Rally at the Dog Barn and MADS

I took my two to compete at the Dog Barn in a Rally competition on Saturday, Brodie was doing Level 1 and 2 and Sparkle was just doing Level 1. It was a very soggy day so I'm really pleased that my Level 1 ring was indoors! It was a lovely show though and again I was struck by how friendly and helpful everyone is. They had lovely Rally themed cakes on sale as well!

Brodie was a total star! He was a bit unsettled in his Level 2 round as a car backfired and put him off but the judge was lovely, stopped the clock and let me take a second to settle him. He ended up 5th which I was amazed at! He did his Level 1 round like an absolute dream, so attentive and everything just flowed. Spark on the other hand I had to work hard to keep her attention and it felt much more messy. I could not believe it when Brodie came 2nd with 207 points (out of 210) and Spark won it with 208!! I had seen some amazing obedience dogs go round and they were sooo accurate but I forget that Rally isn't necessary about perfection, its about flow and connection with your dog and each judge looks for slightly different things. 

My two having a rare moment of looking angelic! 

On Sunday we went to MADS UKA show, mostly to do Masters with the older two and do some nfc with Sparklina, particularly aluminium dog walks as they are more of a challenge for her than wooden or plastic. I handled Brodie like a numpty and got E'd in both bits of masters, Matt and Brax on teh other hand came 2nd in both bit making them 2nd overall and qualifying for the grand finals again! Spark did some good nfc stuff too-love UKA for baby dogs! 

Brooke bean is being a good girl most of the time and continues to stay so happy despite all of her restrictions. We had coffee on the comm on today and she loves people watching-she has always been very curious!

No wonder they made such gorgeous babies!

This is Spark BEFORE her weekly agility lesson! She was so cute all curled up that I felt bad waking her up!

And this is her having a race around the field today with Squidge...if you look closely you can see Toad mousing in the long grass!

A day in the life of a bored dog!

Brooke has had many weeks of not being allowed to run around and do normal dog things so she has made some notes about fun things to do if you are restricted just in case other poorly dogs could get some tips...over to Brooke!

 I am not allowed to do ANYTHING at the moment, I even have to go to the toilet on lead which is really embarrassing :-( Because I hurt my shoulder I have to be in a pen or a crate most of the time and am not allowed to walk or be loose in the house. I have a choice of beds in my pen as sometimes I like my bed with sides to put my chin on and sometimes I like my blanket so I can stretch out. I also have a special Back on Track bed that is therapeutic and I love sleeping on that in Dads office and in my crate at night.

Eating is the highlight of my day!! I love my food and its sad as I don't get to eat as much now as I'm not running around. My Mum and Dad have a huge variety of food toys for us doglets. Here are some of the toys I get my food in to keep me busy! Since I had my operation I haven't been drinking very much so my food has been really well soaked which makes it harder to get out of the food toys. Sometimes Mum is really mean and freezes it in my Kong toys-grrr!! You don't need to have fancy toys though, sometimes they put my food in a plastic bottle or a folded up bit of cardboard and I love ripping it up. I have used some fun food games too that involve pushing and sliding things but I got a bit too wild with my bad leg-oops!

I am having this thing called bio magnetic therapy twice a day at the moment. My lovely physio Sally has lent Mum and Dad a machine and I have started to associate this with sofa and bed time! I get to cuddle up on the sofa in the morning while Mum has her cup of coffee and at night time they let me curl up on the bed to be done as it takes 20 minutes each time. It is warm and nice and I often doze off having it!

If Dad is working from home then I hang out with him in his office for the day spending some of my time attached to him via a lead and some of the time in a crate. If I have to go with Mum in the car then I get my own crate on the back seat so none of the others bash into me and I get a hoof to chew on-yippee!! I love hooves and Mum says they are good for my figure as I can't eat them like most other chews :-) 

Because of Mums job she is like a flea in a fit and we go all over the place! She takes me out and lets me sit watching the world go by. This is me and Brax having a picnic. Mum had walked my lovely husband Brodie and stupid Sparkle and they had got all smelly in the river so us posh gingers wanted to get as far away as possible! Mum let us sit out while she ate lunch. I am getting good at going to coffee shops too-Cafe Nero is my favourite...I can sit in if its nasty weather and sit out on the the common if its sunny. Otherwise I would get no fresh air! Dad is strong so that he carried me on a walk round the fields. It was nice to be out with everyone again. They say I've got to stay at the vets on Friday for another operation so wish me luck everyone.

My puppies cheer me up and they are now handsome 5 month old boys!! Here is a picture of each of them, so proud of my boys :-)

Squidge (with his brother Rommy)

Blaze in his new harness

Maverick graduating from puppy class

Poor Brooke Bean

We have been battling trying to keep Brooke sound since she hurt her ligament in her shoulder earlier in he year. We had been doing a lot of physio work on it and she was getting progressively more lame to the point that we decided together with Sally our physio that it was worth getting a specialist vet to have a look in her shoulder with a camera via keyhole surgery.

She has never had so much as a sedation before so we were reluctant to leave her but Patrick the vet was lovely and kept us informed about what was going on. Unfortunately it was not good news. Her shoulder injury had caused inflammation that had made her immune system go into overdrive and lay down bony calcium deposits in her biceps tendon and shoulder joint. This is turn had made the joint more inflamed and has created a vicious circle of calcium deposits and inflammation which is gumming up her joint. The next step is another general anaesthetic to put a steroid injection right into her joint which stops her immune system going into overdrive. Fingers toes and paws crossed that it works for Bean as we are just desperate for her to be able to enjoy life again.

The size of the surgery wound was incredible. Shame she spent all that time growing her hair back though!

Brooke has been really spoilt-we got a lovely pressi of a Back on Track bed from her Grandma Lian which was so kind of her. Brooke always chooses to lie on it so it is obviously very comfy! Thank you Lian x

The other dogs are mostly fine. Brodie has had a cyst on his tail which has been quite sore and needing to be bandaged up to stop him fussing at it. You can just about make out his little bandage in the pic below. He has a Rally competition coming up so we have been getting in a bit of practice. The nice thing about Rally is that you can practice easily everyday on walks and in the garden. 

Haven't done any agility training at all since the show (until Tuesday when I did some entertaining seesaws with Spark!) but the dogs have been enjoying hanging out in the field with me as Brooke prefers being left in a car crate to being left at a home while I walk the others. No agility shows for a couple of weeks so will have some down time while we get Brooke through the next op-can always rely on these goof balls to cheer me up! Was lovely seeing my sis at the weekend as well, so nice to catch up and the doglets just adore her! 

Doglet hugs are always lovely too! (Excuse my sock!)

First Rally Comp and Spark goes Grade 4!!

So our busy Bank holiday weekend started with a trip to Cippenham KC show. Dolly was such a good girly and got 4th in the C1-3 agility (with weave faults on a really hard course!) and she also came 5th in the C1-3 jumping in a big class of 52 dogs so I was very proud of her! This is her on the jumping course-almost had a detour past the tunnel :-)



Sparkler had her first ever clear round at a KC show and came 3rd in a C1-7 helter skelter which was a lovely flowing course-she still is backing off the jumps more than she does in training but that will come with experience.

On Monday I took Brodie, Brooke and Sparkle to their very first Rally competition. Nervous was an understatement!! I was terrified! Had no idea what I was doing but everyone was so helpful and friendly. It was really well organised and fairly similar to champ agility in that you walk the course and then run in order. The dogs really enjoyed their day out, particularly Brooke as it was fun for her to be working again. It was a great experience for Spark as a young dog to work without the adrenaline of agility!

Well the dogs did very well for their first time! I didn't really understand the scoring system but apparently all five rounds were deemed 'excellent'! Brodie got a 6th in Level 1 and a 4th in Level 2. Brooke came 2nd in Level 1 (with a score of 205!) and got 199 at Level 2 so another qualifying score. Miss Sparkle only did Level 1 but managed a very respectable excellent score of 197! The classes were so big that they were split into 3 parts with 35/36 in each part so really pleased for a first time!

Little Brax has snuck into the sheltie photo to show off her rosette from UKA. While we were doing Rally, Brax and Matt were busy at agility coming 2nd overall in the Masters and qualifying for the Grand Finals! Not bad for a tiny ten year old fuzz ball!! So proud of them both :-)

Sorry epic blog continues! I then went to JDA agility show with Sparkle and Toad mid week as some of my clients were competing and it was a bit of a J9 club outing. Well what can I say?! Totally speechless with how well everyone did! First up was C3-5 agility which was a tricky course with a tricky entry and exit to the dog walk. I handled it the 'safe' way as didn't want Spark (who is long striding) to fall off trying to get on the dog walk. I had also decided that if she ran her dog walk nicely and happened to go over the finish jump I would just reward her. Well she didn't see the finish jump so I called her back towards me (haven't taught turns off dw yet!) and finished the course. What with the long route onto and detour off the dw and the held seesaw I thought we would be safe in a combined agility but nope...she won it! Grade 4 was not the plan just yet!! She was a little superstar though and went on to win her helter skelter and C3-5 jumping. The only one filmed was the jumping :-) I had given myself a kick up the bum and decided to run her like I do in training hence the blinds and the ketchker turn!

Just as exciting as Sparkle getting her first wins was my clients doing so well! Jenni and Rommy got their last G6 win to reach G7 and champ level and Willow beagle won her second G4 agility confirming that she is ready for G5! So proud of them all :-D Special mention for my little Toad did a stonking run in the agility and the jumping but after a sat nav failure in the agility he is on the lookout for a better handler!! Love him! 

Oh and I saw two of the Grandpups at JDA-what stunning little boys they are! Here are Mav and Squidge

Workshop week

I have had a bit of a manic week this week! For some reason I had booked workshops on Tuesday with Laura Chudleigh and Thursday with Dan. As it turns out Brodie worked in the Tuesday one and Spark (who had the all clear from the physio on Wed) worked in the Thursday one. My little boy did me proud and worked nicely despite me panicking a bit about him not doing all the euro turns. Like all workshops there was definitely things to take away and practice from it-one being that I needed to cue my pivots more with a bit of off arm as I am lazy and know that Toad turns tight anyway! Here is a video of his workshop



Miss Sparkle had a great time yesterday and got to put weaves in a course which she hasn't done on a workshop before. It was so obvious that she felt better as she didn't take any poles and got her weaves every time bar once when I said something silly! I asked a friend to film her last run where we put all the elements of the course together and she got it right. Being picky she was a bit wide on the left turn on the third jump but I should have hung back and nagged more!



We are still not seeing a vast improvement in Brooke bean, she is being a good patient (most of the time!) but is lame particularly after exercise. It must be so frustrating for Matthew-not sure I'd cope as well as him as it is frustrating enough looking after her on a daily basis and not letting her do the one thing she loves most which is running :-( Generally a bit fed up at the moment. We both seem to have encountered more than our fair share of rudeness and 'yes...but' people this week. Hopefully some changes are in the pipeline...

Catch up...naughty blogger!

The pups had a get together in my field last week! They are such scrummy handsome boys :-) Here they are with Zoe's sheltie Merlin. From left to right Squidge, Maverick and Blaze. The two tri's are a very similar size but Squidge is still smaller and lighter-he gives as good as he gets though! 

Blaze, Brooke and Squidge posing at Tunbridge Wells show. We kept being asked if Brooke was a puppy!

The boys playing with Auntie Sparkles favourite toy!!

Blaze and Sparkle also came with us to vote last week! Spark has an ear out on the door as Matthew was inside voting :-)

 We have done a couple of agility shows over the past couple of weekends. Brodie and Brax had a great time running at the Kent FAB show. Both of them won their senior jumping class which qualifies them for the finals in August! Brax also won the IFCS jumping and agility qualifier! Brodie had 5 faults on the Aframe (I think he got it...partly as he has only missed one in 6 years of competing when he was in G1 and partly as I actually looked back at him which I don't always do) He technically won as all the other dogs in his height were eliminated!

I took Brodie, Sparkle and Brooke with me to Hatton on Saturday. Brodie only ran one class (C5-7 jumping) which he came 4th in. It had some great quirky jumps in it which made a nice change. It had a water jump, gate and brush fence! Sparkle did her first agility properly in the ring, it was a lovely course and she got her dw, weaves and aframe but then flew off her seesaw at the end (which she promptly put herself back on!) In the jumping she coped with all the strange jumps well and only had faults in the weaves and in the steeplechase just had a couple of poles. 

Best thing about Hatton was there was 'have a go' Rally right next to the agility. I did rounds with all three and got feedback about what to improve on. Also it was Sparkles first go and she did well, especially with the agility going on in the next ring! All three have their first competition in just over a week-eek!!

On Sunday Matt and I took all the doglets to Tunbridge Wells show. Brodie did Olympia qualifier (5f on seesaw) and Crufts teams. We were eliminated in teams which was gutting as we still finished 3rd and were 28 seconds faster than the winners. Feel so bad letting my team mates down :-( 

Brax was in her first champ of the year and got through to the final bless her! She ran well but got eliminated at the end having already done a naughty dog walk! She was loving it though-going great guns for a veteran. 

Spark did one jumping run and could not weave. The more I thought about it the more I wondered whether she had done something flying off the seesaw the day before. Luckily my wonderful physio fitted her in and I feel terrible as her neck was in spasm. Luckily her back was ok but she was all locked up through her neck and shoulder. Fixed now but a week off work and heat packs and stretches. And I thought she was being cheeky in her weaves...

Love this pic of the older two! They are the healthy, fit ones at the moment!!

Little visitor and random pics!

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