Remember last week when Katie shut down half way through the morning Rally class and about 20 minutes into the evening Agility class?  How I was trying to figure out what happened…was it too much school in one day?  The wrong food, or amount of food eaten prior to the second class?  The heat?  Me???

Today I didn’t take her to the morning Rally class, something I felt a bit sad about.  I really want to try to get our second and third Novice Rally leg, and I need the classes (Katie doesn’t) to keep all those directional signs straight!  I scheduled a mammogram during that time instead this morning, so I guess I was somewhat productive!

Then this afternoon, in between planning and planting trees, I fried up six boneless, skinless chicken thighs, with the intention of cutting one of them up as tonight’s “value” food to be used during agility class.  Katie was very interested in the frying process, her little nose just wriggling.  Plus, since she was so interested in the chicken she totally left her normal  afternoon dinner alone, and eventually I just picked up the bowl and put it aside.  She never really ate much at all prior to class.

We got to school early and walked around the building a bunch.  Got all her business done, got her re-acclimated to the building.  Initially she was a bit hesitant to go inside, but once there she seemed pretty OK.

And the best thing?  We didn’t do any teeter tonight!!!!  WHAHOOO!!!  We started out with a series of  jumps!  Katie loves to jump.  We did the broad jump and a bunch of regular jumps in a pattern.  On our first time up I kept Katie on her leash and was telling the instructor that I wasn’t sure how Katie was going to do tonight, given last week, when all of the sudden I felt a tug from the leash and realized Katie was RUNNING toward the broad jump, the first in the series.  I called over my should as I ran to catch up, “Well I guess she’s going to do just fine!”  And she did.

The other half of the class, those with bigger dogs, was across the ring doing tunnels, weaves and the tire.  It all looked complicated and when we got over there Katie and I went first, so we didn’t get to see anyone else attempt it.  It was a curved red tunnel, then jump, then a double jump, then tire, then another curved (but blue) tunnel, then weaves then jump,  then back through the red tunnel the other way.

Right.

I set Katie up in a sit in front of the entrance to the curving red tunnel and as soon as I got her leash off she was racing for that tunnel.  She has a tunnel at home that seems to be permanently set up in the living room and we play all the time “chase the lambie” (her favorite squeeky toy) through the tunnel, so I guess that’s working!   She burst out of the red tunnel, took the next two jumps and the tire at full speed and then totally balked at the blue tunnel in the corner.  It was a dark corner without much light, and the tunnel was dark too.  NO WAY, NOT GOING IN THERE!  She actually turned away and jumped back through the tire, and back over two jumps to get away from me! LOL!  We tried a few times,  but no go, so we skipped the scary blue tunnel and did weaves and jumps and the fun red tunnel no problem!

The second time we got to run the course I ran on the other side (the outside edge of the curve) and we were going so fast she just sailed into the scary blue tunnel and I had to RUN really fast to beat her out the other side to get her into the weaves.  She did the whole course no problem!  WHOOO HOOOO!!!!!!!

Then the whole class got together and we put the two pieces together.  We did the tunnels, tire stuff, then went back through the red tunnel and over to all the jumps.  She even ran through the blue tunnel with me on the inside and I did a front cross after that to get her into the weaves.  KATIE WAS PERFECT!!!!!!!!   And grinning the entire time.  She got a jackpot of chicken and cheese after that last run!  Such a girl!!

So….was it the fact she hadn’t had school in a week?  And no school that morning?  Or was it the chicken thighs?  Or was it that I tried to keep her excited and engaged the whole class and didn’t worry about much?  Or was she just having a bad day last week?

Only the Sheltie knows.

Guess what?  Katie had a full day of school yesterday.  After so many weeks off, her spring break I guess, we went to Rally class in the morning and Agility in the evening!  I really debated whether to enroll her in the Agility class because we were already committed to the Rally class on Thursdays.   But about an hour before the agility class I asked Katie, who was sprawled out sleeping near my feet, if she wanted to go back to school…and she jumped up, tongue rolling out and grinned at me, then ran for the door.  I took that as a “YES MAMA!!!”

In Rally I’m having trouble with her focus, and she’s surging ahead quite a bit.  So much to see, so many doggy butts to sniff.  I want to get those two more legs for our Rally Novice so I need to make sure we’re working on our heeling every day.  She’s much better when she and I are alone out in the driveway then when we’re in a ring with 8 or 9 or more other dogs, trotting around in a big circle.  But still.

As for Agility?  Well, she wasn’t sure what was up at first.  We are in the beginning agility class (the last one we took was like preschool, pre-agility!)  with about 9 other mostly really big dogs.  There are actually about 15 dogs in the class, but they broke it into two groups, those who had been through this class before, and those of us who had not.  Maybe eventually we’ll all be together, but I hope not, as that would be a BIG class!

We worked on jumps (no problem MOM!) and teeter (I HATE teeter MOM!) and tunnel (ZOOOOOM!!!) and A-frame (Again!  I want to do it AGAIN MOM!) and tire (BOOOOORING!).    We obviously need to keep working on that tiny teeter out in our driveway.  Though before our rally class in the morning she ran up the teeter all by herself, so it might have been more that she didn’t like the stranger hovering nearby then the teeter itself.  Who knows?

Last night she slept great.  No wonder!

Last night Katie, her dad and I went to agility.  She missed last week because she was sick, but we’ve been working almost every day on her makeshift dog walk in the driveway.  I was anxious to see if the fact that she’d run back and forth, up and down her home grown dogwalk would translate to running on the dogwalk at school.  I got a bit anxious as I realized they were setting up for school with the full size, high up in the air, dog walk.  She’s never walked on anything that high before.

Then class began and the instructor announced we were starting with teeter.  Great.  Katie hasn’t practiced teeter!  I didn’t want her to get all weirded out right at the beginning of class.  So I was hesitant the first time we approached it, and Katie picked up on that.  They had one end of the teeter propped up on the table, and they were lowering the teeter as the dog walked across it.  Katie has never walked across it in class.  Ever.  So she jumps up on the table right away, then balks at the board.  Nothing doing.  We gave up and went back to the line.  Husband says, “Just run her like it’s her board at home; get excited.”    Good point.  So when it was our turn again I ask Katie….”are you READY?!”  Then we take off at a dead run, I yell “TABLE!”  and she jumps on it, and I’m already yelling “WALK IT!  WALK IT! WALK IT!” and she just runs down the teeter board like it’s nothing and surprises the instructor so much they never lower the board and Katie jumps off the board and laughs at all of us.  Everyone cheers.  We get back in line and I’m hugging her and giving her treats and she’s loving it.  So after that she had no trouble with the teeter, though she’s not thrilled when they lower it.

Next we’re going to do dogwalk, then tunnel, then jump then table.  Sigh.  I have no idea how she’s going to respond to the tall dogwalk.  Turns out she’s not going up there.  No way.  No how.  Not happening.  So they got out a piece of dogwalk and laid it flat on the floor.  Katie was not the only dog not doing the dogwalk, there as a big ole 10 month old lab that wasn’t ready to climb it either.  Katie had no problem with the flat on the floor dogwalk, and successful flew full tilt down the flat dogwalk, ran through the tunnel, did the jump and landed on the table with a flourish every time.  Husband said she looked beautiful.  I don’t  know, I never actually saw her jump I was always calling the next obstacle and running toward the next thing!

Quick break and then the instructor added A-frame and a jump to the dogwalk, then tunnel, then jump then table.  Sigh again.  She HATES the A-frame.  She won’t do more than put her front feet on it…and streeeeetch out for a treat.  So after some of that I ask if it’s OK to pick her up and put her on the frame.  They said OK, so I did that all evening.  Putting her about 2/3 of the way up and she runs over the top and creeeeeps down the other side, then springs over the jump, races over the flat dogwalk, flings herself through the tunnel, does the jump and lands triumphantly on the table grinning the whole way.  Over the evening we added more jumps before the Aframe, including the tire, and she did everything except run the Aframe and the tall dogwalk.  I was really pleased.

This morning she and I had a Rally class at the same place and the agility stuff was still up in one of the rings.  So I got there early and we worked on A-frame.  A little bit of treat when she stretched up for it…picking her up and helping her walk up the A-frame, then she was over the top and trotting down.  Then putting her a little further down, helping her walk up it and then she was running down.  Then suddenly, after about three attempts I put her on the yellow at the bottom of one side and she raced up and over!  Then the next time we ran toward the A-frame and she just went up and over, then turned right around and went up and over it again on her own!  SUCCESS! You go Katie girl!  She started laughing and running back and forth over it even without treats!

Of course she was a bit wild for Rally class after all that excitement.  But I was so proud of her I didn’t care.  After Rally we went back to the agility ring just to see if she still felt good about it.  I took off her leash and she RAN over to the A-frame and up and over it on her own!  Well!  I said enough of this, let’s work on the high dog walk.  With me putting her low on the walk and holding her until she reached the top she was fine.  She trotted across the top and down the other side, raced to the tunnel, took a jump and landed on the table.  Silly girl.  Eventually she ran up the dog walk, across and down it by herself.  Only once, then she got a bit scared, so we quit and did a few tunnels and jumps just for fun.  I gave her lots of treats and hugs and we went home to tell Dad all about it!

I hope she remembers how fun this was when we go back to class next Wednesday.  I think she will, she really seemed to enjoy running full tilt.  That’s something that is surprising everyone, but not me.  Once she gets something she goes full speed.  I have a hard time keeping up with her now that she’s running full out.  Husband says she’s definitely looking at me for instruction, though I’m too busy to notice WHERE she’s looking.  Such a girl.  Who knew?