Chicago!

~Before the concert~


~NKOTB are in the middle where the bright light is, poor camera quality…~
This post isn’t entirely about Georgia and our training, but worth sharing anyway. In my last post I said I was going to Chicago to see my friend, M, and see the New Kids On The Block and the Backstreet Boys. Well, it was fabulous!!!! I definitely found my inner teenage girl. I screamed, clapped and sighed a lot, but no crying – promise! The pictures above aren’t that great, but believe it or not I thought we had good seats (my camera is what is not so great). I could see them pretty well and the big screens helped too. It was a blast! Those guys are so talented and aged so well! Jordan Sparks (American Idol winner) opened for them and she was really good too; I was impressed.

The day before the concert M and I took an architectural boat tour on the Chicago River, it was really neat. We took lots of pictures. At one point on our tour we passed a dog park on the river and I instantly started missing Georgia. I’m definitely close to her and our training has brought us closer together. N said Georgia was very good while I was gone, but would sometimes wait at the door for me when she thought she heard the garage door opening. She missed her mom!

Nothing else to report, we won’t see C again until mid July. Georgia is doing well, but I need to continue to work and make time for training and working on “staying”, we need to master that for more than just 10 seconds. This post was short, but just wanted to share about my Chicago trip, it was great! Have a good day everyone!

Work to Do

~Well, hello!~

We are having a long break in-between our lessons with C due to me being out of town this weekend and her being gone on vacation for two weeks. I have worked on “staying” with Georgia, but need to spend more time on it. Sometimes the problem is me being lazy. I have been better about walking her, but yesterday I just got lazy and didn’t do much correcting. Sometimes I worry what people may think when they see me turning and walking the opposite direction if she pulls. Then I get home and think to myself, “Why do I care?!?” I need to forget about the world around us and just focus on us and training. I think part of the problem is I don’t enjoy walking in my neighborhood due to some rude and annoying kids at every turn…as well as adults. I just keep my head down & rush through it to get back home and I shouldn’t feel that way. I think I’ll stick to a certain route on my walks where the more “normal” people seem to live, that way I can enjoy it and feel  more comfortable correcting and training.

Georgia has been bothered by allergies a lot lately. Anyone else have an animal with allergies? I’ve been giving her some supplements that help. Normally I give her one a day year round, but recently I’ve been giving her two a day and that seems to help. She now knows the sound of a pill bottle and comes running. I don’t know if that’s just sad or kind of funny. She gets her supplement with peanut butter so that sweetens the pot.

Georgia also has a new toy that we got from C. It is called a Brush Bone. I HIGHLY recommend it. It is by far her favorite today, although it does hurt if your dog drops it on your bare foot. It’s similar to a Nyla bone, but instead of a smooth middle of the bone there are brush bristles and other rubber items along with two refillable edible disks. You un-screw the bone and then can replace the disks. She loves it and it keeps her busy. In fact, I gave her two new disks this morning and she was already busy working on it and didn’t even walk me to the door to say good-bye - haha. On one hand she loves her toys and to play, but she is a good cuddle buddy. Yes, I let my dog on my couch - think what you will. We do have her sit on a specific blanket and roll/vacuum the couch regularly. The picture above is of her hanging out with me watching a movie. She’s such a good girl and I look forward to going home to see her every day.  This is what I hope to bring to others when we start our visits. I want them to feel the love and excitement Georgia has for people. I want them to feel like she is truly happy to see them.

That about wraps up this blog entry. This weekend I’m off to spend time with my oldest friend, M, and to see The New Kids on the Block and the Backstreet Boys in concert in Chicago!!! I’m just a little excited!! Have a good rest of the week and weekend!

Lesson 7 & Walk

~Since I didn’t take a picture at the C&C Walk, here is a random, but cute one from Halloween!~

This time we met back at our place to have fewer distractions. Georgia was barky (is that word? I don’t know) from the moment C arrived. She likes C and was excited. Once the excitement died down Georgia would bark if C and I were chatting and not paying attention to her (this isn’t normal). Little did Georgia know that even though we weren’t paying direct attention to her, she was the topic of discussion. We worked on “Leave It” with human food instead of dog treats,  this is a much bigger temptation for her, but she did great!  Very impressed that I only had to tell her “leave it” once and she did.

After that we worked on “Stay”, which still needs some work. She only stays for a very short amount of time. Unless I keep saying “stay” and I should only have to say it once. She also doesn’t realize that “stay” means to hold your position. I think I’ve got her thinking it just means stay in the same place, but you can change positions – oops. So, I will be working a lot on that this week and next. We will have another lesson at home and then two more out in public, somewhere other than our PetsMart…maybe another one or another pet store. Just has to be indoors and somewhere that dogs are welcome, so we are kind of limited. Over all it was a good lesson, but nothing ground breaking.

The lesson was Saturday morning and then in the afternoon we participated in a walk for Crohn’s & Colitis downtown with friends (one of my good friends suffers from Crohn’s). Georgia joined us on this walk too. It was a HOT day, so we brought her plenty of water, but she still was hot to say the least; we all were though! She was so well behaved. Only tried to jump on people she knew, didn’t try to jump on any strangers that came up to pet her, so I was glad about that. We had a few people approach us and ask if they could pet her because she looked sweet. That made me feel good and Georgia was very sweet. When the walk was over and Georgia was lying down in the grass resting a teenage boy asked if he could pet her, we said sure. He was so nice and really liked her. He had such a big smile on his face and said that he’d wanted to pet a dog all day. After we left the boy I said to N, “Wasn’t that neat? That’s exactly what Georgia will bring to the people we visit once we become a certified Pet Partners Team.” I think N really got it and understood why I’m excited about this. If she can make one person smile and feel happiness for one minute then she’s done her job.

I wish I had taken some pictures at the walk. I think it was just so hot, that I wasn’t thinking straight. So, next year I’ll be sure to do that. She had fun meeting other dogs and of course people. I hope everyone has a great week…only 5 more days until next weekend!!!