Playing Catch Up...

So I've been a horrible blogger and horrible mother--I just realized my last post was July 16 (Dally's 5th birthday) and it's now Dec. 24! Sheesh! Where has the time gone??

I'll try my best to cover what's been going on the past five months....

Dally: She has now made it back to the Excellent level in Preferred. She has two legs in Exc A Pref JWW and one leg in Exc A Pref STD 4 inches. (At a trial after Thanksgiving, she zoomed through JWW first, 11 seconds under standard course time, but then the STD was a long time away and was full of some difficult entries and directions--she got distracted in the weaves and popped out.) We've been off from agility since that Saturday after Thanksgiving--no practice, no trials. Our first trial of 2011 is towards the end of January in Franklin, Tenn. I have been bad about checking my agility calendar for the first part of 2011, so I really need to get on the ball with that.

Meanwhile, she competed in her first AKC Rally trial the first weekend of December at the Queen City Dog Training Club in Cincy. She Qd in both runs, scoring a 91 and placing 4th on Saturday, and scoring an 85 on Sunday. She probably would have scored a 95 if I could learn to count to three when doing the 1-2-3 walk/stop exercise...she's currently looking for a new Rally handler. ;-) She seemed a little confused when we arrived at a place we normally do agility trials, and to do such "mundane" exercises, but she seemed to like it.

Mesa: Little LaMesa turned one Nov. 10!! We celebrated with a special cookie that said "Happy Barkday" and some extra play time. She's also started her agility classes at Goose Creek Dog Sports in Versailles. She's part of what we are now calling the "Small Dog Posse 2.0" which includes friends from the original "Small Dog Posse" and their new, young dogs--a Pyrenees Shepard, Rat Terrier, Min Pin, and a mix. Mesa loves her agility classes! She is so fast and so smart that she catches on quickly and wants to do more. I can't tell you exactly which she likes more--the contacts, tunnels, jumps, or weaves! She's already doing the dog walk and teeter at full-height. She's not afraid of the teeter at all--she loves to make it "bang" and rides it all the way down to the ground. We're now having to work on her jumping technique--she jumps a little like a Springbok (doesn't stretch out her hind legs over the jumps and jumps early). It's hard for me to get my timing to cue her to jump, so we need to get that under control.

Mesa also competed in her first AKC Rally trial at the same time with Dally. The first day we were both very nervous, so because we spent most of the pattern on a tight leash, Mesa was NQd on Saturday. Sunday, I used Dally's "big girl" choke chain and spent more time with Mesa before our go, and she did great--scoring an 85! I'm hoping to finish her and Dally's Rally Novice title by mid-March, but I just need to pick a place and enter!

That's a pretty good round-up of our activities through the fall and first part of winter. I promise I'll keep things updated better, as well as post some photos from our Rally experiences!