Sunday 22 March 2009

Been a bit rubbish at updating the blog this week, but I'm back at work now so much more exhausted!

Had a great time at dog training on Wednesday.  We found out that we will be doing a display at the Belton Horse Trials at the end of April.  A display team has been set up and it is likely we will be doing some kind of obedience to music group routines.  Ash was to do an agility display, but we have since been informed that we will not be allowed to do anything agility related due to clashing interests with an agility club that have been at Belton for years.  

Either way, I think it is going to be a triumph or a disaster..  we cannot rely on practising only in the Wednesday night class or it will be pointless.  It could provide some great advertising for ICC, and we need to have a tight routine that will impress the audience.

Agility class on Wednesday was great as well.  There was only me and Ash, and Alex and his Cocker Spaniel Jaffa in attendance, so we had twice as much time to train.  Just for fun, Alex and I swapped dogs and I ran Jaffa, with Alex running Ash, which was fun and went surprisingly well!  I think Alex is a new best friend for life of Ash's though, as he gave him some chip shop sausage.  We did lots more weave practise, which was really beneficial, as perfecting the weave poles is the only thing that is preventing Ash and I from properly competing.  I was training with the normal weaves, instead of the channel weaves, and Ash is doing well with this, but we need to work on increasing the speed he takes them now.

Yesterday was a busy day for me, and Ash.  ICC had been invited to attend a puppy show at Pets at Home, and I left work early to go along with Ash to do some good PR for the club.  Lorraine was there with George, and Fiona took Gwenna along to enter into the show.  As we had been led to believe that the show would not be very well attended, Lorraine gave Heather the morning off, but my God the place was absolutely packed!  There were so many people there that you could barely move!  By the time I got there, Fiona and Lorraine had already ensured that they had spoken to most people and given them our business cards, but I still managed to sell ICC to a few new people, and I also made sure I mingled with the others and gushed about how great ICC is (which is easy to do, and I could do all day!).  Ash was very good, he was petted by lots of lovely polite children and fed lots of treats!  What could be better eh?  He was also very happy that Becky arrived with his "girlfriend" Saffron, the most beautiful, tiny little gold and white Sheltie with one blue eye.  I adore her!  I could happily pop her in my jacket and take her home! <3

All in all, I'd say the morning was a great success.  From what I could ascertain, we had lots of very interested people.  I went back to Lorraine's for lunch afterwards (to save me driving home, only to drive back out again for the puppy social walk a couple of hours later), and the business phone rang a few times!  Hopefully that will be some keen new owners from the morning at Pets at Home! ;)

At 2pm we headed to Wilsford village hall to meet up for the puppy social walk.  Due to Ancaster Valley still being inhabited by sheep, we all drove over to Sudbrooke for the walk.  It went really well, and no one had to feel Ashy's wrath other than Bruce, a slightly OTT Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy.  Only 5 months old but still a good 3 times the size of Ash!

As tired as I was when I got home, I still had to walk Trent and Indie.  I decided to take them out seperately, for about 40 minutes each, so I could do some training.  Indie is really good at walking on a loose lead when we're on our own together, although her herding instinct still kicks in whenever she sees a lone car coming down the highstreet!  She doesn't pull me, she just stops and goes into typical collie herding pose, giving the car the eye!  Silly girl..

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