Well, whadaya know.....

Yup!  Jasmine got her third Q in her doggy lifetime, which also happens to be her first in the Advanced level.  It was a last minute decision of my part to enter her in one event at the trial last week, just for the heck of it.  The course was quite straightforward, and I didn't try any fancy moves.  If you watch the video, and if you happen to be a judge, you might be tempted to call a refusal on our move when I lost my way...  Did the judge call it?  If he did, the scribe didn't note it, and Jasmine and I got a lucky break.  On the other hand, we're not in trials every weekend, and when we are, we rarely qualify.  Therefore, I went proudly home with a beautiful ribbon in my pocket.  Both dogs earned pigs' ears for their good behaviour.

Fannie, for her part, was a good little dog, and sucked up all the attention that was given to her.  Both dogs borrowed Noble Walter's crate and were quiet as a clam in there.  They looked quite cute with the great silver ribbons attached to the crate.

Scary moment

We've been having a very wet Spring, with important rainfalls.  The horse arena where the trial was held wasn't spared and several muddy spots could be found on the sand.  Just before the second tunnel, I was so sure that Jasmine would detour to the water puddle (she's been know to do this during our off-leash walks), that I called "tunnel, tunnel, tunnel".  It wasn't even necessary.  She didn't even glance at it.  : )

Fannie's training

Great news!  Fannie figured out the basket exercice, and now, we're reducing the size.  The same goes for the balance disk.  Training a young puppy IS fun. 

The basket case

One rear-end awareness exercice which Fannie needs to do is the "basket" exercice.  The idea is to shape her into putting all four paws in a basket.  Once that's done, you reduce the size of the basket until she can put all four paws in a itsy bitty basket.  We've been working on it for the past two weeks and no results.  Before getting all depressed, I consulted Jasmine's notes on this same exercice and found this.

"Jasmine finally got it and in one day, went down three sizes with no problem."

That perked me up.  : )

Introducing Fannie

Fannie is a little black miniature poodle, so picture taking will be difficult.  Here a few pictures to describe her outgoing personality.  Let's just say she's keeping me on my toes, and annoying the heck out of Jasmine.

Week 6

This week's theme : "Fill the frame". There are many ways to fill the frame, and here is one of them. Jasmine could hear another dog and human walking and went into the sit to listen. It's also a submissive stance I guess. ; ) Fannie is in the car, snoozing away.

Week 5 - 52 Weeks of Jasmine

Boy oh boy!  Am I ever behind now!  This is what happens when Jasmine gets a little sister.  Yup!  Jasmine now has to share her house with little Fannie, a black miniature poodle.   You'll get to see her later on, but for now, here is week 5's theme, "Vintage".

Not bad if I do say so myself.  My first thought was to get a shot of Jasmine around old buildings or objects, but hey!  Why go for the ordinary?

I also used this shot as a profile pic on facebook.

Week 4 - 52 Weeks of Jasmine

Theme: I ate this.

I worked the whole week trying to get the right balance of the food with Jasmine looking on.  Jasmine is looking at the food, yet she's not the main subject of the photo, which was my goal. Unfortunetaly, getting Jazz to sit in the centre of the frame was next to impossible.

Thanks to muttsandaklutz who suggested I use a special feature on my camera. It worked. The food is in focus and Jasmine is part of the blurry background.

Minus 29 Degrees Celcius and Counting...

Ah, the joys of living in Canada!  The forecast for today called for -29 degrees Celsius, so no use in risking it.  Dress in many layers, keep your car full of gas, put in the little bottle that will prevent you gas line to freeze, bring your Winter Survival Kit in the car (candle, extra blanket, matches), put on your warmest coat and you can be sure nothing will happen.

And nothing did!  : )

It was minus 7 degrees in my garage, but by the time I was at Tim Horton's a mere 300 metres away, it was -19.  Yup, that cold.

Although Jasmine and I haven't been training or practicing very much lately, I was adamant that I participate at least in one "official" run in January.  AARF is one of our favorite venues as everyone is so friendly and things are relaxed, which is my kind of competition.  We're also getting more and more comfortable out there and I definitely don't was to lose that!

I was working yesterday, so obviously I hadn't registered Jasmine in any event.  Today, the only run we could participate in was advance jumpers, so we "jumped" at the possibility! 

At our last handling class, even I realised that my timing sucked.  This is apparent again in this run.  (groan). 

Some observations

At the startline, Jasmine is usually happier if I don't carry her in.  I have no idea why I did since for the past 3 trials, I've been keeping her on leash until I ask her to sit.  Oh well.  We were the last to run, but that's quite common for us.

During classes, our instructor usually tells me "call her while she's in the tunnel!".  My "duh" moment was to wonder why, but today, I have the answer.  Jasmine does sometime look for me at the exit, but most often than not, she doesn't.  Consequently, it's not surprising she barrelled out, and kept on running straight ahead.

My usual routine

At this point, my usual routine is to blank out all my logical thinking, which of course, I did.  I didn't handle the next sequence very well, so Jasmine ran around the second jump.  My carefully planned threadle after jump, tunnel disappeared from my mind.  My mind is still on the forgotten threadle when it's time for the front cross after the last tunnel, so my timing sucks.  Jazz hesitates a bit at this.  The rest of the course goes well, except for the last two jumps.

Running out of the ring for her reward


I realised last July, that Jasmine was leaving the ring, sometimes in the middle of a course, to go for her reward. Since then, I've made her finish her courses by calling her back in the ring.  At the last trial in AARF, it was so obvious...  She ignored her last two runs, went for the table where the bowl of treats were. 

At our last handling class, Jasmine pulled her leaving the "ring" trick again.  My instructor then suggested to "make" her tug as a reward instead.  I did this at our second try, and it worked.

The result of this shows today as well.  Jasmine doesn't leave the ring completely, but stops, comes back to me, and finishes the run.  Not bad!  Progress!!!!

Watching the video afterwards


A bit funny.  As I'm watching the video now, the judge raises her hands so many times to note our faults, I feel as if she waving at me.....