Monday, September 3, 2012

Labour Day Weekend

It's been a busy weekend here in the land of emptynest.  We (and by this I mean 90% engineering dad) are in the midst of painting (which I'm barely allowed to do) and redecorating - which I am allowed to do.  Saturday was shopping for some cupboard hardware as engineering dad is building me a pantry closet.  Sunday the boys and I had a nice long run in the woods (well they ran anyway) and in the afternoon we went down to our local wading pool for the Pooch Plunge.  Both of my guys thought this was a super fantastic idea - although Rylie may have wished that those pesky Golden's would keep away from his ball.  After a try or two neither of them had an issue with the makeshift ramp and were easily able to get themselves in and out of the pool.  It was hot and sunny and was a beautiful day for a swim.

Today we had an agility trial.  Max ran first and turned in a truly awesome performance in his master standard run for a Q.  He was very pokey in the snooker and we got whistled off when he took the wrong side of a jump.  It was a really tricky course  - or else I picked a really bad route but I doubt we would have made it as far as we did if he had been running his normal speed.  By the time jumpers came up in mid afternoon Max decided that he just wasn't playing the game and left the ring.  There might have been a couple of things preventing him from having the focus he should have but I will have to consider just not running him outside in the summer.

Rylie's standard run was really nice.  His contacts were lovely.  A pop out in the weaves cost us the Q. I think I could have restarted him but he never pops out and I just decided to carry on and be happy with the run.  His advanced snooker was lovely and we did get a Q in that one.  The master jumpers course was tricky and pretty twisty turny.  Rylie took one wrong end of a tunnel but otherwise was spot on.  I think we are starting to gel as a team and I am starting to be able to see the course a bit better from his viewpoint.
All in all I was thrilled with Max's standard run and al three of Rylie's runs.  I am mildly concerned with Max's last two runs  but we have two more trials this month so we'll see how they go.  I was much happier with my handling and decision making than I was last weekend.

1 comment:

katie, Maizey and Magnus said...

Wow sounds like Calvin's 'Aunt' and 'cousins' had a busy weekend!;) I'm glad you're having so much fun in agility! Seems like it was just the other day I was reading and you seemed to just be getting started. You always seem to have a good, balanced attitude about it. It's very nice to read! :))