving. We hit the road around 8:45 or so. I had considered stopping at a mall up in that area to check out a store a friend had told me about, but I found out that it didn't open until 11:00 and there was no way I was going to putz around at the hotel that long! The dogs and I all wanted to get home.

Next up is the NADAC trial in La Crosse in a couple of weeks. The USDAA trial in Cannon Falls is our only trial for February, so I'm considering doing both days of that one. If Secret Q's in Standard on Saturday she could move to the "big ring" for everything on Sunday. That's my only hesitancy; running in two rings stinks... Hopefully we could work through the conflicts, though, because I'm really looking forward to working towards that PDCH!  :o)

A Snowy End to 2012

I've given up hoping for another snow-free winter like we had last year. As awesome as it was to continue training through January and February, there is a certain amount of fun that comes with the dreaded white stuff.

We got about 4 to 5 inches of super fluffy snow (the fun kind!) yesterday, so we took advantage of playing in it this morning since I didn't have to work. Have I mentioned lately how nice it's been to step back from the shelter? I miss being more involved there, but I've learned how important it is to have down time now and again to recharge. The biggest bonus is that I don't resent going there anymore, so everyone benefits. I'm working tomorrow and New Years morning, then only one weekend in January. And you know what, I'm kind of sad about that now...

December has spoiled me, what with having to use up all of my vacation at work. It's going to be hard to go back to working a full week again! But no worries, I'm still off Monday & Tuesday of this coming week. Maybe the house will get cleaned yet.... Who am I kidding?

I'm not sure if having me around more is what has been turning Secret into a possessive bitch lately or what. She's been attempting to guard Kaiser away from me more than usual the last few days, for which my response is to invite him into our space and tell her to knock it off. This morning I was sitting at the computer and they got into a fight. I don't even know what prompted it, but it was NOT okay and clearly started by Secret. It was all noise and gnashing of teeth, but it's still enough to unnerve me.

Kaiser turns five tomorrow! I find it so hard to believe, because to me he stays the perpetual puppy of the family. Luke turns nine only two days later, on Tuesday. Crazy.

This has been a year full of changes, no doubt. All of the uncertainty when the family business was struggling, being unemployed, finding a new job.... The dogs have adjusted better than I could have hoped for, considering how drastically different their own lives are now. I can't imagine having gotten through it without them. It would be pretty depressing to come home to nothing!

We've had plenty of changes in our dog life as well. By far the biggest would be taking the plunge to start showing in a new organization. Secret has conquered a lot of fears this year -- dealing with the teeter and all of the other "new equipment," that weird slatted dog walk issue that cropped up mid-year, traveling alone -- oh wait, we didn't conquer that one.  ;o)  Trials in general seem to be causing her a lot less stress and there are many areas where she really shines (namely, anywhere but the weaves...).

Some of my dog friends were recently talking about goal setting -- as in, do you make them and do you tend to achieve them. Goals have always been an area where I find I struggle. Now my job requires that I come up with them each year, so you can imagine how much anguish that causes me. lol

So much of the future is unknown, especially when you are dealing with other living beings. Injuries can happen, someone could get sick, who knows. I always have an "end goal" in my sights with regard to agility that starts on the first day we trial -- get the Championship titles. Do other people not set that same goal? To me it seems silly to set anything smaller, because those will undeniably be achieved on the way to the bigger goal. And I don't ever set dates to get things by because honestly it's not going to alter my life at all if we get it or not... Would it have been nice to finish Secret's NATCH in 2012? Sure, but we didn't, so we'll do that in 2013. I'd hardly call that a "goal" for 2013, though, considering she's two Q's away and it's highly unlikely that she won't get it eventually.

See, I stink at goals. I'm too practical.  lol

My goals since starting USDAA have always been to get her a PDCH. Why else would we be there? If my goals were to get as many CH titles on her as possible I suppose we could start AKC or CPE, but that's not what drives me. I don't know what drives me.... Maybe that should be my goal for 2013, to figure that out.  ;o)  Ultimately I do agility because I like spending the time with my dogs and I love being around awesome people who share my passion and understand me. That's not going to change no matter what titles are on the line.

I do really want to attend NADAC Champs this year, but that will come down to finances, not qualifying. We'll see how the year goes, I guess.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to one and all! I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday!

Today has been a quiet day here. I worked at the shelter this morning -- This is how I have truly ENJOYED my Christmas mornings for the last three years. I only had six dogs, largely due to a hugely successful adoption promotion we recently had -- how awesome is it that so many animals found homes before Christmas?!

My brother & his family had to get back to Chicago today, which means that we had Christmas with my mom's side of the family on Sunday instead of today -- With nothing else planned for the day, I attempted to go see Les Mis with my parents, but who knew the movies were so crazy popular on Christmas day?! The 1:40 showing was sold out and the next one wasn't until after 5:00. The line was well out the door, so we decided against seeing anything else and just came home. I've spent all day hanging with the dogs and reading The Hunger Games, which my nephew brought up with him from Chicago. Yeah, I tend to be a bit behind on literature crazes.

Today was my last of SIX days off in a row. Honestly, I can't even tell you what day of the week it is anymore, so in that respect it will be nice to return to work tomorrow. The dogs and I have enjoyed our downtime together, although they probably would have preferred a bit more excitement. Luke pulled a muscle while playing fetch last week, so even that has been quite limited for them lately. I've eased up the last few days, though, and everything seems to be going okay for him -- so the dogs quite enjoyed their frisbee time today. In between that, Secret has been SUPER cuddly lately...

We had a white elephant gift exchange with my mom's side of the family. My cousin stole the dog-themed gift basket from me.  :o(  Brat.  But WIN, he gave me the big tuggy rope with tennis balls attached to it, claiming that his wee Min Pin would never play with it -- He just wanted the chewies. That would be the extent of the Christmas gifts the dogs received this year... Sorry dogs, I'm a terrible mother. Not only do I make you dress up in antlers, but I also fail to get you any gifts.

Life returns to normal now. The holidays are over. Secret & Luke are entered in a USDAA trial on January 5th, so we have that to look forward to in the new year! Yup, I decided to enter Luke and withhold Kaiser. Luke gets to run Veteran Standard & Gamblers, so that should be interesting fun. Secret is entered in Standard, Gamblers, Snooker (all P2) and Jumpers (P3) -- I kept her out of PSJ since she doesn't need any more Q's at the moment and we won't be sticking around for round 2. I might wing it and see how late the day goes before I decide on staying over before driving home. Have I mentioned lately how nice it would be to have USDAA trials closer to home?......

The Snowpocalypse That Wasn't

Happy End of the World! As you can plainly figure out for yourself, we are still here and the world didn't end today on this, the last day of the Mayan calendar.

This day also coincided with a "giant storm" that turned out to be pretty sad (at least in terms of Wisconsin winter storms). Don't get me wrong -- we had snow and we had wind, but it was far from the epic proportions they were obsessing over on the news.

We ended up with a sad little 5" or so that mostly got blown into drifts here and there. It was also fairly wet & heavy snow, not the fun fluffy stuff that the dogs enjoy so much. No worries, though, they are making the most of what we have. Yesterday morning Secret plunged face-first into the snow that was building up on the deck. Weirdo.

I was scheduled to have the morning off yesterday (Thursday) due to Secret's vet appointment, but with the blizzard in the forecast I elected to shuffle my days off around a bit so that I could avoid driving and just stay home. That means that I don't go back to work until Wednesday now! The dogs seem to think it's pretty awesome to have me home all day.

Secret and I just walked up to her vet appointment yesterday because I hadn't cleared the driveway yet. It was a quick & easy appointment. I did her bordetella vaccination at home before we went - this was an epic failure last year and I figured if worse came to worse I could say screw it and just have them do it when we went. She still put up a stink over the whole thing, but I think I actually got the majority of it up her nose this year.

With that out of the way, Secret wasn't actually due for anything other than her annual physical and heartworm test. Easy-peasy in and out. I discussed her chiropractic schedule with Dr. Randy and he didn't really have anything to add to that -- we agree that she is freakishly long and there isn't much we can do about it.

Today I tortured the dogs with a Christmas photo shoot. You'll have to wait for those pictures, although if you are on Facebook you've already seen them... Since the pictures turned out kind of cute, I decided this afternoon to make a Christmas card -- something I haven't done in years. I made treats to take to the vet's office, though, and I thought it would be nice to have a card to go with them. I thought Dr. Marta and crew in Viroqua would like a card, too, so I'll be sending that off in hopes that it reaches them before Christmas.

Tomorrow I'll blow a bit of time delivering our Christmas goodies to our favorite vet staff and then I suppose the dogs will expect me to entertain them. Tonight they convinced me to take them along while I did some last-minute Christmas shopping. Yeah... That was fun. Actually, I was kind of glad to have the company as I spent 40 minutes attempting to get out of the parking lot at Farm & Fleet. It probably would have been a bit better had I not waited until everyone got out of work to go shopping...

On a somewhat training-related note (since we have done zero agility to speak of since the last trial) --- Since Secret is doing so well with her pre-dinner tugging, I decided to switch it up and change out the toy. I've been able to use either tug leash successfully, but had not tried other toys yet. Yesterday I pulled out an udder tug. Square one. Very interesting! Guess this little game will continue for a while, changing out toys until she happily & immediately tugs anything presented.

It snowed....

Well yay... It snowed. The weather-guessers have been threatening the possibility for the last week, but the forecast kept changing. To be safe, I did put all of my agility equipment away on Friday. I'll never forget the year that all of my jumps got frozen to the ground for an entire winter a few years ago. It's a pain to play around them and probably not that good for the equipment, either. The only thing I took directly to the basement was the table. The rest can wait for another day.

It's hard to hate the snow when the dogs love it so much. As I type this, Secret has been outside for over an hour playing SO happily in it. Kaiser & Luke joined her in a game of chase and now that Luke is back in the house Kaiser is keeping Secret entertained. Seriously, she is going bonkers out there. Who knew she liked snow THAT much?

It's hard to say how much we've got so far. It's very wet & heavy, but there must be close to 3" out there by now.

It made for a fun day at the trial. It was a very, very small trial today anyhow -- made even smaller by those who opted to not take their chances with the weather. We started at 8:00 a.m. and our last run of the day was around 12:10 p.m.

I don't have video from today (seriously, it was SMALL and everyone was so busy running or working that I didn't even get my camera out). The dogs all ran well and were on their best behavior all weekend. I didn't even mention that yesterday, but Secret did SO WELL in her crate all weekend! I crated in the back of the arena again and used the same thick blanket (better at blocking movement/noise) that I did at the USDAA trial where she seemed to stay quiet. I did not hear her bark even once the entire weekend. Not once! That makes me so happy and I think she rests a lot more in that situation as well!

Jumpers went well for all. It was nice and flowing, so I managed to use all blind crosses in Secret's run. Gotta keep it fun one way or another.  ;o)  Luke sailed through the course nicely, so we managed to get the last of the Jumpers Q's that he needs for the next NATCH. Phew, glad that's out of the way -- although it would be kind of fun to have gotten a NATCH on something other than Chances for once! Kaiser was a little twitchy in Jumpers because I over-handled a few tight spots, but he stayed with me for a Q.

Chances was up next and while it didn't look like a bad course, it ended up being pretty brutal. The overall success rate in Chances this entire weekend was dismal, which might be why our judge decided to give us all a mulligan and offered the opportunity to try it again before we switched to Open. Sadly it wasn't for points, but who hasn't wanted the chance to try a Chances course again?

On Secret's first run I handled a turn-away/send out from the wrong side of the hoop (something I only noted when I watched one of the two successful runs). So on her second go I changed my tactics and she did a beautiful job! It was just lovely -- and not many dogs managed to get it on even the second try, so I was very proud of her.

Luke had gotten that turn/send out, but then didn't get the additional switch after that jump. I fixed my blunders with him and he also got it on the second go. Kaiser, being Kaiser, did even worse on the second go round and decided to just make up his own course.

Luke Q'd in both rounds of Regular. Yay! Secret decided I'd used up my runs for the day with that extra Chances run and pretty much said, "Meh, I'm done," on the second round of Regular (the first was lovely!). She made it through, but we had all sorts of blunders that more or less stemmed from me not supporting enough (because I assumed she'd get there on her own -- so yes, I was being lazy, too). Her weaves were very slow and we had two big redirects that sucked up a lot of time, so Secret ended up being 0.6 seconds over time in Round 2 -- Which means she got one of those stupid 5-point Q's to screw up all of my nice round numbers.

Kaiser didn't have a good day in Regular. Fifteen runs in a weekend might be a little much for him. He nailed all of his contacts, I'll give him that! His first run was really nice but we failed to get a turn following the a-frame and he took an off-course hoop. I loved his dog walk in that run, though. It was the second-to-last obstacle and he ran across and nailed the stop at the end (vs. creeping like we usually do). In Round 2 he decided he'd had enough and took the weirdest turn/path ever to take an off course hoop. This hoop was also the finish hoop, so I guess he just thought he was done for the day. I debated just ending the run there, but it was kind of a naughty turn away so we did the last few obstacles, which included a really pretty a-frame contact (especially for the end of the weekend where he usually short-strides them).

So Secret & Luke ended up tied in the Q department with 5.5 each. Kaiser came home with 9 Q's and a new title ribbon -- Family Dog Center has a new style new title ribbon that I should really get a picture of, but my floors need cleaning and I'd be embarrassed to set up for a ribbon picture.  ;o)  Maybe next time.

The next NADAC trial isn't until the end of January, so there won't be any more NATCH opportunities yet in 2012. We actually don't even have any more trials the rest of the year, so I guess it's okay that the snow has come because now we just get to play for the next few weeks.

Oh, and speaking of play -- Secret continued to tug all day today and put in even more effort than she did yesterday -- actively sitting back and jerking the leash a few times. I am happy, happy, happy about the progress we've made in such short time! And I'm sure everyone we trial with is happy as well because Secret no longer sits and barks the entire time we are waiting to go in the ring....

It's Working!!

You know that crazy idea I had recently that involved making Secret tug for her dinner? Well guess what, I do believe it's working.

She's been getting to the point where she is actually offering resistance and increasing the amount of time she will tug before eating. I've been asking for small increases in duration each time and it appears to be getting through to Secret. The first tugs were more or less borne of frustration, but now she's catching on and seems to understand that tug = eat.

Today we had a NADAC trial here in La Crosse. My expectations were no different than with dinner -- If you want these treats in my hand, you must tug. Truthfully, this was probably a step beyond what I'm asking for at dinner, as I haven't asked for her to tug when I actually have food IN my hand. But it clicked for her and she was totally game!

We actually got some GOOD tugging. Not crazy tugging like you see from so many dogs at trials, but good honest-to-goodness interacting and even a little play growling and a slight shake once, even! Hey, I'll take it! We're making HUGE progress!

And I do think it made a difference in her runs today. Secret was a happy girl -- all except for Chances. That was the run where I had to pull her out of her crate and go straight into the ring. We barely had any time to get pumped up and it showed in her run. We had plenty of time before each of her other three runs, though, and they were great! Secret even beat Luke's times in every run! In her first round of Regular, Secret had the 2nd fastest time in the class, with the average being about 5 seconds slower (right around where Luke was).

Secret was 3/4 today -- We didn't get Chances (barely anybody did...), so she will not be getting her NATCH this weekend. Oh well! Hopefully we can get a Chances Q tomorrow to increase our odds for January!

I'll be curious to see how tomorrow goes with regard to the tugging. She's always so pooped by the end of the day on Sunday, so I'm curious to see if this jazzes her up at all.



Luke was his usual crazy, happy self. He was a bit of a wild child and was slipping around the arena today. He knocked a bar in the first round of Regular for one of those stupid 5-point Q's, but somehow managed to keep the rest up (despite a lot of ticking). Luke wasn't even close in Chances, which means that he won't be getting a NATCH this weekend, either -- But he did knock out a nice Jumpers run, so he got one of those out of the way, at least!



Kaiser actually has two videos to share. He got to run last night because I won a free day in the worker raffle at the last trial. Kaiser was the obvious choice because Luke isn't running games anymore and I really don't feel Secret is up to three days at this point in her career. I could have, you know, saved money and applied it to Saturday or Sunday, but we're only running five runs each day this weekend and Friday had six. Yay for more runs!

Kaiser gave me the most bang for my (free) buck and knocked out 6/6 runs last night. He likes games, so it's not much of a stress. I think we got a gimmee in the first round of Touch-n-Go because I'm pretty sure that he went through an off course hoop, but you win some & you lose some...

He finished his V-NATCH points in Weavers and got his Outstanding Elite Tunnelers title, which means that he just needs three more Tunnelers and four more Touch-n-Go Q's for his Versatility NATCH. Oh, and I won the worker raffle again last night for another free day! Sweet!!



Today was rough (on both me & Kaiser) since we didn't get home until after 11:00 p.m. last night. He was a trooper, though, and put in some nice runs. Only two were Q's and they aren't pretty Q's, but I'll take them. I'm thrilled any time we bring home Regular Q's!  :o)

Petco sent me a 20% off coupon last night that had to be used today, so we swung by there on the way home from the trial. They correctly peg me as a sucker, because when I have coupons I buy stuff we don't need. On my way to the food, I walked past a Kong display that said, "Buy one, get one 25% off." So of course, I did. I got a couple of the Squeezz toys. We have these at the shelter and I've always been impressed by how long they keep squeaking. Well that was a stupid choice, I've been listening to obnoxious squeaking since we got home... But the dogs think they rock, so yay.

Right now Kaiser & Secret are going bonkers in the back yard. Time to conserve energy for another big day tomorrow!

Big Dreams, Tiny Budget

It's been a while, but today is another dog agility blog event day. The subject is "backyard training," and if you'd like to see what everyone else has to say you can visit this site:  http://dog-agility-blog-events.posterous.com/pages/backyard-training

I haven't had a chance to visit to read what everyone else has to say yet, but I'm hoping to get some good ideas! Since August of 2008, 99% of my training has all been done in my backyard. Both Kaiser and Secret were solo projects taught at home with no outside help. Part of the reason is because there were/are no local classes that fit my needs, but also because training just gets expensive -- especially with three dogs!

When I first started agility with Luke in 2007 he was my only dog. I quickly became addicted to the sport and we enrolled in session after session of weekly classes with no break. I'd often take a private or semi-private lesson each week in addition to our group classes, and sometimes I'd even go down for ring rental on another day. Paying for all of that training time adds up, there is no doubt.

What ultimately led to me getting serious about finding a way to train on my own were the struggles Luke and I had in the NADAC Chances class.  When we got into Elite we just COULD NOT Q. We literally went over 10 months without a single Q when we moved up (and we were trialing two or three times a month back then!) and it was getting depressing. The local training classes did not touch on or encourage distance work at all, so I felt the only way we were going to see any improvement was if I found a way to work on my own. Thankfully I feel that my experience riding and training horses for so many years really helped my intuition for learning agility and I felt that I could be fairly successful on my own.

The more I got into agility, the more I found myself backing away from horses. I was approaching 30 and had been renting my apartment for over 8 years, so I decided that it was as good a time as any to start house shopping. I would sell my younger horse, Norman, to help with a down payment towards the new house, which was more or less the beginning of the end of my equestrian life. While house shopping, I stressed to my realtor that a big flat empty yard was ALL that mattered. She struggled greatly with this request, but eventually we found the perfect property. My yard is 100'x100' fenced with no obstructions -- unfortunately it's in the town of Sparta, but you can't win them all...

My older horse passed away shortly after I put the offer in on the house, so I was horseless as we moved forward with the deal (unfortunately the only reason I was looking in the Sparta area was because that's where my barn was....). I found myself selling off all of my tack and equipment to put towards my new passion in life --- buying agility equipment! Before I moved in, I had a couple of tunnels, my dog walk & a-frame were ordered and all of my PVC was cut and ready to assemble into jumps.

Being able to train at home has been such a blessing and has completely changed my outlook on dog training in general. I can't imagine going back to a group class anymore because it goes against how I train my dogs. I love having the ability to set an exercise and work each dog for five or ten minutes. This keeps them fresh, happy and excited about agility. All the work that we do is in drive because I don't have to worry about bringing them up & down over the course of an hour long group class.

I can work on what I want/what we need. Training at home was THE KEY to building Luke's distance skills and is largely why Kaiser & Secret both have had good distance from day one. So many people at trials have asked me for help and I struggle with advice since I know how difficult it is to work on those skills in a class environment when the instructor and other students aren't interested in learning those skills.

There are negatives to training exclusively at home, no doubt! I don't have anyone to tell me how many stupid handling errors I am making or give me advice on how to correct this. I video as many of our training sessions as I can for this reason, but it would still be nice to have one on one feedback on occasion.

When you have a weekly class that you pay to attend, you tend to be guaranteed to train at least one day a week. At home, sometimes it just seems like a whole lot of effort to set a course, especially when it typically takes longer to set/take down a course than the time I spend actually running it with the dogs. It was great when I had my cousin, Bethany, coming over to train with me regularly because that helped a lot with my motivation. I miss that, for sure. My motivation was kind of lacking this year -- I never even got my contacts out of the garage this whole season! It was the year of jumping drills & teetering; that's about it.

I also miss getting to run drills that someone else comes up with. Many times when you set up exercises for yourself, you tend to set them to your strengths. I dubbed this year the "Year of the Backyard Dog" and set numerous drills from the Clean Run article of this name in order to attempt to push myself out of my comfort zone more often. I love these drills! They are easy to set with a fairly minimal amount of equipment, they tend to fit into a space that allows for easy stationary video and they test a wide variety of skills. If you look, you can even find ones that focus on specific equipment. This came in super handy when it came time for me to train the broad jump earlier this year after we started USDAA!

Living in Wisconsin, I would gather the worst part about backyard training is that it goes away for a good half of the year. Last year ROCKED in that I was still playing agility outside in January and February, but most years bring an end to running outdoors far earlier than that. Not only does winter make training outside difficult if not impossible, but we tend to have long stretches of time where you can't do ANYTHING outside due to ice or extreme cold.

That's why, two years ago, I decided to put down mats on half of my basement. Secret was due to make her agility debut in February of 2011 and I was panicking about the idea of having no way to train her. My basement was half framed in on one side when I bought it (the other side has a finished room, so that couldn't be touched), so my dad helped me knock it all down and I ended up with a 20' x 23' big open space. It's not much, but it has given us a great winter play area.

I can fit a few jumps in this space and usually bring down my table, the teeter and a set of 6 2x2 weave poles. I also keep our exercise peanut in the basement and we burn off some energy on that when the weather prevents us from playing outside. The stairs are also a great way to get some crazies out on a cold day as well as to get some good cardio exercise in!

We are still snow-free going into December, but my new job doesn't allow me the opportunity to train outside before it gets dark. Right now I'm thankful that all of my dogs are more or less able to survive in "maintenance mode" and that we are still able to be successful at trials with the limited amount of training that we have available to us.

We'll see how true that statement holds this weekend, as we have a NADAC trial here in La Crosse! Secret has a shot at getting her NATCH, as she just needs two more Chances Q's. I'm going to try to not feel too pressured and just let the chips fall where they may. Even if she got it in January it would still be less than two years into her trial career, so I'm in awe of her, regardless. Luke also has a shot (at NATCH 4), but he needs two Chances and two Jumpers -- I tend to be far more likely to screw up his Jumpers runs for whatever reason, so we'll see what happens. It could be a very exciting weekend, though, especially on the heels of Kaiser's NATCH at the last trial!