Teaching Weaves

I have entered Eden in the upcoming GRAC (Grand Rapids Agility Club) trial in a few weeks. I think she will do fine in Novice Standard, it includes all of her favorite obstacles. However, she has never even seen weave poles....so, that must be remedied since she will have to successfully complete 6 for us to even pass. We set up half of my 12-pole set in the front yard and Eden has been weaving for dinner. This video was taken her 2nd time ever seeing them. She's definitely got enough of a base to stumble through the trial :-)

Training Checklist

Things I want to work on with Eden in the coming weeks/months:

• Weaves
• Whisper
• What?
• Article Indication
• Be Pretty on vocal command only
• Heeling with less luring
• Start to shape a finish...flip?
• Commitment/distractions in sit/down
• Take a more serious approach to the retrieve
• Right/Left around an object
• Touch
• Diversify the hold command to anything I hand to her

First Brenda Aloff Appointment

Eden met Brenda Aloff for the first time tonight. She is a trainer/behaviorist that I've been going to for quite some time now and someone I also consider a good friend. I don't know what I would've done without her in the last couple of years.

She thought that Eden was very sweet and attentive and also very, very cute :-) Which, she undoubtedly is. I was just looking for a basic evaluation of Eden's temperament and some things to work on that would also increase our bond.

• Restrained Down: Getting her excited by running around with me and then turning and quickly asking for a down while guiding her to same with collar. This ties a form of compulsion with positive reinforcement. If she does not down on the verbal, I help her into position. She's fairly soft so I barely have to even touch my hand to her collar to have her dropping...on the rare occasion that she doesn't do it on the verbal.
• Testing Commitment of Placement: In either the sit or down position, putting food in her vision and not rewarding unless she is very committed to her position, aka does not move, and ideally, offers eye contact. This she struggles at a little more. She gets wiggly and barky.
• Long Down/Sit: Staying in position while other distractions are happening such as me moving, others moving, me going out of sight etc. Another version of testing her commitment. 
• Impulse Control: I'd like to toy around some more with Eden's impulse control and also leave it command since she has a fairly solid grasp on those already.

Tracking Corners

Eden's corners are coming along quite nicely and the indication (down) on the article at the end is going...ok. It's so awkward because her legs are so short and her upper body is so short that she has a hard time getting her face into the "article" (tupperware) to eat her reward...

Photo Op with Mom

Got some amazingly cute pictures of Eden tonight...and the two of us - and then had a "discussion" with Kastle about not being a jerk and ended up with some pretty cute pics of the two of them and then the three of us :-)

 

 My two little shadows :-)

 

 

 Perfection!

 

My sweet girl and I.

Eden gets a kick out of watching Kastle be evil knievel on someone besides herself.

 My pretty girl!

I'm tired, Mom, can we go home!?

Eden Likes to Chase

The girls have a lot of fun in the back yard!

Agility Class #6

Eden's last Beginner Agility class was tonight instead of tomorrow (Wednesday) because we can't make tomorrow's class. So, we were in a class full of new dogs and people who were all very distracted by Ms. Eden. Very. She did really well though. We started by backchaining an entire course and then we ran it backwards instead. It was the first time she's done more than 3-4 obstacles at a time and I think she did pretty good - feeling more confident about trialing her so soon into her learning :-D

Eden's Got Skills!

Here is a video of Eden's latest accomplishments! :-)

We've got a pretty good start to taking and holding the real AKC dumbbell (she despises how it feels in her mouth so I started with a wooden dowel and progressed). Her jumping has gotten exponentially better. Now I've started applying a new command (hit it) to mean to jump over, pivot to her left and jump back over to me - it's the start to what will eventually be her flyball box turn. For fun she's learning Be Pretty, Whisper and "What?" (her new command to Speak). Frankly she is just adorable :-)

Agility Class #5

It was relatively cool with low humidity tonight and Eden really put the speed on for agility. It makes me really excited to see that because she will probably shine at indoor trials...I hope. Everyone was commenting on the difference in her energy and drive though!

Naughty Eden!

Yesterday, Eden chewed through a Mac computer cord, a pair of dress shoes and the laces to Jason's Schutzhund Helper shoes. I chastised him for leaving her unattended for long enough to do all of that while he did not even notice. She is still a puppy! He was in the room the entire time - hehehehehe. Today, Eden chewed up my hiking shoes - of which I had been trying to convince myself I could afford a new pair for awhile now. Luckily, Jason feels the need to replace them since they were damaged on his watch :-D

Shoes???

What shoes???

Thanks Eden!!!!! :-D

Me and Pie

Me and Ms. Eden-Pie had a photo shoot tonight. It actually went really well, got some really amazingly cute photos but then they were all out of focus :-( These were from the third time around and she was very unenthusiastic by then...might have to give this a whirl at a later date.

The primary reason that she was hot, tired and distracted (although she did run a spectacular track before-hand as well)...

 Not that I blame her at all, he is such a JERK!

Success! Me and my two shorties :-D

Eden is just as sweet as pie...