Obedience class: Week 7 (aka, Dahlia and the new class)

I can't believe I never updated on Dahlia's progress this past week. Because of my teaching schedule, we were forced to change classes for the last two weeks. So instead of going to the Tuesday night class this past week, Dahlia, David, and I jumped into a new class on Friday evening. It was a little weird joining a different class, but was also great fun. She got to meet Vito, a really large 7 month old Rhodesian Ridgeback (a breed of dog I've never met in person!). Gorgeous animal and he and Dahlia were GREAT together. Not a growl between them. He was also a really sweet dog and at one point during class, while we were waiting for others to complete their "come" exercise, he came over to David, sat down in front of him, and leaned up against him. Awww...we know he just wanted his "doggy crack," but it was still really cute.

And for the record, Dahlia (who was supposedly a jealous dog) did not seem fazed at all by Vito's actions.

We also met Missy, a shih-tzu/poodle mix (I think) and Jessie, an English pointer. Jessie was NUTS. Totally out of control, energy out the whazoo. But her owner took it totally in stride, was absolutely calm about it all. And Jessie was just all too happy to do everything. She's going to be one great dog when she grows out of her puppy craziness. Well, she's a great dog NOW, but just a lot more hyper than she will be eventually. I was worried about her meeting Dahlia, since Dahlia doesn't seem to like dogs jumping up in her face all the time, but she did great when she met her.

I really like this class and although I love the dogs in the other class, I think Dahlia would be even further along. They were already working on rolling over and shake, along with calmly greeting other dogs (something Dahlia SO NEEDS). We did the greeting and passed with flying colours. She was totally awesome. Now why the fuck she can't do that when we're out on the road for a walk I don't know. It might be MY tension being relayed to her since I get worried that the other dog is going to be dog aggressive. I need to work on that myself to be honest, so hopefully Dahlia and I can work together to greet doggies more calmly when we come across them on the street.

We tried to get her to roll over, but only got her on her side. Maybe eventually we'll get her to do it.

We got back for our 8th and final class tonight. Dahlia's gonna be a graduate! We have to take our cameras and get shots of her with a little cap on. How silly, but it should be fun (if we can get the cap on her head!). We're definitely signing up for intermediate classes, also with Colleen. I'm looking forward to continuing!

Obedience class: Week 8 (aka, Dahlia the graduate!)

Tonight was graduation for our class! I wish we could graduate with the dogs we went through most of it with, but ah well.

We did some basic things tonight...same sort of stuff as before. While working in the aisle, we met a woman who owned Siberian huskies who thought Dahlia was just amazingly gorgeous. She just kept going on and on about her...it was cute!

Colleen is very impressed with our girl and thought she would be good for competitive obedience and might even enjoy agility (even if she never competes at it). She suggested trying to skirt around the whole "dogs must be AKC purebred to participate in XYZ) by getting a certification that Dahlia is a flat-coated retriever (even though she's NOT). You apparently fill out a form and submit pictures of her and they judge her based on if she looks that breed or not. Funny that she should suggest. It's worth a thought!

For graduation, we tried to get her into a corner, against the wall, and wearing a graduation cap. Amazingly, the cap was NOT a problem. It didn't even faze her (thus prompting Colleen to say "ooo Halloween is coming up Dahlia!"). Colleen thought she would make a great kids' dog, because she'd let them dress her up and it wouldn't bother her. I love how relaxed she is.

We managed to get a few decent shots of her in the hat before passing it onto someone else. And we got a basic obedience certificate. We definitely want to work toward the Canine Good Citizen test (and are, in fact, good at most of this except the long distance stay and her reactions to other dogs). She'll do well eventually I think!

And so here's the graduate:



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