Well, last night was the big night....graduation from beginning obedience!! I was excited and so was my daughter, so we both loaded up Frankie and the treats and off we went.
It was time for class to start and there were only two dogs there, including Frankie! Usually there are 5, and they're all usually very punctual, so I was really surprised. Another dog showed up, but about 20 minutes late.
We went over the goals that we said we wanted to accomplish back in the very first class, and all of us had made great strides toward those goals. There was a little obstacle course that we each did using what we learned throughout class. That was fun and Frankie did everything with gusto! There were two cones in the room...we had to do a 'puppy push-up' at the first cone (sit, down, sit), then loose-leash walk to the second cone and do a 'sit-stay' while the instructor counted to 10. Then we had to loose-leash walk around the bucket of treats with goodies on top, using our 'leave it' command, if necessary. After we got around the bucket we did a 'down-stay', during which we had to get one of the goodies on top of the bucket and reward our dog.
After that, there was a brief lesson on the beginnings of the 'heel' behavior in which the goal was to lure the dog around behind you so they would end up sitting by your side in a heel position. Frankie did well!
Then the instructor handed out the completion certificates and class was over.
Kind of anti-climatic if you ask me. It would have been fun if everyone was there, though. My daugher was looking forward to seeing Quincy, the little Shih Tzu pup that she had grown fond of, but maybe the owner was sick or something. They've been there every class. The owners are two of the sweetest old ladies that you could ever hope to meet.
Oh well...on to intermediate!! We'll probably start at the beginning of March or so.
That's all for now!
Ellen & Frankie
