May 2010Monthly Archives

Last Pictures of Angel

Angel

I just want to say, it’s my blog and I can cry if I want to. Yes, I am still mourning Angel, and I still miss her a lot. I just loaded up these last pictures of her that were on my camera.

This was when her eye was still working. Three days before she died. My heart is still heavy and sore with her loss. Though my husband and I have talked about her, remembering all the good things. Like when she would warm up like a motor boat down the hallway when the neighbor would drag their garbage can down the driveway, and she would get outside and bark at them. Or at the garage door. She would always bark at those two things. Silly girl.

She loved pig ears and she loved walks and camping. She was so scared when we first got her, but she grew and became more and more confident all the time. I still miss her every day.

Cynthia

May 23, 2010

Angel

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Angel

Getting Better

Jet's Play Moves

Well, I’m getting better, though it’s slow going. I was kinda manic yesterday, different than my depression I’ve had for the last week since we put Angel down. Jet makes me laugh, he is such a goof. This is him making play moves towards his new German Shepherd friend Lenka, who is not in the photo, but really should be. She came from Slovakia in her Mom’s belly, and was born in Texas. Both of them are from far, far away!

I did agility last weekend with Chase, too. Haven’t had the gumption to post any videos yet. I also entered Tatum in prenovice again, she did really well! I have video of her too I need to get up. She is doing well, though she was a bit nervous.

So life goes on, even though Angel has died. So sad. I will miss her for the rest of my life and I hope she is flying free somewhere having a great old time. I do believe something happens after death, I just don’t know what it is. Someday I will find out… we all find out eventually.

So I better get back to looking for some cheap insurance companies so we will have car insurance for our trip to Denmark in June! Ack, it’s coming up so fast!

Cynthia

May 20, 2010

Angel

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Agility, Angel, Chase, Jet

Very Sad

Well we are sad here, because Angel is gone, and I don’t really have much desire to blog lately. I went and did agility last weekend. It was okay, but my heart was so heavy on Saturday that I handled Chase very poorly. We got one half Q, which was good. Then on Sunday we got another half Q, which was also good, because that got Chase his open standard title. It was ASCA.

I haven’t even been on my laptop much… been just kinda hiding, sometimes in bed, sometimes in front of the TV. Mostly with the other dogs snuggling against me.

I’ll get better… but for now, I just have to be sad for a while.

Cynthia

May 17, 2010

Agility, Angel, Chase

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Agility, Angel, Chase

Angel is Gone

We let Angel go this morning. The vet thinks she may have had a brain tumor. Her right eye no longer worked as of yesterday… she couldn’t open or close it, you could just see the red of her third eyelid. And she was pacing in circles. She wasn’t in a good place anymore.

I slept all day after we let her got his morning. It’s my way to avoid emotions. Now I eat because I think I should, not because I’m hungry. And drink for the same reason. I know we’ll get through this, but it’s not going to be very easy.

My husband came with as we let her go. He is a wonderful man and he cried with me.

Emotionally Drained

Ugh. So Angel still isn’t doing well. We took her back to the vet yesterday just to see what they recommended. We did some more blood work. It came back just fine. She’s not eating much at all now, only a few bites of food once or twice a day. She’s dropping weight really fast and she’s getting so very light now.

Angel and Chase April 2005

She has a fever of 104.7, which is really high. About 101 is normal. The vet gave us some antibiotics to see if they will help. But her white blood cell count is normal. So in a way her body is fighting something off. In another way it’s not.

So she is really going downhill fast. We cried at the vet a little yesterday. I cried coming home from work today. Right now Angel is on my bed with me and we are snuggling. We have to let her go soon. She is just old. We don’t want her to go, we are very sad. But we don’t want her to be in pain, either.

This is a cute picture of her and Chase playing tug. She didn’t play tug much with Chase, but she did love to play and have me chase her around when she had toys and socks. Now she just sleeps all the time. I love her so much, this makes me very, very sad.

And I’ve eaten too much sugar tonight, ignoring the quick weight loss tips, because when I’m stressed I either don’t eat, or I eat junk. Bleh. I’m just an idiot. Oh well. Angel, I love you so very much.

Obedience Is Hard

Jet And The Scrubby Brush

Okay so I kinda mentioned last post that Chase didn’t get that last leg of his CDX at the AKC trial last weekend. He’s a good boy and he tried really, really hard. The first day he was really distracted, and the second day he did awesome, but he laid down on his long sit and that disqualified him. Ugh. I hate those sits and downs! They last for 8 minutes, and going in the ring for the real exercises last less time than that. Every time I train Chase for that sit stay, I apologize to him, saying I know they are dumb!

But anyway, obedience is actually very difficult. My trainer tells me it takes an average of 21 tries in the ring to get a CDX. That’s a lot… and Chase has only been in the AKC ring 5 times now. He nailed his first two, which was great. But now his sits are getting sloppy so I have to give him more information that he needs to sit… he needs to stay in the position I put him in until I release him. It’s hard, it’s not a fun part of obedience. It’s an obedient part, which I guess is reflective of the name. But still… bleh. And this picture of Jet is him not being obedient! LOL. He got my dish washing scrubby brush and of course I had to take a picture of him as I was tugging… taking it away. He is such a goofy boy. Such a sweet puppy.

Anyway, Obedience is tough, but it’s also a challenge that I love doing. We’ll get it, I have no doubt. Next weekend we are doing ASCA agility and that should be fun, too. I hope to get Chase out of open standard and into Elite. And start working on some of those more elusive Elite titles! And then I won’t have to buy weight loss products, because I’ll be running around getting tired!

Teaching Jet to go Jogging

Silly Jet

What a silly picture this is. LOL. Jet is such a goof. I just completely adore him. He is a happy boy isn’t he!?

So I want to go jogging with Jet. I know he’s still young, and a lot of repetitive running isn’t good for him yet, but I’m want to do it eventually and I want him to jog nicely on a loose leash by my side. Loose Leash Walking is one of the hardest things to teach a dog, and one of the most important too. Because who wants to go for a walk with a dog who is darting to the end of the leash, pulling like crazy, barking and yapping? No no that is not fun. And dogs like that don’t get to go out on walks, either. And when I start taking him jogging on a regular basis, I really want him to be by my side. He’ll have lots of opportunities to go on sniffy goofy walks too.

So today I took him out with a clicker and treats, on his collar and leash, and we went a lot further than I thought we would. He did really well. When he’d pull on the leash, we would stop. When it went loose, I would click and treat. It’ll take some work but he’s really getting it nicely. I even did a little bit of jogging and he stayed with me. I was thrilled. Dang Jet is a smart boy! I knew the Danish Swedish Farmdog was for me… but every day he seems to surprise me even more with how amazing he is.

I have to get back into shape. I was on my feet the last couple of days and I was beat when I got home. Maybe an acne light would warm me up, but I don’t know about that. I think the older I get, the more important exercising is going to be. Bleh. I wish I liked it more.

Oh, and no Q for Chase on Saturday either. He did great, but he laid down on his long sit, which is an NQ. So we’ll be trying again in June for that last leg!

Chase, Jet, Jogging

Trying For That CDX

Well today Chase went into the obedience ring again and we tried to pick up that last CDX leg in AKC obedience. He was a good boy except for he didn’t heel. The place the show is, is at a huge conformation show, indoors. And so there are a ton of dogs and a ton of people and it’s an extremely distracting environment. And I didn’t get there early enough and heel him around to make sure he knew that was what we were doing. So he went in the ring and wandered off and didn’t heel at all. Bleh. He also laid down on his 3 minute out of sight sit stay.

So I’m glad that I entered him tomorrow too. I figure he will have a good chance of getting 1 leg if I entered him in 2 days. And I will do some heeling tomorrow morning before we go in the ring. And I’ve been working the sit stay too. I hate those stays. They are awful, and I always apologize to Chase when I ask him to do them, saying I know they are stupid, but was just have to do them. I’d rather go atv riding than do those stays… and I don’t like that either!

So tomorrow, hopefully will go better. He’s a good boy. I was only a little mad at him during the heeling. The rest of his work was very nice!