Week 2 of agility class went a little better! Fitz jumped through the tire and ran through the tunnel no problem at all. Minus one small marking incident, he did great and was taking treats too! He was still very distracted by other dogs whenever he wasn’t doing a trick but concentrated on his task at hand when we had something to do.
New this week was the plank, just something to get them used to walking on a plank and he did great, getting up on it, sitting, laying down, turning around, walking! (It took a second try to get the turn around right but he kept it up!). Also new was jumping up on these platforms which was no problem once he figured out what he was supposed to do. Again, sitting and laying down on it and jumping up/down to/from them.
I can’t wait for next week! It went fast this week but it was HOT so that was a good thing 🙂 For now we’re just working on our homework, still with the clicker.
Finally a picture of what Sarah and I worked on Saturday. We are both stitching Celtic Banner, using a green color scheme but she’s using pinks for contrast and I’m using just purples, not being a pink fan myself.
Celtic Banner Recap
We started stitching Celtic Banner in August of 2006 on a long weekend in Maine. I continued to work on it about once a week through 2006, finishing up the alphabet in December.
In August 2007 we went back to Maine for a long craft weekend where we continued working on Celtic Banner, I finished up the next 2 motifs after the alphabet there…
Motif 1 after alphabetSecond motif (love this one!)
In 2008 I did not go up to maine due to the wedding (and I didn’t really stitch due to wedding preparations) so Celtic Banner sat on the side lines waiting for my life to slow down a bit again.
In 2009 it was back to Maine for our long weekend of stitching! And stitch we did! Lots of progress was made.
Lots of bands finished upFinal progress in June 2009
And that brings us to the present unfortunately. I did actually stitch more than what is shown above, that big knot was almost finished when I picked up the Banner on Saturday.
So after our Saturday stitch I finished up that big knot in the center and Sunday and Monday night I worked on the border and then started just a bit of the compass below it.
Current progress!
Once that compass I’m working on is done I’ll be done with page 3 and started on page 4 (4 page pattern!). The end really is in sight. I’d like to keep working on this piece for a while, at least till I get ambivalent to it, right now it’s the only thing I ‘want’ to stitch so i’m sticking to it!
Yesterday while Ryan did some work I got out in the sweltering weather with the pups. They had free reign on the front porch (Fitz stayed inside mostly but Buddy loved watching people walk by). While they did their thing, I painted! I got the second coat of green on after I caulked the frieze board. Once the green was dry I got the first coat of yellow on the trim (finished it up just as it was getting dark). It takes a while to cut in the yellow around the siding but we love the effect so it’s worth it.
Front - almost done!Just to get an idea what the panels will look like with the green, what's white will be yellow.
Today Fitz is at daycare and Buddy came to work with me again. Tomorrow they’ll both be home all day (probably a short day since Buddy can’t hold ‘it’ for 10 hours likes Fitz can). I’m hoping Fitz will be tired out from daycare (hah) and Buddy will be more comfortable alone now that he has been for short periods (plus I’ll put up the camera so I can watch them).
I took the day off today, my friend Sarah came up and we spent the day chatting and stitching. While I was doing that however Ryan was hard at work around the house. He continued to remove the ceiling of the porch and started putting in some supports for a hammock 🙂
Front of the porch, the ceiling is all gone.Just a little bit of ceiling left and some new supports.
I’m looking forward to painting tomorrow but for now – back to stitching!
Fitz and I started Agility class last night. He’s been really into treats and food lately so I was optimistic that he would do well. Until we got there. All the other dogs around distracted him and he wanted nothing whatsoever to do with treats. He wanted to play with the dogs (it doesn’t help that the last time I dropped him there it was for a daycare (day of playing).
He did pretty well though, mostly without taking treats. We started with recall (he has to run up to the directed side that my hand is at. It helps it showing them which tricks to do (they follow the hand). He didn’t do it exactly but he ran to me when I called him.
Next up was the tire, I’ve got him jumping through the hoop at home so he knows the concept but at home he likes to chase the treat I throw. He was not interested in the food and he was definitely the dunce at this one. Finally someone gave me some cheese which he was a bit more interested in and he jumped through. After a few slow ones he got into it and started doing very well.
We moved on to the tunnel. Slow to start (but not the worst in class), he finally came through the tunnel to me. After that he was a pro, running through the tunnel, not caring a bit about a treat at the end. What really happened was some new dogs showed up and were playing in the corner, he wanted to get to them so badly he’d do anything I asked 🙂
So class was not horrible at all and I’ve got to start him on understanding the clicker now. Next week I’ll bring cheese and hopefully it will go smoothly from the start.
This morning I took the boys for a nice long walk to tire them out. Fitz is home by himself today and Buddy came to work with me since he’s not ready to be left alone for such a long time yet.
Out for a strollPlenty of grass to walk on but these city boys prefer the blacktop walkways through the park.
They walk really well together, I use the extending leashes so that I am not getting tangled too much (if they’re too close they go back and forth). When they’re in front they walk pretty confidently forward. Until they see squirrels 🙂
Today is chock full of puppies (well mostly dogs but they seem like puppies). First, my office mate at work brought her adorable 10 week old puppy in to work! He’s a snuggle bug and very fluffy. He slept most of the day but who can blame him, it’s hard being so cute!
After work I picked up my aunt’s dog Buddy for 3 weeks while they’re in Africa. He had a comfortable ride to my house and a huge shock to find out that I now live with another dog (last time he came up it was just him). He and Fitz sniffed each other and Fitz decided Buddy was a toy when Buddy ran down the stairs (he likes to throw his toys down the stairs and chase them). Once they got comfortable enough to ignore each other I took them for a decent walk and then back in to chill in the A/C.
Fitz has now confiscated Buddy’s toys as his own and Buddy is passed out in my lap. So far so good, I’m optimistic that they’ll both sleep through the night ignoring each other and tomorrow working from home will be interesting (Fitz usually sleeps all day).
Fitz: What... aren't all the toys mine? Buddy: Tuckered out
Yesterday I took a half day off of work and went down to visit my sister and nephew. He’s just over 2 months old and he’s such a cutie. He’s tiny but he’s very alert and was looking around at everything all day yesterday. It was a great time to visit because he decided to stay awake all day again for me. Say Hi Jason! Let me help you, take that pacifier out so you can say hi. Waving hi 🙂
It was a hot day so he spent the evening in just his diaper to cool off a bit and then it was on to muscle shirt number two for the evening and some tummy time (at which time he promptly fell asleep). Tummy time! And he's out 🙂
I even got to spend some time with him this morning (he was hungry though) before heading in to work.
Bye bye little jason, I will definitely see you soon! bye bye for now
While I was over I added the tabs to the wall hanging for Jason’s room so they can hang it up. I also remembered to take some pictures of it finished since the only time I did it was with my dad’s camera. Wall hanging for little Jason Closeups - I designed the monkey based on one of the fabrics in the quilt. The rest of the animals were part of the pattern.
Just one last thing to sew, a skirt for the crib. Should be a quick one and I was tempted to do it last weekend but it was too hot to go up and spend time in the sewing room!
We could not motivate ourselves to do much this weekend unfortunately. Saturday morning was good, Ryan removed some more of the porch ceiling then we went to the lumber yard to get the rest of the wood for the window panels. After that we spent most of the day down at Kimball’s for my work summer outing which was a lot of fun.
Back home Saturday night all we did was a long walk and watch some more Castle.
Sunday wasn’t much better, no motivation at all. We did put up the frieze board (planed the wood first) and I got it primed at least. So the front is ‘done’ and ready to be fully painted. I still want to caulk the frieze board though before I do the second coat of paint. Frieze board up
Today it’s just a short day at work and then down to my sisters to hang out with her and my nephew! I can’t wait! Then back to regularly scheduled programming.
I think Fitz prefers when I go to work for the day instead of working from home. When I’m home I make him hang out with me and he’s used to sleeping the day away, saving up his energy for the evenings so he can whine and bug us to go outside.
Today I left to go to the chiropractor around 8, came back by 9am and he was laying in bed just looking at me like ‘what, you’re back?! I haven’t even slept yet!’. There was evidence that he may have pulled a toy out (which is unusual), but he hadn’t slept yet. He couldn’t even get out of bed to follow me to the kitchen, he just watched me like he didn’t know what was going on (maybe he thought he was dreaming).
Now as I’m working I’m getting huffs and loud sighs from his side of the room. That pretty much means he’s fed up with me and is giving up on waiting to see what I’m doing (outside? no. food? no. play? no? sleep? no. computer? not interested (sigh) ).
Sorry Fitz, at least I can take you for a lunch time walk when I work from home, the rest of the day you just have to put up with me typing away 🙂
