Kick @$$ New Collar!

I have been running to my mail box everyday waiting for this collar to arrive! I found it on Etsy while looking for 2 inch collars and I squealed when I saw the dragon stamp. Falkor's litter was the Dragon's Lair litter, and Falkor is named after the Luck Dragon in the movie The NeverEnding Story.

The collar is just AWESOME! I am breaking in the leather and once the insane wind settles down I'll take some pics of Falkor wearing his new gear.

Pat Hasting Seminar in Canada

Last weekend I drove up to Falkor's breeders house and then we drove up to Thunder Bay Canada to see Pat Hasting's "Structure in Action" seminar. The seminar was AMAZING! I am a very visual learner and being able to see exactly what Pat was talking about through her slides and on actual dogs at the seminar was perfect. I learned a ton and I actually feel like I can look at a dog and see their structure. During the seminar Pat used two litters of puppies to illustrate various structure points. There was a litter of German Shepherds and a litter of Border Collies. Pat was able to show us an actual herring gut (OMG ewww) and more than one slipped hock. It would have been nice if there had been a smooth coated litter so we could really see the lines on the pups. It is harder to see structure on fuzzy, wuzzy puppies.

She also evaluated numerous adult dogs that either had prior injuries or where doing something strange with their bodies. It was very interesting to see how dogs compensate with other parts of their body when they have an injury.

I wanted to jump up and cheer when Pat was talking about how it is important for good breeders to be concerned about the structure of the pups they place in performance homes. She talked about how many breeders keep the pups with the best conformation for show homes and then place the other pups in performance or pet homes despite the fact that it is vitally important that the performance pups have really good structure. Here, here!

I highly recommend seeing Pat's seminar to anyone that wants to learn more about structure in dogs!

Puppy Paradise!!

Wow where has this week gone?? Last weekend I went up to Falkor's breeders house and got to love on a gorgeous litter of Dane babies that happen to be Falkor's nieces and nephews. As you can imagine they were entirely too cute and I almost had to sneak one home in my suitcase.

Oh the heavenly puppy breath! Jennifer had just introduced the pups to pottying outside and they were already taking to it at 6 weeks old! It was so cute to watch 7 little pups tumble outside and explore the world.

They have such unique personalities and you can already see so much potential. One of the girls is a mini version of her Momma and she is a little spitfire. It was a riot to watch her.

Here are some of the pics I took.

This is Ladybug's little Mini-Me. She has a lot of personality.

The gorgeous Harl boy. Oh I love him!

The big mantle boy and his sweet sister.

"Blue" was such a sweet, sweet girl. How could anyone resist that face???!

Dane Puppy Lust

Falkor's Auntie Ladybug had a beauuuutiful litter of puppies at the beginning of September and I am having major puppy lust. Falkor's breeder has a puppy cam set up so I have been spending obscene amounts of time watching adorable Dane babies play and sleep. There is a stunning harlequin male pup that I am obsessed with even though I know I can't have a puppy right now. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on how you look at it :), I get to see the litter next weekend which I know will just fuel the obsession. But I get to play and cuddle puppies and smell puppy breath so the torture is totally worth it! I will of course be bringing my camera so I will be able to share the extreme cuteness with everyone when I get back. I can't wait!!!

Way, way too much fun!!

On Thursday nights our obedience club has member classes and for the current session they are offering a Freestyle class with the amazing Linda Farr. She did classes during the last session as well but we had to miss out because we were taking a Rally class. I decided to give this session a try and it was a complete BLAST!!

I was really interested to see how we would do some of the moves (namely weaving between my legs!) because of Falkor's size. He had no trouble at all and really seemed to love all the new moves we learned. I couldn't believe that after only a few minutes I had a 170lb dog weaving in and out of my legs (without launching me into space)!! We also worked on spins, twists, backing, alternating paws, spinning and twisting around a pole and bowing. Falkor was so happy and enthusiastic with a big goofy grin on his face the whole class. In addition to it being such a blast, I think the moves will be wonderful for body awareness and body conditioning for Falkor.

I feel so lucky that Falkor is always up for anything I throw at him and always with a big, goofy grin and a wagging tail.

Once I get our moves a little more polished I will take some video of them and post them on the blog.

The weather has been just breathtaking beautiful and I am just loving all the training we are able to do outside now. The summer was suck and I am so happy we are having such an amazing fall!

Oh and I just ordered a super fun collar for Falkor off of Esty. It's a 2in leather collar with his name stamped in it. I cannot wait to get it. Of course there were about 20 that I wanted to order but I was realllly good and only ordered one. :)

Have a great weekend everyone!!