Clear Kody

We have just got back from a long weekend at Dog Vegas. The dogs have generally ran very well and I have been really pleased.

On Friday Heidi had 1 pole in her agility again, and a couple of 'wild' jumping runs. Megan, who is only doing jumping had 1 very good run but ran past the last but 1 jump. Kody had some nice runs including a lovely run in the Helter Skelter where he ran past the last jump which was right infront of him! I had Brian running in 2 Helter Skelter classes on Friday on small height, he really seemed to enjoy himself and flew round, just taking an off course jump in each class.

Yesterday the dogs ran well agin, Kody and me only having 1 mistake in each class, Megan just missing her weaves in one and jumping too wide in one meaning she missed a jump.

Today was a very hot day but the dogs still worked really hard. Heidi had 2 poles in her first agility, Kody had a nice agility run but slipped off the end of the dog walk and see saw (my fault) which I thought he had been faulted for, we finished the course but I sent him the wrong way over the last but 1 jump and I hadn't realised he'd been clear until that point! Bad mummy. We then did a very tricky jumping, managing the hard part but I gave him a terrible line onto the long jump meaning he jumped over it from the side. Very bad mummy! In his last jumping though I got my act together and we got round it clear although a bit messy. He was out of the places but I was so pleased with him. I had only been saying earlier in the day I haven't had a clear with any of my dogs since May!

Megan and Heidi did the G1-4 jumping and both only got faulted in the weaves. They flew round really well so I decided to check their times to see how far behind Heidi Megan had been. To my surprise Megan had been over 2 seconds quicker than Heidi! Clever puppy!

Massive congratulations to Jo and Keisha for their 2nd place in the First Contact Final yesterday and then winning into G7 today!

Birthday Boy

Happy Birthday to Brian, who is 6 today! I think he has enjoyed his day and has been a bit spoiled, a new ball & frisbee a massive bone and lots of treats and he got to meet and greet plenty of people at the show this weekend.

This weekend we have been at Empingham. I have really enjoyed this show, I think it may be my favourite show and the sun has been shining today which made it much better.

Heidi and Kody have been really good dogs this weekend. Heidi has had no mad screaming, she has worked really well and listened and yesterday just had a pole in her jumping and a pole in agility and today she just had 2 poles in the agility and a missed weave entry but she has got EVERY contact this weekend so i'm really happy. She started the ABC qualifier off really well too but for a split second I lost concentration and forgot to get on the right hand side of the A-frame which then left me with nowhere to go and a very cross Heidi!

Kody has had some really good runs with only a little mistake here and there, we have had some issues with the dog walk though, he keeps falling off. All I can put it down too is that they were the rubber coated dog walks and where he would normally put the 'brakes' on for his stop on a wooden one it would just slow him down but with the rubber it means he stops suddenly and loses his balance and falls off! I took him the practice ring yesterday and out of 10 goes he fell off 4 times! He stayed on it today although I haven't pushed him too much on it and he did miss a contact on it this morning. Generally though he is running very well.

Megan...well she is only running in jumping at the moment and probably will for the remainder of the season now as I want to make sure we get this dog walk right this time before I compete with her. She has been a bit 'wild' this weekend, off doing her own thing and not listening although she did do her weaves very nicely in a class today so I cant complain too much!

Looking forward to 3 days at Vegas next weekend, lets hope the sunshine sticks around!

Brian is Magic!

I am sure I have mentioned before Brian's ability to make footballs appear from hedges and other random places. Well this weekend was no exception. Me and my mum & dad took him for a walk along the stream last night and on the way stopped off at the sports field to let him have a quick blast. As soon as we got there he ran over to the hedge and began digging, he has got 2 footballs from this particular spot on 2 separate occasions before so I thought there is no way in the world he will find another. A few seconds later, you guessed it, Brian appeared with a football!

He was chuffed to bits with it and played in the stream for ages with it and pretty much carried it on his whole walk. Today he is absolutely shattered, we have not long got home and apart from wondering where the others are (they are back tomorrow lunch time) he has curled up in his bed already. Some company he is!

Relaxing Day

Today has been a lovely relaxing day, It was my birthday earlier in the week so with my birthday money I decided to treat myself.  I had my hair done this morning followed by an afternoon of having a manicure, pedicure and hot stones massage. It was lovely.

I've just finished packing the dogs stuff, the mali's for their holiday in the morning to Sandra's and Brian's stuff for coming with me so now its time to chill out in front of the tv for the evening :0)

Hormone Hell!!!

The last few weeks have been an aboslue nightmare here and how I still have hair left is beyond me! With both the girls being in season there have been an awful lot of hormones raging in our house. Thankfully Heidi's are generally short and was over quite quickly, we are not so lucky with Megan.

Megan has turned into an absolutely horrible monster since her season started, she has become very aggressive towards Brian and Heidi, the only dog she is nice to is Kody. We had an unpleasant incident with Megan last week, she came out to the front of the house with me to the car (which is fenced in with a 4ft fence), as we were outside a lady walked past with her dog, Megan lept over the fence, ran accross the road and had a go at the other dog, resulting in the other dog having a bite on it's leg which although was small, needed veterinary treatment. The dog is ok however we are expecting to recieve a vet bill shortly.

Needless to say I have been at my wits end with her. Her season seems to be nearing its end now and her aggression is subsiding although she has had the occasional grumble at Brian but nothing compared to what it was. She has always been grumpy with her seasons but never anything like this. Thankfully it will be her last as we had already decided she would be spayed after this one although after the few weeks we have had it's likely that Heidi will be done too. (Mainly as having Brian neutered seems like a pointless exercise as Kody is neutered and has actually been worse than Brian with the girls, i've needed eyes in the back of my head as they have all turned into escape artists too, opening doors and jumping baby gates!)

I havent wanted to do any training with Megan at all since she has been so horrid so her dog walk training has taken a back seat although we did resume it yesterday and she hadn't forgotten what we had done so far.

As a result of the last few weeks and lack of training I have had a re think of the shows I had planned for the rest of the year, we are doing Empingham and Dog Vegas at Grantham and 1 day at Scunthorpe so I can enter the ABC qualifier with Kody & Heidi (I doubt Meg's dog walk will be ready) and I had entered the 5 day Vegas in August but I have now cancelled my entry and dont plan to do any more KC shows after Scunthorpe (I have entered Bromsgrove, havent decided whether to cancel it yet). I want to have fun with the dogs and lately it feels like we have lost sight of that so I plan to maybe do a couple of the smaller independant shows just to finish off the season and give the dogs some fun.

It's not all doom and gloom, the Mali's are off on holiday on Friday to stay with Sandra as im going to my cousins wedding (Brian is coming with me), Kody should be pleased about that, not sure what he did when he was with her last week but when he came back she said she'd happily keep him! Sorry Sandra-hands off!

Picture left is Kody in a 'cool coat' at the weekend, he wouldn't let me cool him down with the hose pipe like the others do but was happy to wear the jacket!