What went well today?

1. We played Susan's Retrieve Game first thing this morning.  I got a bit distracted by the squeaky but for the first go at this Mum was pretty pleased with me.
2. Had a lovely walk on the beach doing some retrieving of the tennis ball from the sea.  Charlie and Barbara came with us too which was fun.
3. Mum sold a painting.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Watch Retrieve Video again and check the list of games and choose five of them to play over the day.
2. Practise trick routine.
3. Have a good relaxing walk.

Oh and here's the video of my first attempt at this particular retrieve challenge:

Oops - Mum has missed a day or two again but I forgive her.l

Best thing happened for her yesterday was the H360 Coaching call.

Best three things that went well today.

1. I went to the Rest Home with Mum and everyone loved me.  I was also very well behaved and Mum was so proud of me.  We kept being asked to do cop-cop - seems to be a crowd puller that trick.
2. Then we went out for a walk with Ponto, Percy and Dylan. It was lovely and sunny and warm.
3. When we had had a rest back home we played the first Blueprint games in the garden. Mum has videoed this but has not watched it yet.

Plan for tomorrow.

1. Blueprint games.
2. Get the painting ready for the guy picking it up.  Mum was glad she sold this one as it has funded lots of fun training camps and stuff for next year.
3. Practise our trick routine for the upcoming fun show "Best Trick" class.

What went well today?

1. I have perfected getting in a suitcase.
2. I ran and jumped onto my Mum's back and she managed to crawl along with me still there.
3. I did my ringstack all the way through in order to get a yummy treat.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Mum is going to continuing making her video of us for the H360 Course.
2. We are going to agility training at Amy's and I always love that.
3. We will practise the suitcase, ringstack and jumping on Mum's back and cop cop to make a short trick sequence for at a fun show on 22 November.

Mum missed doing the blog on Saturday and last night because we had a visitor, Alan, for the weekend and yesterday we got up very early and drove him back to London so we could look for his cat who had disappeared on Saturday evening before his girlfriend went to work.  Luckily Kitty came back after we wandered around calling him.  After that we went for a walk under the river to Woolwich, we sat and had cups of tea or coffee at a cafe, then did some shopping, then walked about three or four miles along the River Thames to Greenwich.  At Greenwich we went for a ride in the Emirates Cable car over the Thames.

The Emirates Cable Car

Me and Alan on the path along the Thames

The Thames Flood Barrier, 02 Arena and view of Canary Wharf

Along route I did some lalas, waits, sit pretties and other fun games.  I looked out over London on the Cable Car and then because we had walked a long way, we took the Dockland Light Railway back to where Alan lives.

The drive home took us ages as we decided to go through Central London and there was an awful lot of traffic and masses of people, however, I was so tired I slept the whole way home.

What went well today?

1. I can now put the coins in through a smaller gap in my money box.  Mum is very pleased as I picked this up easily, but then I am very good a my ringstack and can also balance a ball on a cone so this type of thing is familiar to me.
2. We played contact games, running along a thin long flat plank in the garden.  Alan, my Mum's youngest human child came to visit (he is a grown up) and he held me lightly in a restrain while Mum called me.  Loved that game.
3. I also went for my walk to the beach with Percy today and we played on the sand.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. A long walk for me on my on with my Mum.
2. Practising the little routine we are going to do as "best trick" in a show near the end of November, including the suitcase.
3. Have a quick weave game too in readiness for the trial on Sunday.

What went well today?

1. This morning we had loads of fun in the den, there are some videos of what we did below.
2. Then we had a lovely walk and I played check check and lala round some posts and trees and Dylan and I both played "on" on a tree stump and then some retrieve on the playing field.  We also met our friend Charlie while we were out.
3. Mum bought me a money box when she took her Mum out for lunch today.  It is a tin shaped like a London bus.  At the moment she takes the whole lid off and I pick the coins up from the floor and drop them in.  The first time the noise startled me for a moment but then I realised I'd done good 'cos I got a nice fishy reward so I did it again.  Now I am expert.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Mum is going to make the entry to my new money box a bit smaller so I will start to learn to find the hole to drop the coins in.
2. Play matwork for our contacts.
3. And, of course, we'll have a lovely walk where we will also play retrieves, waits and all sorts of other games.

Just look at some of the games we played for breakfast today:

Pick up my Toys (and a spoon and allen key)

Get in the suitcase

Walking backwards onto a wobble cushion

Going forwards round my Mum

What went well today?

1. I am now running really fast round Mum forwards in both directions.
2. Practised NRMs while at Amy's for agility training and I got it!
3. The new local fun dog show told my Mum they would add a "Best Trick" class to the novelty classes just for us.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Lots more fast sits, downs and stands.
2. Proofing contacts - well that is Mum's job to make sure she is similar to how she is in the ring so I don't get confused.
3. Have a really good long hike along the beach and cliffs.

What went well today?

1. Mum says I'm getting really fast going from sit to down to pretty to stand now.  
2. I say that she is making the criteria much clearer for me.
3. We played lots of contact games today.

Plan for tomorrow

1. Mum's getting up early to do the housework upstairs.
2. We'll have a shortish walk in the woods in the morning and play recaller games and practise various tricks and lalas etc.
3. Going to agility training in the afternoon and Barbara and Charlie are coming to watch.

What went well today?

1. We played our breakfast games on my bed, really fast response sits, downs, stands and pretties.  Love playing these games.
2. I relaxed after my walk on my bed.
3. Mum has found a training partner to help with our NRMs.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Lots of mat games for our running contacts.
2. Crate Games
3. NRM games.

What went well this weekend?

1. We had great fun at the Wicked Weaves Camp at Devon Dogs.  Mum thinks that my contacts are definitely better than she had realised.
2. Did lots of my favourite things like handstands and other proprioception tricks.
3. Great visit to Alexis, Lucas and Fiddy.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Practise mat contact work.
2. Go for a really good chill out walk.
3. Mum needs to make a poa for how to get me to run independently on the dog walk if she is hanging behind.

So what went well today?

1. I held the wooden spoon nicely while my Mum put some of my breakfast in it.
2. We walked all the way along the beach and cliffs and I played fetch with my tennis ball running down the grassy bank from the cliffs all the way onto the pebbles of the beach.
3. My friend Charlie and his Mum Barbara visited this afternoon, I showed her how I can now get into the suitcase.   She asked Mum how to start teaching Charlie this and he managed to put all four feet in the suitcase before he left us.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Drive to Devon Dogs for the Wicked Contacts Weekend.
2. Visit Fiddy, her pups and her Dad in the evening.
3. Then back to Devon Dogs on Sunday for the second day.

So what went well today?

1. I held the wooden spoon nicely while my Mum put some of my breakfast in it.
2. We walked all the way along the beach and cliffs and I played fetch with my tennis ball running down the grassy bank from the cliffs all the way onto the pebbles of the beach.
3. My friend Charlie and his Mum Barbara visited this afternoon, I showed her how I can now get into the suitcase.   She asked Mum how to start teaching Charlie this and he managed to put all four feet in the suitcase before he left us.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Drive to Devon Dogs for the Wicked Contacts Weekend.
2. Visit Fiddy, her pups and her Dad in the evening.
3. Then back to Devon Dogs on Sunday for the second day.

16 October

What went well today:

1. Crate Games after I had stopped shouting at Mum.  Oops my naughty spots were playing me up a bit this morning, but then I settled down and we had loads of fun.
2. I walked around my Mum while we were out in the park, both directions, getting the hang of that now.
3. I was really good at keeping all four paws on the ground to say hello to people today.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. We haven't had the weaves up in the garden for a while so we are going to play weaves tomorrow.
2. We'll play at "dead" again as we haven't done this now for a couple of days.  Hope I remember what to do, but I expect I will.
3. Mum is going to start planning our routine for the Christmas Tricks Show at the Care Home as we now have the date for that.

15 October

Well Mum forgot about us doing my blog yesterday - oops!

But what went well today?

1. I am now going round my Mum like she's a post - she had taught me to go backwards round her - that's a cinch for me, but had totally forgotten about teaching me to go right round. I go behind and in between her legs, but I hadn't learned just to go round.  It was our fourth session today and the video of our playing is below.
2. We went to Amy's for agility training.  Luckily it wasn't raining so we were out in the field rather than the barn.  Amy thought that my turn on a check check was good and Mum practised picking me up on the other side of a jump after I had raced through the tunnel.
3. We watched an interesting programme on TV all about the secret lives of cats.

Monday 13th October

What did we do today?

1. Well we did what you can see on the videos below this morning.  It was great fun.
2. I got into a suitcase, I rolled onto my side, "dead".
3. I also did some check checks and lalas in the garden, very early but it was beginning to rain.

So our plan for tomorrow:

1. Hopefully we'll go for a really long hike, yesterday we only went a short way as it was pouring with rain all day.   Mind you, we posted our letter off to book our Richard Curtis Camp too - I am very excited about that.
2. Practise our dead tricks again along with lots of the other things I do.
3. And Mum has to do the shopping, so that means she'll buy sausages and cheese and liver and make up some lovely treats with them for our playing over the next week.

Just look what we did this morning

Zoom Zoom

Jump over Mum's arms

Reverse between Mum's legs

Lie on my side "dead"

11 October

What went well today?

1. I went across the road with Ponto to play with our neighbour.  It was pouring with rain and there was lightning and thunder as we crossed the road.  Neither Ponto nor I care about that at all.  The reason Mum took me across the road was so that I didn't have to stay with Percy and Dylan who get a bit upset by the thunder.  Grandma stayed with them.
2. I did some really nice tight turns with check check at the jump.
3. On our walk Mum added a couple of zooms round things after recalling me to her - that was great fun - because then she sent me straight off to see what interesting things there were to sniff out again.

Plan for tomorrow

1. Mum has found out where we can go for a camp doing HTM - I am excited about that so we are going to continue practising me walking backwards and between her legs.
2. The weather man says that at last we are going to have a day without heavy downpours in between the sun so Mum has to mow the lawn, then she is going to set up one of the H360 blueprint exercises for me to do out there - can't wait.
3. We haven't decided where to go for our walk yet - I hope it is somewhere exciting, like Uddens Woods.

10 October 2014

What went well today:

1. I am getting really good at getting into the suitcase and hiding myself completely except sometimes my tail still sticks out.
2. I am going much more tightly around my PNUs.
3. I had a lovely walk at the beach with my Mum and completely ignored a dog that insisted on following us.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Mum is thinking about going back to HTM so is going to look into this.
2. Ponto is going across the road to be a therapy dog for our neighbour.
3. We are going to practise checks and lalas on the jump wings.

9 October

What went well today?

1. Me getting into the suitcase.
2. Ponto, Dylan and I went with Mum to Badbury Rings.   Not many dogs there so Ponto wore her muzzle and ran free with me and Dylan.  We had a great time and only got a little bit wet in the rain.
3. My PNU - Mum thinks I am getting far tighter going round this now.

Here is a video of me getting into the suitcase.

Our plan for tomorrow:

1. Play the suitcase game again and take it downstairs to show Grandma.
2. Mum and I are going out on our own today as Dylan and Ponto had a good time with us yesterday.  Percy, Dylan and Ponto will go out together later.
3. Mum is going to bring a jump into the Den so when it is dark and/or rainy at breakfast time we can use one jump indoors.

What went well (8 October)?

1. I did suitcase really well so tomorrow will be pushing lid up to get in by myself.
2. Ponto began touching the edge of the food bowl with her mouth.
3. Had fun at Amy's, practising serpentines.  I got a little bit distracted by the piglet in the crate in the corner but once I had walked past him and taken a good look it was fine.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Get in the suitcase!
2. Lots of PNU work to tighten up my turns.
3. Mat work.

What went well today (7 October) - Mum is late doing the blog?

1. We played get in the suitcase and Mum held the lid today so I had to push it to get in.  Here is the video of that. 
2. We also practised me doing control behaviours at a distance, first in the den, then when we were out for our walk.   I am getting good at this but have a bit of trouble with "stand" at a distance - I understand "stand" but once up I want to go back to Mum.  We will have to think of a smart way of me holding my stand at a distance.
3. Ponto is also learning to get in the suitcase and is doing quite well.  She puts all four feet in and a sit, and she has tried to lie down in it once.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. We are going to try doing the suitcase with me pushing the lid up.
2. Ponto is going to start learning to pick up a food bowl and put it into another food bowl.
3. Dylan is going to start learning to get in the suitcase.  And I am going to agility training at Amy's.

So what went well today.

1. After the rain Mum took me out for a walk through the woods and to the shop so that we could get Grandma some cash.  We played retrieve with my tennis ball and plenty of RZ. When we got to the prettily planted trees we did check checks and la las and a few nanas too. And we did 15 recalls during our off lead walk in all, which together with the seven or eight at home means we did about 20 odd recalls definitely today - aiming at doing 100 one call recalls this week.
2. Percy, Dylan and Ponto then went for a walk with Mum and I stayed with Grandma.
3. We also played walking backwards with me between Mum's legs.

Plan for tomorrow.

1. Do another 20 recalls including some collar grabs.
2. Play mat games, suitcase games and roll in a blanket games.
3. Mum to watch some more H360 videos and make notes.

As promised, here is the video of Percy and Dylan's visit to church.

Well today went well:

1. Both Ponto and I demonstrated how we are learning to get in the suitcase, and the other trick of walking backwards between Mum's legs to Grandma in the living room - so new H.
2. Mum thought I was extremely good when out with Dylan at Stanpit.  We played a lot of Recaller games and did at least 10 good recalls including collar grabs and stopping and running past each other.
3. Percy and Dylan were the stars in the afternoon - they went to church, to the Animal Blessing at Holdenhurst Village Church.  Mum has taken a video and will upload this to my blog for you all to see when it is ready.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Rain and storms are predicted so we will do a lot of playing in the Den I expect including getting in the suitcase, PNU work and other such tricks.
2. When the rain stops we'll go on a hike to the beach perhaps.
3. Mum needs to do some reading for a new course she is starting on psychology.

What went well today for us?

1. We woke up late but the rain hadn't started and we played in the garden, checks, lalas, contacts and starts and lots of balance breaks between so great fun.
2. The rain then started and it poured and poured which Mum says will be really good for the camellias as this September has been very dry.
3. When the rain finished the sun came out and we went for a lovely walk round Mudeford Wood where we played lots of games as well.

We also practised the suitcase trick and I started learning to pull a blanket over me.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Mum thinks this three things each day is getting a bit boring so we may do something different with the blog although incorporating the three things.
2. Mum is taking Percy to the Animal Blessing Ceremony.
3. Mum and I will do all sorts of tricks, Recallers games, and agility practice and I'll let you know what we did tomorrow.

Journal Day 8

Well this week we have been resting a bit, but still doing quite a lot.  So what went well today.

1. We started by playing a few shaping games for breakfast including my first go at getting inside a suitcase.  In the end I think my Mum wants me to hide in the suitcase with the lid down.

We also played putting my toys away in the basket.  Now I am usually very good at this but at the beginning I got confused and thought I had to get in the small basked with the toy - however, I soon realised what I was doing.

2. Our walk to Hengistbury Head was loads of fun, and we met a lady with a dog who thought I was really good.  Mum explained that we use Do Land type training and IYC and we gave her a card for Absolute Academy too.  Her dog was a mongrel, and seven years old, she thought he was too old to start training, but we let her know that wasn't so and Dylan and I enjoyed ourselves with him.

3. My Mum's new polo shirts arrived and she was very pleased with them.

Plan for tomorrow

1. Work some more on hiding in the suitcase.

2. Work some more on lalas and checks and jumps.

3. Work some more on contacts.

And Mum might also take either me, or maybe just Dylan, to a fun dog show.  As we don't know if there is a best trick there, she might just take Dylan so that he has a nice 121 outing with her and feels important.

Journal Day 8

What went well today?

1. My Mum's and Ponto's visit to the elderly at the Rest Home.
2. My start line wait games, and my la las and check checks as well as my jumps and my seesaw and A frame contacts.  In fact Mum thought I was very good today.
3. Percy was feeling really well today and joined Dylan and me in our walk at the woods.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Mum and I will do mat work.
2. I am also going to do my washing line trick as I haven't done this for a long time and we will be doing this as part of our Christmas show at the home.
3. We're going for a lovely long hike at Hengistbury Head again.

Journal Day 7

What went well today?

1. Bob's training for breakfast. We did balancing a ball on top of a cone, standing up against my back.  Four feet on four pods, racing from one crate to another, tug drop and run.
2. Training at Amy's - Bob did not even think of going off sniffing and did a couple of really nice turns.
3. We also had fun playing calming markers.

Plan for tomorrow:

1. Mum is going to watch some more H360 and Absolute Dogs Videos.
2. We'll train according to the videos.
3. We'll also do our mat training.

And, of course, we'll have a great hike together.