My day was not finished, Pizza was next to show. She was in a tough tough Senior Bitch class (that included a best in show winner and the #1 Weimaraner in the country!). She showed well, and ended up getting a 3rd place in the class. This means that both my pups will earn their dual futurity award!

I stayed around to show Pizza in the all-breed show. 70 Weimaraners entered...whew! It took over 2 1/2 hours to judge. I am so proud that she made the cut in bitches, and then made the final final cut in bitches! We left only with a best of breed owner-handled ribbon, but we did manage to top off the day with an Owner-Handled Sporting Group 3 out of 18 dogs! She was wonderful, this day ended up turning out way better than I had ever dreamed. I can't even put into words what this means to me, and especially Dolphin winning the best dog in futurity award - a breeder's dream come true (and a dream i had never even dared to hope for!). I hope my mom was watching. I am sure she was.

Video Clips of Pizza from the shows

This morning in agility class, Dolphin flew over the A-frame too fast, took a header off of the peak and skidded on his face. His lower lip was scuffed and a little bloody. Amazingly that didn't slow him down. He was really fast and motivated today! We have some work to do in getting him to flip away from me into the tunnel (like when the tunnel is underneath the dogwalk). BUT today was a stellar day - he did 12 weave poles for the first time!

Yesterday I went out to ride Cadence. She has moved to a new place, it's pretty nice! Although my ride wasn't perfect, I felt like we did pretty well and made progress. I am still having trouble getting her canter transition to the right, so Darla had me practice on an older, more broke horse. My plan is to show her in Findlay next weekend. Then the BIG plan - to show at the NSBA world show in Tulsa next month. I have paid $1400 in entries, bought a non-refundable plane ticket, a rental car, and hotel. I am all in! I am not putting a whole lot of pressure on myself - I just want to go and try to have a good ride (and not look foolish). I have less than zero confidence in my riding abilities anymore, and not a whole lot of confidence in Cadence. She is more of a marathon rather than a sprint, so I keep reminding myself that we have a lifetime to get it together...it doesn't have to happen this year. But one can always hope, right?

I was slightly insane, and I entered three days of agility this weekend. Noodle was entered all 3 days, and Pizza was entered Saturday and Sunday.

The weekend was humbling to say the least. On Friday, Noodle Q-ed in Masters Jumpers, but on Friday she got distracted and stopped right before a jump in standard. She ended up clearing the jump from a standstill, but the momentary lack of forward motion caused a refusal. Saturday she Q-ed again in Masters Jumpers, but had to be walked off of standard because she left her contact on the A-Frame to run past the judge. Not letting her get away with that! Sunday was a bit of a wreck - she had to be walked off yet again in Masters Standard because of leaving the course to do a drive by, and also a visit to a bar setter. Her jumpers was kind of slow and calculated...she was extremely distracted so she was spending a lot of time looking around. I micro-managed her, and we were clean until she knocked the very last jump...heartbreak!

Pizza kept up with her tradition of not q-ing in jumpers...had several off courses on both days. She actualy q-ed both days in open standard, finishing her OA title! I entered her in Novice FAST on Sunday, and although she did a weird thing (turned around and ran back down the "up" side of the A-frame to go visit a bar setter), she got her points and her send bonus to Q and finish her NF title.

So overall, it was somewhat of a successful weekend, but also somewhat of a disappointing one. Mostly disappointed in Noodle...I thought I had worked hard enough and trained her out of her drive-bys and visiting and just plain distracted by other people. Apparently not. Now I am spinning my wheels wondering what steps to I take next in training? I have no idea.

Pizza is due in season next week, but oddly enough it is Noodle that looks and acts a bit like she is thinking of coming in. This would be REALLY early for her, as she generally sticks to a 9-10 month schedule and next week would be 5 1/2 months. If they both decide to come into season, I am ok with that - get it out of the way before the Weim Nationals in October!

This weekend was all about Cadence! We had a horse show in Findlay, OH. The English classes weren't until Sunday, so I drove down Saturday evening to ride after the show was done for the day. She rode wonderfully for me. We are still working on our sticky canter transitions, but they were a lot better and I am getting better at feeling what I need to do to set her up for a good transition. It felt good to ride in the English saddle again.

However, in keeping with my 2021 tradition of getting my hopes up only to be dashed, Cadence acted badly in her class with Darla on Sunday morning, and we decided it wouldn't be a good idea for me to show her. She is still having issues with traffic, and at times it seems like it is better, and other times it seems she uses it as an excuse to be bratty. It was disappointing for sure, but just goes to show that I should not let a shred of optimism enter my brain, because that is a sure way to ensure that something bad will happen.

Well, that was my last chance to show before we head to Tulsa next month. I haven't shown her since January. It's a hard thing to stomach when I had such big hopes for this year, but I have to remind myself that I need to be patient...Cadence didn't read the schedule and know that this was an important year. She is on her own timeline. She is training well, is sound, and happy, and in the end that is 100% the most important thing to me.

Lovely. Pizza is in season today. There go my classes for the next few weeks, and there goes my agility trial this weekend. She is going to be ripe for the dog show next weekend. This is the one thing I hate about having females. Ugh. At least her timing is good so I won't have to worry about her coming into season during Weim nationals.

HAPPY 5TH BIRTHDAY NOODLE!!! I can't believe she is 5 already. That's a full-fledged adult dog! We celebrated her birthday week by getting to do TWO agility classes. Since Pizza is in season, Noodle attended her class also. It was great practice, and her focus both days was on point. The extra practice was great as we are heading into two days of agility trials on Friday and Saturday.

Dolphin's two classes were so-so. Wednesday morning he was a complete slug. For one thing, he is definitely not a morning dog! Plus with Pizza in season, I think he was just a little emotionally wrung out. He did everything correctly, just ultra slow (and he spent half the class laying at my feet snoozing in between sequences). Thursday's class was better (it is at 11:45 am so not so early for him). He had a bit more energy, although he was still pretty slow. We worked on collection recalls at a jump, which is really hard for him. His big body and bone make it harder to do the tight turns.

On the plus side, he did do (blue)12 weave poles twice in class! I have been doing my weave training in tiny spurts - I have a set of 6 2x2 weaves in my front yard, and randomly each day I will run him through them once or twice on our way out to potty. He does better with those short sporadic training sessions than doing big sessions.

This weekend's agility trial is all about Noodle, since I had to pull Pizza for being in season. Today it was just Masters Standard and Masters Jumpers. The courses were pretty flowing, which sometimes is not great for Noodle because she has too much time to think on the easier courses. However, she proved me wrong once again. In Standard, she had beautiful focus and a very pretty clean run. What is interesting is that this is the first trial back to "normal" since they started up after the Covid pandemic last July. They allowed spectators, and full crating inside. This meant there were huge crowds of people and dogs, and lots of dogs barking in their crates as we ran. Noodle walked into the building with 100% focus on me and that never wavered. I have no idea why...I expected this "back to normal" craziness would really amp her up, but it didn't.

Jumpers was after a long wait, and she came out of the van super focused again. She was a little slow in jumpers, but beautifully accurate for another Q. OUR FIRST DOUBLE Q!!!!! Our MACH journey has really started now! I was really happy with her, albeit a tad puzzled as to why she has been so good the past 3 days. I mean yeah, I will take it and enjoy it, but I sure would like to know the reason why she has such amazing laser focus right now. Is it just by chance, or has my training really progressed her that much? Maybe tomorrow will tell...one more day of agility.

Today was our second day at the agility trials, and we had three runs scheduled today. First was Masters Standard. The course started with a tunnel, and for some reason she was really distracted looking at the leash runner and the people by the gate. Because of this, I couldn't send her from a distance and had to basically send her to the tunnel right from the mouth. This put me a bit behind, and after the next jump I was behind her and she didn't see my signal to go on forward to the dog walk. So instead, she started taking a couple steps towards the judge. I called her name (she gets ONE chance!) and she came immediately right back to me! Unfortunately that was a refusal, so no clean run, but she ran the rest of the course perfectly. Since she only went about 3-4 feet in the direction of the judge and came right back and finished, I didn't walk her off. So no double Q possible today, but I was still pretty happy with her run.

Excellent FAST was next, and the send bonus was HARD - two jumps, and a wrap back to the first jump. I am amazed that she did it! We finished out with the correct number of points (this time I checked and re-checked my math to make sure I added correctly LOL!), so we earned our first Q in Excellent FAST.

Last was Masters Jumpers. She was really tired by this time, had been sitting in the van for about 1/2 hours and it was HOT. I had the a/c on in the van, but the humidity still made it miserable outside. She ran her jumpers clean, but it was sloooooow. She went into the tunnel and I actually had to stand around and wait for her to come out. Her weaves were super slow, but even though she was hot and tired she put in enough effort in the jumping to jump clean, so we have another Q!

Since this is the first weekend in a LONG time that she never had to do the walk of shame (me walking her off the course in mid-run for being bad), she can reture her crime scene collar and get to wear one of her nice collars at our next trial. But if she is bad, the crime scene collar comes back out!

So in our MACH journey, we need 19 Double Q's and 669 Points It's a slow journey, but I am ever so thankful I am ON this journey...who would have thought this out-of-control dog would actually be in contention for a MACH? If we do get it, it will truly be a dream come true and one of the biggest accomplishments in my dog training career.

I took one last ride on Cadence today before she heads to Oklahoma tomorrow. She rode great for me! It's rides like these that make me so super excited about her. I did about a million canter transitions and all but one were pretty darn good. I worked hard on keeping her straight - shoulders straight in front of me at the canter to keep her moving correctly and not driving her hock so hard. I fly to Tulsa on August 20th to show at the NSBA World Show, not sure what is going to happen but at least I can't say I didn't try! I just hope she behaves enough for me to show her, or that is going to be one expensive trip for nothing. Fingers crossed....what is meant to happen will happen. That's my zen feeling for this whole thing.

I mentioned Noodle's incredible focus this past weekend, but interestingly it is continuing here at home. The past few days she did her usual - race to the fence in attack mode whenever someone walked down the street or when the neighbor had his dog out. Each time, she took off and I called to her and she immediately did a U-turn and came right back to me. I mean instantly. What the heck? She is still charged up when she sees random people or dogs outside the fence, but is so focused on me that my voice turns her right back around to me, even in her excited state. I don't know why this is, but I am really enjoying it. I am almost afraid to say it, but maybe she is finally getting trained? It seems like the eternal journey, but in looking back (and that's the benefit of having a training diary for decades!) I can see how far we have come. We've really come far! I am sure there will be minor setbacks, but we have been moving in the right direction for a while now and it feels really good. I am feeling like less of a failure now (and by saying that, I am sure I jinxed myself into something bad happening...).

On the flip side, Dolphin is out of his freaking mind with Pizza in season. He was manageable until today...and now he is a basket case, whining and crying and pacing. I have to keep them pretty much completely separated now. Ugh. He's not as easy to manage as his daddy Pretzel was. Hopefully he will get better as he gets older...maybe?

Guess what? Noodle came in season yesterday! She was looking suspiciously swollen, and the trace of blood confirmed it. She is 3 months early! I guess this proves that bitches in the same house do sync their cycles, even if they spend ZERO time together. On the plus side, this means Noodle shouldn't be in season for Weim Nationals, which was a big concern of mine. On the minus side, this means instead of every 9-10 months, she is syncing with Pizza to go every 1/2 months...ugh.

Today we had an agility seminar, and Noodle was allowed to run in pants. She was a miserable, hormonal mess in her pants. She went in the tunnel over and over again and wouldn't come out, trying to make a nest for herself inside. I couldn't get ANYTHING done with her. Here is the interesting part, when I took her pants off (since she wasn't really bleeding yet), she immediately acted normal and ran her sequences great. It's like the pants gave her permission to act all hormonal and neurotic.

Today is Pizza's 2nd birthday. Where did the time go? I refuse to stop calling her "my puppy" because she still is!

This weekend we went to a show in Marion, OH - only an hour or so away from us. This was an experimental trip to see if Mark could handle driving the motorhome for a short distance. He did great! Today I showed Dolphin. My goal was to give him a great experience and have him stand solid for the judge. In breed, he backed away slightly when she reached for his ear, but I was able to being him forward with the bait and he stood fine after that. I think he showed wonderfully! We got Select Dog and OHBOB, so off to the owner-handled sporting group we went. He was great in the group, I was preemptive and showed the bite before the judge had a chance to grab at his mouth, and I was super pleased with how Dolphin was. He did kind of chase the dog in front of him on the go-around, so i have to work on keeping better control. I am used to letting him gait way out in front of me, but he took advantage of that this time. Other than that, I was thrilled with him, and I am so happy with his progress.