Category Archives: Zodiac

Pupdate – Zodiac’s Book

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Zodiac - puppy in training - January 2013

Zodiac

A few weeks ago I made a goal to get two words done each week on Zodiac’s book. You probably aren’t keeping track but I haven’t posted any pages from is book in the past two weeks. So much for that plan. I have done some work on his book. Last week I gathered all the photos I have of him in one place. Some of the photos where tough to know if it was Yakira or Zodiac. I need to do better at adding information to the photos in the metadata when I take them. That is one of those things on my long-term to do list but that hasn’t come close to seeing the light of day.

I also took some time and decided what I would focus on with each of Zodiac’s “Z” words. Lots of them have similar meanings but I’m happy with the topics I’ve come up with. I also have all the “Z” words in the book with their definitions. Now it is just a matter of finding or taking good photos for each word and writing some text.

Today I thought I’d get to work on a few pages and place some photos too. But instead I got text written for 8 spreads but no photos placed. So here is what I got done today:

  • zaftig – full-bodied; well-proportioned: Most puppy raisers think their dog is the cutest, but of course they are wrong, Zodiac is really the cutest puppy ever! He was a very solidly built. At 13 months he was 65 lbs. even though he isn’t a very tall dog. He has the cutest way of looking up at you with the whites of his eyes showing. Zodiac has matured into a very handsome nicely put together dog.
  • zany – comically wild or eccentric: One of the Zaniest things that Zodiac loves to do is dig in his empty dog dish. I usually take it to mean that he would like some ice cubes. Zodiac loves ice cubes! He will grab an ice-cube or two and dash into the living room to munch down on them or chase them around the kitchen. It could be that he is really trying to say that he wants more dog food but he never gets that. He hasn’t ever done this before a meal. Well, he has me pretty well-trained to the ice-cube thing.
  • zap – strike suddenly and forcefully: Jumping is probably my least favorite thing about Zodiac. Sometimes it comes so unexpectedly when I’m sitting at my desk working on my computer and “zap” his paws land abruptly on my arm and shoulder. I sure hope that his future handler loves this trait because I think it is just part of who he is. We have been able to moderate it but not stop it all together.
  • zax – a hatchetlike tool for roofing slate: Once in a while Zodiac uses his paws like a zax and punches you. The most memorable time was when my friend Lisa, and I along with Zodiac and a career change dog name Osaka where driving through the night to a Guide Dog for the Blind graduation. We both too tired to drive so the four of us slept in the car. At some point Zodiac punched out with one of his paws and caught Lisa in the eye. Boy did that ever hurt. I’m pretty sure her eye got scratched but it healed up fine. Of course Zodiac wasn’t trying to hurt her, she just got in the way of a powerful paw stretch.
  • zealous – ardently active, devoted, diligent: Zodiac is very zealous about life and what it likes to do. Sometimes it comes across as stubbornness. I’ll never forget our first day together. He was exploring his new house and decided he wanted to go it the spare bedroom. This is our cats territory and off-limits to the dogs, so I picked up his puppy leash and stopped him. He did like that and pulled harder to go into the room. I think we spent 10 minutes with Zodiac trying to go forward into the room and me preventing him. To his credit he learned his lesson and we never had that battle again.
  • zeek out – (slang) to lose control of oneself: Zodiac has always been attracted to sounds and somewhere along the way he learned that the doorbell usually meant something interesting was about to happen. When Zodiac hears the ding-dong, he gets all excited, barks a couple of times and runs to the door.  I then ask him to step back from the door and wait calmly for me to answer it. Sometimes he does better at this than others.
  • zenith – highest point or state, culmination: (this is for his graduation day or whatever his career of choice)
  • zephyr – thing of fine, light quality: The only thing about Zodiac that  is fine and light is his hair. He is a lab so he has plenty of hair. It is the thickest and scruffiest of all our puppies. Though as he has grown up it doesn’t seem so scruffy.
  • zero hour – a decisive or critical time: (this is for recall day)
  • zesty – energetic; active: Zodiac has always had a zest for life. He is a fun-loving boy and loves to be out doing things, going new places and making new friends. Zodiac is sure that everyone he meets is just as happy to meet him. He is ever the optimist that something fun is just around the corner. I love the happy light that is typically in Zodiac’s eyes.

Even though that wasn’t how I planned to go ahead, in the end, I think it just matters that I’m making progress and not that I follow my previous plan exactly. To my way of thinking, plans are to help us move forward. I don’t always get a project broken up in a way that really works in real life. Then, I think it is important to just go with the flow and feel good about your progress. Does that ever happen to you? How do you handle it when your plans and reality don’t work together?

 

 

Zodiac’s Book – getting started

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Title page for Zodiac's Book

Title Page for Zodiac’s Book

As our time with Zodiac comes to a close, I’ve been wanted to get started on his puppyhood book. I have a template so many of the design decisions are already made. Beside speeding up the process of completing each book the template gives a continuity to the series. Today I picked a font (Hobo Std) and two accent colors (blueish green and yellow). The colors might get changed as the book comes together but they are a good start. I also picked out 19 “Z” words to describe Zodiac. Finding “Z” words was a challenge but I did it.

  • zaftig – full-bodied; well-proportioned
  • zany – comically wild or eccentric
  • zap – strike suddenly and forcefully
  • zax – a hatchetlike tool for roofing slate
  • zealous – ardently active, devoted, diligent
  • zeek out – (slang) to lose control of oneself
  • zenith – highest point or state, culmination
  • zephyr – thing of fine, light quality
  • zero hour – a decisive or critical time
  • zesty – energetic; active
  • Zeus – supreme deity of the ancient Greeks
  • zigzag – a course with sharp turns
  • zillion – an extremely large number
  • zingy – full of zing; lively; zesty; exciting
  • Zion – where the pure in heart dwell
  • zippy – full of energy; lively; peppy
  • zoic – relating to or having animal life
  • zonked – exhausted or asleep
  • zoom – to move quickly or suddenly

The next steps are to work on the text for each word and find and/or take more photos to help illustrate all the “Z” words. Zenith will be used to talk about Zodiac’s partnership, hopefully as a guide dog, so that one will have to wait. Also zero hour will be about putting him on the puppy truck so I can’t do that one either. But I hope to have the rest of the pages done by the time he returns to Guide Dogs for the Blind. Then I can put it on to a cd and it will be given to his handler while they are in training. It is lots of fun for them to learn about how their dog was growing up in the raisers home.

Zodiac will probably be in the truck in 8 to 10 weeks. With 19 words to do I better get at least two spreads done each week. So that is my goal. I’ll post them here on pupdate day to help me be accountable for that goal. Since I’ve already do so much this week, I work to getting one spread done for Friday.

Do you have a project with an upcoming deadline that you are working on? I’d love to hear about it.

Related articles

Pupdate

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Black Lab Clifford, Yellow Lab Dune and Black Lab Zodiac

a Dune sandwich – Clifford, Dune and Zodiac

It has been a few weeks since I actually got a pupdate post written. Zodiac and Dune are doing good. It looks like Zodiac probably won’t be returning to Guide Dogs for the Blind on the next puppy truck in May. There are 25 dogs older than him and the truck only holds 19 dogs. I’m glad to get a few more weeks with him.

We were a three dog household for the last three days. My sister’s career change, Clifford was here. The three of them had so much fun together. Clifford looks very like Zodiac so it takes careful observation to know who it who.

The other great news this week was an email from Yakira and Diane. It sounds like they are doing great. Here is some of what Diane had to say:

My orange tree is in full bloom complimented by the newly opened scents of my roses freezias and lilacs.   From many other gardens the sent of jasmine contributes to the spring ambiance.

Today Yakira and I took an absolutely delightful 5 mile walk.  This has been a bit of a struggle for Yakira but she is finally demonstrated a willingness to walk decent distances at an excellent rate of speed. Honestly I would call our walk today a 10.  Before to long I can see that we will be enjoying a routine walk of 9 to 10 miles.

I have recently taught Yakira to drink from a safe water bottle.  Our walks are long enough and the weather will be warm enough that she needed the compliment to her food rewards of, of course, a portion of her daily food ration, as well as teriyaki beef jerky from Costco.  My retired Guide, Bettyjo, enjoyed the jerky as a reward and so I anticipated that Yakira would also find this an excellent motivation when developing new behaviors.  I am looking forward to also incorporating apple slices into her food rewards.

I absolutely love giving Yakira water from the cute little 8 oz water bottles.  She is so cute that everyone who passes by while she is drinking uuus and ahhs about her.

Yakira and Bettyjo get along famously and the cats have come to accept her as a member of the family too.  It is really nice to see all of them getting along so well when we are not working.

I have to say that Yakira is the best shopper I have had.  We walked along the arcade here yesterday for the first time.  She did a really amazing job in stopping at each open door to determine whether or not the store was the one I was looking for.

Yeah for news from one of our puppies! Yakira sure has an awesome life with Diane.

Pupdate

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Zodiac & Dune

Dune and Zodiac are both so cute. Well maybe Zodiac is more on the handsome side these days. He is a year old now and no longer looks like a puppy. They really enjoy each other’s company. It is amazing how many times the two of them will be laying down near each other and Dune looks like an exact copy of Zodiac, except she is smaller and yellow (of course).

We found out at puppy class this week that Zodiac is scheduled to go back to Guide Dogs for the Blind on the next puppy truck. That truck is expected to come on May 18th. I’ve had it in my head that he would be returning sometime in June but it isn’t looking that way. I figured out how to put a count down widget here on my blog so I can count down to his departure. I was so proud of him on Sunday. I got up to teach a lesson at church and left him by my chair. I forgot about him because I was so focused on teaching. But he was very good, even with a little toddler distraction right by him.

Dune has had some challenges this past week or so. Our snow all melted and she didn’t like not having snow to pee on. She had 4 accidents in one day! It had been about 3 weeks or more since she had a single accident let alone 4 in one day. She is doing better now but we are having to pay a lot more attention to her relieving. Since she was very young she would let us know when she needed an extra potty break by sitting by the door. Dune isn’t doing that much any more.

Dune is making some progress on her kennel stress. While she still isn’t quiet while we are gone she isn’t stressing out so much about it. Before she would get so stressed that not only her jaw was wet with drool, but the whole front, down to her legs would be soaked. Now even her jaw is dry. She also got the last of her puppy shots this week, so now she can go on walks and to parks and places like that.

We also got an email for Banta and Mark this week. It is always so exciting when I see that I’ve received an email from one of our puppies. Here is some of what Mark had to say:

Banta is doing very well.  For the most part she is working perfectly.  She has her stubborn moments.  We finally had a big snow a week ago.  Banta likes about 6 inches of snow.  We got about 10 inches and she seemed annoyed that all of her favorite places to play had too much snow.  Eventually she got in there and played like a crazy little girl.  She is so much fun, I love her to death.

All in all it has been a good week on the puppy raising front.

Pupdate – Scavenger Hunt

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Dune

For puppy class this week we met at the Valley Fair Mall. I thought it would be the usual socializing but our leader divided us into two team for a scavenger hunt. The two little puppies, Dune & Eagle, stayed in the center of the mall while the rest of the pups went off to find the things on the list and take photos of our puppies with the items we found. It was lots of fun. The mall was rather quiet and so the clerks were always happy to help us and the pups went lots of places all over the mall. Here are some of the photos.

Dune in Akyra’s lap

King & Zodiac in the arcade

plastic fork in the food court with King & Zodiac

a bouquet of flowers with Zodiac and King

Zodiac, King and a stuffed bear

King and Zodiac by luggage with wheels

Our Scavenger Hunt Team – Bill, McKale, Raelyn, King & Zodiac

Pupdate

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Zodiac

Zodiac Eval:

On Monday Zodiac had an official evaluation by our CFR (Community Field Representative) at Trolley Square. Last Saturday we had an optional outing at Trolley Square to give our pups a chance to experience the environment ahead of time. Zodiac had trouble on Saturday with layovers and animal distractions at the Best Friends Animal Society. I was feeling a bit stressed about his eval. We worked on his lay-over and he got some better. He was so good at church on Sunday. I was sitting next to a mother with a crawling baby. This little girl dropped food and chucked toys and Zodiac handled it all perfectly. That helped me be more relaxed about Monday.

He wasn’t perfect on Monday. Her refused to do the layover. Now we have a new food protocol for helping him with that. We had the last eval slot of the night so Best Friends was closed, so he did perfectly there. She commented on his strong neck when she took him for a while and some kids decided to create a big distraction at the wrong moment. For that she suggested more time on the flat collar and less on the head collar. Overall I think he did ok. His next eval will probably be just before he returns to Guide Dogs for harness training.

Dune in her new puppy in training jacket

Dune’s Jacket & Three Months Old:

At the end of the eval for Zodiac, Dune got her jacket. It was a fitting day to earn her jacket since she turned three months old on Monday too. She has been getting bored at home and wanting to have new adventures. With her jacket she is legal to go out and start socializing. On Tuesday Dune got to go to the Library and a short trip into our local grocery store. She was so excited and wanted to meet every person she saw. On Wednesday we had a women’s meeting at church and so I took her. She settled down pretty good. The food protocol is great for this. She gets a kibble every few minutes for sitting and then laying quietly on the floor. She got lots of oohs and awes because she is so cute. On Thursday Zodiac went to work with Bill so the two of us had a quiet day at home. She wanted to go with them so bad. Dune laid on the landing by the door for about an hour after they left. This morning Dune got her first chance to go to work with Bill. I picked her up before noon. She is too young to handle a whole day at work. She did pretty good, once she accepted that the tie down wasn’t coming off.

Both pups are doing good and they both have things to work on. But they bring lots of smiles and laughter to our lives.

Pupdate

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Photo & Video Sharing by SmugMug (video of Dune sharing her opinion of the x-pen)

As if you haven’t heard enough about my puppies this week. But it is Friday, my traditional day to give update on my puppies. Forefront this week has been Dune’s arrival. We have had our trying moments since Wednesday but each day gets better. She finally pooped outside last night for the first time. And she learned to go down more than one step today and then surged ahead and took the flight of stairs all the way to the bottom. She is starting to really catch on to relieving outside. Tonight she went to the door but I didn’t clue in what she was telling me until she had a pee accident right there. Hopefully last night’s two-hour scream-fest will be the last. I think we have a tactic that helps her settle down and go back to sleep after she goes outside to relieve in the middle of the night. Tonight will be the test.

Zodiac went to work with Bill again today. Dune had her first “outing” she went to my sister’s house and got to meet her Career Change black lab Clifford. They got along very well. When Zodiac got home from work tonight they were both very happy to see each other and they played together for a few minutes. I’m very proud of the good big brother Zodiac is being.

The phase report came out yesterday as usual but Yakira was still in phase 7. The good part is that the rest of her string was in phase 7 too. So it can’t be that Yakira is having a challenge with the training. Maybe her trainer got sick or something like that. I’ll be very surprised if she isn’t in phase 8 next week.

Lots of Pupdates

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It has been a fun week in getting news on our pups. When I think about it I’ve heard something from all of our pups in one way or another so lets take them in order.

Apex: you may remember that we are planning a cruise to Alaska with Apex & Sue. Sue is a super organized planner and she is keeping us on track in make plans for this exciting trip. This week she sent us an update some of the little details of our trip.

Banta: She is in perfect health. Banta recently had her annual trip to the vet for shots etc.

Carrie and Casey

Casey: We got a wonderful update from Carrie and Casey about their holiday travels including photos from Invermere. Plus some stories about a “couple of typical lab incidents.” She had some trouble eating a fleece blanket and the stuffing out of her dog bed while in her crate. Thankfully she didn’t develop a blockage and all is fine there. The other one had me laughing because she pulled something similar when she was being puppy sat when she was young. Here it is in Carrie’s words:

One night, I was up extremely late preparing for two important presentations the next day. I had 3 hours of sleep in total. Sometime in those 3 hours of sleep, Casey got up and consumed half of the cat’s litter in his litter box! Gross! I was in my business suit and high heels, cleaning up large amounts of upchucked litter, wondering if I could take her with me to the courtroom and if she was going to throw up cat litter all over the place while I made my submissions! She looked a little green but I called the vet to make sure she didn’t need to go in again and they said she should be okay. That was a really rough day. Since then, Casey is now happily on tie down on her bed, and I’ve installed a door thing to prevent her from gaining access to the litter box. She is so sneaky and mischievous sometimes but it is hard not to resist her beautiful brown eyes.

Casey running in the snow

Waffle: Bill was going through some mail and found a card stuck between two other pieces of mail from Waffle’s new partner! This was our first direct contact with Carole! We didn’t even have her name. I’d sent a couple of things to her via Guide Dogs for the Blind. But with career change situations if is up to the new owner to decide if they will have any kind of contact at all. Carole offered to send photos, so I popped her an email and we got a few photos of Waffle in her new life. Here is a little of what Carole said:

Waffle has a busy life.  She travels with me for work.  She’s been to Boston, Arizona, Costa Rica, New York so far. When we’re home she’s with our elderly boxer, Tucker, and her best friend, Evie – a 2 year old black lab.  She still doesn’t swim in the pool but I’m planning to teach her this summer.

Waffle

Now I can do the last version of Waffle’s puppyhood book, including or career and a little about her home and family.

Yakira: Puppy #5 is continuing to move along through training. This weeks phase report has her in phase #7! She will most likely be class ready next week and a new class is starting in Oregon on the 21st so it is possible that Yakira could be graduating as soon as February 2nd. Of course it will probably take longer than that for her to be partnered but who knows.

I need to get moving on Yakira’s book too. I’ve worked on it a bit but I’d like to have it pretty much done by the time we go to her graduation. Coming up with words that start with “Y” for her book isn’t the easiest thing to do but I think I’m close.

Zodiac: Our current puppy is doing well. He is really starting to mature and he kept things lively around here and he probably makes me laugh every day. He is such a fun-loving boy.

Puppy #7: Our club leader said to keep next Wednesday open for a new puppy to come. It isn’t 100% for sure yet but it is the first hard info we have had on our new puppy. Thinking of a new cute little puppy always brings a smile to my face.

It is amazing to me that with seven different dogs involved that we could have some kind of contact or information on each dog within a week span. That makes this week extra special to me.

This Week’s Pupdate

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Yakira – photo by Lisa Thompson

I was so happy to see the number 6 by Yakira’s name on this week’s phase report. She made it through the holidays without missing a beat. On not so good news the other puppy from our club that was in for training has dropped off the report so he must have been career changed this week. I’m always sad when I puppy doesn’t make. They always have a good life ahead of them but it is still disappointing when they don’t have what it takes to be a guide dog.

On the home front Zodiac is doing really well. Thursday was his 10 month birthday. He is starting show more and more maturity. Just in time for a new puppy to join the family. We will probably find out when in the next week.Zodiac really enjoyed having Kai with us for a few days. He was better than I expected. Kai is growing up nicely.

Zodaic in front of the “official” puppy portrait wall

I finally got Yakira’s official portrait back from Pixels. The wall has seems kind of bare the last few weeks. I got it done before Christmas but the exposure needed to be tweaked because the lighting on Yakira wasn’t as bright as on the other puppies and she just looked like a black blob. They redid it for me but I told them I didn’t need it before Christmas. I still remember many years ago when we I was a picture framer and how crazy things got during the Christmas season.

Pupdate – Yakira & Zodiac

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Yakira – photo by Lisa Thompson

I was concerned that with the Christmas Holiday, Yakira might not move on to phase 5 this week but she did! If you are interested in what Yakira is learning in phase 5 go to this post on Casey. Two of Yakira’s littermates, Yancey and Yasmine showed up on the phase report last week. They are now in phase 1. Her sister Yumi was recently dropped from breeder evals and should show up soon. That just leaves Yuma out there somewhere.

It has been an interesting week here. We were puppy sitting Beacon for Christmas. Our new club leader took him on Wednesday for an evaluation. Zodiac had lots of fun playing with Beacon most of the time but sometimes it seemed that Zodiac was done playing and Beacon wanted more. Even though they are only a few days apart in age, Zodiac comes across as much more mature in most ways. Zodiac was exhausted when Beacon left and so was I. We will be puppy sitting Kai starting tomorrow until next Wednesday.

Bill & Zodiac on Temple Square

Tonight we took Trax downtown to see the Christmas lights on Temple Square. It was a good socializing opportunity for Zodiac. There were a surprising number of people doing the same thing we were and Zodiac did great. He can be a bit distracted by wanting to socialize with people but he did very well tonight. We couldn’t find his head collar so he had to do it on his own, with just the flat collar. He really is starting to grow-up and gain a lot more self-control.

Zodiac on the Trax train