Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

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Happy Father's Day

My Aunt (Dad’s sister) found some old family photos, and gave me this one of Dad.

What a serious little boy; wonder what he’s thinking about?

Maybe he’s considering what he’ll be when he grows up.  What choices he’ll make and how his life will turn out.  Maybe he’s imagining a long and satisfying career as an engineer.  Or thinking about all the exciting and interesting places around the world that he’ll explore, all the wonderful things he’ll learn, all the people he’ll meet, all the friends he’ll make, all the good he will do.  He can’t know yet the mark he’ll make in the world, but I bet he has an inkling of the family man he’ll become; a wife and four kids, two girls, two boys.

It was a wonderful and full life.  And those four kids?  They turned out all right too.

Celebrating you today Dad.


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Agility review

Another Thursday…another agility class for Katie and me.  Again this week I skipped the Rally class held on Thursday mornings so that I didn’t overtax the Sheltie brain.  Plus I had a ton of garden related stuff to do and it was a beautiful day.   But I’ll blame the Sheltie brain for the missed class just the same.

Again our class was split into two groups, those with more experience (not us!) went over to the other side and worked on contacts.  The rest of us got to start with teeter first.  UGH.  Last time we started with teeter Katie got tired of the game and shut down.  Of course the Sheltie brain had forgotten that, while the human brain tends to dwell on the potential negative outcomes.  So I looked at my dog and decided to assume she’d do whatever I asked.  And when it was our turn she trotted right up that teeter, instructor holding her leash, right out to the end as it gently landed on a couple of stacked up milk crates and got her “Good GIRL!” and treat, then stayed there while I walked a step or two and then jumped off when I released her.  YEA KATIE!!  And it was like that every time, she was pulling on her leash to head up that teeter whenever it was our turn.

But the chute?  What the heck is that Mom?  I’m not going in there!  It’s RED!  MY chute is BLUE!  This is an EVIL CHUTE!  OK.  I’ll go in the tunnel part, but as soon as you’re not looking I’m getting back out of it!  Yes siree!  I am NOT GOING IN THERE AND YOU CAN’T MAKE ME!

In fact when we tried to put together a string of stuff, double jump, send to tunnel, weaves, chute, she bypassed the chute and as I was talking to the instructor about how to get her to do the chute she ran off and did the teeter by herself, with NO MILK CRATES to break the teeter’s fall!!  Behind my back!    I ran over there and rewarded her, she was standing 2o2o looking over her shoulder wondering where the heck I was.  Silly girl, you wear me out!

Then we switched sides and our group did contacts.  We started with them jumping on the table to get to the downside of the dogwalk, then tossed a treat onto a paper plate at the bottoms so the dogs would pause, eat the treat, and then get released.  She did it perfectly every time.  “Don’t need no stinking table mom, I LOVE the dogwalk!”  When we finally got to run the whole dogwalk she was thrilled, charging up and over it, and even stopping at the bottom for her praise and treat!  I was so proud of her.

Her reward, at least in her mind, was that we did A-Frame next and she LOOOOOVES the A-Frame!  Though it wasn’t always this way, now whenever she sees it she tugs to run up and over it, so when we got to actually run it a couple of times she was in heaven.  Contacts?  No problem as long as she got a treat.

So at the end we put the two sides together.  Tire, dogwalk, weaves, curved tunnel, A-Frame, jump, double jump, tunnel, weaves, chute, teeter.  Piece of cake, right?  Well, we haven’t practiced tire in a long time.  It was hot.  We’d been there almost an hour.  Katie was getting squirrely.  We had to wait for all the big dogs to go first.  Enough excuses.  She refused to do tire.  It was already after the class hour, and the next class was waiting to start, so after three attempts I just kept going.  She charged for the dogwalk, ran through the weaves, shot through the tunnel, flung herself up and over the A-frame, stopped at the bottom, I said good girl! and kept running, yelling “JUMP.!”  She did not.   I turned to see where she was and she was SITTING at the bottom of the A-Frame looking at me.  “Treat Mom?  Where’s my TREAT!?!?!  I am NOT MOVING until you give me my TREAT!”  So I did (probably the wrong thing to do) and we moved on to jumps and tunnel and weaves and were running full tilt at the chute!  She ran into it!  She got 3/4 of the way through it, I’m yelling “CHUTE!  GOOD GIRL KATIE!  CHUTE!” and she turns around and runs out of it, runs all the way across the ring and out the ring and into the kitchen.

SIGH.

I went and got her and told her she was a good girl and we tried chute once more, no go, then we did teeter for the treats and that was the end of class.

For the most part she had a really good time and so did I.  In the end that’s all that matters.  The fact that she has a chute at home that she runs through with no problem is something I won’t think about right now.


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Katie and the little tent

The weather here yesterday was beautiful, cool and dry.  As evening descended I suddenly wanted to be camping, but it seemed like too much work to drag the tent up from the basement and accumulate all the pillows and blankets.  But husband said he’d help, so in the last few minutes of light we popped the tent up and loaded it with everything I needed to make it through the night.

Katie watched us put the tent up;  she was very excited because she loves to camp.  But she’s never camped in the little tent, not really enough room, and no little doggie window near the floor for her to keep track of the night’s comings and goings.  A couple of nights ago I slept in the little tent all by myself and had a wonderfully relaxing time sans dog.  This time I wasn’t going to get away with sneaking out the front door and creeping around the house so that she wouldn’t know.  She knew.

So Katie and I trooped out to the tent.  As usual she was in first, claiming the biggest pile of pillows for herself.  She’s such a pillow hog.  As we settled in she was restless, moving around and around the tent, plopping down, getting up, sighing, trying to see out the windows that were still zipped up.

Then I had a brilliant idea.  How about if I unzipped one of the windows so she could see out?

Turns out that is a WONDERFUL idea for both of us.  Suddenly we were sleeping in front of what seemed like a big picture window.  We both watched it get darker and listened to the birds heading home for the night.  The fireflies started to dance, the freeway noises lowered, and the frogs began to sing.  Katie curled up in a ball on her (two) pillows, let out a big sigh and fell asleep.  I drifted off too.

She was such a good girl all night.  While I had trouble getting comfortable she slept on, upside down, curled up against my side, or flat out by the wall.  She didn’t even bark when the guy with the noisy van drove by and threw the newspaper onto the driveway.

And this morning?   She didn’t want to go back inside!


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Peaceful morning working in the garden…and stuff

Last night I set up the little tent even though rain was predicted for early this morning.  I don’t mind the sound of a bit of rain when I’m camping, but Katie is definitely an anti-rain girl, so she stayed inside with her Dad.  I spent the night listening to the bullfrogs, traffic on the freeway a mile away and the breeze in the trees.

Sometime during the night I woke up hot, and sat up to unzip the window coverings.  Outside, across the yard and under some trees were dozens of fireflies!  These were the first I’ve seen this summer and there were seemingly hundreds of them – dancing among the branches and in the long grass of the dark night shadowed lawn.  I watched and held my breath – they looked just like magical fairies  dancing in the night and I was entranced.  Finally sleep claimed me again and I didn’t wake until I heard the gentle patter of morning rain on the roof.  I lay there and enjoyed that too, wallowing in this opportunity to sleep past 6:30, Katie’s normal “got to get going Mom!” time.

When I finally ventured back into the house, about 8 a.m. I found Katie curled on the sofa, nose hanging over the arm, facing the front door (waiting for me to come home?) sound asleep.  Such a guard dog.   I snuck right up on her and she only had time for a quick yip before she was all wiggles and tale wags and licky-licks.  As I was petting her I suddenly realized that Katie had an appointment this morning!  She was supposed to be at the groomer…like right NOW!  As soon as I started to quickly move around the house, getting myself dressed Katie realized what was up and went to hide.  Silly (smart!) girl!  She shook all the way to the groomer and was visually shaking when I handed her over to the groomer.  I felt so bad I apologized to her, which probably made it worse.

While Katie was getting a bath, and probably talking ill of me to all the other doggies, I got a lot of gardening done.  Husband has planted more than a dozen trees and they all needed watering, there were weeds to grab, and a bed of wildflowers to plant.  All done without interruption, because chief interrupter was off getting groomed.

I was going to sleep out in the tent again tonight.  But thunderstorms are predicted, so I guess I’ll sleep inside.  Good thing, because as gusty winds came up this afternoon my little tent rolled across the back yard.  Guess I should have staked it down.

Katie is now back from the groomer.  She looks pretty!

She’s a bit mad at me, but was willing to do a bit of recall given I had treats!

Now she’s sleeping, the better to keep me up tonight when it’s thundering.  A Sheltie has to be prepared at all times you know.


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Ants, 38 seconds, and goal achieved.

This morning when Katie and I went out to do her business I noticed this.

It looked like my husband had spilled a bit of peat while he was planting trees yesterday.  I didn’t think much about it.  But it isn’t peat.  Can you think what else it might be?  Does a closer picture give you a better idea?

I didn’t think so.  I’d need a close up lens on my little point and shoot camera for you to really see what this is.

It’s tiny tiny tiny red ants!  I don’t know what they’re doing, but they seem intent on doing it together.

After Katie finished doing her business I went out for a 4 mile run/walk.  I’m working back from an injury that occurred almost two years ago.  It’s hard.

My rules for this run/walk were simple.  Run a minute, walk a minute.  I allowed myself to run longer than a minute if I felt good, but never less than a minute.  And walks were never ever longer than a minute.  Those of you that have done sits and downs in dog obedience know how long a minute can be.  I have it from a very authoritative source (me) that 38 seconds feels like a minute.  I glanced at my watch at least once every minute for 54 minutes during the run…and often the first glance showed that only 38 seconds had gone by when I thought for sure it had been at least a minute!

Aside from the normal red winged black birds that circled my head when I ran through the swamp I also got to see a swimming muskrat, and munching young groundhog, a couple of chipmunks scurrying across the road, a giant crow jeering (ahem..cheering) me on and a myriad of other birds flitting across the road in front of me.

The morning was misty, cooler than it’s been, gray skies.  Just a touch of rain falling gently on the back of my neck.  So peaceful.  Except for my labored breathing.  Four miles seemed longer than it did years ago.  During mile 3 I began to realize that most of my energy was being expounded moving me up and down rather than efficiently moving me forward.  I tried to lengthen my stride, an attempt to get home sooner rather than never.  But as a car approached and I began to move off the white line of pavement that I’d been running on I realized it was taking me five steps just to get both feet on the shoulder.  Obviously my stride hadn’t lengthened at all!  LOL

Turning into my subdivision, 3/10 of a mile to go to my driveway, I was relieved but also hot and smelly.  My right knee was beginning to twinge, and I was pretty sure I had a blister on my left little toe.   But the mist was cool on my face, and I knew I was going to reach my goal.  Eventually.  I ran the last three minutes home, because it was downhill.

And because I could.


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Lambie, the tunnel, and the park

Katie would like to explain to all of you how to play “Lambie in the Tunnel.”  So, as interpreted from Katie-speak:

First you need a lambie.  And a tunnel, cause you all live too far away to share mine.  Not that I’m particularly good at sharing anyway.  Wait!  Mom!  Edit that out!!

Then you get your human to throw lambie into the tunnel.  You can get her (or him) to do this by standing in front of her (him) with lambie in your mouth and making your big brown eyes look pathetic, as if no one has EVER played with you in forever…or at least in the last ten minutes.

This is where it gets kind of theoretical, so listen up.  You can either run around the tunnel to the other side, then run as fast as you can, scooping up lambie as you go through the tunnel, and drop it at your human’s feet.  Or you can chase lambie into the tunnel from the same direction as your human threw it, scoop it up and run back to your human, either outside or inside the tunnel.

Or, and this is the best part, if you want to make your human feel really silly you can just look at her (or him) and stare as if it were beneath you to run through this silly tunnel, much less collect a lambie at the same time!

Then, after you  retrieve the lambie  a few times beg to go for a ride to the park!

After all, you deserve a park trip, given all that retrieving you’ve done.

Enjoy sitting in the shade and watching the little league kids play ball.  Then resist totally when your human says it’s time to go home.

In this way you keep your human in line.  This is very important, as you all know, to any Sheltie-girl ( or boy!).


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A different dog

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.


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A river, more peonies and…Shakespere?

My Friday afternoon began with a bit of canoeing in Ann Arbor on the Huron River with my Aunt B.  We canoed from the canoe livery in town to just below the Barton Pond dam.  They said it was two miles of river up to the dam, but it was really more like canoeing on a  beautiful lake.

It’s been a fair number of years since I’ve been in a canoe for any length of time, and today my behind is letting me know that I sat for a good long time on a hard aluminum seat!  I’m surprised my arms aren’t expressing their displeasure at the amount of work I forced out of them yesterday as well.  Of course they may be waiting until I’m less suspecting.   Like tomorrow.


The pond and river were wide and smooth most of our way up to the dam.  On the way back a storm was coming in, the winds picked up and we had little white caps to maneuver.  There was no stopping to rest aching arms, as the  head wind would blow us  further back up  the river whenever we stopped paddling!  It was a challenge that we won!


Later in the day we had a lovely picnic lunch at Nichols Arboretum in preparation for watching Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Nights Dreams” which is being done Thursdays through Sundays through the month of June.  Here’s a link to the Ann Arbor Newspaper’s review which will also tell you a bit about how the play is done in this beautiful outdoor setting.  For those of you in or near Ann Arbor, you really should go enjoy this event.  It’s unique and wonderful and set in a place so beautiful you can hardly believe you’re lucky enough to be there.

We had a marvelous time.  The play began in the peony garden, so I got to take more pictures of the beautiful flowers.  They still look good, though some are not as beautiful as they were last weekend.

The audience gathered in chairs and on blankets along the hillside to watch the opening act; the setting the stage, as it were, of the love between Hermia and Lysander, and the arranged marriage Hermia’s father has made between her and Demetrius, and of Helena whose overwhelming  love for Demetrius has been scorned.

After each scene the audience picks up and moves to a new “set” within the Arboretum.  This makes the production fun, even for people who don’t love Shakespeare.   Each setting seems perfect for the action that takes place there; the hapless couples become more and more confused wandering through the forest on that dream filled night.

The audience gets to see it up close and personal.  The actors are so close  that you can see facial expression, hear most of the words and watch the prat falls as they race up and down the hills of the Arb. 

We enjoyed the fairies dance among the trees in the woods, listened to the magical music played by nymphs on the hillside, and laughed at the antics of  the band of Pucks causing trouble on this midsummer evening.

And then it began to rain.

During the last minutes of the play the thunder rolled and the skies opened up.  Rain poured down in buckets, the production was called for rain and we all ran for our cars.  I haven’t been out in rain like this since I was a little girl.  We got soaked.

But we laughed all the way back to the car.


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Update

Thought you’d enjoy laughing with me.  This morning Katie asked to go out and I figured she needed to “go.”  So out we went, and she ran straight over to her mini teeter, jumped on it, ran to the other end, stood 2o2o and looked at me with expectant eyes.  Lucky for me I had a few pieces of kibble in my pocket.  Then she jumped off, turned and ran across it the other way and wouldn’t get off to go do her job.  In fact I had to bribe her to come back inside!  She was going to stand on that teeter till she got what she wanted!

She’s kinda stubborn.