Weather and such

 

Thursday about 4 p.m. the first front blew through.  I was out "picking up the dog toys" and was carting the puppy pools back to the garage.  That gusty wind that leads the front was blowing strong, and it slammed the gate shut.  I unlatched it, and it slammed the gate open, then as I was putting those pools away, the wind shifted and slammed the gate closed again.  Adventures.

It's raining.  We shall see tomorrow how much we get, but as I type I can hear the thunder rolling over.

Friday morning was a little hectic, and I didn't get the rain gauge checked until I came here to update the blog after supper!  It showed half an inch.  I do not know how much of that was the rain overnight, and how much might have been the automatic sprinklers that I left run for the ten minute cycles through the stations this morning at 4 a.m.

Here is part of the Friday morning hectic contribution.  Ms. Ember had been worrying at the bottom step's carpet again, so I put her into her X-Pen with her toys while I was whisk-brooming up the fragments of carpet and padding her teeth had dislodged.

This was more than Ms. Ember could handle, and smarty that she is, she managed to move one end of the X-Pen panels and slip out.  But that wasn't enough for her.  She also nudged the part next to the couch, and managed to place herself ON the couch, inside the X-Pen with her toybox and the waste baskets.

Sometimes I don't know whether to be amused at her cleverness, upset with myself for not doing a better job by her sooner, or what!  Guess I'll just have to keep on loving her and doing best I can, one day at a time.

In any case, that meant taking time during puppy nap #1 to add two panels to the edges (thankfully I had two extra panels I could use).  Ember's containment system is made up of not one, but two eight panel X-Pens.

Friday morning was also puppy class over at Zoom Room.  I have three more classes already pre-paid.  I have not scheduled another private session, but need to do that soon, or my prepaid set of those will expire!

Ember was a rock star this morning, if I must say so myself.  I replaced the suggestions of the trainer in charge with the Susan Garrett versions of them.  So when the class was asked to play "the Name Game" that only required the puppy to make eye contact with you to get rewarded, I used solo recalls, since her name is also used as her recall word.  And when it came time to practice the "heel" position, I used the "mama's hip seam as your personal pez dispenser" to walk her "at heel" in circles, while a couple of the other pups were still working on luring into the by your side at a sit position.  Finally, when they asked for a practice of "middle", I used Susan's "sound" (it's not a word, it's a noise, kind of like a trill, but it means the same thing as the class use of "middle").  She tucked herself between my legs, as desired.

One of the staff commented on how well she was doing this morning.  Considering some of her problematic class sessions, this one was a real ego boost for her mommy.

Which is good, because Mommy has been super frustrated by trying to provide video clips for the online classes.  After a couple of teary sessions, I came up with two good clips late in the day.  Solo Recall and Tug.  Welcome to my back yard.  The camera is propped up at the door of the elevated playhouse over the sandbox.

Life in Emberville remains good.  Spark on!