Getting chilly!

I have totally run out of time to blog so far this week! I went to a wedding at the weekend and it was lovely to catch up with old friends, the weather was a bit grim but at least the whole day was inside the church! On Sunday Matthew and I had an obedience lesson with Anna with the two youngsters. The dogs worked really well and we have lots of things to do for homework. So when we get all the piles of snow they are warning us about, we will be able to do lots of constructive work in the house! We had some exciting news earlier in the week which means I will have to sit down and concentrate on sorting out some winter training plans, more news in a future post :)

Brodie posing!

Ickle diddle!

Brooke doing her froggy legs - her tail never stops!

Dolly practicing waits, she is really getting it now! We had a fab training session at the end of last week. She did some great weaves and lovely contacts :)

My little Bumble bear is 9 months old tomorrow-eek!! What happened and where did that time go?!

I got her a new toy this morning and she loves it, she like to lean on my legs or feet to chew her toys! Its a pink 'log' that you can pop treats in - haven't put treats in it yet as it seems exciting enough without them!

Wet weekend :(

No shows this weekend, just horrible rain which seemed never ending. I was supposed to be doing horse agility yesterday with Max but it got cancelled as the school turned into one giant lake and I would have needed waders to work him!!

I ended up walking my little Sparkler in a storm, poor girly! Her first experience of hail, thunder and lightning and it all came together. The hail was the worst in her opinion as she felt she couldn't possibly open her eyes and look at where she was going!! The lightning came next and I geared myself up for the thunder not knowing what she would do. I guess walking her near the clay pigeon shooting place has paid off as noise doesn't phase her generally. I found a manky bit of sausage at the bottom of my treat bag so by the end of the walk she was looking forward to the thunder-crazy pup!! :) The shelties are all totally laid back about storms, fireworks and shooting so I'm glad Sparkle is too.

This is Brax after having a bath and tidy up at Auntie Jenni's last week :) She is sooo cute!

There was lots of sofa snuggling at the weekend - Brodie is the only one who doesn't because he gets too hot!

I took some photos this morning as the younger girls were making me laugh so much about the pink ball, there was no squabbling but they both wanted it!!

Sparkle had it first...

Then Brooke pinched it...(note the smug tail wag!)

Sparkle plotted to get it back...

Brooke wasn't going to give it up easily...

But the sneaky collie got it back when Brooke went for a drink!

Dog Vegas-a show of 2nds!

We had a lovely time at Dog Vegas show over the weekend, despite the slightly wet weather! The doglets were brilliant and were really keen. Brodie only did two classes and was 2nd in G7 agility and 3rd in C6-7 agility. He is pictured above with 4 x 2nd rosettes just to show how pretty the 2nd placed rosettes are! The other two are Brooke's for C4-5 jumping and C4-5 agility. Clever bean! Dolly also outdid herself getting 2 x 2nds in C1-3 jumping - fabby spanner. 

The other J9 doglets competing did really well too - Jenni and Rommy got 2x1sts and a 2nd in C4-5 jumping and Paul and Chester came 2nd in C6-7 jumping. Very proud of how well they did :)

Tired doglets all sofa snuggling after the show-don't know what Sparkles excuse was as she didn't do much!

Love little diddle!! What a hairy little bear she is now-amazing to think that last year we could see her collar as she was so hairless. She has come so far since being diagnosed with hypothyroidism a year ago.

I haven't put a picture of Diva on the blog for a while but this was her first rug experience-she doesn't approve of the colour!!

The doglets chilling in the field today :) Brooke was too busy playing with her ball and Spark was ploting how to get it back!!

Chippenham Champ Show

We had a lovely weekend with my Mum staying on her return from America. The dogs were over the moon to see her again and turned themselves inside out with excitement! We had entered Chippenham Champ show a while back so dragged my Mum along to watch. Well... did our clever dogs put on a show or what!! Having not done a champ class with wee Brax for over two years we thought it was time to give it a go, knowing that she was fit enough and coping ok with KC height jumps in training. Matthew (as he put it) did it for a bit of fun! There were 51 entered and some of the best small dogs in the country competing. Our little diddle (twice the age and half the size of a lot of the entrants) was on fire!! She came 7th in the jumping round and 12th in the agility round (veeery slow dog walk) but the times for the jumping round were soooo tight (click to make it bigger)

Here is little Brax in action in Champ jumping

She got through to the Champ Final but unfortunately ran past the tyre which was the penultimate obstacle! Matthew is still kicking himself as if that hadn't have happened Bracken would have got her second Reserve Ticket!! Its hard to tell why it happened. My only thought is that he had pulled her off it once after the dog walk and being a smart little dog maybe she thought a bit too much for herself! Here is her Champ Final run - please excuse the dreadful filming, I was being a nervous wreck!

Brodie and Brooke did very well at Chippenham too! Brodie came 2nd in Grade 7 agility and Brooke came 2nd in Grade 4 agility (with very held contacts, lol!) You can't really see in the photo but they each won a very pretty plate :) 

I really liked these two pictures that I took during the week - Brooke snuggling up to Brodie but he doesn't look too sure about it! Also little miss naked Brooke out playing in the field, her coat is coming through very dark this time round.