Holiday Update

Well we are home and have had a really great couple of weeks away with the dogs. Dashing dogs was first where Megan set the standard high getting her first ever KC clear on the first day! She got another whilst we were there and Heidi got a 2nd in Agility so we were very pleased with that. We had a day out at the beach on Monday with the dogs although it didn't go totally to plan as the when we got to the first beach the tide was in and all the way up to the road so we had to find another!

On Thursday we left Dashing Dogs and headed off to Dog Vegas where we have been until today. Heidi had some very good 'nearly runs' taking out just 1 pole or missing out 1 weave but on the whole very good. Megan got a 2nd in the 1-3 Jumping on Friday morning so I was chuffed to bits with that and a 16th in the First Contact Qualifier as well. The dogs have become very tired though and it was definitely the right time to be coming home, Meg was losing her enthusiasm to run and had become very distracted by her dad watching (as she was at times during the start of the week) so for her last run today we just ran round as fast as we could not stopping for contacts or worrying about taking the right course so that she had fun and ended on a high.

The video's are of some of our runs from the past few weeks away, unfortunately no clears were caught on film (maybe a clue to leave the video camera in the van?!)

The Babies Are Back

Brian, Heidi and Megan were dropped off this morning after having a few days away. By all accounts they have had a brilliant time with Sandra. She said they were really good and well behaved (shame they aren't like that at home!) and they settled right away. They have been for some long walks in the fields near where she lives and played in the long grass which made them run around like mad! They also had lots of cuddles on the sofa in the evening.

The picture is of the dogs with Sandra who it would seem they really like!

They were all full of beans when they came home but I think the excitement of being back has worn them out as they are all now fast asleep again. The rest of their day today will be spent relaxing (apart from a trip to the field later) so they can recharge their batteries ready for the next 10 days away.

We will update our blog when we get home after the bank holiday.

A Wicked Weekend

Well on Saturday morning the dogs headed off on their holidays to stay with Sandra from Barking Mad. They have only stayed with her once before but when they were collected they were all (even Heidi) really happy to be going off on their adventure and couldn't wait to get in the car!

Me and Conor have had a few days away, starting in Kent where we visited Conor's family and met the latest addition to the McManigan family. On Sunday we set off to London for a few days. We have been on the London Eye, to Madam Tussauds, we went to see a film in 3D at Leicester Square which was a brilliant experience and then last night we went to see Wicked which was really good. We have been shopping, had some nice meals out and stayed in a nice hotel too before getting back home this afternoon.

The house is very quiet as the dogs are not back until morning so I'm using the opportunity to pack for our next trip away as I'm working tomorrow on lates and then on Thursday we are heading off to Dashing Dogs for the week and then from there to Dog Vegas (where we are camping too) so our caravan will get another good outing but will be it's last for the year so we are going to make the most of it!

Scunthorpe Show

Today we have been at Scunthorpe Show, only having one dog to run certainly gives you a lot of spare time! Me and Heidi had 4 E's today, her first jumping was totally my fault, the other 3 all had 12 weaves and we had some issues, mainly her coming out before the end and in her second agility class I put her back on the A-Frame contact because although she had got it she didn't wait to be released. She obviously realised and waited on the dog walk so I was pleased with that.

The long jump picture is one I bought today from her first agility run as I really loved it. I don't generally buy photo's as the prices they charge are really high, especially as I know what they cost to print! Still I really did like this one.

Me and the doggies want to say a massive congratulations to Lucy and Ben for winning their third champ ticket today making Ben 'Ag Ch Ben Bombastic Mr Fantastic'.

Well done to you both!!!

Thursday Training

It's a good job we made it to club tonight, we haven't been for 4 weeks and wont be going for the next 3 due to Lucy and us being away for different weeks! Tonight went well though, Heidi and Megan worked very well, Megan is brilliant, I love running her, she is just so much fun! Even when she did make me out to be a liar for a while though with her contacts and got them every time until her last go  where she jumped her dog walk one so at least Lucy got to see. She has given me a few ideas to try out but really I think we just need to re train them. I'm going to wait now though until our shows are done, we don't have that many left before we start winter training.

Hopefully moments like this will be a thing of the past!!!

Lucy is sadly going to be leaving us very soon as she is heading off to pastures new in Scotland, she still intends to come down once a month to train us but Jo is taking over Lucy's classes so at least we don't have to find a new club all together!

This weekend we are at Scunthorpe show, well for Saturday anyway. Megan is in season so she can't compete and it's mine and Heidi's last show together for a while as her daddy is back on Sunday and I'm sure she will be over the moon!

Bonvivant Bash

Today we have had a lovely day out at at Bonvivant (Heidi and Megan's breeder's house, Jan). Jan put on a lovely BBQ and set up a fun agility course for the dogs to play on and we had a lovely day out. Once the girls settled they seemed to have a great time. Brian came to and was very happy getting a fuss of strangers as always. He also got his back fixed by Christine who does McTimoney, his pelvis was a little out of line which Natalie had said last week when he went for his massage so he is all fixed now and should be feeling much better. She is local so I think I'm going to try and book Heidi in for a check up too.

I took my camera today but I didn't take a single photo, not like me at all. Jan took plenty of the dogs though. Well my 3 are certainly tired from their adventure and having had their dinner are now all fast asleep. So thank-you Jan and everyone else who was there for a lovely day.

Adams & Derby Update

Me and the doggies have had an enjoyable 9 days away, both shows were lovely and it was a nice venue but I am now glad to be back. Still no clears from either of the girls but considerably less eliminations so that's a good improvement. I think Heidi's best run was on Friday in jumping, she had 2 poles but I went to get her time and she was over 7 seconds quicker than the winning dog! Megan had a really good jumping run at Adams too, she was 4 jumps from the finish and I really thought 'this is the one, she'll go clear', Unfortunately the photographer was lying on the floor next to the jump so instead of taking the jump Meg went to say hi!

On Tuesday they had some fun activities for the dogs to do, they had a fastest recall which I did with Heidi & Bri, Brian would have won the slowest recall! They also had a game where they had to retrieve 6 tennis balls out of a bucket of water in a minute, Megan didn't understand it and got 1, Heidi got them all but took 49 secs and Brian did then in 21secs coming second. They had a teddy bear retrieve too, they had to go out collect 9 bears one at a time and bring them back. Being a lover of teddy bears I thought Meg would do it, but she only got 4. Bri was even worse and got 2! Heidi didn't let the side down, she managed all 9 in exactly a minute.

Our week wasn't without injury though, on Sunday night Heidi cut her pad on a walk on Cannock Chase, it wasn't deep and didn't bother her so i didn't think too much of it. By Tuesday evening she was really badly limping and when I looked she had chewed off half of the skin from her pad. It meant she couldn't do the Toni Dawkin's training on Wednesday so I did it with Megan. Megan really seemed to enjoy it and I was so looking forward to being able to put what we had learnt together into practice this weekend but then...she came into season on Thursday so that was the end of that! Heidi had plenty of rest and had recovered by Friday so I still had her to run for the weekend.

All in all it has been a good week, we met lots of people and caught up with Reno & Zippy (Meg's brothers) had some good runs, nice courses and some mental moments too (including Heidi falling off the dog walk, snapping a weave pole and breaking the tunnel fixings as she went through with such force!)