Brooke and Rommy play date :)

Brooke went round to play at someones house yesterday! She absolutely LOVED Rommy who is a very handsome blue merle sheltie who is almost one. They played great chase games round the garden but it was the naughty lil minx chasing Rommy in HIS garden!!



I am having slight issues finding a harness that sits well on Brooke at the moment. She is currently in Brodies Rogz puppy one which isn't great (partly as its blue and everyone thinks she is a boy!) but at least its not tight round her 'armpits' like the green one was getting. I've also tried an ezy-dog one on her but as she is quite narrow across her chest it slips from side to side too much. I'm sure its just a lanky stage she is going through but any ideas gratefully received for a long narrow puppy!!

UKA Thames and Brooke 18 weeks

We had a fantastic weekend relaxing on the Saturday and going for a nice dog walk and on the Sunday we went to Thames Valley UKA show. Brax and Brodie were on form and they do love the slightly lower jump heights at UKA. Brodie was a wee superstar and won all three of his classes - agility, jumping and steeplechase!! I was so pleased with how he ran and it also qualifies him for the Tug-e-Nuff Performance Challenge at the UKA Grand Finals in December!! Clever sheltie, I'm so proud of him :)

Brax won her jumping class and came third in her Gamblers. Its funny watching the videos as Brodie struggles to find his stride in the wider weave poles but Brax loves them and goes much faster! Here are a couple of videos of each dog. We only took four videos as we kept clashing with each others runs!


Its the first time that Brodie had run on the aluminium equipment and he has a 'moment' on the dog walk and then was fine on the seesaw!






Congratulations to Jane and Robbie and Jackie and George who both won their Steeplechase classes on their first attempts at a higher level!! (Also thanks to both doggies for making friends with Brooke!) Well done to Helen and young Toby who got a 2nd and a 3rd in the agility and jumping :)

Brooke had great fun being out round the rings making friends with lots of dogs. Two dogs that she particularly liked were both blue merle shelties. One was a young merle dog who she really wanted to play with - he was very handsome! This was her after her busy day


I finally managed to video her on her wobble cushion. She is all lanky and leggy at the moment so organising her legs is an issue!! You can see in the video as well that she has suddenly lost all her puppy coat and looks really slinky and smooth.

Rugby and 'In the Box!'

The dogs and I went off to the local hospice to do another demo last week and again I was amazed and so proud of how well they coped, especially little Brooke. She took great delight in showing off her 'In the Box' trick which the patients loved. She also retrieved her little ball from under peoples chairs and that earned her a round of applause! Here is a video taken a couple of weeks ago of her box trick. Since then she has lost loads of puppy fuzz and has some lovely rich coloured adult coat coming through.



We went to Rugby at the weekend and had some nice runs but the weather was awful on the Saturday so no videos! Brax did two clear rounds in the champ but didn't make it into the final, prob due to getting slowed up in the very wet cloth tunnel. The bigger dogs managed to push through slightly easier but it was a shame for the real lightweights! She did some lovely contacts and considering she doesn't 'do' rain she was a good girl :) She got 9th in a huge C6-7 jumping class on Sunday despite the weather.

Brodie ran clear three out of four times over the weekend and was just out of the placings again in a couple of classes. I'm actually most pleased with the one I mucked up (silly handler!) as I managed to layer weaves from miles away - clever Brodie! Brooke came rounds the rings with us again and enjoyed taking it all in and watching the action.

Well done to Jackie and her lovely spaniel Mr George who won into Grade 4 at Rugby!! Also congrats to Caroline and Bobby for their 4th in a big jumping class :)

East Lothian

We had an exciting adventure up to Scotland last week with Lian and five shelties! My Dad only lives a few miles from the showground so it was an ideal opportunity to visit him as well. We had a lovely, busy weekend and it was also the pups first big road trip and they did really well. They also had soooo much fun playing on the beach and in my Dads lovely garden. Matthew was racing the pups on the beach and he can't get away from them, they are faster then him now! Thanks to Lian for the fab pics.






Lian has put some gorgeous photos she took on her blog There are some great action pics of the dogs racing around and the pups playing :)



On the saturday all three of us had champ class up first. Unfortunately the bloke who does the show processing had messed Matthew's tickets up and had entered him and Brodie into the small champ!!! This meant that he had to run 4th instead of 16 and Brax and him were not warmed up and flustered :( resulting in an E.



Brodie and I then ran the same course and got E'd in the same place!!! I just totally forgot to engage my brain and tell him to come to my side. Poor Brodie looks really confused in the video - bad Mummy!



We both did G5-7 agility before Champ Agility and Brax was 3rd and Brodie was one out of the placings. This happened to us in both the graded agility runs on saturday and sunday 4th but placed to 3rd! I was really pleased looking at the grade 6 times though as he would have won by a good margin in both runs.

Brax and Brodie both ran clear in the Champ Agility. It was a good course, testing but flowing and the dogs enjoyed it! I had to slow Brodie down to run the left side of the dog walk but I was pleased with his rear cross towards the crowd - he wouldn't have happily done that last year :)





On the saturday we left early and went back to Gullane to let the dogs play. It absolutely poured with rain so we met up with Lian, Yvonne and her Mum to have a meal and good chat! It was so nice to catch up properly in the dry and have a lovely meal.

On the Sunday we went to walk the first course and discovered tunnel under Aframe and Dog walk and a TABLE!!! The judge had specified that she didn't want a pause on it but the dog to jump on and off cleanly. Fortunately all three shelties were impeccable on the table! Brax had a cheeky detour in a tunnel but an otherwise good run, Brodie did a nice run (4th again but placed to 3rd!)but I slowed him up to get the dog walk. Lians Sizzle, Brodies lil brother had a brilliant run apart from an unlucky E. All runs are on my YouTube page. It was such a fun course to try though.





Last run of the day was the jumping which all three dogs did a lovely clear in. Great fun blast for the dogs and a nice way to end our Scottish agility adventure! I only caught half of Brax's run :(





The puppies were so well behaved all weekend and had so much fun beating each other up! Being 16 weeks we took them out round the rings to get used to the atmosphere and they were brilliant. The only time Brooke got a bit gobby was when Matthew was running Brax - very jealous! She tugged and played round the rings happily though which was great. She is easily distracted by Sonic but this got better over the weekend and she got her usual focus back on us. She is now spitting out baby teeth all over the place - poor lil gummy bear!! Last video is of Brodie getting the girls to chase him in my Dads garden - he is such a tease!

Brooke 15 weeks

Brooke had her first training session at the agility arena today. We didn't do much as it was very hot but she had a great time!! I was really pleased with how she wasn't fazed at all by the barking dogs in the kennels or Brax whinging for her turn! Brooke did restrained recalls through jump wings (no poles on ground) as well as sending her on to her tuggy toy through the wings. We did a straight tunnel a few times which she loved, here is a short clip of her doing a tunnel

We also propped the see saw on a jump wing and fed her while she gently wobbled on the low end. This didn't bother her at all, mainly I think as she loves her wobble cushion at home. We kept it short and sweet and although she seemed keen to do more, I held her in the shade while Brax had a run round with Matthew. Brooke voiced her opinion about this so in this video clip of Brax running round, it may be best to turn the sound down!!

After Brax had run round, she was really hot and panting quite hard. Normally is VERY rare to see Brax pant, even after doing a run on a hot day at a competition but this picture made me laugh - what a long tongue!!!


Brooke's ears are starting to threaten going bolt upright this week! Her right one stuck up a bit and went down again, sure sign that she is starting to teeth. Poor girly :( She has also had a growth spurt this week and looks a bit lanky again. Still not quite as big as Brax but catching up! We have been doing a couple of new tricks this week like walking backwards, roll over, retrieve and leave it to add to sit, down, wait and standing on things like small boxes and her wobble cushion. I am hoping to video these at some stage.
Brooke is such happy little puppy and we couldn't imagine being without her now. She is such a special girlie and she makes us constantly smile at her antics! Brooke has decided that Brodie is the best big brother ever and spends ages chasing around with him and licking his face! He is very patient with her and lets her take anything off him, big wimp that he is. We took all three of them on a lovely walk early yesterday morning and Brooke met some more dogs. At the moment we are letting her walk for about 15-20 mins and then carrying her as I'm always paranoid about overdoing it. She was tired after being a social butterfly and slept solid for a couple of hours having loud twitchy dreams :)