catching up ... Part Six... puppy training with Scara

Scara has been with us nearly 4 weeks now. She is settling in very well. I am not rushing her into any form of training, she has a lot of socialisation to catch up. She has been out and about at the dog shows, she is 6 weeks older than Sonic so she is allow out near the competition rings but not Sonic. She is a bit nervous as well as excited when she sees the dogs doing agility. She is not sure about those excited dogs barking and running and at the same time, she wanted to join in. I am sure she will get confident sooner or later.

As mentioned in one of my earlier post, she has been a naughty girl at her first camping trip with us to Axstane. She tried to escape from the garden area 7 times on Saturday morning. I wasn't sure how she did it, she either jump over the fence (easily) or crawl under (easily), either way, that is not allow! At the end, I have to keep her in the puppy pen for most of the day, only let her out when I am supervising her. If everything goes well, we are going to camp at Wellingborough show this weekend, we will see if she behaves then.

I have taken her out a lot for the last three weeks, mainly to walk on the pavement to let her get used to noisy traffic, walked past bus stops and schools and stations. She doesn't like the crowd at the bus stop. Every morning, I choose the peak hours to take her out, so hopefully she will get used to them soon. She is absolutely fine with the school children. How weird!

Training wise, I've done very little with her. She is a fast learner and very keen learner too. She is greedy, that is a good start to clicker training. She can do sit, down, left & right and hand touch. I am still trying to get her to play with me. She will play anything with Sonic but if I interact, she will stop. She loves me but she hasn't got the idea that she can play with me. She is very bouncy, very happy little girlie. She hasn't grow or maybe grow very little since we have her. We love her for whatever she is.

Many people ask me if I will breed from her, the answer is ONLY if she grows big enough to carry babies inside her :) She is 5 months old now and I don't see she will be big for that :) Whatever size she comes in, we love her!

She is a gummy bear at the moment. She is loosing her baby teeth FAST! Daddy Colin being a good daddy. He is very good in catching up his training with Scara too ... to take her out for a little walk everyday on her own after he comes back from work, no matter how late that is. Colin loves Scara too bits and Scara loves daddy too! Happy ending!

Now, here is a little video of Scara doing her sit, down and left & right and hand touch; and also introducing her to the scary Rocker Board:

catching up ... Part Five ... puppy training with Sonic

I am still trying to catch up with news ...

Sonic has been a good boy, as you all know that we started our clicker training late due to him lack of interest in food to start with, he is very much into toys, he will play with any toys you present to him and he is a great tugger just like his daddy. Sometimes I think he is more of a mama's boy but lately, I can see Sing in him. He tugs just like his daddy :)

So, we are a late starter on clicker, from week 12 until now, week 14, we have done a few basic tricks, such as ... sit, down, left & right, rollover, paw, creep and hand touch. Some of you may know that he is not a human-oriented dog. He will approach you when he wants to but for the first 12 weeks in his life, I can never catch him! He would not allow me to touch him, let alone pick him up. This is why whenever we go out walking, I have to have a lead hanging on his collar or harness, that is for me to be able to catch him when we finish our walk. He is brilliant with his recall though, eventhough I cannot catch him, I have no problem calling him back to me. I always take a toy (mainly different kind of tug each time) whenever we go out walking. I used the tug as a reward when he comes back when call. He is 100% respond to my recall when we are out but not at home in the garden with the cat around. If the cat is not around, he is brilliant! How can steal the "value" of the cat?

He is very confident little man, no problem taking him anyway, to people's house with dogs or without dogs, walk on the High Street ... so long no one suddenly approach him unexpectedly, he is fine. He is bomb proof as I can see. When we were camping at Axstane a couple of weeks ago, we had thunder and lightning, all he did was stood on the caravan step looking for the sounds, no sign of fear or anything, hopefully he will be good for the Bonfire Night to come.

I have done a lot of work since he was 8 weeks old, that is for me to be able to touch him and pick him up. I spent a lot of time, maybe 5-6 times a day but very short period, not more than 5 minutes. I sat on the floor with either food or toy (depending what he wants but gradually move from toy to food and clicker when he realised food is great) for him to approach me and I gently touch him and we process from there. Or, when we play tug, I will try to gently put my hand on his side ... I want him to know that my touch is not that horrible ... there were no improvement between week 8 to week 12.5. I was rather sad, how did I bred a puppy that don't like me? Especially when Scara joined our family, she was so affectionate, like a puppy should be. That made him stand out even more. I have been thinking to rehome him at week 10 but I knew he is the one I have been waiting for so long, so I want to hang on ... at week 12, I was heart broken. I cannot have a puppy that won't let me touch him, hug him and pick him up. I beginning to seriously thinking about finding him a home ... I have been seeking a lot of advices from friends and people I trust and they all knew how much I love my little boy and they wanted me to be patient (that is the thing I lack of!). At week 13, I had a secret whisper with Sonic and after that, things changed. He will let me touch him and stay there to let me put a lead on his collar. HOW WONDERFUL is that? You won't believe I have tear in my eyes. Now, we can go out walking with lead off. HOORAY!! That is a big milestone for us!

We are set for the routine ... in the morning, normally after his breakfast while he is fresh and awake after a long sleep at night, we will spend 10-15 minutes to refresh all the tricks we have learned so far, then follow by a play with different toys. He will then have a nap for about an hour. Then, in the afternoon, just before the lunch feed or right after the lunch feed, depending on the day, we will have a game in the garden for 5-10 minutes. Mainly just racing up and down the garden with toys. I am hoping to develop that into "circle work" later. He then will have another long nap, normally between 2:30 to 5:00, when he wakes up, we will do tricks in the garden follow by play, just like our morning routine but outdoor. Then, just before bed time, we will have a little play for 5 minutes. 

I have taken some videos during our training for the last couple of weeks but I just haven't got time to edit and upload them; I took a couple this morning as you can see my focus is very bad, it is either too far or too close that you can't see his head. These are un-edited video clips ...

This is Sonic doing his morning routine tricks, in this little video you can see him doing ... sit, down, left & right, rollover, paw and creep. As he does not like the direct contact with me (yet?), so our paw is me showing him my fist and he will give me his paw, this way, I don't have to shake his paw but hopefully in the future we can have a proper paw in my hand:

This is Sonic on Rocker Board and Elephant Trick. I decided to buy a Rocker Board & Wobble Board Combi, they arrived yesterday. When I first show it to him, he straight on it like he knew what he is doing. Such a clever little boy. I am very proud of him showing no fear on the board. This is the 2nd time he is on the Board. I started teaching him the Elephant Trick a couple of weeks ago but I didn't do anything for 10 days due to the stress of the house chaos. We only just returned to re-do the trick and he performs better after a long break!

 And here is the clip of our morning play routine, please excuse him with the pink toys. I bought them when I have litter of puppies and it seems that all my previous litters were girls :) He has to make do with them.


And finally, this is one of our many afternoon routines:

catching up ... Part Four ... more agility, great experienced.

Sizzle and I went to the World Tryout yesterday. We have never done anything "serious" like this before. I just wanted to go along and gain some experience. With so many dogs and no one to look after them for us, we cannot lodge anywhere the night before, so we have to wake up at 4am to travel on the day. It took us nearly 3 hours to get there with good traffic.

I was too nervous and it was boiling hot, so I couldn't get to sleep on Sunday night. I didn't know what to expect either. I guess the excitement kick in as well. Believe me, when I got there, I was half dead. I was very tired and got a bit of headache at this humid weather too.

The venue was indoor, eventhough they tried to open as many door as possible but with handlers and dogs going in and out, it really got stuffy as the day goes by. I personally suffered a lot. I am not very good in the heat and I do not know how to handle myself in the heat either, I always get very grumpy and tired and suffer headache in the heat. Unfortunately, it hit me seriously hard on Sunday and yesterday. Oh, our car's air-conditioning broke down as well. JOY!

We were running indoor on a rubber surface. I have not run on this surface before and it is also Sizzle's first time. We got half an hour to do the warm up. They set up three sequences at three different heights for warming up, then swap over. We had jump-weave-jump; jump-tyre-jump; and three jumps. The Small, Medium and Large take turn to warm up at each sequence. The tyre is the European type that we don't normally see at the normal show. I am very pleased with Sizzle to be able to take that tyre in the correct way but I got worried when we did the jump-weave-jump sequence as Sizzle forgot how to weave and was busy sniffing at the particular pole, that got me really worry.

The running format at Round 1 is, Small, Medium, Large; then at Round 2 is, Medium, Large, Small; Round 3 is, Large, Small, Medium.

At each round, Small & Medium got 8 minutes to walk the course, then Large got 8 minutes to walk the course. We got to see the course map when they are setting up the course, so you get the idea what the course is like.

Round 1 is Jumping Round:

Running Order: Small, Medium, Large

At the Tryout, all FCI rules apply. NO collar; start on the whistle and whistle for elimination; and if you touch the obstacle, I am not sure did you get fault or elimination? Sizzle draw to run last at Round 1. Hey man! I was nervous like hell as you can see I got lost at jump #4. I nearly back jump jump #2! Thank goodness I realised before it was too late and managed to "push" Sizzle to jump #4. Poor dog, he surely needs a new handler!

Apart from the stupid mistake I made at jump #4 to cost us a refusal, he ran clear after that and here is the little video of Round 1:

Round 1 result:

 Round 2 course map:

Running Order: Medium, Large, Small

After walking the Round 2, I sat in there to watch all the Medium and Large. There were quite a few Large dogs. The weather got hotter and became rather humid. Just before they finished the Large, I felt like I am going to pass out in the heat, so I have to run out for some fresh air. That surely didn't help as when I ran Sizzle in this round, I was totally uncoordinated. It was a disaster!

Round 2, my disaster run with Sizzle:

Round 2 result:

 

Round 3 course map:

We had an hour lunch break before Round 3, it was good as I need a break from my disaster round. Also, I have learned not to stay in the whole time to watch all the dogs run. I go in and out to get some fresh air ... finally, we ran clear in this round, unfortunately with 2.984 time fault. Not sure if he got tired or the heat got on him but I can see in the video he was slowing down.

Round 3:

 Round 3 result: 

and this is the result after 3 rounds:

 Final Round course map:

Again, Small & Medium had 8 minutes to walk the course. I was so glad to be able to run in the Final Round. By this time, I was calm as I came with nothing but to enjoy the great experience. I am so glad Sizzle still run in the heat for me. I am not sure where the 5 faults came from, I thought we got marked on the Dog Walk but I watched the video many times and I don't think he miss the contact and the judge only raise her hand when I ran INTO the see-saw. This made me think is it me that got the fault and not Sizzle? I am not sure about the FCI rules but I've heard you either got faulted or eliminated if you touch the obstacle and I knew I did ran into the see-saw and very obviously touch it with my leg.

Sizzle at Final Round:

Final Round Result:

I loved and enjoyed every minute at the World Tryout. Although the weather was a bit too hot, otherwise, everything was lovely. Lovely judge Natasha Wise set up some real challenging courses and I am very proud of my little man to be able to tested on those courses. 

Small Team GB is consist of Bernadette with her super Zaz-star; Nicola Garret with her pocket rocket Indy; and Dawn Weaver with her amazing little Puzzle! Watch out for Team GB!

I am so tired but content! I love my little Sizz-man, for whatever he is!

catching up ... Part Three ... more agility

I missed Landsdown Agility Show this year. This is one of my favourite; the venue is on top of the hill at Landsdown Racecourse, it has stunning view with good dog walks! We always take the dogs for a good long walk after the show on Saturday evening. You can walk alongside the race track, about a mile or more, there is a pub where we always stop for a drink.

I decided to tryout for the World Champ with Sizzle this year which was on yesterday. I have to withdraw my Landsdown entry, I don't think I could possibly go camping and do a 2 days show then go for tryout day. Instead I enter a fairly local show which I thought it was on Saturday but then to realise it was on Sunday.

It was boiling hot on Sunday, the sudden temperature change hit me hard and it also affected the dogs too. I wasn't IN IT at Watford show, every single run I ran, I've got eliminated. I've entered Saturn and Bless his little heart, he is such a honest dog, always save me from going to the wrong obstacles but I still managed to go wrong course!

Sipzie was a nightmare. She broke her startline wait everytime. I knew I cannot let her get away with it, with the heat and the queue, you always tried hard not to hold up time, I do anyway. Sipzie was very naughty, she broke her stay, I insisted at the first run, if she don't wait, we don't go, so she was good but again, she cannot weave. She did 10th pole and pop out, her usual pattern. I studied the videos, it seems each time I praise her "good girl", she pop out! If I shut up, she will weave slowly then look up, she pop out! She had three classes, the first two she had trouble with the weave; the last class, she didn't even get pass 4th obstacle because she was too busy barking at me!!! I have to pick her up and walk out. I am beginning to wonder if this has slowly form a pattern.

Our problems are ... if I whine her up, she gets really hype in the ring, she would not do her "set up" routine and definitely no startline wait. If I don't whine her up, she still won't do the "set up" routine and will try to break the startline wait and she will take off slowly or sometime as flat as pancake! I am confused myself now, I do not know whether to carry on or stop running her for a while. Any suggestions welcome!

Sizzle was badly affected by the heat too. Well, I guess being a black dog, he suffered more than the others. Also, I stripe his undercoat (not a wise thing to do), mmm ... poor little man! He tried to run well but I let him down in two classes. In a challenging jumping course, we managed to do all the tricky bit and got eliminated on the easy part, my fault being careless. Then, in the last class, he ran clear in the Agility, I think we got placed 3rd.

Sizzle @ Watford, G6-7 Agility:

 

 

 

Catching up ... Part Two ... Agility @ Axstane

We took the caravan on Friday evening to Axstane (18th & 19th June weekend). I was having two minds to either travel on the day or camp. From memories, the weather wasn't great and I was really worried how Scara will cope at her first camping in a horrible wet weather. It was a stressful week with all the workers came around to sort the house out and to be honest, I want to get out of the house, so we decided at the very last minute we will take the caravan. We got stuck on M25 for ages, it was supposed to 1.5 hours journey turned into 3 hours journey. Luckily, with Colin's help, we managed to set the awning up before the rain got heavy again!

Scara was a naughty girl, she tried to escape from the garden 7 times on Saturday morning. Where we park the caravan wasn't the safest spot (we only learned that on Saturday morning). We had so many cars drove pass in front of our caravan in SPEED. It was supposed to be 5mph but these so called dog lovers drove pass us with at least 20/30mph. I was furious especially I caught Scara loose outside our garden fencing. She either jump over and crawl under, either way IS BAD! After the 7th time, I decided to keep her in the puppy pen as I do not want a squash puppy!

The weather on Saturday was a mix bag, sometimes dry, sometimes rain but it passed very quickly. I did get soak to my skin once queuing to run Sipzie!

Agility wise, I didn't do well at all on Saturday, I don't know why but I just can't get anything right with any of my dogs! I have not have any single clean run with either Sizzle or Sipzie but ran clear with Saturn in the Mini/Mixi pairs with Bracken. This is Saturn's first proper run since Crufts. He only got one run, that is the Mini/Mixi pairs. We were leading for a long time until they started the Mini/Maxi pairs and we got pushed down to 11th place.

Saturn & Bracken @ Mini/Mixi pairs:

 

I was a bit too laid back and casual on Saturday due to the weather and missed Sizzle's Jumping run, so he only get to run in the Combined 1-7 KC Olympia. He ran well until I pulled him too much from the DW into the wrong end of the tunnel, I was lucky not to be marked for a refusal but I still managed to get an elimination. Our pull through didn't work again! Sigh ~

Sizzle's KC Olympia run:

My run on Saturday with Sipzie didn't go well either, she kept messing up with the weave now. She can weave brilliantly at home and at training but whenever we go to competition, whenever I command her to weave, she either go into the 1st and 2nd pole and pop out or bark and bark and bark ... and no weave! It happened almost everytime for 3 weekends at competition and I fear that has become a pattern. I don't know how to stop this problem but I have fellow competitors suggested I change the weave command to something else. I will try that to see if that helps. I believe is a kind of frustration from her than a command. At our last run on Sunday, she got really hyper and barked before we were anywhere near the weave and because she was busy barking, she didn't see anything in front of her and knock the jumping wing down. When I tell her off, she immediately went flat! Sigh ~

I finished my Saturday off early and fell asleep for the rest of the day. I am not sure if I was too tired or too stressed and thank goodness, I felt much better on Sunday and I was ready for the Champ with Sizzle.

After my disaster run in the KC Olympia, all I want is a clear round and Sizzle did me proud to run clear in the Champ Jumping. That clear round made me feel very good as I haven't have a clear round with him for ages.

Sizzle's Champ Jumping:

 

As there were only Small & Medium Champ at Axstane, so we soon got on with Champ Agility. I was having two minds when I walk the course, as you can see, I had a hicup the jump after the Dog Walk but luckily I recover quick enough this time to save am elimination; then again tunnel to weave, I was thinking to do a flick, so Sizzle is on my left but I was too worried that he will see nothing in front of him so I decided to do the front cross in front of the tunnel and send him to the weave. Sadly, he missed the 2nd pole and we got 5 faults on that.

Sizzle's Champ Agility:

 

With just 5 fault, it was good enough to take us through to the Final. WooHoo! First Final for us this year. Sizzle ran really well apart from me pushing too hard at the end to chase for time, he missed the Dog Walk contact! Oh well, we have to do more practice! I am really happy with my little man. I maybe bias but he is a great little dog, to me anyway!

Sizzle at Champ Final:

 

 

As for Miss Sipzie, all I can say is if she can weave, we can do better! I just needed to find the solution to it!

This is one of Sipzie's G1-3 Agility on the weekend:

 

and this is the Combined 1-7 Tunnel Jumping:

 

 

puppies video

Follow up from my catching up post on PUPdate this morning, here is a compilation of Sonic and Scara taken a couple of weeks ago. You can see Sonic always try to tease Scara to play. I have to say, after nearly 4 weeks with us, Scara finally playing with toy and is loving it! Thanks to my Super Sonic for being a brilliant teacher!

catching up ... Part One ... PUPdate

It has been stressful, tired and busy for the last two weeks with the leakage and heating/hot water chaos; with two hooligans charging around like a lunatic all the time didn't help either! With the puppies, you can't tell them off or restrict them too much, well not with my puppies anyway. So, when the workers were here to work on the leakage and the Boiler in the last few days, I have to keep all SEVEN shelties in one room, you can imagine how mad we were. Even the big ones got stressed due to these two crazy puppies! Oh, how did I forget the cat ... so we have two mad puppies tried to attack the poor cat (you occasionally hear the puppies yelp, I think the cat got them!) and the five big ones stay out of the way, so they were all up on the sofa!

Sorry, I've missed out Sonic @ 13 weeks and Scara @ 19 weeks. I was planning to do my puppy growing up training video weekly, unfortunately I just haven't got time. Hopefully everything should be back to normal in the next two weeks, so I can do a proper catch up. For now, some random photos ...

 this is Mai handsome boy Sonic enjoying himself in the morning sun at 14 weeks old.

 No ball is too big for this little man

come and get me!

he is very cheeky, prefer to drink off the pond water

 small tennis ball is fine too

 Or a chew?

Sonic is like Sing when he was younger. Whenever we go out walking, he will always find something and then he will carry around with him most of the walk ...

 this wasn't a set up photo. I caught the father and son enjoying the morning sun 

It was boiling hot on the weekend, we set up a paddling pool in the garden. Believe me, Sonic will slam his break hard when he sees a puddle when we go walking but he loves the paddling pool.

this is Scara taken at 19 weeks old ...

 Scara at 20 weeks

 happy tunneling

 always happy

 never too early to start agility?

she is getting very good in retrieving the ball for me

enjoying the paddling pool with daddy

 a very happy daddy and a very happy little girlie :D

 two crazy pups!

Thames Champ Show

I was glad that I decided not to Camp at Thames this weekend but missed the good dry weather on Saturday. We woke up early Sunday and it was dry and warm, so I packed the car and load the dogs ... off we go. We were 10 miles away from the showground, it started to shower. I thought it will stop but sadly, it has been non-stop raining the whole day! Just imagine me standing in the rain watching and running the dogs ...

I was lucky that most of my classes were in the morning. I only have half an hour to walk 4 courses including the Champ Jumping. They weren't the easy courses but I knew which one I want to concentrate on. It is so handy to have Colin around, after a few weekends of no Colin, I really missed him. He is so good in taking the dogs to toilet/exercise for me; then bring the dogs to the ring for me so that I can watch and not being stress running back and forth the car and the rings.

 

I decided to run Sizzle in the KC Olympia first as his running order was quite early, so that Sipzie can watch, that will surely whine her up. Colin didn't managed to video this run because the video camera went all blurry again :( I don't think we did terribly well in this run as we got there and there were no dogs on the line and I have to rush in to run my dog. I have to learn in future that I SHOULD NOT rush to run, that didn't help me and my dog. Sizzle was a good boy. I was worried how he copes in the rain but it didn't seems to bother him but I do worry me slipping in the wet and him slipping off the contacts. He ran clear and ended up 8th place out of 242 dogs, so that is good for me. I knew where we lost all the time, the See-Saw. It is still our weakest piece of equipment at the moment. We had a bad angle to turn into the pipe tunnel, instead of crossing behind the See-Saw, I chose to front cross and send him in the tunnel; he stop short on the See-Saw and it took ages for it to tip, otherwise it was a good round.

Soon after I ran Sizzle, I ran Sipzie in her Graded 3-5 Agility. She was all whine up by watching me running Sizzle. She was too excited and cannot content herself anymore. I thought it was good that she is so excited and wanted to do agility. Unfortunately, the winding up is a bit too much for her. She tried to break her startline wait a few times and after that, she just went bonkers, she barked all the way and missed most jumps and cannot weave! I have to stop her and made her lie down til she stops barking before we can continue. After that, she did a beautiful round!!! Duh!

After Sipzie's Graded 3-5 Agility, I had to run over to the other ring with Sizzle to do his Grade 6-7 Agility. He was one good little boy, I was so pleased with him. It was a handling course and I only have one wish, I want to be able to run clear with him as we haven't have a clear round for so long and Colin was joking that I should start collecting a clear round rosette for him! My little man ended up on 2nd place, I am so proud of him!

Thank goodness the video camera behaves this time, sorry about Sipzie whining on the background. Colin was worried that she will distract Sizzle, so he tried to shut her up but no worries, none of my boys care about what happened outside the ring when they are working with me:

Soon after this run, it was the Champ Jumping. The start sequence is quite challenging. I was having two minds whether to go the long way or the shortest way. I find some of the obstacles are very close together. To be honest, I don't know what Sizzle will give me, so I have to work harder. I determined to go clear. When I walked in, I decided I will turn left on the wall, the short way but my worried is he will back jump #3 if I didn't catch his attention. Anyway, all went well and he even picked up the weave entry after the pipe tunnel. The distance from the exit was so short that some dogs missed the weave entry. There is another trap after the weave. There is a U shape pipe tunnel but you have to take the wrong end of the tunnel. I have seen handlers that front cross after the weave or handlers cross behind the weave; and some dogs got eliminated because they ran into the exit end of the tunnel ... when I walked the course, I wanted to pull Sizzle and flip him into the tunnel but there is also the jump on the right that worries me, if I pulled too much, he will probably take the jump instead of the tunnel but I am so glad he was very responsive and we both trust each other. He did exactly what I asked him for and he did well too. We ran clear but not in a fast time.

Sizzle's Champ Jumping:

After Sizzle's Champ Jumping, There is Sipzie's Combined 3-5 Jumping. This time, I will tried the normal way, not letting her watch me running Sizzle. She was much better and focus on me. She didn't break her startline wait and we ran well. One thing I didn't realised was that she popped out on the last weave until I watch the video but I am very happy with the run. I thought she ran rather well apart from the last weave pole.

Sipzie's Combined 3-5 Jumping:

Soon after I ran Sipzie, I have to rush over to Champ Agility with Sizzle. Again, this is a handling course but not great for running contacts. There is a long jump in front of the Dog Walk but the dog should take the jump slightly to the left. The gap between the long jump and the jump is also very small. I've watched those super running contact dogs ran before me and they all got caught after the DW, they either took the long jump or jump the wrong way of the jump they should take. I was getting very nervous about it and yet there is nothing I can do. I can only tried harder. If I can beat Sizzle to the end of the DW, I probably can do something but with the start sequence like that, what can I do? I have to say, I did try to run very fast to beat Sizzle to the end of the DW, eventhough I didn't quite get there but he was such a wonderful boy yesterday, he listened and responded so well and I guess my timing was spot on as well. He didn't even look at the long jump and turned so tight on the jump into the weave. I was very happy we pull through this bit but I know another trap coming up. I cannot leave him on the See-Saw to get into the position to do a front cross, so I was left behind and my handling started to go wrong and he nearly took the A Frame instead of the jump because I turned my shoulder too early, we got a refusal but managed to get him back on track again. The three staggering jumps that bother me got me this time. Ideally I wanted to be able to turn Sizzle to the left but I was too late doing all my front crosses and I put myself in a bad position, so I turn him right which will be a big risk of him back the last jump and he did and I saw a few dogs did the same! Sadly, we got eliminated again! The dream of going through to Final once again demolished!

here is Sizzle's Champ Agility, once again sorry about Sipzie whining at the background:

BTW, we got home by 3pm. We were all soaked to the skin and shivering at home! The leakage still not sorted and the heating and hot water not working! JOY!

Sonic 12 weeks; Scara 18 weeks

Sonic is 12 weeks old today! His ears are still nicely tipped, I hope they stay that way so I don't have to worry about tipping them. He is definitely a slow mature boy, he beginning to LIKE food, so I can do more with clicker now! 

I decided not to go to Thames Agility Show today, not like me? I know. Colin needs to go to the banks to sort out his financial stuff so I thought it would be good to take Sonic to High Street to meet more people. We decided to go to Croydon, it is bigger and busier. I didn't realised they have a "market" there as well; so there were more people and more noise for him. He is one brave little boy, eventhough he is not too human-friendly but he say hello to many people.

 This picture was taken after we came back from Croydon, he was so tired and yet wanted to be out in the garden, just in case he missed something! He is a very busy boy who wanted to get involved in everything!

Scara was 18 weeks yesterday, she really is a daddy's girl. She is always happy to greet Colin when he comes home from work and loves to have cuddle with Colin. Funny how she is different with me. She is always busy and wanted to do something when I am involved!

 daddy's girl!

I have taken out her out to get used to traffic noises this week, she is slowly building up her confidence with the outside world. Today, Colin took her out a few times to walk around the block so she get used to walk with daddy instead of me. Colin is hoping that she will be his walking partner when she is older.

These two pictures made me smile A LOT. Sipzie dislike Sonic and Brooke but Sonic in particular. After Brooke joined her family, I have caught Sipzie tried to "kill" Sonic many times. Since then, I never let them be alone without my supervision. The tension between them got worst and I am watching like a hawk. Soon after Scara joined us, the situation changed. I can see Sipzie "released" her tension, she is happier around the puppies and in the last three days, she beginning to tease Scara to play with her. It was so good to watch her wanted to play with the little one. She is only a puppy herself and I like to see a bit happier at home and play with the others. 

 Scara 18 weeks

 I was warned that Scara loves water. I didn't realised how much she loves that water!! I found her climbing onto the rockery and was walking up and down the water!!! Then, of course Sonic joined in the fun as well!

 Sonic: the pond water is tastier!

Happy 2nd Birthday to ZAP

Happy 2nd Birthday to our First Licosateria litter

Mai P'cious Zap

photo by Karen Valentine

We wish Zap a very Happy Birthday, hope your daddy spoil you with a good long walk and some yummy treats! 

Licks from daddy Sing and mama Gem xxx

Sheltie ears!

Sizzle before his ears trim

I received the latest Nutshell on Tuesday, the front cover is this beautiful tri bitch CH Janetstown Jeana. The first thing that notified me is her beautiful ears and her sweet expression. I am pretty good at grooming my dogs but my only down side is I never seems to be able to trim their ears to standard, this is why I try to leave them for as long as I can, I do not want to damage their good look because of me. After seeing this beautiful bitch, I decided to have a go with Sizzle (poor dog)!

The Nutshell with CH Janetstown Jeana on the front cover

 and this is my result:

It took me more than hour just to trim his two ears but now I have a problem. After a good trim, meaning remove a lot of dead hair and thinning hair around the areas, both his ears are much lighter and they now sticking up!! Sizzle's ears are natural, I don't have to use any kit to tip his ears, I feel very lucky about it and his ears are beautifully tip a well, not too heavy either and now I am gutted as the weight from the hair is lifted and they are now sticking up! I like my shelties to have nice ears!

After a good massage, they now back into the proper position but I know I have to keep doing it, otherwise it will go up again! Arrrggghhh ... Sheltie ears!!