Happy Memorial Day

What a beautiful day. The weather in Minnesota today was about as perfect as possible. Sunny, warm, but comfortably so.  With the busy week last week and busy weekend, we had lots of things to get done. The garden got weeded, laundry done and hung out to dry. Did a little bit of weight pull training with this dogs, getting reasdy for next weekends pull.  Got the shopping done and had a wonderful family dinner. 

In addition we also stopped by the veterans park and honored our country's veterans. After all without them, what would our lives be? Thank you to all those serving our country.  We are thinking of you and wishing for peace so you may return home.

THANK YOU! And todays results

I want to thank you bloggers out there for the support.  Music is co-owned by me but lives with Joyce.  Joyce had entered him looking for the major, that did not appear.  He had only been in the ring 1 day this year, back in March, so yesterday was really meant to be a practice day since next weekend there is 3 days of majors.  Neither Joyce nor I  truly expected him to win yesterday.  I did apologize to the person who had the reserve dog today,  Had I pulled Music yesterday her dog would have earned one point-but with him in her girl who won breed earned 1 more breed point. Maybe not a consolation, I dont know, but in any event I will say we did not set out to hurt anyone else by using the entry Joyce paid for.  A couple of people have suggested taking this further, and I appreciate your support, but I dont think I want to have this continue.

We did pull Music today, and I handled Joyces other dog, the wonderful Vegas, for her as she did not feel up to it.   Today Vegas was WD, BOW and BOS, and my girl Peace was Breed. Nothing in group though.

Hug your dogs, and again, Thank You.

Good day at the dog show

What a fun day today.   Music was BW and BOS to Dianas Jenna with BOB Safari was WB. No Select points awarded though.  Grace loved being at the dog show again. Even though is not at her best looks wise, she had a great time and her tail neer stopped all day.  In Pre-Novice we were 3rd out of 3, but she scored a 186.5 and I am thrilled with that.  That is a good score for a dog that still will not sit in the ring.  When she is inside those white show gates, her sitter goes out, but she will stack herself like the show girl she wants to be.

My friends Wire Fox Terrier tookWD- he now only needs 1.  And another good friend finished his dog, but I will let him post for himself later. Even though he already did on facebook. 

Prophetic Dream?

I don't often dream and remember them, but this morning I woke up before the alarm clock so happy and at peace.  I had just had a dream about the birth of my next puppy.  The mom was a brindle pointed black and I was there watching her and her owners hands as she was giving birth, but just watching not helping or anything.   She had 9 beautiful pups.  The dream ended with Mom and babies happily nursing and resting.  Quite a lovely dream, except for a few things.  I am over my dog limit, I am not shopping for another dog, I figure my next new pup will be a Peace baby, and she is a brindle, not a black. 

Now, is this because I really want another dog?  Is it because I know Carolyn's girl Hannah is busting at the seams, or is it because I adore Jeri's Junie?  Junie was from a litter of 9 and mom is a brindle pointed black.  I love LOVE love Vegas and he seems to be very much like the description of Junie.

Anyways, I am not in the market for another dog! I do not have puppy fever! I am not breeding another litter any too soon either.... well maybe.....  Can you tell I want another puppy?

Agiltiy lesson and weekend plans

Grace and I had a great agility lesson last night.We wound up having a half hour private, since the other gal did not make it. You can accomplish quite a bit in a half hour.  I am so glad I started us back at the very beginning.   We are getting much better at our teamwork. She is paying a bit more attention, and I am able to read her needs better.  Clicks for both of us!

I am sure you are all tired of hearing me talk about how different this girl is, but last night even her instructor got a good picture of just how different she can be.  Many dogs do have a working side preference,  and a left or right turn that is the natural movement for them.  Grace apparently is pretty ambidexterous, in both a good and bad way. She will turn equally either way so far. Where it gets odd is that in some exercises, she prefers to work on my left, and on others she prefers to work on my right.  For example. last night was our first exposure to the teeter with this instructor.  She wanted Grace to approach from the side and slam the end. When we approached the teeter on the left with Grace on my left, she would hit it with both feet.  When we approach it from the right with her on my right, she avoids it, hops over. I was able to get her to put one foot on it from that side.   Ok, most of her obedience work was on the left so maybe that makes sense.  But then we go to the weave poles.  In Grace's prior class, we were starting weaves, but she was teaching channels, so in the 16 weeks we had, we really hadn't got the weaves closed down, so really not much weaving.  With this instructor we are starting with 4 poles, and just small barriers in the path of the poles to suggest the weave. The barriers suggest that the dog should weave back the other way, but do not stop the dog. Last week we guided the dos through on leash and helped them be successful. Tonight we worked off leash. In the weave exercise, with Grace on my left, she will go through the first  and second poles correctly but couldnt find the space between 2 and 3 to come back to me.  But on my right side she was able to figure out all 4 poles successfully  Then we tried going back to Grace on the left, ans she still did not want to turn back toward me, until I put her back on leash, helped her and then she got it on the left side.

What we need to work on- Attention!  Grace does get easily distracted.  At the end of our time, a gal came in with a dog Grace is not familiar with and she was so focused on the other dog I couldnt get her to even look at me. She wasnt barking or lunging, just watching them walk in and sit down. Yes I know staring is not good either, but she was off leash and didnt move, just watch.  I need to work on focus and attention in distracting places.  Hopefully tomorrow at the show we can do some practice since we will have lots of time between breed (8 am) and pre-novice(last obedience class of the day).

Tomorrow Grace is entered in breed.  Even though she is not pretty right now, I am leaving her in conformation.  She loves showing and while winning is always nice, I entered her so David could show her, so ugly or not I am letting them play together.  I am also hoping that since she loves showing, going into breed will help her be calmer for pre novice. Less excitement the second time she gets to work. I am hoping its a fun day for her.

One Flower and my layout

  This is the planned layout.  It is going to take me forever to sew as it took me almost all week just to get the white around one flower block this week.  But no hurry! 

Why is it...

that once you enter a show, the dogs entered have to lose ALL their hair?   I entered Grace in Pre-Novice for the show this weekend.  Since she was going anyways, Dave wants to enter her in breed-she loves it, and he likes getting to show a dog too.  Sure OK,  it will be fun.  So what happens?  Grace goes naked.    Peace is rather short of hair too, but not nearly as naked as Grace.  I guess its good we weren't planning on winning anything! 

The heat of Summer...in May

Yesterday 90. Freakin 90. Today again, expecting 90.  I really do not care for 90. Oh yeah its humid too.  Right now its 78 degrees, not bad but the dewpoint is 79 so its rather muggy. UCK.

But other than that it was a weekend so no complaints.  Saturday I did stuff around the house as it was rainy until midday. Yesterday we had shopping to do, and we were able to stop over and visit one of the pups, Timmy. The girls and Timmy ran and played for a while, but it was pretty hot, so they also hung out and visited a bit.  Then we had weight pull practice.  I am SO thankful for Barb allowing us to use her air conditioned warehouse for weight pull practice!  Peace is still really uncertain about the whole idea of this. She will do it, but she is not pleased.  Siren was rather lazy yesterday, and not too eager either.  it is possible that both girls were just getting tired by then though as they had been outside playing with Timmy prior to the pull. Grace did much better yesterday.  She started off giving me the paw, but after one run where she got a pretty stern leash correction she pulled.  The funny thing is, even when she was giving me the paw, her tail never stopped wagging. She wags the whole time she pulls, so I think she really rather likes playing with Mom. Such a funny girl! One of the pullers was taking pictures and in every shot of Grace her tail is a blur. 

Grace and agility

Last night Grace and I went to her agility lesson.  She is such a funny dog. Last week she was real sniffy and not so interested in working. She did not want to stop at her targets for anything. Last night though, the only sniffy wander off moments were when she wasnt being asked to work. Like when I was getting instruction or we were setting up.  She was so much more focused on doing stuff.  She likes the doing stuff part alot!

I think the difference in the weeks is what we were working on.  Last week we were more focused on just driving to a target.  Could it be that she just thinks that is too boring?  Last night we were going out through hoops to a target, and starting to weave to a target and all night she was much better at actually stopping at the target and not just blowing by it.

She is interesting to work with I will say that, and she definately has character.

Have I mentioned how much I enjoy UKC?

UKC has now announced that they will have all breed lure coursing!  The few times Magic has been able to play at lure coursing have been so much fun.  I sure hope we get some lure coursing close enough to MN to go do that.

I really appreciate how UKC realizes that some really odd people like myself, love doing stuff with our dogs that may not be the norm for the breed.  We have been having so much fun doing weight pulling, even though cardis are not generally thought of as a pulling breed. 

Heck, at the last couple of pulls, local small dogs have been incredible. We had a 7 pound pap pull 63 times his body weight, and just last weekend Toby the Strong, a chinese crested pulled 117 times his body weight at the pull in Michigan.  Simply amazing.

One Flower Wednesday

My flowers for today.  One full flower and one partial.  My layout will have a partial on each row either top or bottom, so if I wind up going with the plan I am anticipating, I will need 6 partials.

 

You too can have your very own Gracie

Both available on EBAY!

Nice Weather, Nice weekend

The weather was finally lovely this weekend.  Yesterday I worked at the neighborhood organizations plant sale. I also brought home the majority of the plants for my garden so those got planted. I still have a bit more to get, but its a start. 

Today we had weight pull practice which was fun And we are cooking dinner on the grill. Yum!

Front Crosses, and rear confusion

Ok we are doing OK on our front crosses. not so on the rear ones.  I can't seem to get my head wrapped around the difference, when I stop and think about it.  But if I just go do what feels right, we do well.  What I mean is if you ask me to show you a rear cross I am going to stare at you dumbly. But if you say, send her aound that cone from here with her on your left(or right), we get it.  LOL  But dont ask me to show you a cross because I will just stand there like a squirrell in the middle of the road trying to decide what to do...

What I learned last night though is I really have to get in the habit of supporting Grace more. She is trying to read my body language and if I drop my hand she is going to come back to me.   That is if I can keep her connected in the first place.  Last night she was really sniffy and not interested in focusing with me.

Tonight Magic and I have our class. He hasnt limped for over a week, so we will try class, but we may limit our involvement just a bit.   He has been on limited activity, trying to make sur ehe has adequate heal ing time so he will be happy to be out and about I am sure.

agility with 2 left feet and apparently no brain

Grace and I are working on our foundations agility training.  We are supposed to be working on our front and rear crosses.  The problem here is that hte dog is supposed to learn to do this stuff based on my body language, right?  How does that work when I can't seem to master any of these things myself?  Last night I am standing there, with Grace in front of our cone, and I cannot for the life of me remember how to move my body. Where to move my hands, arms, legs?  What the &%&^?  I have done crosses out on the courses with Magic?  At least I thought I had? I think Michelle told me once or twice that we did a movement right?
arrggghh.
I dont want to mess Grace up, she is not as forgiving in relearning what I taught wrong, so I want to do it right. I want to be a better handler.  Does it make sense to practice the movements without the dog until its smooth, and natural, and them add the dog? I did that a bit with obedience footwork, and found that although I can do the foot work correctly without my dog, I often dont when the dog is with me.  How do you get it ingrained into the stupid handler? 
Sorry for the ranting, I didn't post last night because I thought it would fade, but I still feel frustrated today. I took a break from agility for the last year or so because I was feeling this much frustration. Maybe this just is not the sport for me?  Shouldnt the handler enjoy the activity too?

One Flower Wednesday

Quite a while ago I started a Grandmothers Flower Garden quilt. I worked diligently on this project. Then I burned out and it has sat. Well last week I ran into a group of quilters doing versions of this quilt, and having a quilt along. One Flower Wednesday.  The goal is to do at least one flower every Wednesday, and post them weekly or once a month.  

So for this my first one flower Wednesday.  I was enjoying stitching this so much I went beyond the actual flower to the white, which I didnt quite finish this week. But any progress is a step in the right direction, so here it is.

If anyone is interested in joining this project, here is a link to the Garden Party

Happy 2nd Birthday to the Dream pups

It is such a joy to me to know that Graces litter has grown up to be such wonderful loved and loving dogs.  It makes me so happy to hear from others how they met Talie, Merlin or Timmy and what nice dogs they are.  Thank you to the owners of all of the dogs for taking the pups and allowing them to grow up to be such good family members and doggie citizens.  Well except of course for my 2 heathens.

Peace and Siren and Grace want to send birthday wishes to the whole family.

Timmy

Timmy's mom sent me some new pictures.  Isn't he darling.  Happy 2nd Birthday tomorow, Timmy!

(Timmy was Bolt, for those that remember the litter)

Happy Mothers Day

Its so hard to belive that 2 years ago on Mothers Day Grace was becoming a momma. She gave me such a lovely present.  I want to send Mothers Day wishes out to all the mothers out there, 2 and 4 legged.

Today Grace and Peace both got baths.  They are both shedding like crazy. My son asked what I wanted as a gift today-I asked him to vacuum!

All in all

Yup, lots of not so nice little events occurring in our life right now, but all in all, for the most part they are all very workable issues.  Other than Jade, we are all happy, relatively healthy and if not recovering well.  Graces tummy upset didn't turn into a pacreatitis issue, and she loves the hamburger and rice diet. (The first day she got real dogfood, she hesitated to eat. I am sure she was looking for the "good" stuff.)  Peaces eye with the 2 different drops appears to be just fine.  She will go for a vet confirmation though. Magic is not limping, and although he is still resting, he is thrilled he has gotten several new bones and is hordeing them from the girls.

The car will be fixed, new vet appointments made and maybe the garden will get put in.

So all in all life is not too bad. Its all in how you look at it, I guess!

No Vet visit yesterday

On the way to the vet with Magic yesterday my wonderful little red corgimobile came up lame. So I have a lame car and a lame dog!  Actually what happened was the water pump siezed, which snapped the belt, which in turn took out the power steerng hose.  Fortunately we were only 2.5 blocks from home. Magic is still favoring his leg, but not nearly as much so I let him walk home with me. The walk did not seem to cause any further pain as he was still moving without showing constant signs of pain last night. 

I do think he only strained something at agility last Friday and is naturally healing, but I am still making him live in jail and rest, and once the car is fixed, he will be going to the chiro just to make sure he is all in order.

As for the car- although it wouldnt start again right after the big blow, when Darryl got home we went over and it did start so we wrestled it down to the station and they will look at it tomorrow or Friday. At least no tow fee!

Grace is stepping in

With Magic on the injured reserve list, Grace is going to have to step in and become the performance dog of the family!  We had a long talk about it last night (while I was removing the other 7 dogs she carries in her coat) and we both agreed that while it might mean a little more hard work than she would prefer, she is willing to step in.  Actually, I think her exact words were WOOO  arroooooo chuff chuff but I took that for OK.  In reality knowing Grace it was probably well you can try.... 

Hair

Everywhere!  My poor vaccuum just cant keep up!  Last night I combed out all 3 girls.  I got some hair off of Peace, but piles and piles off of Siren and Grace.  Then I vaccuumed. 2 hours later, the carpet looked like it hadnt seen a vacuum in months.

I need to recarpet-when I do, I am going to search high and low for corgi colored carpets. Course, then they will just show the mud that the dirty feets bring in.  LOL

Magic is still limping. I see a long vacation for him this summer.

Its not over

Magic came up lame today.He is using his right front but occasionnaly is  limping.  He already had a vet/chiro appt scheduled for Tuesday. So we are going to have a couple of days of crate rest. He is not happy! Neither am I.