Oy if it's not one thing it's another!

"Mmmm...frosting!!"


Training Falkor has been quite the journey so far and I have thoroughly enjoyed it...except for a few bumps in the road...which is to be expected of course. Although sometimes I can't help but feel like just as things are moving along nicely we hit the next giant brick wall. First is was the knee issue, and then it was zoomies after a Rally jump, then it was zoomies during recalls, then it was working through a jumping issue after Falkor jammed and cut his toe on a jump in Rally, and now we are dealing with reactivity.

Falkor has been becoming reactive to some dogs. At first is was only dogs that challenged him, then it was only certain intact males, and then it was only certain males and now it can be any random dog, although I don't think I have seem him react to a female dog. It is incredibly frustrating and disappointing because up until about a year ago Falkor loved all other dogs. I could take him anywhere and he was thrilled to play with any dog he came across. I don't think anything specific happened to trigger the reactivity we are dealing with now.

I am able to "manage" him and most people that meet him wouldn't guess that Falkor can be a jerk to other dogs, but I hate having to be on alert all the time. And it can be difficult with such a large dog in tight quarters.

We are working on behavior modification and desensitization techniques, and I'm confident with lots of work we will get to a place where we are both comfortable. But I can't help but feel a little sad that we could be spending all that time on training for performance instead. I did everything that your supposed to do...research the breeder (and Falkor's breeder has been completely wonderful and supportive), research the sire and dam, socialize, socialize, socialize, etc. and I am still having to deal with this issue. It's just a bummer.

In much happier news, Falkor's little sister Famke got her third point this weekend at the dog show in Des Moines!!! It was my third time ever in the conformation ring and my first point with her. (One of her breeder's showed her last summer and she got her first two points then). Famke LOVES it and thinks that dogs show are giant parties. It was a fun weekend!

Finally back to class!!

Opening Presents!

"I was a very good boy Santa!"

I don't know who is happier that classes are back in session...me or Falkor!! I majorly slacked on training over the holidays and I am thrilled to be in some sort of routine again. We are taking Advanced again and we are also taking a Beginner's Retrieving class and Beginner's Jumping (broad, bar and high) on Thursdays for member classes. Falkor was SO excited to be training again at the club building last week. You could actually see the smile on his face!

Our local club trial is only a month away now so we have lots of work to do!

Welcome 2011!!!!!

I can hardly believe that it is 2011 already! But I fully admit to being swept up in the feeling of everything being new and full of possibility. I was almost afraid to look back at the goals that I had set for Falkor last January but it wasn't that bad. Here are the goals I set for last year and what we did with them:
-Get our RA and work towards our RE - YES we did achieve this goal!! Finished our RA in September and have 2 legs toward our RE. It certainly wasn't easy. We had the jump induced zoomies to contend with. We worked REALLY hard on that and got through it. We had some beautiful runs and some downright scary moments. LOL I am really pleased with the progress we have made since last year.

-Get certified in tracking and possibly try for a TD - Um not even close. I completely slacked on tracking this year. :(

-Enter in Novice Fast agility (if they offer it) at the Great Dane National this year - No agility whatsoever because of the @#$% knee issue. And we didn't get to go to the National. BOO!

-Work really hard on our heeling skills - YES to this! Still need lots of work but I feel we've had success there as well.

-Enter Pre-Novice a few times- No Pre-Novice but we did get the chance to enter Beginner's Novice which I LOVE!

-Enter at least one UKC trial - No and honestly that just came down to finances. I had to be choosy about what we entered.

Ok now with a deep breath of the fresh 2011 air here are my goals for the year.

Rally- Finish our RE. I don't have plans to work toward a RAE right now. Mainly because there are so many other thing I want to focus on and I only have so much time and money.

Obedience- Finish our Beginner's Novice title and shoot for entering Novice in the fall at our local obedience trial. I would also like to train Falkor through Open and start working on Utility exercises as well.

Agility- It kills me to even think this, but I don't know if agility will be in the cards for Falkor. (Due to his knee issues) It really breaks my heart. We are going to play around with it a little and see how things go...maybe I will be pleasantly surprised!

Tracking- I really want to buckle down with our tracking training and get certified in the fall sometime.

So cheers to everyone and hopefully 2011 will be THE year for you as well.