We have a little sheltie shaped visitor at the moment! Blaze has come to stay while his Mum and Dad are on holiday. We are loving having him to stay and he has slotted in really well with the other doglets. He is a very happy, cuddly little boy :-)
Here he is posing with his Mama Bean-he isn't as tall as her yet but taller than Brax (not hard!)
Grandpa Matt and Blaze at puppy class-he was very attentive!
Granny and Blaze selfie! (although it makes me look like I have a moustache lol!)
The whole gang together-what a gorgeous load of doglets!
In between puppy cuddles and work I have done a bit of dog walk training this week-I did a session that was 100% hits (on 11 reps) which was brilliant as its finally coming together after me being almost ready to chuck a stop in!
Brodie found a fake cat on his walk and stared at it like this for about a minute while I almost wet myself laughing-he never fails to make me laugh, my little clown!!
First rainy day for a while so I went fishing in the field and caught a collie :-p
My two have had a very busy three days! I hired Chance dog trainings lovely indoor venue to practise contacts somewhere else with Sparkle and see how they coped on the carpet. Unlike a lot of the training arenas with poorly cushioned astroturf, this one is actually the same as the one at Crufts (it is the actual carpet from Discover dogs) My guys loved running on it! Here is a video of them training-thanks to Jenni for filming :-)
Jenni ran Rommy and bought Squidge out for a play as well. Being somewhere new didn't bother him and we discovered he has inherited his mamas love of cage balls!
On Saturday we went to a local fun show. Brodie only did one class but managed a 3rd out of a decent entry in AV Pastoral/Working. Jenni got this lovely picture of him in the ring. Just love this boy!!
And here he is posing! His coat has been looking so lovely since he has been on Millies and its hard to believe that he was struggling with pancreatitis for so long. Sparkle was a good girly at her first showing show and came away with 3rd in Best Condition and in Best Trick!
Yesterday we went to Wallingford show. Brodie managed a 7th in C6-7 Agility and was a bit too wild in the jumping getting E'd! Sparkle had two E's but they were good ones. She found the distances quite tight but left the poles up which is progress!!
We had a quiet weekend, no shows but did some training at the field and went for some nice walks. Some of my lovely J9 people were competing at Shuttleworth so I went along to watch and as usual they all made me very proud doing some lovely runs and coming away with some great results!
We have been trying to entertain Brooke with various things that tax her brain but keep her calm as she is so full of the need to run but can't be let off lead. We managed to get a thundershirt to fit her (yay!) to limit the amount she can move her shoulder sideways. It definitely seems to help. This was us shopping in the pet shop...trust her to find some cage balls! She looks very scruffy at the moment due to losing her hair after the pups. It is slowly starting to grow back!
Modelling her new thundershirt in St Albans on a trip to the market
She also took Brodies place at Rally and was a very good girl! I took this while I was walking one of the courses and she was sitting watching one of the other dogs have a go. She was so good that I have been brave and entered her in a competition along with Brodie and Sparkle in May :-)
And just to prove despite her lack of hair that she can still look pretty!
It has been so warm here over the past couple of days-the older two couldn't even pose properly!
We have a few exciting days coming up! Hiring an indoor astroturf venue to practice contacts, a fun dog showing show and an agility show on Sunday!
Two weekends in a row I have done a UKA show in not the best conditions! I took Brodie and Sparkle to Lydiard and the wind was horrendous to the point an Aframe blew out of the ring! Brodie was a good boy and came 2nd in a steeplechase. Miss Sparkle had a couple of poles in the Beginners steeplechase qualifier and would have qualified if she had kept them up! She had a crack at Gamblers (all contacts had been removed so it was a tunnel or weave gamble-I opted for tunnel so we didn't get max points but she had a nice blast and came 2nd! Her first rosette this year :-)
I took Dolly and Brodie to UKA Easter and he did a lovely agility run to finish 3rd despite a bit of dithering! Dolly did a lovely jumping run and was 5th (placed to 4th) in a good sized novice qualifier-good spanner! Well done to Jenni and Rommy who qualified for the Grand Finals!! Brodie had fun socialising-here he is trying to get into Rowenas caravan :-)
I also got to see Squidge and Blaze at UKA Easter-what fabulous pups! Happy and confident around the rings at their first show on the ground. This is Blaze doing some downs next to the rings
And Squidge having a tug round the rings-yes it was very muddy and chilly but the pups weren't bothered!
Yesterday we went to Matts Mums for dinner and took Brax. She was eyeing up Matts carrot cake but trying her best to be sweet and innocent!
Brooke is still on lead walks only and very fed up bless her. She has her physio check up tomorrow so hoping to find out how she is doing. She is very naked after the pups and is shedding hair like crazy! Still such a pretty girly though.
Sparkle and I have been trying to practice our running contacts as we have had a few ropey session since her coming back into work after her season and my 8 weeks off due to the pups. I think it is lack of confidence so trying to get her out to different venues on varying dog walks. She was good in our session the other day-she did five dog walks in total and had three hits like the picture, one total miss and one miss where she tried to dunk a front foot in.
I will give it a few goes in the ring and see how she gets on but sooooo tempted just to whack a stop in and be done with it! All the courses at Crufts pretty much required a stop and a lot of handlers with running dog walks either struggled or their dogs missed. Same story in a lot of champs. Lots of think about! Brodie has a running contact and when I got to G7 most of the courses had turns off the dw so I trained him to stop too and its come in really handy. Here is Toad demonstrating his stop at the weekend (wrong end of tunnel after dw) Please excuse the dither by the weaves and the messy handling after the tunnel!
Two very special birthdays have been celebrated over the last week! Brooke bean has turned 4 years old and Brax has turned 10!! What a couple of special gingers they are and they both quite rightly got spoilt on their Birthdays :-) Both such amazing girls and we are lucky to have them x
Princess Brax was treated to a pamper day on her Birthday from her Auntie Jenni and Brodie got a full spa day too! They both desperately needed doing and look amazing now-Brax's belly hair was almost on the ground so she is all ready with her go faster haircut for the show season! Look how fluffy and white they are :-)
Brooke bean got a new harness for her birthday-its a long story (and for once nothing to do with Sparkle eating harnesses!) She managed to injure herself a while back and hurt her shoulder. She is seeing the physio on a weekly basis and having all manner of treatments which seem to be working well but we are taking her recovery very slowly. She needed a new harness that didn't sit on the point of her sore shoulder and this one fits the bill as its thin, light and made to measure. She is still very naked from the pups bless her!
The older two shelties were joined on one of their regular demos last week by very special guests-Jenni and Squidge! Yep at 10 weeks old little Squidglet (and I mean little, he is dinky!) did his first demo at Age Concern. He was such an awesome boy and made his Granny and Daddy toad very proud! Here is the demo squad
And Squidge showing how brave he is on a wobble cushion!
I have been very busy at work over the last week and been out for some early walks which is lovely when its so light-here are Brax and Spark wondering where we are going next?!
And I did a tiny bit of gridwork with the Sparkler. I have a new app on my phone that freeze frames videos so here is a still of Spark in flight up a progressive bounce grid!
I took the three midis to Ajaxs at the weekend. Mostly to get some NFC (not for competition) runs in with Sparkle so I could reward various things. The other reason was to have a go at the Beginners Steeplechase qualifier. It was the first time that I have ran Brodie, Dolly and Spark all on the same day and the one I struggled switching to was Miss Dolly. Probably due to not training her much at all recently but her jump commitment point is basically when she is in the air unlike my two!
Brodie ran soooo well-he was loving the big spread out courses and was totally bonkers about being at a party! He won a jumping and came 4th in a fast steeplechase so he gets the first 'sofa' picture of the year!!
The reason I couldn't actually use the sofa was that I didn't have the heart to move these two off it!!
This was one of Toads Eliminations but I loved this run! Thanks to Jenni for filming and dog juggling for me :-)
This was the beginners qualifier-needless to say we didn't go clear and I'm actually regretting running it as it was just all too tight for Spark and the point of going was to build her ring confidence! Sorry I can't flip it round but you get the idea.
I was pleased with how Dolls and Spark ran. Dolly it was just my timing so I now I have more time I need to borrow her more regularly! With Spark it was baby things. I had been practicing weaves in the garden while she was in season but I should have twigged that using stick in the ground ones would be a nightmare for her as she was pushing them out of the way. We need to do more weave homework but I was really pleased with her waits and focus. She wasn't quite as quick as she is when she is confident and her jumping was a wee bit stuttery but its all ring experience she needs now. Here is a compilation :-)
Brooke has been sore on her shoulder since having a run in with a stair gate so she is resting. To cheer Brax up we took her to the market on Saturday-she enjoyed being an only doglet!
How are the puppies I hear you ask! They are doing really well :-) I saw Blaze and Squidge at Ajaxs which was lovely! Here are a couple of pics-Daddy and Uncle Rommy just keeping an eye on them!
Daddy dog got a lovely pressi in the post from Sarah and her hounds! He was so excited he couldn't stop looking at the yummy treats! Thank you again Sarah for thinking of my lovely boy :-)
This pic is for my Mummy! Every year for Christmas I love getting a magic tree from her-I think they are so pretty and this year I hadn't done it cos of the pups but here it is all finished!
Squidge and Blaze went to their new homes over the weekend which has left Maverick as an only child for a week. I have really enjoyed having him to work with as one puppy is much easier than three to get out and about! Little Mav has had a baptism of fire this week as he has had to become a fully fledged Burdett doglet and tag along with me during the day at work. Here is a little video of what Mav has been getting up to!
He really is his Dads boy! They both love sleeping on their backs :-)
