More Snow and 2010

Somehow I'm still writing 1997 on papers. Maybe I'll finally catch up on the year!

Today has been ridiculously foggy and wet. But wet and snowy is always preferable to mud. We're hoping everyone else is having fun in the snow and that it doesn't melt too fast.

I've come across a bunch of my old dog training notes and picture from when Blaze was a very young dog. That seems like such a long time ago. We were in a local training class and agility in Columbus, involved with 4-H, and always wanting to find more, new things to train and things to do. It's years later and I've had many more experiences, and much less time! There are so many more opportunities for dog owners now than there were ten years ago. More activities, more local competitions, more training schools, and many more opportunities for instructors to learn more and help students better. Today, if I was a novice pet owner with Blaze, we would receive very different help and start solving his anxieties much sooner. Now is a good time to be a dog owner!

Take this year to try something new with your dog, agility, rally, or even competition obedience. AKC's mix breed program is starting in April, allowing mix breed dogs to participate in agility, rally, and obedience events. This will bring more opportunity for dog owners in areas where other organizations are less available.

We'll be doing some new things.... I'm impatiently waiting to start obedience with Griffin, and to finally start trialing in agility with him.

And maybe this year, if we're lucky, I'll become more competent at this blogging thing and utilizing technology.

Snow and Training

Friday we had a great work day with our Ohio 4-H Teen Dog Experience crew. 3/4 of our staff met up for hours of work on the 2010 OTDE activities and to also train our dogs.

We spent the early afternoon at PosiDog training our dogs. I took everyone, but mostly worked Griffin. Mostly we did foundation work for obedience and agility (going around objects on cue, heeling with duration, stays with duration, staying on a mat) but we did get to some sequencing. For as little sequencing as we do, I'm always surprised at how well Griffin does!

Things that went well: Sequences! Attention! Wraps to the right.
Things to improve: Start line position, turns to the left, my speed, going ahead of me at speed.

The rest of the day we worked on "camp stuff", preping for the teen conference in February, working on workshops for the spring, and trying to figure out how to handle summer campS...with the possible grants available.

The rest of the weekend has been the regular commitments and enjoying the snow with the dogs.

Obedience Work

We've been alternating between patching up our agility training after a fabulous Silvia Trkman seminar and the super precise focus with our obedience. Though, as she would say, it should all be the same thing, running and fun and play.

Lots of heeling. Lots of running. Lots of tricks and turning. And the occasional stand for exam work in which he's improving with training (imagine that).

Classes at the farm are on hold for the winter, though I'm still doing privates in Licking County. We're teaching at PosiDog and Dogtalk, and soon will be doing some 4-H lessons a bit further away at the special request of a club I've gotten to know over the last six months.

At the moment I'm catching up on some reading (which somehow makes my reading list longer...I don't know how that works!) and I'm working on my plans for 2010. It will be busy with increased numbers of classes, Griffin starting to trial, lots of seminars and events to go to (horray for clickerexpo!) and of course our fabulous Ohio 4-H Teen Dog Experience activities. We applied for a few grants that might allow us to greatly expand the number of 4-H members impacted, and I hope that goes well.