No time to blog!

...Our three after their walk on a snowy sand dunes at Perranporth, this morning...Mindy's on my lap.

...these are the 6 pups left out of the 11 that still need homes, they are 6 weeks tomorrow, there is a boy and girl in each colour!

Lurcher Annie's Pups anyone!

4 weeks old today I think.......
The bitch is the farmers down the road and she had 11 pups, 6 boys and 5 girls, in the hay rick, he didn't know what to feed them or how to bring them up, so guardian angles Jackie and Nicky at Hawksflight (look at my links bit) bought them into their home and are raising them all...
They will be ready on or around the 11 December, when they will be 8 weeks, they will be microchipped and come with 4 weeks free insurance, they are staying down in Redruth, Cornwall, if any of you blog readers want to know any further details just send me a message and I'll pass on phone numbers etc..
She is such a good Mum...

Look at all those colours...Father unknown

Ian has picked the foxy one, think that is him in this photo on the right! and I narrowed mine down to 3 and "fancy that" they are all lined up here....one on the left is a girl, who is chewing Mums ear in the top photo, next is small grey brindle dog and then the pretty grey and white brindle girl.

An event without the dogs!

Ian with looooong legs!

Merry go around, do you remember these???

Long body...I don't think I've laughed so much for a long time!

Long Bodies....

Melodies!

You should hear the "Compton Theatre Organ" the chap came and played it for us, he was a great story teller and a great player of this Organ!...I think I could sit in a theatre with a silent black and white movie listening to him tell the story with this Organ! it was brilliant for a first timer.

Any way if you want to spend 3 hours or so, out and about in Devon, I'd say go and see all the old fairground rides in use.......they hire the place out and I recon it would be a great place for a Christmas Party or even a wedding!

Ps. this time of year it's only £3 to get in.....

brown signs off the A30 at Lifton on down, saying Dingles steam Village...

www.fairground-heritage.org.uk

On the way home we walked the dogs on Bodmin Moor, so everyone was happy, we should do this more often, Ian had tears in his eyes with laughing so much with the mirrors, I felt like kid again.....

..End of the year photos!

..at the end of the each year I take a photos of the woofits with their achievements, some may seem small to other peoples, but they all mean such a lot to me and are amazing, they all are so treasured, our home is so small (one bedroom) that they cant stay out all year, and end up in the garden shed, well the trophies and first place Rosette's, the rest get bagged up and given away to worthy causes!...but they are all treasured!

Do you have a favourite trophy?

I have a few, over the years....but this year I have two, which standout and they both are Mindy's one was a 2nd place at Wye Valley a hand painted plate, Mindy's first KC trophy (which so happened to be Red's first KC trophy at Supadogs, in 2001, a plate and 2nd place.....spooky) and the best one this year was a first place, that Mindy won at SWAT a photo frame and a picture of my choice from the lady doing the photo's.

Photos at shows are so stupidly expensive these days, even if they are great...I refuse to pay £10-12 for one photo, if they where cheaper I'd buy loads.

Two other trophies which will stay with me for ever, Red won one from the "Voice" crystal end of year "sweety jar" with lid, this one is always in the lounge and Cassie came 2nd in the pairs at Supadog with Kevin and Jansey (starter pairs 2001) and that's Cassie only ever trophy, it's a dog water bowel....I really miss Cass, bless her.

So here are the photos of all the dogs and their prizes.....Poor Buzz, cant cope with photo's especially if Red is watching! ...Look at Mindy, big yawn another photo hater!

Seesaw re-train 2010.

I ummm'd and ahhhh'd!

.....whether to put this in a post or not. I am certainly not secretive about how I train, I just find it may be boring for those family members that know nothing about agility and really aren't interested.

and in this case I wasn't sure whether I was doing it right!....in the begining I had a definate plan on how to train the seesaw, for me....my thoughts where: what was the point of a small dog running just to the pivot point and then tipping and moving down to the contact area....takes far too long and you would have to always be there for them....at the end of the day, the fastest dog wins....So I did my homework, watched loads of youtube videos on how others had trained their dogs and read articles etc.......

and I chose to use the method of the dog running all the way to the end with you there with food or toy, what ever gets the dog motivated, yes it would have been much easier if it was a toy and I would rather a toy, but I have learnt you need to adapt with each dog, if I had used a toy with both of my small dogs, I don't think I would have got Mindy anywhere near the SS again after her accident in June this year at Thames DTS, she got the contact the seesaw touched the floor then as she ran off it it bounced back up and hit her on the chin, it then took two weeks for her even to be within 2 metres of the ss, lots of clicker training and cheese got us to the start of the video, so from there we decided to use the "bang it" game and she eventually managed to "Look at it" (click, treat), then touch it, (click, treat) with her nose to touching it with a paw,(click, treat) often these click treat would be a jack pot too, then to jumping on the end, whilst it was on the floor (she had no problem with the dog walk and continued to run it in the ring) we then raised the end a little and she learnt to jump on the end and ride it too the floor...the rest of her progress is in this video diary...up to you whether you watch it all as it is long and some cases unedited......but this worked for us.....Harry joined in too.

She then managed to do three ss in the ring before the end of "My"season (September) and won the last agility class, to take her into G6.

No video's of that run, as she had at the previous weekend show, left the ring to go and chat to Ian who was videoing....Bless, such a baby, well actually she is a baby, I keep forgeting this was her first season competing and she's now up with the big guns!

Dogs are such great teachers........Love them.

So that's why...

So that's why you don't see too many "puffs" in full coats, out walking in the woods, although to be fair, Mindys coat is clipped shorter than a proper puff!
This was only 20 Min's in on the walk and she was far worse by the time we got back to the car another hour later!
.....Mindy is a hunter and chaser, where Red goes, she goes.
Harry was muddy, but not this bad.......

Bless them, but what fun to watch, her and Red ducking and diving in and out the trees, jumping some puddles and running through others!
So we spent the first hour when we got home using the dog wash and dog blaster......thank god for both, a god send!