Dog Day Afternoon

When I got home from work today, it was HOT (about 95 degrees). I decided it was too hot to take the dogs for a walk, so figured I would let the BDC (Black Dog Club) get their yah-yah's out by the pool. Well, Hope did, Nick and Toddy had no desire to swim, but I think they still had fun. Nick was happy to steal the stick from Hope, and Toddy was happy to chase Nick to get the stick or a toy.

The pool temperature was perfect for the hot afternoon...I was actually IN the pool when I took this video :-) That Nick, he's such a THIEF!

Black Dog Club Weekend

It was actually a nice, relaxing weekend to finally stay home and just do a whole lot of nothing, but go on a few walks and let the dogs play...

Mother and daughter...Toddy and Hope...

Hope, Nick, and Toddy...

Profiles...Toddy, Hope, and Nick

On Sunday, Nick and I went on a field trip to the El Dorado Town Center shopping center with a friend and her pup, Gerrit.  After some training and lunch, we took them to a nearby school to play.  Here is a picture of the boys taken by Gerrit's puppy raiser.

We also went to the school a few times to let the dogs run...

Stick Thief

Hope's mom Toddy is staying with us for several days while her family is on vacation. It was such a nice day today that we took a couple of walks and I let the dogs swim...well, Hope swam and Nick mostly stood at the edge of the pool and waited for Hope to get the stick so he could steal it! Poor Hope, but she didn't seem to mind...

And that is not just any stick, that is the famous Molly-stick :-)

Family reunion weekend

Our trip to Southern California was also a family reunion in many respects...

My main purpose for the weekend was to attend our monthly HOPE AACR meeting in Costa Mesa.  We stayed in a hotel the first two nights to attend the drill on Saturday and the HOPE meeting on Sunday.  Here is a picture of Hope and Nick at the hotel in their tent:

And, kicking back on their bed...

But, here is where they really slept ;-)

After the drill was over, we went over to meet up with Nick's brother Najee at his puppy raiser's house for some playtime and dinner.  The boys had a great time playing with eachother, it was so cute they would just run back and forth, over and over, with the same toy in their mouth.

Najee and Nick posing for a family picture:

Najee's puppy raiser also has Titian, her first CCI puppy who was released from CCI.  From left to right (Titian, Najee, Nick, Hope):

And finally, a little video of the dogs playing that night...

On Sunday, we had a reunion of our HOPE family, it was fun meeting up with several of the teams who Hope and I went through the certification training with last year.  I wasn't at a very good angle for this picture as I wanted to be near Hope as she is afraid of Oz, that big black furry Newfie.  She finally approached him on this trip, before she would just back up or try to hide behind me.  That's her little black head to the right of Oz... :-)

After the meeting, we drove to Oceanside to meet up with my friend who is raising a puppy named Kane, who is Hope's nephew.  Kane's dad, Pryde, has the same mom as Hope. Najee and Titian also came for a visit as well so the dogs had a blast playing and swimming.

From left to right: Titian, Najee, Nick, Hope and Kane

And a little video of Hope swimming...

Dogs at play...

What a fun and relaxing weekend.  Well, except for the looong drive!  We let Hope and Nick get their yah-yah's out with Kane before we left.  Nick was able to retrieve whatever toys he wanted out of the toy box :-)

What a disaster!

Well, sort of....Hope and Nick made their acting debut last weekend in Irvine playing the role of evacuees for a diaster drill that was run an organization called SCART (Surf City Animal Response Team). I found out about the drill last month from some HOPE members who are also part of this organization. They were asking for therapy dogs to play the roles of the evacuee dogs. I was able to get permission to bring Nick too, even though he is not a therapy dog.  

The scenario was that there was a wildfire where I lost my home and needed to evacuate my dogs. There was an emergency animal shelter set up and Hope and Nick were processed through the shelter as part of the drill. They went through "intake" where I filled out paperwork for them to get into the shelter, had their picture taken, had my picture taken (for identification purposes), and given an unique ID number that was put on their collars. I was given a bracelet that contained their ID numbers. They were then taken to a makeshift dog kennel and held there until I came back to retrieve them.

Here's a picture of Hope and Nick before the drill started in their working dog mode (they didn't have to wear their vests for the drill):


After they went through Intake (where I filled out the paperwork) and they were given identification numbers, they were taken by volunteers to the kennel area:


Nick goes into the kennel:


The Kennel area (Nick on the left, Hope on the right). There's a miniature schnauzer named Shay in the kennel all the way to the right, he is a therapy dog that visits at hospitals.


After being kenneled for a bit, both dogs were taken to the Vet tent to be checked out for any medical issues (Nick on the left, Hope on the right):


Nick being sprung from the kennel and on his way back to me:


Hope being sprung from the kennel and on her way back to me:

The cool thing is that we also got our picture taken that appeared in the local paper, Orange County Register.  I have no idea when this picture was taken and am just glad both dogs were behaving themselves ;-)  Here's a link to the article (click here)

It was a fun day and we were glad to help out.  It was also good for the dogs and I was pleased with both of them as they were both comfortable being handled by other people (who didn't have much in the way of dog handling skills), remained calm, and were comfortable being kenneled.

Fun day!

Throwdown...a dime?

On one of our Lend A Heart visits the dogs are individually introduced and we do a "dog and pony" show at the beginning of the visit of their "tricks" which ranges from performing obedience commands, catching a biscuit off their nose, etc. I never really taught Hope any fun "tricks" while I had her, so instead I use some of her service skills for this portion of the visit.

Hope learned how to retrieve things as small as coins off the floor, using the command "get". She has been able to retrieve coins off a carpeted floor, but has had some trouble picking up coins off a non-carpeted floor. Last week, our visit was outside so I had her try to pick up a quarter, knowing she might have some issues, but she did it! I was so pleased with her for doing it that I put it on my status line on my Facebook page. One of my friends then put a comment out there to try a dime now.

Sounds like a Throwdown to me and Hope was up for the challenge. I even captured it on video so I could put it on my Facebook page...here she is! :-) Good girl, Hope!



If Nick were smart, he would be paying close attention as he will be going through this training come August when he leaves for Advanced Training. Notice he doesn't even bother to lift his head!

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day!

Hope and Nick sent this picture to their dog-moms Toddy and Niobe today...(that's Hope on the left, Nick on the right in case you are wondering)

Since my mom came up for the day yesterday, we spent the day together and had Mother's Day a day early.  So that left me with an unplanned free day today, yay!  The dogs and I had a nice relaxing day after several busy weekends, so it was nice to have some time together just to chill. I took them on a long walk first thing in the morning, went out for a paddle in the morning, and then took them on a hike at the lake in the afternoon.  Now we all need a nap! :-)

It's not all work

I've been working a lot with Nick this week while I have him to take him to different places and work on distractions. Earlier in the week, I took him through the drive-thru car wash. He was fast asleep and then all of a sudden was wide awake wondering what the heck was going on with all the noise and the funny things rubbing against the car. His eyeballs were so big! He did great, not scared at all, just alert and curious. It was too funny.

Yesterday, we went a dog park in Roseville after work and boy was he ever distracted by all the dogs, he could barely do any of his commands.  We just worked on the outside of the park, we didn't go in as CCI does not like its dogs to go in dog parks.  

Today, I was on a mission to see how he would do again at the dog park determined to get him to pay attention to me and to execute his commands.  I even had his Gentle Leader ready if I needed it.  He was a totally different dog today, distracted a little at first, but then he was fine and totally paid attention to me and did his commands just fine.  Who knows why yesterday was such a disaster.

After we got home, I took Hope and Nick to the schoolyard to play.  I've been letting them play in the field in the back of the school rather than the small kindergarten yard when there aren't soccer games going on - I guess that season must be over.  Nick carried the dog toy all the way to the school, it was so cute.  I didn't even carry his leash either, just threw it over his back and let him walk, he stayed right next to me.   He and Hope got their yah-yahs out running all over the field, now they are snoring....

In need of swimming lessons...

Now that the days are longer, there's more time after work to take the dogs out. Hope needed a bath before her therapy visit this week anyway, so I decided to take her and Nick to Folsom Lake for a quick swim. Because it was a little cold and windy, there was nobody out there when we got there.

It's a good thing the ability to swim is not a requirement for Nick to be a service dog, because if it were, he would never make it. I thought he might just follow Hope out to the water to swim, but he would only run as far as where he could stand and stop and wait for Hope so he could steal her stick. Oh well, maybe one of these days...guess I'll have to start throwing him in the pool or something, haha...

Puppy class at Sacramento International Airport

Last night, we had puppy class at the Sacramento Airport.  Somehow the local news stations found out about class and the two TV stations did a story showing a local CCI graduate and filmed "Big Dog" class.  Luckily, they were finishing up as we arrived for our class so we didn't have any cameras following us around.  

Here is a video of the story from one Channel 10:

Nick did great at class and it was so cute to see Hope so excited when we got home when she realized Nick was home! :-)

Anybody home???

I took Hope to the lake for a walk/swim after I got home from work tonight. She still refuses to jump off the dock, its so funny.  I try to encourage her, but she is having no part of that.  She'd rather just run up and down the dock and back with the stick.  Maybe her buddies Mason or Maggie can teach her!

After she was done swimming, she kept going off into these bushes near the edge of the water and wouldn't come back to me when I called her.  I went over to see what she was so interested in and guess what? There was a turtle...and it was real. I don't think anybody was home though as when I touched it with a stick, nothing happened.  I have seen turtles out paddling over by the Aquatic Center, but never one this big.  Weird....

Hope says, "Is anybody home in there?" ... Guess not, Hope

We walked along the bike trail for a bit afterwards so she could dry off a little (I forgot to bring a towel!).  Here's a picture of her near the Rainbow Bridge.  

A great night for a walk...

A Tough Day

Today was a tough day at work, another round of layoffs, another day of valued colleagues losing their jobs.  This economy has been tough on our company resulting in a loss of a lot of jobs and its not over yet. Even though I found out last month that my job was safe (for now), its still hard to see others lose theirs.

I was exhausted when I got home today and at the spur of a moment decided it was too hot to take Hope for a walk, but not too hot to take her to Folsom Lake for a swim.  I love being 5 minutes from the lake. She got to enjoy a good swim and I used the time not to think about anything for a while. Thanks Hope...

Girls weekend...and rattlesnakes :-(

It's been a girls weekend around here...I've been puppysitting a friend's CCI pup named Idelle since Thursday night.   That's her on the left, Hope on the right, in the picture above at Folsom Lake today.

Yesterday, we spent all day helping out at UC Davis Picnic Day at the CCI booth.  It was looong day for us as we got there at about 7:30 and didn't get home til about 5:30pm.  Poor Idelle was exhausted and Hope was so energetic when we got home that I left Idelle at home to rest and took Hope on a walk, just the two of us. Here is a picture of Idelle and Gerrit with the granddaughter of one of our puppy raiser friends. We took her with us when we went to watch the parade.  The dogs did great and weren't bothered by all the activities and noises of the parade.

 

Today was a relaxing day and the weather was beautiful!  We went out to Folsom Point at Folsom Lake and parked on one side of the lake and walked to the other side towards El Dorado Hills. The girls had fun swimming. Well, Hope had fun swimming for a stick and Idelle had fun stealing it from her when she got close to shore (hmmm...just like Nick does...). 

Here's Idelle coming in for the "steal"....

Unfortunately, we saw two rattlesnakes today too.  Its definitely rattlesnake season now that the warm weather has arrived.  The first one we saw was actually pointed out to us by a guy on the trail just ahead of us...it was teeny baby one that was barely as thick as a pencil, but you could already make out the rattles.  He said it crossed the trail and he almost stepped on it.  We saw the 2nd one on the hike back to the car.  It was huge, probably about 3 feet long, it crossed the trail right right in front of us; there was no missing this one.  I tried to use heavy footsteps (ie, make noise) on the narrower parts of the trail just in case. Yikes....

Other than the rattlesnake sightings, it was a fun Girls Weekend ...

Hiking at Lake Natoma

Working in a building without any windows really makes me realize how much I miss not being able to see what the weather is like outside.  The weather was so nice this weekend, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to take Hope on a hike.  

This morning we went for a hike at Lake Natoma, it was beautiful out there, probably in the mid-70's and very green with lots of wildflowers.  Today it was just Hope and I as Nick went back to our co-raisers.  We probably hiked about 4 miles or so and Hope got to swim a little.  It felt so good to be outside again!

I found some nice trails off the bike trails and Hope was happy to be off leash. I'm pleased that for the most part, she is happy to stay near me.  It's starting to be snake season and there are lots of ticks out there, so keeping her close to the trails is a good thing.  

Here is a picture of Hope near one of the trails we found...

At the edge of the lake with some outrigger canoes in the background that came zooming by; this was where we stopped to let Hope go for a swim...


A great day for a hike and swim!  In fact, it was so nice out there this morning, I decided to take a long paddle in the afternoon to this very same place so that I could drop off a geocaching Travel Bug that is hidden nearby. See my geocaching blog for a few pictures (click here)...

A week full of field trips

Since I had Nick for an extended period of time the last couple of weeks, we went on a bunch of field trips/outings with some puppy raising friends.  Last Saturday, we were joined by CCI pups Gerrit and Idelle at a dog event in Rancho Cordova to work on dog distractions.  Gerrit's puppy raiser and I actually traded dogs for most of the event, another good opportunity for our dogs to be handled by another person.  Nick did very well with all the activity going on!

The other interesting thing was we got to see some different types of competitions (actually, they were "fun matches") involving obedience, rally, etc. I never knew what rally was so it was fun to watch. I actually think this kind of thing is more of the type of thing that Hope would like, she was never meant to be an agility dog even though I always enjoyed doing it with her and she seemed to have fun doing it.

Here's a picture of Idelle, Gerrit, and Nick on Saturday.... (photo courtesy of Gerrit's PR):

During the week, I took Nick on various errands after work: to the grocery store, to get my oil changed, post office, etc.  One evening, we met Nick's buddy Gerrit and his puppy raiser at Petsmart in Folsom.  Luckily, we picked a good night as they were having a puppy class, so there were lots of distractions as the dogs were walking around the store with their owners practicing their obedience.  Here's a picture of Nick practicing the "kennel" command in a fancy log doghouse. 

 

Nick's behavior out in public is great; he doesn't seem bothered by much, what a good boy!   

Nick the Therapy Dog?

Nick says, "If Hope can do it, then I can too!"

First, a little background...In January, we moved into another building at work.  Last month, we were asked to introduce ourselves in a meeting to the other ~100 employees in the building so they would know who we were.  Of course, Nick was introduced to the crowd too and I told everyone that they were welcome to come pet Nick (with permission, of course!).

Well, today one of the Repair Techs in the building took me up on the offer I had made.  I was sitting at my desk and heard a faint "Excuse me, is Nick here?" behind me.  When I turned around, the guy said he could really use a dog-fix as he was having a bad day.  He just had a death in the family and he was missing his dog who he had just put down a month or so ago.  I released Nick and he cuddled with him on the floor.  He explained what was going on and I could tell he was rather sad.  It was just about the time to take Nick out for his mid-morning potty break anyways, so I asked the him if he wanted to go outside and play with Nick.  After Nick finished doing his business, I took off Nick's cape and leash and he probably played fetch with Nick for about 10 minutes or so in the parking lot.  

Yes, I broke a rule about taking off his leash in an unfenced area, but sometimes CCI rules are made to be broken.  Afterwards, he thanked me and said it really helped to relieve some of his stress. 

Good job Nick!... 

Hope's new teacher?

Well, this isn't really about Hope, but about some friends who can teach her to jump - maybe? Mason is a COC (change of career) CCI dog whose new career is being a beloved pet dog, companion, therapy dog, and now dock diving dog with his puppy raiser.  I became friends with Mason's puppy raiser when I had Rolie, my 2nd CCI puppy who is now a service dog.  It was because of Mason that I became involved with HOPE AACR with Hope.  

His newest job is that of dock diving competitor, he has taken some lessons and will be competing for the first time in a few weeks. I loaded up my kayak so we could get some pictures and videos of Mason diving off the dock from the water at Lake Natoma's Negro Bar area.  I tried to not drift off too far in the kayak and take videos and pictures at the same time, and not drop either camera or get it wet, not so easy (I did have a dry bag!).  Luckily, it wasn't too windy out there today so we picked a good day to go out (for my sake anyways!). 

It was so funny as we almost didn't get to do any jumping.  When we first got there, Mason dropped his toy and it rolled under the dock and got stuck in a gap beneath the dock, along with a bunch of other wayward tennis balls.  We tried to use my paddle to get it out but it wasn't working, then some guy comes over with his huge fishing net and asks if we wanted to use it. It worked! Phew...

Here are a few videos and a slideshow of the photos I took today...we had a great time watching Mason show us his stuff!  In the first video, you can kind of see the yellow stick dog toy that is being tossed in the water to get Mason to jump off the dock.

These are the videos I took from my kayak...

Maybe Mason can teach Hope a thing or two, huh? She also got an offer from her new friend Maggie, who has also competed in a dock diving competition too.

A change in plans

The weather has been warm and sunny this past week, so I put the racks on my SUV, loaded up the kayak, and was looking forward to a leisurely paddle, the first this year, at Lake Natoma. There was a bit of a breeze as I was loading up my kayak, but when I got to Willow Creek at Lake Natoma, the wind was starting to pick up even more.

I debated for a few minutes as to whether I should even go out or not, but decided to go for it. I wanted to paddle to Negro Bar to check out the dock for a friend who needs a place to practice with her dog who took dock diving lessons and who will be competing in a few weeks. Well, I did go out, I did paddle, and I did turn around after 45 minutes or so...it was so windy out there that it was hard to paddle. Plus, I try to use some sort of judgment when I go out by myself to stay safe. Today was not a day to be paddling by myself.

So I paddled back to my starting point, packed up the kayak and drove home disappointed my paddle was cut short. Oh well. As I was unloading my kayak, I thought it would be fun to take Hope out for a quick swim before it was time for me to go pick up Nick at our co-raisers house.

I think the dock will be nice for Hope's buddy to practice his dock diving. And frankly, I'm hoping if I take Hope out there with me, she will learn how to dive off the dock! As you can see, even though I was throwing sticks a few feet off the end of the dock for her, she ran back down the dock to get the stick from the water's edge rather than just jumping in from the dock itself.

Oh well, maybe she'll get the idea someday...



Here's Hope at the dock...

A quiet day at Willow Creek

I took Hope out for a quick trip to Lake Natoma's Willow Creek area this morning in between storms for a short hike on the bike trail and to let her swim for a bit.  For some reason, she couldn't seem to figure out where I was throwing the sticks today, after losing 3 of them, I gave up and we went for a hike instead.  Some days you got it, some days you don't I guess....

Here's a little video of Hope...


This place will always have a special place in my heart as this is the exact spot where I took Molly for her last swim on our last day together right before I took her to the vet to send her to the Rainbow Bridge. This is also the spot where we put in our kayaks during the summer, almost kayak time now that the weather is warming up!

It's NOT about Hope

This post has absolutely nothing to do with Hope, Nick, or any of my dogs for that matter.  Rowina is a CCI breeder who Hope and I go to Sutter Hospital with for pet therapy visits.

But, I just had to post this video.  A few weeks ago, I went over to some friends' house to help them with the traditional litter picture that most of the CCI breeder caretakers try to do for each litter that they whelp and care for.  The final pictures always turn out so cute, but I don't think people realize how much work actually goes into getting that "perfect" picture of all the puppies sitting still like they are actually posing for a picture.  

I took a ton of videos that day and this movie gives you a glimpse of the "behind the scenes" for the perfect litter picture...hope you enjoy it...

This is the "village" that it took to get this picture taken...plus, there were two photographers behind the cameras trying to capture the special moment...

And, this is the final product, now you can see what it took to get here for this one shot!...

My worlds collided...

On Saturday, I went up to Auburn for a nice hike with Hope near the Confluence (where the North/Middle fork of the American River meet...).  How this hike came together was rather funny as certain aspects of my life came together through some common bonds.  What's that saying about six degrees of separation? Here goes...

• Hope and I joined an animal-assisted therapy organization called Lend A Heart last month...
• When I was at the CCI Crab Feed last week, I saw a Lend A Heart (LAH) volunteer who was part of the team evaluating Hope and I last month. Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to talk to her at the Crab Feed as I was in line to buy a drink and didn't know where she was sitting. Before she walked off to her table, I saw her talking to a guy in a kilt...
• I thought to myself, I wonder if that guy in the kilt is a geocacher?  There's a group of geocachers in the area who dress in kilts (don't ask me why, but they do...)...
• I emailed her back asking if she had been at the Crab Feed, and if she happened to be a geocacher because I saw her talking to the guy in the kilt...  
• Well, it turns out that not only is she a geocacher, but I have found several of her caches. She hid a few of the caches on Lake Natoma that I got from my kayak.  I told her Hope is probably even in some of the pictures on my logs for her caches.  She told me that she recognized my geocaching name too...

And, that's how I ended up going hiking today...she invited me to join her on a hike she was doing with other geocachers from the area.  The hike itself was pretty short, only a few miles, over a bridge and down the Western States Trail that ended at a waterfall. It was a good thing it was short as it started raining when we made it to our lunch spot, but it didn't ruin the day.  It was kind of fun to meet the other geocachers whose names I recognized and we found one cache along the trail.

The best part of all this is that Hope has a new buddy named Maggie who is a therapy dog , loves to hike, and goes geocaching - just like her.  They got along great today, even when we let them hike off leash and let them play in the water by the waterfall.

Hopefully, we can arrange some time to go caching/hiking together...and we'll be doing some therapy visits together too.  Very cool how things came together....

A picture of Maggie and Hope on the trail:

There were probably about 6-7 dogs on the hike today, this is Maggie, Hope and Pharoh (a shelter dog who's owners just adopted in October).

Hope at the waterfall:

Even though it was a short hike, it was nice to get out for a few hours before the rain really started coming down. I'm also happy that Hope and I have new friends, both human and dog! :-)

More field trips for Nick

Last week, I took Hope and Nick to Newcastle to visit a good friend of mine.  She lives on 5 acres and has a fully-fenced yard and about 10 goats.  The dogs had a blast playing with her black lab, Rosie, who is about 4 years old now and came from Lab Rescue...what a sweet dog! Of course, I couldn't pass up a training opportunity to expose Nick and Hope to the goats. Jennifer put some of the goat's feed in a bucket and shook it, and boy did they come running up to the fence!

Playtime...a pile of black dogs: Hope, Nick in the front of the pack, Rosie in the rear:

Hope and Nick wonder if Jen will give them any feed if they are polite...

Nick watches the feeding frenzy...

Nick checks out the goats in action and wonders why they make such strange noises...

During the week, I took Nick to a lot of different places, grocery store, pet store, etc. At this point, we are trying to work with him on taking him out to different places. On Friday night, our puppy class was held at a bowling alley. Nick didn't seem to be bothered by all the noise, in fact, the only thing he seemed to be interested in was laying down and just chilling out rather than performing his commands.  We were joking that Nick is perfectly content just being a people-watcher, haha. :-)

Here is a picture of Nick (and Shera) at the bowling alley:

Happy Birthday Hope!

Hard to believe, but today Hope turned 4, where does the time go? She and Nick enjoyed Frosty Paws to celebrate the occasion. In the evening, I took her on a Lend A Heart visit to an assisted living center in Sacramento. She did very well and what a great way to spend her birthday, doing something she enjoys...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY HOPE!

CPR and Snow Day

Nick had a busy day today...

In the morning, I took him with me to an American Red Cross CPR class in Rocklin.  I'm required to take CPR, First Aid, and Pet First Aid as part of our HOPE aacr training.  We listened to a lecture for about an hour first, then went into another room to practice CPR on dummies. There were a ton of people and Nick did great! I wish I would have had a camera with me as it would have been funny to get a picture of him with one of the CPR dummies....

After the class was over, we met Nick's buddies Gerrit and Carlo and their puppy raiser and drove together to Truckee for Snow Day, an annual event hosted by one of the our GRC Chapter's puppy raisers.  We got there late, so it was actually kind of nice as most of the dogs were worn out already so there wasn't a lot of crazy dogs out there playing.  Nick did great and loved carrying a toy in his mouth waiting for another dog to chase him.  What a good boy...

Ok, so black dogs and snow don't exactly go together very well, unfortunately this was my best shot of Nick...


And, here's a little video...

Nick is the black dog in the yellow scarf. The 3 dogs on the toy rope are Nick, Carlo and Shera. And, that's Nick's buddy Gerrit playing with the stick at the end...

A busy schedule...

Hope has had a busy few weeks.  Last Thursday, we went to Sutter Hospital for our visit to the STAR unit and visited with the patients there in the morning.  Then after work, we went to the Sutter Rehabilitation Institute to visit with the patients there.  Then immediately after that, I took her to our first Lend A Heart general meeting to start meeting some of the members in that group.  Whew....busy day.

Here's a picture of Hope and Sheeba (a 4-year old Rhodesian Ridgeback) in the gym at Sutter Rehab where we do our visits.  It was nice to let Hope jump up on this table as some of the patients could reach her easier from their wheelchairs.  I realize how short she is as some of the patients could barely reach her from their wheelchairs so we tried something different that night.  The "lap" and "visit" commands sure come in handy for visits too...

This week, we have two reading programs to do after work in the evenings.  Then depending on what is going on at work, I may do a Lend a Heart visit with her on Friday afternoon.  But, we'll see...

Playtime in between storms

This week I have been watching a friend's dog, Cara, for the week while her owner is on vacation. Unfortunately, it has also been raining so we haven't been able to get out much for walks or playtime.  Earlier this week I had to get a little creative as I could tell Hope and Cara needed to get their "ya-ya's" out.  Who needs expensive dog toys when a cheap 89 cent empty plastic bottle will do?

Nick came back home after puppy class last night, so today we were a houseful of black dogs. It was perfect weather for a nice long walk and playtime at the school yard near my house. Nick was so cute carrying the dog toy I brought along almost all the way to the school. Hope used to do the same thing as a puppy too... :-) Since my yard is so small, I use the school yard a lot to let the dogs play; its great as its fully fenced, so its safe for the dogs to be off leash. Hope helped me close the gates with the "push" command she learned in Advanced Training...

We actually went out for a couple of walks today as it was such great weather to be out and about.  I was amazed to walk by the ponds nearby out on the trails that were nearly full, a month or so ago, the ponds were practically bone dry.  I think all the water run-off from the neighborhoods drain into the ponds in these wetlands.  (L to R: Hope, Nick, Cara)

A different angle...

A little reminder...

It's a good thing CCI graduations roll around every 3 months...

Just when I start to lose my motivation and feel some of the negative emotions that inevitably comes with the puppy raising journey (frustration, anger, disappointment, etc., you can fill in the blanks...), attending a CCI graduation always seems to renew my spirits about puppy raising and what it is all about...the graduates who are at the receiving end of what we are doing. It also makes me realize how many special people and dogs have entered my life since I began this journey. And yesterday was no exception...

Nick and I drove down to Santa Rosa with our co-raisers and some good friends who raised Nick's half-sister Orsa who was graduating. Our local CCI Chapter, the GRC (Gold Rush Champions), rocked...we had several dogs raised in our area that graduated yesterday and we will have several new graduates who live in the Sacramento area. As always, the graduations are so emotional and the speeches were wonderful...another tear-jerking ceremony.  

This is a picture of Nick and his half-sister Orsa before the ceremony. Orsa is from Niobe's (Nick's mom) second litter. She graduated as a Skilled Companion for a 7-year old autistic boy. Before he received his CCI dog, he had opened a lemonade stand to earn money for a dog. During the ceremony he gave the money (which he was carrying in a plastic bag) to CCI...it was such a special moment. He now says he is going to sell orange juice to help pay for Orsa's food...how sweet is that?

After the ceremony, we had another "Winnie Round-Up" at CCI. Our co-raisers have an RV that they park in the back parking lot at CCI, and we hang out (with adult beverages and snacks, of course) to support our friends who have the hard part of turning in their puppy that day. 

Nick poses for a picture at CCI, such a handsome boy - all 65 lbs of him!

I just needed another reminder of what it is all about and graduation reminded me of that...

A field trip for Nick

I had the day off from work today for President's Day, so I took Nick on a field trip to Lee's Feed in Shingle Springs with some friends.  It's a great place for training.  Here are a few pictures from our field trip....

Nick practicing an "under" in a tight space and not sniffing the bags of dog food...

Nick in the "bird room"....


Unfortunately, this time around there were no baby chicks at the store like the last time we were here. But we did go into the "bird room" and Nick got to see some bunnies, guinea pigs, and walked by some aquariums.  

After we got back, we did another "Dog Pyramid" picture at my house.  I'm getting my carpets cleaned tomorrow so had moved all my dog crates into the spare bedroom. Nick was so funny as he has no hesitation about jumping in the top crate, he learned that one in Oceanside I guess. That's Gerrit and Idelle in the bottom crate, this is a CalPERS puppy picture I guess since all three dogs are CalPERS "employees"... :-)