Worst Trial Ever?

This weekend we went up to Lindstrom to practice on dirt some more to prep for champs.  My plan was to handle discriminations at a distance because there are always distance discriminations at champs it seems.  We have not worked on discriminations since before CeCe was competing and she has had no problems.  The bad thing is, up until this trial, I would baby CeCe to the tunnel so there was no chance she would take the contact obstacle (remember our rush to get regular Q's?).  To my surprise, she sent out to multiple tunnel discriminations and nailed them; I thought she was a complete contact sucker!  Then I realized I had done something veryy bad.. in two runs I turned her into a tunnel sucker -.-  In chances she blew me off and went way out of her way to take a tunnel.  When it came time to take the dog walk with a tunnel underneath it, SHE TOOK THE TUNNEL!  What the heck she ALWAYS does the dog walk when I tell her too!  By this point, I admit, I was done taking her blowing-off crap.  I made her redo the dog walk discrimination and luckily got it that time.  BUT she flew off the side of the contact when it would've been soo easy to add an extra stride and hit it nicely.  I pulled her after that because she was being ridiculous.

Weavers was a complete failure.  I don't really want to talk about it but her 2x2 training did not stick in this one... pulled her off for being yet again ridiculous.

Next was touch n go which I'm always confident that CeCe can do well in.  This course had a wrap in it which is always exciting (:  We were trying to hit that 100+ running index again and with a 5.35 yps run Im prettyy sure we got it. 

Last was jumpers.  I definitely did not feel in sync with her this run.  It felt a mess, but in reality was not tooo too bad and we did Q. Yay?  The best thing I saw during that run was in the home stretch horse shoe.  I was trying some distance and layered a jump.  I saw her pulling in but then noticed she corrected herself and went back out to the correct jump without me having to stop and support her more.  An okay way to end a bad day.

Apparently blogs fail without pictures so boom boom POW

In between touch n go and weavers Sara was holding CeCe and I noticed her back left paw was bleeding.  Upon further examination Sara determined that her nail had pulled up from her paw a bit. /:  I was a little shaken, but CeCe didn't seem to be in pain so I ran her.  When we got home I found Riley's snow boot and ended up putting it on her for part of the night and all of the next day.

I was planning on doing only hoopers, tunnelers, and maybe chances if it didn't have contacts on sunday because of her paw.  The day started with hoopers and CeCe pulled a really nice run considering I was a little off due to my worry about her foot.  She showed great "go on" distance! 

During the regulars I noticed that CeCe had bled through her boot so I sadly decided to not run her anymore that day.  I was really sad, I couldn't bring myself to even walk chances with Chrissy and Sara because I knew CeCe could have gotten that one.  Watching CeCe be only a spectator for her favorite course, tunnelers, was equally hard.  By the end of the day I wanted to curl up into a ball and die. 

This morning it looks like CeCe's foot has stopped bleeding for good but she has a vet appointment today anyway; Im scared for infection.  Ill keep this updated as best I can.

Nikon D5100

After three calls to customer service over the span of a week, Nikon FINALLY shipped my camera battery, charger, and lens cap with next day shipping.  Maybe it would have happened sooner if the "top dog" wasn't in intensive care..but anyway YES FINALLY!

Yesterday I just played around getting to know my camera and the functions for a few minutes.  Took one blog worthy picture which was actually my seconds picture ever taken with the camera!

35 mm lens f1.8

Today I was at my dads house so I could take photos of the dogs and test the action shot settings!  I knew, since it was early in the morning, the lighting wouldn't be too attractive, but I was just too anxious to wait.  CeCe is a touch subject to photograph since she refuses to hold her startline stay for very long.



55-200mm VR

55-200mm VR

55-200mm VR

Next I wanted to try my macro lens out with action since I had done a simple test at my moms house and the macro seemed to pick up the action better.  I brought out Riley knowing he would wait until I called him across the jumps.  CeCe was so angry because I took out some cheese for Riley and she couldn't get any, but that's what you get for not holding your start line very well..!

35mm

35mm with focus setting on 3D tracking

35mm with 3D tracking

Im super excited to try my camera out at Lindstrom!!  And Chrissy is happy because now she can get some good V-NATCH pictures!  Lindstrom will be a blast.  Chrissy and her family are driving down friday night and staying in our pop-up tent camper in our backyard!  Sara will be joining us Saturday night making a full house with five dogs!  Still have to clean my room..I should get on that now.

CeCe's Third CPE Trial

I pulled a Karissa and tried to take some photos of Ce Monster with her ribbons. The sun wasn't out so excuse the gloomy feel.


 With Champs coming up I wanted to work on CeCe's start line stays because as I was watching Jack's video (you know which one you obsessive Champs addicts you), I realized if I could not get any sort of lead-out from her that I would DIE from all the running.  Either that or I would be seriously behind causing CeCe to miss a contact or something along those lines.  So every run (except for one, I just had to do ONE running start) I lead-out even if it was a mini one like in Jackpot.  She broke it once but really not bad for a dog that hates being still on an agility course. 

This brings me to my next area of focus.  I was really excited to see how her teeter turned out.  I definitely wasn't expecting her to stick the contact because like I implied earlier, she has little self control on course.  The contact stick fell apart on Sunday, but thats because there is no training in CPE and I couldn't reinforce the stick!  The first time she self-released I turned my back to her trying to lead out and she got antsy.  The second time, well, who needs to stop anyway? Psh!

My 2x2 instructor was at the trial so I was a little nervous!  To make matter worse, she was planning on watching Jackpot, a class I have never done, so I was ready to crap my pants at the startline.  CeCe did really well and ended up with the highest Jackpot score for the weekend, except we left early so we couldn't claim our prize.  My instructor was impressed, especially since she noticed I ran the course differently than I had walked it. xD  Im pretty sure she was not expecting Ce to be so fast because when I told her at class that CeCe had problems collecting for the weaves because of her speed she didn't seem to believe me.  Afterwards I asked her for suggestions for the Standard round to possibly get CeCe through the weaves on the first try.  Watching the video back Im positive I slowed down too early for the weaves.  I guess it will take time to get used to. 

Something I was not expecting were the horrible entries to the dog walk.  To make matters worse, the course seemed more distorted than the course map.  Almost all the handlers were not helping their dog hit the dogwalk at a nicer angle and two fell off! 

Sorry this one is sideways but LOOK AT THAT ENTRY ]=<

Not good for running contacts..

Overall a very successful trial!  Im really glad that my instructor was there because at class she was more friendly with me and she knew CeCe a little more so we got more specific help.  She actually got CeCe weaving 12 poles straight (no tenth pole pop)!  One last session; Im hoping to try the 12 poles in class when she is less tired to try and get her to pop so we can fix this problem for good!

Hello, Im Robyn and My Sheltie is Obnoxious

Last night we had our first 2x2 class at On The Run canine center!  It was great to be back to where CeCe's agility career started.  I was surprsied to see Kelly with Jake there for the same class!!  She helped me understand the concept of the 2x2 training before class started and offered to bring her dvd next time.  She makes me miss taking classes at TCOTC with instructor Jim Nally.  Anyway, class went swimmingly!  Once two sets of two were put in place CeCe's lightbulb turned on and she started making weave entries I never would have even attempted at home!  Im very excited and I can't wait to see her progress through the other two sessions.  The only bad thing about that class is sometimes there is some waiting/ rest time and all CeCe wants to do is keep working so she can get her treats.  She is so bratty that whenever we aren't doing anything she stares at me and barks.  (She came to us all bratty like that and although she has gotten better she will NOT stop that bad habit.)  The instructor even turned to her once mid-speech and said "yes I know you're a Sheltie but barking for treats wont work!".  All the other dogs never made a peep. Sigh.
No video, sorry!  Possibly next time but who knows.


The teeter session today went fairly well.  Check out the video description because it pretty much explains everything.

Why all the unlisted teeter training videos?  Well I noticed as the days went on, the views decreased on my videos so I decided to stop spamming youtube.  Now Im spamming blogger..lol  YAY spam is delicious.

Birthday Training

Today we only did a short session because we have a weaving class tonight at On The Run. Only worked on contacts because Im thinking of going to a normal teeter within the next few days and contacts will be my main struggle here on out. She did really well, Im so glad I tried to teach her 2o2o earlier. It really helped because she is targeting even though there is no target. Smart girly!

Make sure to check out yesterdays session as well!  And because I can, here's another video not related to agility (:

Total Garbage

Im ready to kick my base across the yard. This session my teeter base collapsed once and fell over twice. Not okay. On top of that my boards that I duct taped to one end to make the board tip more slowly were coming untaped. Of course! My life.

Angry explaination done. I replaced the table which was about 15-18" with some pvc dog walk supports which are about 13". CeCe doesn't seem to mind the change but she is coming in too fast to stick her contact sometimes. I did a mini 4-on session since I was tired of putting the teeter back in place from it falling over and she definitely understands it. Looks like she's offering the touch thing which we had worked on a coupld months ago. Interesting she has remembered since I'm using a different command. Ultimately she is offering me a combo of her 2o2o and her moving touch behavior.

Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)

          Im very happy with CeCe's progress today.  I was struggling with the 4-on contact but Chrissy gave me an idea and now I can finally see the light!  Although Chrissy's idea didn't go quite as planned (the board beat CeCe up a little bit lol), I think Ce dog now understands that I want her to wait until I release her!!  I bet that 2o2o training we did awhile back helped beause she looked to be offering that some of the time, but YAY for SOMTHING!  Now the hardest part is behind us we can go back to goofing off a little and just work on speed/ confidence, and contact proofing.  I AM expecting another road block in her contact training when the teeter doesnt have anything to catch it (the table) because the grass will be beckoning to her to run on.  I already have a plan for that though mua ha ha.  Just no plan B.. Hopefully all goes well so we can finish this baby up before the CPE trial next weekend. (:

Marilyn Manson wins at teeter training ;)

Dear Blog

Im sorry I have been neglecting you.  Its been over a month and I feel bad.  But I really didnt find it necessary to make a post about trials when the youtube description explained the majority of my thoughts.  And training sessions would have been boring for you because it was mainly just weave proofing and wraps. 

But I guess I have more to say about wraps than just mentioning them, so quickly:
I know akc has a lot of wraps so I knew eventually I wanted to teach a wrap on command but when our latest nadac trial had a wrap in it I got motivated to begin teaching the command right away.  I use the command "tight" and I give it to her before she is jumping so she has time to think and collect.  Im still mixing it up being "tight" and "go [on]"  so she doesnt lose her distance skills when I start hanging back.  Bored yet? Good.

After training today.  CeCe says yum?

Teeter training has begun and I frankly have no clue what Im doing but Im just going to smile and pretend I do.  She is looking good for having a confused trainer, in my opinion!  Well not completely confused, I am now spending each night going through training strategies in my head.  Last night I only got a couple hours of sleep because I was thinking of a command for her contact and figuring out how I would go about changing her down behavior to a crouching target.  I definitely make it hard on myself thinking of names for behaviors that are outside the usual.  I dislike conformity and for some reason I do not like the word touch..  Her 2o2o command was "dos".  Yup I had to resort to foreign language.  You can imagine how I struggled with a term for her 4 on teeter behavior.  I eventually came up with "stick" sometimes "stick it" because her teeter command is "tip it" (oh yeah Im on a ROLL with creative names aren't I?). haha 
Since CeCe just got introduced to "stick" today she doesnt know what it means exactly..  And I was struggling with strategies for a held contact since this is new to me.  For instance if you take a look at my video (Ill post it at the end) and look at 2:19 in the video, you'll see my face of confusion and awkwardness.  Thankfully miss Chrissy came to my rescue with a strategy that may just work to help teach a better "stick".  Ill try it out tomorrow and of course video!