Hello, 2024!

Wow, 2023 went by FAST – so fast I barely had a chance to adjust to writing ‘2023’, and we’re on to 2024. As expected, it was a busy year. Hard to believe I’ve been here for 3 years now! Hopewell continues to be a perfect place to live, and the property just gets more and more comfortable. Helps that Heidi is always out there working on it! I ended up finally replacing the old appliances in the kitchen and that’s been a huge last item on my list of things I wanted to do when I moved in. Well, three years isn’t so bad. Of course, I now need a new roof and new siding … but, hey. There is always going to be something. I love how cozy my 50 year old house is … but it’s still a 50 year old house, it has quirks that need work, that’s for sure. But won’t be dealing with interior stuff for a while now, it’s time to put the money into the outer stuff. Still, super happy with the decisions that landed me here, life is funny like that.

Animals have been a bit neglected as I’ve been slogging through the last portion of the year. I really dislike having evening classes, and while I have limited them, they really grate on my nerves this time of year. But, yeah, roofs and siding and probably at some point a car … shit happens. And, good lord, has it gotten expensive to live! I still enjoy all my classes, but, yeah, I needed a break and I’ve really done nothing but read books continuously so far during my vacation. Didn’t help that I started out getting sick again, that sort of weird not really feeling sick, but congestion that eventually went into my lungs. Not sure what that’s about, but it’s FINALLY going away. Annoying, that’s for sure, looking back at my FB memories, it’s funny how if I’m going to get sick it’s almost ALWAYS the same time of year.

I didn’t go to the New Years UKI trial at my arena, and I’m not sad about it. The courses were rough, and it’s not fun when dogs are failing left and right. When no one Qs in anything, that’s probably a sign to scale it back a bit. I like the UKI courses that are mostly flowing with a COUPLE weird challenges, not 15 of them in a row.

Really though, in the end I don’t have a dog for UKI. It’s official, I gave it a year, but Asher is not the dog for international courses. He’s been pretty clear it’s uncomfortable with it all and I need to respect that. Boy, taking that away really took away any urge to, you know, train anything. So I really haven’t, not since our big Week of Agility where it was just a disaster. And I don’t really want to drive to Ridgefield for AKC, and, well, it’s AKC. So, yeah, not a lot of motivation at the moment – especially as Bryn doesn’t really like trialing.

Navarre is officially retired from agility, which is another huge bummer. I gave him 4 months off and just being a dog, he’d been cleared for months beforehand that there was nothing obviously wrong. I started to ease him back into agility and put him into a class of mine for the break, just jumping 12 inches. He went through one and a half exercises and did the freeze thing again – something about agility makes him uncomfortable, so that’s that. I’d love to actually find something to FIX to help him be more comfortable, but I’ve been searching for that for like 4 years and haven’t found it.

So … yeah, Navarre is retired from agility. He’ll be 9 in a few months, so it’s not like I thought he had a ton more time left. But he’s such a vibrant and athletic dog otherwise, it’s hard to think of him as retired. He does love to work though, so what to do with him is the question now. He never loved obedience, I can’t do herding with him … what else could we really do? I have zero interest in nosework, I’m sorry. I mean, I think it’s a fun thing to play around with, but I’ve never been drawn to nose sports whether it was barn hunt, nosework or tracking – just not my thing at all. I don’t want Navarre to feel like he’s being left out though, so I’m still pondering on finding something he’ll love to do.

I HAVE been thinking about trying to consistently go to the disc club events that happen in McMinnville every weekend. Navarre certainly loves that! And Haven is doing great with it as well. Well, once she decided that bringing it back was fun. We’ve introduced actually catching the thrown disc and she’s been making fabulous and safe decisions about it. Unlike Asher who continues to make TERRIBLE decisions in that regard (hence why he doesn’t get to play disc). But, yes, disc when the dog tracks the disc and plucks it neatly out the air in motion while not jumping … I actually think that’s a pretty safe activity. Navarre and Haven are both good at it, and it makes it fun. Naturally, the first meeting of the disc club is when there is 5 inches of snow expected this weekend – ha! Okay, universe, I’m trying to take a hint here.

So then we have Bryn, who I also have in classes this January. The good news, super excited and having a great time. The bad news … she’s just so HARD. Agility should not be this hard! So, yes, she’s still flanky, it’s still a pain in the ass to run her … just, hmm. And I’m not going to stop playing with her, we have a lot of fun – but it’s probably in both of our best interest to stop trying to push the more complicated international stuff. Sigh. She’s going to be a hell of a lot easier to run on more straightforward flowing courses. I’m not giving up on it, and as Navarre had to drop out of his international class, she’s filling in for him. But, yeah, we made PROGRESS last year – but she’s just … hard. Fun, but hard. And she does great without the motion! I worked her some in the international skills class and she has lovely skills … but the motion, man, it just kills for her.

So … back to square one with Bryn and Asher, or back to AKC, as the case might be. And sometimes AKC CAN be fun … but, yeah, been there, done that. I am trying my best to get an ASCA club started locally to put ASCA trials on at my arena. Flowing courses, just standard, jumpers and gamblers – it’s something that would be appropriate for all my students, not just a select few like UKI. And, yes, Asher and Bryn would absolutely enjoy ASCA courses, that’s for sure. So, we’ll see.

In the meantime, Heidi has actually been working Bryn quite a bit on sheep the last few months – and they’ve been having a great time! Bryn is funny like that, she is particular about who she will work for, and her and Heidi really seem to understand each other. So that makes me very happy that Bryn is getting more chances to do what she loves the most. I don’t know if she’s learning anything, but I don’t care, I have zero ambitions in the world of herding. I do think if I had need for a dog for actual work, Bryn can absolutely hold her own in a real world situation. She is a lovely natural herding dog who has a lot of skills.

So goals for Bryn and Asher this year? Hmmmm … good question. I’d definitely like to actually work with them more, as I really didn’t make the time last year for it. I always MEAN to, but the problem with having your own arena is that when I’m out there I focus on all the maintenance and even when I go out with PLANS to work my dogs, I just get things ready for other people instead. So I think for 2024 I am going to give a very simple and should not be at all hard goal of working them once a week. And, no, I have most definitely not been doing that, especially the last couple months. You don’t make any progress when you don’t practice ANYTHING. I think I was discouraged as last year I really pushed and tried the beginning of the year to work through the issues we were having … and, well, didn’t succeed. And I don’t have any big goals for them, other than I’d really like us to come together as a team and feel like we’re out there working together. We do that MORE now … but not like we should by this age. But, yeah, they grew up in a different time than the other dogs, what with covid and moving and building up the arena and business and all that. Hopefully we can catch up this year … but it’s not going to happen unless I put in the work.

In the meantime, yes, I’ll admit while the other dogs have been somewhat neglected, I’ve been having a fabulous time with the puppy. Because puppy time is my favorite time, and you can’t be lazy with a puppy – they NEED you to make the time. Haven gets trained on something every day, and she continues to just adore training. What she is less good at is actually taking those behaviors on the road, she is not a good generalizer. She gets so mad when I ask her to do something and it’s not in the normal place/situation. So our goal for 2024 is to get out there and work in all the new places so I don’t end up with another Bryn situation.

Haven is 8 months old now, 15.75 inches and 20 lbs – which, to me, is just perfect! Small enough to carry, big enough not to worry about being fragile – and a great height to jump 16 in all venues. Knock on wood, I am hopeful that she actually will be able to do all the venues! She seems quite the comfortable and athletic dog (as she jumps the walls of the arena and the fences in my yard like a gazelle), and has not shown anything that would indicate she won’t be able to do more complex skills. We have introduced all the backside/threadle skills on a 4 inch jump. As usual, she picked everything up right away and she thinks they’re fun. We don’t work on agility super often, but when we do she seems … easy. Which I think is a very dangerous thing to say, but I’m saying it anyway. She’s not a speed demon, she doesn’t throw her body around, she doesn’t flank or do anything weird – she’s just … normal. How novel! We just keep introducing little bits of agility here and there, she absorbs them quickly and we move on to something else. It’s fun, it’s easy, I’m just waiting for her to get older to do more, but I’m happy with what she’s shown me so far. I’ll admit, I’m perfectly happy if she ends up being a nice, middle of the road dog that is just happy to play the game. I have had enough agility drama the last few dogs that I’d like to just DO AGILITY. Like a normal person, with a normal dog. So we’ll see.

Haven continues to love obedience and tricks, I finally broke down and taught her a front. Which is a behavior that I just HATE as it seems like such a grey behavior for dogs to understand. Yet Haven just sort of picked it up immediately. I’m not saying it’s perfect, but compared to the drama I’ve had in the past getting some of dogs to have any clue about ‘straight’ I’m shocked she’s been so easy. She is a very clever little dog, I’ll have to say. So, yeah, she heels on both sides quite well, she’s got a front. Taught a stand for exam and even did it for Shannon (who she LOVES), so that was novel. She’s got a stop/down out of motion. She can do position changes at a distance, she’s got left and right finishes, her stays are good. She has the skills to do all the novice exercises and some beyond as well. And she enjoys it, that girl is born to heel.

We’ve worked on some more difficult tricks like catching a toy into a hug and putting coins into a small container independently. We’ve worked on solidifying her verbal cues and putting together some fitness exercises like going down to bow and back to down, and standing on back legs to sit-up and back to standing on back legs. We trained side leg targeting and side stepping. She’s a little sponge and we’ve been having a GREAT time together.

As for Haven and 2024, I’m excited to train her in agility, and possibly in obedience/rally/freestyle as well. Agility is my focus though, I really miss just being to enjoy agility without the drama. Obviously I still don’t know if she’ll end up being to do all the things I’d eventually like to do in agility, but we’ll see. But she’s a hell of a fun dog, and even if it ends up that she, too, can’t do all the things, I have no regrets. I am a huge fan of the borderpap!

So, yes, I decided to go ahead and attempt to breed some borderpaps with Bryn this year (and, no, I’m not keeping one!). I’m waiting for her to come into season now, and then plan to breed her on her following season this summer/fall to a papillon. I found a nice boy from the Netherlands, he does agility, he’s adorable, a nice jumper, great toy drive … so, yeah. I think they’ll be really fun puppies, and hopefully easy. The folks that have continued to be interested aren’t looking to be on the world team, and that’s the homes I want for them. Hopefully they will be wonderful pets and really fun agility dogs – that’s my goal.

Came down to if I do want to have the option to breed Bryn when I am ready for another puppy … she’s going to be like 7. I am not breeding a dog for the first time when she’s 7. So we’ll do this breeding, hopefully make some nice puppies and I’ll keep that door open for a potential Bryn baby in the future. And maybe I won’t end up breeding her then, but I’ll have that option. And puppies are just fun, I really enjoyed raising Bright’s litter (except for constantly worrying about them dying), and I have a great set up for puppies in this house too. So bring it on, I think that will be an adventure.

As for Haku … well, it’s never a good sign when you bring your dog into the vet and she gives you the brochure for at home euthanasia on the way out. That was a bit of a kick in the gut. I had brought him into the vet for his second Librela shot, to talk about his lump in his groin (which, honestly, I’m not going to do anything about, so it was sort of moot) and other pain relief options. I saw no change after the first librela shot, but I’m cautiously optimistic he does actually seem to be a bit perkier after the second. So we’ll see. He remains on daily galiprant and I’m going to add gabepentin as well once I decide if the librela is actually doing anything or not. He still sees the chiropractor monthly as well.

The thing is, he’s still HAPPY, he still likes to play and take his walks and bark and eat … I don’t think he’s there yet. But, yes, he’s uncomfortable and it breaks my heart. I didn’t know if he was going to make it 15, but sometimes I think he might. He’s 14.5 now, if we can keep him moving … we’ll see. God I love that dog so much, I know he’s not going to make it 2025, so we’re giving it all we got right now.