Good news!

I totally thought I had already written this, so anyone who was waiting for news on here I am so sorry.

Simon's results came back as just an overly inflamed section of skin. Totally benign. NOT CANCER!

Sorry for the delay. We are thrilled that he is totally fine.

He did manage to rip out his stitches five days after his surgery in normal husky style, so we took him to the vet and they just wrapped it and said he had been healing just fine. He is now back to normal other than having a weird naked patch.

I know not how the meme is supposed to be used but it's what I think of when I hear "Good News".

Hiking with Simon.

   Simon and I have been relaxing recently by going on hikes when we get the time to sneak away. With work and I just started up school it feels like we don't have as much free time as we used to. Unfortunately it's also just starting to get cool enough that Simon can enjoy the outdoors for a while without having to worry to much about it being to hot for him.

Although Simon is less than two years old he is actually very reliable off leash. We will always be working to improve our relationship and his training but I am really proud of where he is at considering he is still just a teenager.  I also like to make sure we get to have fun one on one time together. 

Simon goes to work with me almost everyday so he gets to hangout in daycare with other dogs and my coworkers. At home there is Sadie and Nik with us all of the time. And most of the time I train with them together so I don't get a ton of individual time with Simon unless I plan it. So I try to take time and plan some one on one time with both Sadie and Simon to work on our relationship.

It's also nice to see him loving life. He races around leaps sage brush chases the birds he flushes. There is something wonderful about seeing a dog so happy just getting to be a dog.  

We got to enjoy the beatuiful wild flowers that grown in our desert climate. There aren't a lot but the ones we found were beatuiful and it was fun to hunt for them.

It's also a chance for me to get to practice my photography some. I enjoy taking pictures and learning how to do differnt things with my camera.

                               

Such a wonderful way to spend time with my dog. 

Simon's Surgery.

Simon went in for surgery this last Friday. I had noticed a growth on his leg at the end of August and it wasn't going away if anything it was getting bigger. We went into the vet to have them check it out and they were a little concerned about it so they suggested we have it removed and sent in for testing.

Pre-surgery with the drugs kicking in.

That was Thursday and we had the surgery the next day. We woke up early in the morning so Simon and I could get a walk in before his appointment and try to get him to go potty. I took him in and they gave him his pre-surgery meds that made him sleepy before the surgery. I was able to take him home shortly after one he was still feeling the drugs a little but he was mostly back to normal. The rest of Friday he acted a little hungover and was a little out of it and very sleepy.

The growth.

Stitches. 

From Saturday on Simon was basically back to his normal self. It was a little difficult to keep him calm to try and protect his stitches. Today he managed to loosen his stitches and they looked a little strange so I brought him in to get it checked. The vet said it was healing well but that the stitches were no longer helping so she removed them and wrapped his leg.

Stoned Simon.

We sent the growth off to be tested so that we will know what it is and if we need to do anything further. We should get the results back either at the end of this week or the beginning of next and we will let you know what we find out.

Sleep Simon on Friday.

Barn Hunt.

So we had our first barn hunt experience.

For anyone who doesn't know barn hunt is a new sport that is becoming very  popular. They put rats in tubes that are hidden in bails of straw for the dogs to find. The dogs are also required to go through a tunnel made of straw bales and to climb on the bails.

Also the dogs can not go the bathroom  or they are disqualified. Sadie and Simon I'm looking at you here.

One of my dog club friends had tried it with her dogs and liked it so much she bought rats to be able to practice. It's amazing how the rats figure out that the dogs can't get to them and they don't seem to care much. But just to make sure it's not to stressful after a searches the rat get switched out for a new one so they get a break.

Both of the dogs seamed to enjoy looking for the rat and they were excited when they found it. Unfortunately they both thought that they should be allowed to pee on the straw so that is something we would have to fix if we were ever to really get into it.

I think it's a fun idea and good enrichment for the dogs.

My main issue with it is the same problem I have with tracking it's more the dog doing there own thing with the handler watching. I really enjoy rally, obedience, and agility more because they really give you a sense of team work. It's not just the dog doing something its the human and dog working together and I love that.

 We still might try this again a few more times. The dogs had fun so it was worth doing but I think we will more go to practices rather than try to compete in it.

Meet the new puppy.

Are you ready for some supper adorable puppy pictures?

Well here you go!

Puppy in a cup.

It's Puppy time!

Puppy attack!

Not my puppy not exactly but he is part of the extended family. By that I mean he is  my mom's  new puppy and I figured it was about time I introduced him. She has had him for a little over a month but as you can tell because I just finished writing about the dog show in June I am a little behind in updates.

Puppy pose.

This is Napoleon, called Poe for short. He is a Yorkshire Terrier puppy. My mom requested they not dock his tail she really likes it when Yorkies have there natural long tail.

Puppy racing.

He is an adorable little guy really brave and friendly. He has the wonderful classic puppy personality that has never met a stranger he loves everyone and just wants to go go go. He loves Sadie and Simon and does not really seem intimidated by the large size difference. He will chase them around it takes a lot of effort to try to keep up with such larger legs.

Puppy Kisses.

For some reason he has decided that Simon is the best thing ever, Simon doesn't like it but he puts up with the attention. Po will climb on Simon  when he lays down and I even caught  him snuggled up next to Simon but they moved before I could get a picture. I make sure to give Simon a break if he seams to have had to much of the attention.

Puppy and his hero.

Sadie on the other hand likes him just like she has with every puppy she has ever meet. She plays with him and will even lay down to be more on his level. I have seen her crawl on the ground army man style so she is as close to on his level as she can get.

Puppy jumping for joy.

June Trial Part 3.

Simon with all the ribions from the trial.

Over the next few days Simon did better than I had hoped. However he did show me a lot of things we need to work on and his performance was not always ideal. I also think three days of a trial was a little overwhelming for him and towards the end although he still seemed to enjoy hanging out with me and exploring he didn't seam very motivated to do the exercises.

Working on relaxing.

In the end we received six qualifying scores. Four in obedience and two in rally. This meant that he had surpassed the requirement for his beginner novice title in obedience (you only need 3 qualifying scores but I had entered for all four days of the trial so I figured it would be good practice for him) and we had two out of three legs for his rally novice title. We hadn't prepared as much for rally as obedience and it showed. Also during the first and last day I made some handling errors that ended up costing us.  Still it was better than I had expected for first trial for both of us and it was a good experience.

Relaxing, napping same thing.

The big things we need to work on is improving his focus especially when heeling. He would lose focus sniffing, lagging and forging. Most of the higher levels will require off leash work so we will really have to improve. He also had a bad reaction to a German Sheppard while we were there puffing up and growling. I talked to the owner after apologizing for his behavior and she thanked me saying that her dog was about to have the same reaction when I moved Simon away. The dog was giving Simon some pretty hard eye contact before but I hope to get Simon to a place where he doesn't react like that in the future.

My friend and her show/sled dog Keegan. 

Other than our own stuff Simon and I enjoyed watching the agility dogs and the conformation dogs.
I had friends in both so it was fun to cheer them on and relax when I wasn't showing with Simon.

My other friend and her Borzoi Ranger. 

Also I figured some training to settle in strange situations was a good idea, He did pretty good most of the time in what I would consider really weird situations for him but occasionally we had to move back so he would behave and could settle down. I really enjoyed the experience it was a great place to show and the support I had from all my friends there was amazing.

Some photos from dog watching.

Afghan

Standard Poodle

More poodles.

Portuguese Water Dog.

Irish wolf hound.

Samoyed.

Cane Corso.

June Trial Part 2.

Thursday was the first day of the trial and I wanted everything to go well. That morning we woke up super early and when to the dog park for a hour so Sadie and Simon could play. After that Nik walked Sadie while I hooked Simon up to the bike and we did about two miles.  I was doing my best to make sure Simon had some of his energy used up and he would be on his best behavior. I was a little terrified that he might be naughty in a public setting.

I had been to this trial before because it is really close to my home. But this would be my first time going as a competitor not a spectator. I really love this trial it takes up most of the Blackfoot fair grounds and always has so much going on. They have conformation, agility, rally and obedience. They also have places for people to camp on site and grooming stations for the conformation people.  Because Thousands of people go to this show they have a ton of awesome vendors as well. All kinds of dog leashes, collars, treats, grooming supplies, dog beds, crates, as well as food vendors for the humans.

As I mentioned before I knew a lot of people at this trial and I was lucky to have some friends that let me put Simon's crate and my stuff in there tent so I could leave it/him and know he would be safe. We got there pretty early in the morning and I set up my stuff and then we walked over the to Livestock building that obedience and rally would be in. I checked in for both of them and walked Simon around the area to get him used to it. We had a few hours before we were due in the ring so I walked Simon around the whole fair ground so he could go the bathroom and get any extra energy out. We also worked on some attention games I was trying to keep his focus on me. I also ran into a friend from out of town that I didn't know was going to be there who offered to come watch us in the ring.

When it was time for us to go in the ring I was pretty stressed and it didn't help that I was scheduled back to back in obedience and then in the rally ring. Obedience was first and Simon did a fantastic job considering the new situation. His stays and recall went amazing. The one thing I really would want to improve is more attentive heeling. We then went straight to the rally ring.  I hadn't prepared for rally as much I thought I had and we didn't do very well in the ring that first day. I wasn't sure what all the signs meant I didn't know there was a map I could have looked at before and I felt rushed and stressed. We didn't qualify in rally but we did in obedience. I got to talk to a lot of my dog training friends after and they congratulated me on on first qualify score in obedience as well as offering tips to improve our rally performance. I was told about the maps and given a book that explained what every sign meant. Also  offered to walk me through any of the signs I still wasn't sure on the next day.