Monday, March 24, 2008

Another Monday Night..

another good practise

sadly Sally stayed home - I had to be too many places at once but she had some excellent runs this weekend cross country so I'm sure she'll be fine :)

Thea has gone to visit Judy for a couple of nights -I'll miss her but she's needed for some sister therapy for RP.

Brody was doing distance weaves tonight and some odd entries - he was excellent! He'll never be FAST but is he stays this steady he won't lose much time that's for sure!

I set up a jump grid for him four bounces... he really is a snappy little jumper - his legs were up around his ears.. and he flew the line

also tried some jumping into me ... that really got him cracking his back ;)

very cool when the things I read about work!

Saturday, March 22, 2008

getting fit

getting fit is hard work ...
Brody is really packing on muscle - he and I race each other down the road and I try to stretch him often too - spin, twirl, bow, crawl - each one gets him using muscles in different ways

when we are in the county we walk 2 kilometres at least 3 times a day ... Brody and Hank run free and cover a lot more distance then we do - Sally is on a flexie lead for most of the walk and runs free at the end... she covers at least twice as much ground as I do!

It's interesting applying my horse cross training principles to agility - the same principles make sense but I don't have nearly the same kind of charts I had when working with horses to figure it out.

I should keep better track of what I do so that I can replicate it if it works ;)

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Wednesday and Sally is wired

After a week of running and being with us 24/7 - a trial on the weekend, practise Monday and a lesson Tuesday I don't know how the wild child can be quite so wild ;)

But she is - she's ripping tops of bottles and bringing the bottle to me to replace the top so she can do it again - she's eviserated a teddy and played ball for half and hour - somedays I wish she was a lab ;)

Brody is also full of himself - happy, cheerful saucy fellow :)

Practise Monday was short and sweet for both of them... Brody was REVED and blasting through and over everything in his path - he positively glues himself to the teeter for surfing which is great for a little guy who has been known to do a fly off ;)

Sally did some AWESOME weave work and some lovely distance tunnel work :)

In Sally's lesson she was a bit sniffy at first but settled down to work nicely after a couple of inquiries... she needs a break from trials and a refocousing - I like taking her with me though ... tough to back off from even a gambelrs class...

Sunday, March 16, 2008

What a lovely week

March Break draws to a close and the snow is melting, the sun is shining and the promise of spring is in the air!

We went to the county and had a lovely week - walking, snowshowing catching up with Dad and Jean (and Ibby!)It was truely a great week!

To end it off Thea, Sally, Brody and I went to Kingston Friday for gamblers classes. Great fun (even though there were no qs)- all the dogs got enough points in the openings that they could have gotten the q if they'd made the gamble :)

Saturday Brody was his usual dynamite self picking up his first steeplechase q and a second masters snookers q - he is a snookers king :) He barely missed his jumpers q ( um handler error as usual - I missed a jump!)

Sally was nuts - but life with her is a learning curve - so thats just part of the parcel :)

To totally make this an amazing week I found out today that Brody and I made the draw for the CPE nationals :) here is the link :)

http://www.cpenationals2008.com/

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

check out Brody's aac page

brody's Advanced Agility Dog of Canada Title and his first Masters qualification class both show up there :)
the link is right on this page - upper left hand corner methinks ;)

Sally got to play agility last night AND tonight

Last night was a bit unfocussed - but she was very good
Tonight was fun too - lots of foundation practise ...


I'm REALLY enjoying teaching agility too - it's so fun to think about how handling works and how to let other people figure out the best way to handle

I wish somebody had taught me the same way I'm teaching ;)

Though somehow I seem to have figured it out ok ;)

Sunday, March 02, 2008

go snow go

I missed a SECOND trial this weekend thanks to LOUSY snow

grrrrrrr

however the roads were a mess on Saturday morning so I certainly opted for the safe path... the number of cars FLIPPED over onto their backs was staggering and the few scattered in ditches and fields was impressive too

The dogs worked on fitness and "wait" and I'm sure they didn't miss the trial much ;)

Everybody is completely wiped out now