Break from Puppy :(

I'm leaving for North Carolina in a couple hours, for Bryan's brother's wedding. Bryan's the best man, so I'm trying to do as much as I can for him so he doesn't freak out. That means not a lot of time for puppy.

I have to take her to the day care soon, that's where we're boarding her while we're gone. She loves it there, so I'm not concerned about it at all, and I think she'll be in dreamland that whole time. Surrounded by nothing but dogs and playtime! Its a crateless facility, so all the dogs wither sleep in the "doggie slumber party" or in a little room. Zelda doesn't mind her crate, in fact she sleeps in there voluntarily instead of our bed sometimes. But I still like the ides that the day care is crateless, makes it feel more like home.

But my point here is that I almost started crying this morning because I'm going to miss her. I can't believe it! I never cry! I also had this horrible dream last night that I dropped her off, and there was this man there that was incredibly rude and mean to me, which made me cry. I'm turning into such a worry wort mom!

We'll miss class tonight, which honestly I could care less. No news from Lisa yet when her classes are starting, but I hope its soon. I'm seriously think about dropping the Princeton class and taking flyball on Wednesdays at the other club. I just don't know. I don't want to flush $130 down the drain. Come on Lisa!! Start your classes again!!

I started my Couch to 5K program 2 days ago, and I'm about to go out for another run in a couple minutes. I brought Zelda with me, and she did better than I expected. Although I think she might have slowed me down a bit with her pee breaks and desire to sniff everything she passed. But for the most part she kept up and seemed happy to do so. I think I'll try today without her, and see if it makes a difference. She's going to the day care anyway, which will tire her out enough without making her run 2 miles.

I won't be back until Monday, so there will be no updates until then. I need to stop wasting time writing on here and keep snuggling with puppy while i can!

Week #1

I've been excited for this class for 3 months. I had so many high expectations, since it is given by a fairly large, respectable club.

When I got there, there was already about 7 dogs there. Immediately I thought "Wow, this is a big class." I was right on time, so I figured I was the last one. Then 7 more dogs showed up..... for a total of 14 DOGS! I was used to a small class, only about 5 dogs. When the instructor introduced her assistant, I was slightly relieved.

Before we got to the actual training, they had everyone introduce themselves. I was the only one who had agility experience before, but I was also the only one who didn't have any formal obedience training. I taught Zelda everything she knows, and she knows a lot. but since Zelda is my first dog, I've had no prior experience training, so she is less than perfect. She was able to hold a down-stay long enough for the instructors to see though, so I was proud of that. The instructor said its very important for the dogs to have a solid down-stay, because we need to have complete control over our dogs during class. I'm not going to lie, that worried me a bit. But so far she was an angel (other than lunging after the other dogs for play time, of course)

We started out by practicing targets. they handed out plastic lids to everyone to use as their targets. i already had one, since the same technique was used in my first class. When she handed me one, and I said I already had one, she gave me a blank stare and walked away. Um...ok. I had already been teaching Zelda to target the lid, so as soon as she saw it she started ramming her nose into it. Then she started to get a little antsy. She decided its more fun to sniff the horse poop smell in the dirt, than to eat hot dogs and cheese. With so many dogs in the class, I had the instructor come over once, just to say good and walk away.

Then it was time to introduce them to the a-frame. We all got in a line, and one after another, brought our dogs over the a-frame. There was a good 10 minutes in between each attempt, because of the amount of dogs. Zelda got to try it twice. Luckily, she had no fear of it, and actually loves running up and down it. But as we're waiting, and I'm trying to control this wiggly, jumpy, pulling little furball, I'm watching the other dogs go over the frame. I've been keeping my eye on a border collie/Australian cattle dog mix, because this dog did not look comfortable with anything that was going on. It kept growling and barking at the other dogs, and looked terrified the whole time. I watched the owner of this dog pull this dog up the frame by the leash, as the instructor pushed his behind up. The dog was digging his claws in the whole time, and squirming to get free. I was horrified. This is supposed to be fun for the dog, and he was having anything but fun.

Then we split into 2 groups to do the tunnel (luckily there were 2 tunnels) I watched the same thing happen again. The instructor grabbing the dog's leash as it was squirming and screaming, and the instructor shoves the dog through the tunnel. Zelda of course, ran right through with no problems, since she's done all this before. Thank god the instructors did not handle my dog in this way. I could not wait to get out of there.

I e-mailed my old trainer, and told her about all this, and asked her of she could help. She's going to start classes again in March, and she'll be happy to bring me and Zelda to Novice level, then after that she'll recommend some one to bring us further. Hopefully it will be on a different night so I could do both. I'm going to use this class for use if the equipment, and to teach focus amidst distractions.

Since its been a couple days since my class, this post isn't that entertaining, or detailed. Most people who are going to read this know my situation already, because they hear me bitch about it all the time (sorry guys!). Hopefully future posts will be better. I just needed to get down a little background to start. I plan to mostly use this as a journal for training, and hopefully I can figure out what's working and what's not.

Watch out agility world, I'm coming no matter how i get there.

Change of focus

As you can see, it's been almost a year since my last post. i'm going to be changing my focus a bit. I've decided to start training Zelda in agility seriously. That means getting to competition status, and actually competing. People make fun of me, and say I spoil my dog, and I spend too much time focusing on her. But when I get a trophy and ribbons, then you'll be jealous.

I took a beginner's class last summer given by Lisa Judge. I loved Lisa and the class, and Zelda did great. Becuase it was them winter time, there was a serious lack of classes. I finally found one held inside, giving by Princeton Dog Training Club, and had my first class last Wednesday. That's where this blog starts.