Finally...a Lesson!!!

~This is not Georgia, just a example picture~

~Another example picture~

Last night Georgia and I met C at our local PetsMart for a training lesson. It’d been over a month since we’d seen C and probably just as long since I’d taken Georgia out in public. I’d taken her to some friends’ and family’s homes during this time, but not out and about with the general public. It is an understatement to say that Georgia was excited to be at PetsMart. My hand is still feeling the effects as I type. She was pulling SO hard, probably the hardest she’s ever pulled me. She wanted to see and smell everyone and everything. We had trouble calming her down, so we told her to lie down and stay. She’d lie down but get right back up (continuing to work on stay and what it really means).  We went outside the store to give her a break from all the smells and to hopefully calm her down and walk back in without pulling me. My hand was really, starting to hurt so C suggested she go get her dog’s Gentle Leader from her car to give that a try. The Gentle Leader is an approved piece of equipment to use for testing as a Pet Partners team and visiting people as Pet Partners, but I had never planned on using it because it reminds me of a muzzle. I thought if people saw her wearing that they would assume she was a biter and would be fearful of her. I also worried that it would hurt her. Well, I was wrong! It is all cloth, there is no metal causing her any pain & it doesn’t completely restrict her mouth, it’s all about pressure points. It was like night and day!! With a bit of correction she was easily under control and NOT dragging me around. My poor left hand was very grateful!! Don’t get me wrong I  still need to work on using the Gentle Leader with her because I was probably being a little too gentle, but we’ll both get used to it I’m sure.

With the Gentle Leader on we went back inside and there was literally no pulling. Then we worked on stay some more and she did well. C was doing all sorts of crazy things to distract Georgia, but she never left her sit – stay position. I was such a proud mom. I also learned how to get her to remain in a lay – stay position using the Gentle Leader. Since I was there and the Gentle Leader was working so well C held Georgia’s leash while I paid for a Gentle Leader and new leash. I decided to go with pink so it was clear to others that Georgia is a little girl dog. We had several people at PetsMart refer to her as a “him” or a “he”. I don’t correct them….probably for the same reason I don’t correct people when they call me Susan or Suzanne. Wish I knew what that reason was, I just know it makes me feel awkward. Oh well! I doubt people will call Georgia a “he” with a bright pink head collar and leash; however, I’m sure I’ll be surprised.

So, that wraps up our lesson. We have two more with C, which makes me kind of sad. I’ve enjoyed my time with her and I know Georgia has too. She’s helped us to come a long way. If money grew on trees I’d continue to work with her. When it’s all over we’ll have had one consultation meeting and 10 lessons. Time flies when you’re having fun I guess. I would also like to point out that C said she’s never had a dog take to a Gentle Leader so easily. Georgia didn’t mind or resist at all, just let us put it on her. Even though the lesson started off rough and I was worn out by the end, I think once again we took some positive steps forward. Now we need to continue to use the Gentle Leader with Georgia and make her like it i.e. she gets treats when she has it on! J

*The two pictures above are not of Georgia, though in one picture the dog looks very much like her. I forgot to take one of her in her pink Gentle Leader before I wrote this blog post. I will post one of her though; she looks good in pink. At first I thought really negatively of the Gentle Leader, but I promise she can still pant, eat, bark, drink and BITE with it on. It is NOT a muzzle!

Hello? Is Anyone There?!?

~Picture of Georgia and L back in October~

Been awhile, huh? Sorry for my blog silence…in all honesty I haven’t had much to report. Due to scheduling conflicts we haven’t met with C for awhile. I’m hoping in the coming weeks we can set something up. We have 3 more lessons with her and then we’ll be done and it’s up to us to setup a testing time. C thinks we’ll be ready by the time the 3 lessons are complete. I’m worried, but if you know me then you know that I’m always worried. I’ve gotten better in my worrying as I’ve gotten older, but it’s still there. Probably why I’ve been worried lately is because I haven’t been keeping up with Georgia’s training very well. I’ve been busy at work and doing things around the house. Also, my sister and her family have been in town and so I wanted to spend as much time with them as possible. These sound like excuses, but it’s the truth…so think what you will.

I really need to work on getting her to stay and of course NOT jumping when people come over! It’s like she just can’t help it, but I know that’s not true. She knows better and can be trained to stop. She’s just so happy to have visitors! She’s been real good with my niece, L, who is 17 months, but Georgia’s tail is a hazard…L got a tail to the face more than once. It didn’t seem to bother her as she has a dog bigger than Georgia at home.

Really, there isn’t much else. Georgia is happy, sweet and healthy and for that I’m very grateful; she just needs her mom to get it in gear! She’s not digging this heat and neither am I but we’ll take this over ice and snow anytime! Hope all is well with everyone!! Enjoy your day!

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!!!

Lesson 6 = A Good Day

~Just a cute picture taken by Heidi Clark~

This past Saturday we had another lesson at PetsMart. There was another adoption event and it was busy already due to it being a Saturday. We have to stay away from the adoption tent because both Georgia and I would want to take one of the dogs home with us. I wish I could save all the dogs and kids that need homes, but that’s just not possible. Anyway, I would say this lesson was our most successful yet and I felt really excited afterwards. I am actually seeing the changes and progress Georgia is making. I can honestly see it clicking in her mind and that is an awesome thing to see! I’m just a tiny bit proud of her, can you tell?!?

Our last lesson in PetsMart we started out inside and it was just too much for her to focus in – way too many distractions! So, we spent 90% of the lesson right outside of PetsMart, which is still a busy place. This lesson we started out outside and made our way inside with success. She was actually listening and responding to commands inside. Granted, once inside we had to calm her down, but after that she was good. Calming her down involved having her lie down and be still. It required C to get down on her level and talking to Georgia in a whisper. In my lessons I’ve learned to recognize stress in Georgia and when she is calm. After 2-3 minutes C had her calm and we worked on heeling, not jumping up when a person is holding a treat and stopping when I stop walking and sitting, all while staying on my left side.

The pulling on the leash really improved. That’s one of our biggest problems; she drags me toward other people or dogs because she wants to meet them. More than once when someone was coming our way she sat down and waited. We’ve been working on getting her to realize that to get attention from people she has to be sitting and not jumping. Success! However, on Friday night when we had people over she went NUTS when the door bell rang. I had her on a leash since we were expecting them, but it was just insane. She needs to realize that the door bell doesn’t equal she can go crazy. We’ll have to continue to work on this.

We had several people come up to us and several people with their dogs come up to us. Georgia was so good! There was one lady that said, “Can I pet your dog? She just looks so friendly.” That made my day; I want people to feel like Georgia is approachable. We also met an 11 year old poodle and Georgia never tried to jump or be rough, she sat still…whining and shaking a tiny bit because she wanted to play, but listened when I told her to “stay”.

C said that Georgia is starting to look like a trained dog and I’m starting to look someone that has a trained dog. She can see us working together and I LOVE IT! What an awesome relationship Georgia and I have built and are building. She’s my little fur girl and I’m so proud of her! She may be the smartest dog ever…maybe?!

Utah

 ~11,000 Feet, looking towards Salt Lake City from Snowbird Ski Resort~

 ~Mormon Temple, SLC~

 ~Bridal Falls~

A big reason for my blog silence recently was our trip to Utah. We stayed in Park City, but spent some time in Salt Lake City as well. A lot of people asked us why we were going to Utah or, “Why don’t you go to Florida?” Well, I’ve been to Florida (and the surrounding areas) a lot and have seen the Atlantic Ocean a lot, as has N so we wanted to see a part of this country we hadn’t before. Another reason is a good friend of ours lives out that way, so it was a win, win. We got to spend time with him and his girlfriend while seeing a beautiful part of America.

If you know me, you know I’m not big into the outdoors, but I’m proud to say I hiked and got trapped at the top of a mountain for four hours due to an avalanche. Yes, you read that correctly, an avalanche. It blocked the only road that goes up and down the mountain. What we were told would be about a thirty minute wait for the road to be cleared turned into over four hours. Here’s the thing, yes we were stuck and could not get down the mountain, but we were stuck in a very nice ski resort. So, needless to say we were not roughing it. We ate lunch at a nice restaurant at the resort and then sat outside in the sun (we all got a little sunburned) and chatted. While we hadn’t planned on being stuck there we ending up having a nice afternoon with friends and a funny story as a result. The one time Susanna goes into nature an avalanche happens! Our hikes were beautiful and I even walked across a log that was over a pretty serious mountain stream that would have caused some serious damage if I’d fallen. Am I brave or what?!

No, I didn’t ski. N did, but I just wasn’t feeling it. I’d tired before and it didn’t turn out well. While they skied one day I shopped – another win, win. We had an amazing view anywhere we went and the Mormon Temple in downtown SLC, was beautiful. It reminded me of a Disney princess castle. I’d also like to point out how clean SLC is…very impressive! Other American cities could/should take note of that. We visited Sundance (ski resort owned by Robert Redford) and took a tram up to 11,000 feet at the same ski resort we got stuck at for the view. We had a wonderful and relaxing time.

Now you may be asking yourself what this all has to do with Georgia? Well, not much really, but I thought our trip was worth sharing. I will say that I missed her like crazy. We humans are attached to our dogs and things seem a little off when they aren’t around. Not starting my day with Georgia is a little strange. My mom and her dog, Auburn, took care of Georgia while we were gone. Georgia missed us I’m sure, but loves being spoiled by my mom. She also loves Auburn (he weighs about 4 lbs and Georgia weighs about 40 lbs). 99% of the time they play and are best friends, but sometimes food gets in the way of that friendship and they fight. There was one episode while we were gone, but everyone is fine and they are friends again. Georgia has no food aggression with people, just other dogs. We assume her days on the streets of Indianapolis caused this before she found her way to us. So, thank you to my mom and Auburn for watching our fur kid. She had a great time.

I’m proud to report she remembered her commands – sit, stay, lay down, shake. I was worried those might go out the window, but they didn’t. We still have a lot of work to do though in regards to being in public. I took her to a new pet store last night and we had moments of good behavior and moments of extreme pulling on the leash when she saw a new person or dog. We’ll keep working though and keep venturing out into stores that will allow us for her to get used to all of the distractions that exist outside of our home.

Hoping warm weather is around the corner for some nice walks with Georgia. Stay warm and have a good day!