Guess what I found out...

Hmm it's amazing how things work out.. The day after I decide to hold off on getting my pup, my friend Cindy emailed me and said that she is going to be repeating her Stella x Leroy cross for fall puppies!!! This cross just produced five gorgeous pups that all evaluated out as show quality. This is the cross that I had my heart set on a pup from previously, but mama Stella didn't have a black tri girl for me. So keep your fingers and toes crossed!
Nemo is doing really well with his new lessons. I'm seeing a lot of progress with c/t everytime he sees another dog. I think the positive association is starting to sink in. I've also taught him to roll over and Lord help me, that's his favorite trick now. Whenever I look at him and he knows I have a treat in hand, he rolls over and pops back up so proud of himself! I also hand feed him his meals and make him do downs, left/right spins, roll over etc. for his breakfast and dinner. It's so funny because now he'll go through a sequence of all those things before I ask him to do anything. He'll down, spin, sit, rollover, down again, all in a row just in anticipation. It makes me laugh and I just have to break down and give him a cookie :)
We're going out of town to Myrtle Beach this week and I hope to start class at BF3 when we get back. I can't wait for some beach time!!!

Ok I give up...

After three nights of tossing and turning, not being able to sleep, I decided that now is not the right time for a new addition to the family. It was strange because when I told Marcus how I felt about it, he tried to talk me INTO getting the pup, very strange... Anyway, I just never had a peaceful feeling about it, like I was doing the right thing. I'm too busy right now to spend the time with her that I should, and all my spare time is spent working with Nemo. I had to be honest with myself and realize that if I got her, then I would probably wind up slacking off with Nemo, and I don't want to do that with all the work I've put into that little booger so far. Basically my only "pro" was how darned cute she is! **sigh** Oh well, there will be the perfect pup WHEN THE TIME IS RIGHT!

Is she the one?

I THINK that we found my girl...

Silly kids

Summer is here!

I guess we've reached the end of our nice, cool, rainy weather. It's been in the 90's the past few days and the mosquitos are now out in full force.
Last night was P3 test and Nemo did pretty great. He passed all the elements required to graduate, yay!! Some of them were tougher than I thought they would be. For the down stay he had to stay for two minutes while everyone in the class jogged in a circle right in front of him. Terri walked one foot in front of him squeeking a toy, and then rattling a treat bag and saying she has treats - brutal!!! Nemo stayed though! :)
He was really cute on his recall.. He had to come to me in between two dogs playing about 10 feet apart AND in the middle of them was a pile of toys, eek! So I took off running and called Nemo from about 30 feet away, he took off for me, but as he passed the toy pile he did a double take but kept running so he almost flipped over himself. He didn't stop though, and came right to me.
We worked more on his tolerance of being near other dogs. He's showing signs of improvement. I'm going to repeat P3 even though he passed, so that we can work on that issue and just make sure everything is solid before going on to beginner agility class.

You know what I mean....

Somedays training your dog seem glorious and wonderful and you think "Wow, I must have the smartest dog EVER!" and my goodness he gets so many treats and belly rubs, and then there are other days...
I imagine that raising children is much of a roller coaster than raising a pup. That's how I know I'm not ready for kids! :)

Okay FINALLY an update!

I've been having some serious A.D.D. lately! Anytime I sit down to post an update, something comes up that I have to mess with, ugh.... but now here I am, yay! It has been a crazy summer so far.

Training Nemster has been going pretty well, with some challenges, in between all of the rain that we've had. I met with Terri last night to work on some of his weirdo issues that have come up in the past couple of months (hormones...). On lead he has been going nuts when he sees another dogs, especially a moving one. So we worked with her dog walking circles around Nemo, and C/T everytime he sat calmly. We figured out that his "comfort zone" for a moving dog is 15 feet and 5 feet for a stationary dog. He did great walking directly behind and in front of Roo (Terri's dog), if I held a target stick with some peanut butter on it right in front of his nose. He completely forget that Roo was there, he was so focused on that peanut butter :) So we're going to work on shortening and fading the stick eventually.
We also worked on him walking right past her dog with my giving him cookies as soon as he saw her dog and on up to her, but no cookies after we passed her. So hopefully soon he will learn that another dog = cookies! He's also developed a fear of some strangers - mostly men, he will squeeky bark and try to hide, all the while wagging his tail (told you they were weirdo issues..). So Terri had her son and husband walk circles around Nemo and toss cookies at him. After a while Nemo was eating out of their hands and doing pretty well.

She thinks a lot of this is age and he just doesn't know what to quite do with himself. She said the cases like this that she's seen before, where the dog has been well socialized and has had no traumatic experience, have "outgrown" the behavior by 12-15 months old with continued exposure like this to people and dogs.

OTHER THAN THAT :) he's been doing great! We've been doing mostly flat-work, which I want to have down solid before starting any obstacles, since I have no clue what I am doing handling. He's learned to target great and we're beginning table work. Since he's lost his puppy fat he's gotten tons of energy and is fast fast fast!

Ok so that's all that I have for now! I've been meaning to take some new pictures but... The stinkers all had baths yesterday so maybe I will get to it today.

I promise I'll do better! :)

Pre agility 3 class

Nemo and I started P3 last night - what a challenge! It certainly didn't help that Nemo was totally wired from not getting out yesterday with all of the storms that we had. We are beginning advanced heeling work, which was fine except that Nemo was much more interested in visiting with the dog in front or behind us, than he was me. I can't really blame him as I was more concerned about them too :) His moving downs and sits are coming along nicely (when he's paying attention to me, haha..). He's also learning to target, longer stays with more distractions, and also recalls with big distractions. Our circle work definitely needs improvement but he's such a smart little boy, I know he'll improve quickly as long as I get my act together!

No cookies...

Nemo and I both unearned our cookies this weekend. Nemo was so wound up and I was so frazzled...our class did not go well. I think more work on the basics is strongly needed before we're ready to tackle the big stuff! But we did get to meet RUFF...

Cookies for Nemo!

Nemo graduated from his P2 class last night! I'm so proud of my little pumpkin head!! The past couple of weeks we've been working a couple of times a day and it's really paid off. He had to do a 30 second "watch me," sit/stay for a minute from 15 ft with distractions, down/stay for a minute from 15 ft with distractions, have a verbal sit and sphinx down, perform 3 turns - about, front cross, and flip circle, and recalls from 12ft with distractions. He did everything perfectly!!!
Good boy Nemo! We may actually be able to do this whole training thing. : )

April 17th can't get here soon enough

Work has been crazy lately with the tax deadline coming up next week. We've had the strangest issues come up with our clients. We're also invested in some wacky canadian stocks, which creates a whole other tax monster.

I'm REALLY looking forward to the weekend. We haven't been able to play golf in I can't even remember when, and I have no idea when the last time I had my Sunday doggie class. I can't wait! Nemers has been doing really well with his obedience lately. He has his test tonight to graduate to P3. Hopefully we're ready!

I think I MAY have found my pup!! : ) I was going to wait until the fall, but I stumbled across this girl yesterday. It's really amazing - she's from the exact same lines as Nemo (grandparents on back), she has the markings I've been looking for, and she's in Oklahoma which saves the expense and trauma of shipping. She was born on Easter. I'm looking forward to seeing how this baby develops! Such a little hampster...

Dirty Dawgs!

This is the day after our tons of rain last Friday. My piggies found a lovely mud puddle to play in. :)

Update..

My Nemers has doggie class tonight. I think he's doing pretty well, but the true test is always how he does with all those crazy pups and people running around. :) We'll see!

Have a great afternoon!

Howdy!

The weekend just zipped by as usual. Friday we went to see Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Sat. we saw the Last Mimsy. Marcus and I did bunches of yard work, well Marcus did most of the bunches but I planted a lot of pretty flowers! Chloe played with her new pack of friends. We've had a lot of kiddos move into the neighborhood, which is so great for her. Chloe and I got up early on Saturday to go get some doughnuts and kolaches, and then came home and got through the next level of Zelda :) Chloe gets bored with the intricate parts of the game, but loves opening all the treasure chests.


We had a downpour on Friday night so I have some awesome pictures of muddy pups to download and post one of these days. There's a very low part of our yard that collects a lot of water when it rains. It had a good four inches on Saturday and needless to say, Nemo and Dakota were both belly deep in it when I put them outside. They were like little piglets rolling in the mud. They had a blast playing and the pictures are cute, I promise! Nemo kept trying to bury his favorite orange squeeky toy in the puddle, said toy is now nasty!!!

Not much news on the training front. I've missed two weeks of class and was cancelled this week due to mud. Didn't have DDS class last week either, Terri took Roo to AKC nationals. Hopefully they did great!

We've been getting some good practice in at home though. This weekend with Chloe we worked on "stays" with distractions, Chloe being the ideal distraction. :) Nemo did pretty good, she walked circles around him, petted his head, took off running, make squealing girl noises, and he didn't budge. He did trip Chloe twice though when I called him to me. He BOLTED towards me right under her feet as she was walking circles around him. She was so perturbed that he had the nerve to trip to her. It was hilarious!

I know it's been awhile..

There's not much to update... We went camping this weekend, which was some much needed r&r. The pups were glad that we were back though! My little bro was watching them for me and since Ojoe has some weird fear of him, all of them were on edge the whole time. Well, except for Dakota - she'll wiggle her butt for anybody!! ( -:
We missed Wed. class last week so I'm hoping we're not too far behind. I just have to make sure that Nemo is RESTED, or else he has a.d.d.
Oh no new baby.. ) -: Cindy had her litter of pups but did not produce any black tri females. They are all very cute though! Four boys and one little merle girl. I will probably wait on her fall litter.
That's all for now!!

Isn't she cute?

That's Dakota Bear at 4 weeks old-ish. I just thought I'd post that picture because I was too lazy to download the new pictures from the camera this weekend. ( -:

The pups had fun this weekend helping me with yard work. Marcus and I uncovered the pool on Saturday. He dumped a bunch of chemicals and stuff in it yesterday, so hopefully between that and Mr. Sweepy, the murk will disappear. Dakota is thrilled that the cover is off, she loves to stand on the step in the water.

I wandered around the back yard and raked leaves, picked up sticks, bark, acorns, and other debris that's been collecting since fall. I love all of our trees, but holy cow it's never-ending work!! I also cleaned off the a/c units and swept up the patio. I'm trying to figure out what plants I can put in the back flower bed that are hardy enough to withstand three pooches.

We got to play about 13 holes on Saturday before we threw in the towel. It was too crowded and we were playing too crappy to continue. Sunday evening we hit some balls on the range. The weather was perfect and the grass on the range was pretty plush, which was nice to hit off of for a change.

I was so excited to go to class this Sunday. Nemo had been doing great in our little daily training sessions. He's attention has been improving and his stay's with distractions have been coming a long great. He's been loose-leash walking like a champ, BUT Sunday I learned TIRED PUPPY = ZERO ATTENTION SPAN! He got up very early with me to do yard work, and he and the other two ran wild all day. I could tell when I put Nemo in the car to go to class that he was one worn out pup. We had a good time though, I have to remind myself often that he is still a baby. ( -:

What a looooong week!

I'm SO GLAD IT'S FRIDAY! I think I've gotten a total of 10 hours of sleep all week. We've been staying up too late watching dumb movies. That's great, unless you have to wake up at 5:00 a.m. every morning, zzzzz.... I'm ready for the weekend!
Nemo did well in puppy class on Wednesday. He handled all of the distractions much better and seemed more focus. His stay is coming a long great, except when I march in place in front of him. He thinks that means "ok let's go!" for some reason. We'll work on it.. His also getting his "sphinx" down pretty well without much of a hand signal. We have class on Sunday, looking forward to applying our new skills. ( -:
Have a great weekend!!

Mondays...

I'm having a hard time coping with the fact that it's already Monday. What happened to the weekend? Where did it go? What did we do?
Chloe and I did have agility class Sunday, and had a blast! Dakota and Nemo both did pretty well in my opinion. Chloe's mom came and picked her up at our house yesterday, and Chloe just had to show her Dakota's "moves." Dakota must've hopped over her little jump 15 times, with Chloe saying ooooverrrrr... Chloe's mom must think we're weird, but oh well!! ( -:
I tried to talk Marcus into coming and taking some action shots, but he stayed home and watched golf. There wound up being a 4-way playoff, so I guess it was worth it!

Aussie type

So this is Leroy's (the sire of my potential new pup) profile... I'm learning what true aussie "type" is, in my continuing education of the breed, and apparently Leroy has excellent "type." "Type" is important above all else and you should never, ever, ever, ever breed a dog who does not have good type. See how much I'm learning!! ( -: Of course genetics, temperament, etc. are also of the utmost importance.

On another note, Nemo was evaluated the other day to see if he can "opt out" of Pre-Agility 1 class at Dallas Dog Sports. He did! We need some work on long stays, watch me's, and his toy drive, but otherwise did great! We start P2 this Wednesday. I'm excited to get the extra class time in besides Sundays. I need the incentive to get my tail off the couch. I'm also excited because there are three other mini aussies in my class!

Ugh...I have to get back to work. The entire market has totally tanked today because we got Shanghai'd overnight and the Taliban tried to blow up Dick Cheney. Hmmm... time to put the money under the mattress??

Class Pictures

Here are some pictures that Dori had taken in class this weekend. They crack me up!! I like the one of Chloe and Dakota, because the look on Chloe's face is because she is thinking that Dakota is going to have to jump that. ( -:

Dakota is doing great. She'll do anything as long as she knows there's a treat involved. Nemo is doing pretty well, but I need to be more consistent with his training. I can tell a big difference in his focus when I work with him everyday vs. when I'm lazy.

Nemo didn't have his Napoleon complex this week, so I was happy about that. ( -: