Tag Archives: puppy in training

FrontRunner Ride

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Waiting on the platform for the return trip – Bill & Casey

For puppy class this week we road the FrontRunner commuter train from Salt Lake City to Layton and back. One of the puppy raiser’s husband works for UTA and made arrangements for free passes. Casey has been on the train before when we did they same thing for puppy class last winter. Waffle did good too. I thought she might have trouble with getting on the train and going over the gap but she handled everything just fine. I did quite a bit of food rewards as we walked around by the trains and buses just to make sure she kept moving along and didn’t get into her “I don’t want to move” mode. All the dogs seemed to handle things very well.

This was Waffle’s last puppy class as part of our club. Friday she will be transferred to a high school student. It was also Cobb’s last class. He is going to Colorado for our CFR to evaluate him. Lindsey thinks he doesn’t have what it takes to be a guide dog and so Barb will be decided whether to career change him or send him back for training on the October 15th puppy truck. Just one more puppy meeting for Casey, Radison and Kasha. Boy lots of big changes are coming to our club in the next few weeks.

Casey & Waffle Farewell Party

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Invite for Waffle’s & Casey’s Farewell Party

We have the tradition to have a Farewell Party the Sunday before each of our puppies gets on the truck. Since Waffle is transferring to the high school program on Saturday and Casey gets on the truck a couple of weeks after that we decided to combine the two parties together. It is just a relaxed fun time where friends, family and especially kids from the neighborhood and play with the pups and see them in their home environment. We had a card to sign for each of the girls. Usually we have a guess the puppy name contest but since we don’t know what letter of puppy we are getting yet we had a vote for your favorite photo contest. We have an official puppy portrait wall and I had narrowed Waffle’s photo down to four and thought it would be fun for people to vote on which one they liked best. We had an obvious winner. So I uploaded it here because I didn’t get any photos take at the party.

winning Waffle portrait – taken by Lisa Thompson

Now I need to get this photo prepared to take to Pixels and have a canvas made for our wall. I don’t think I can get it back before she leaves but hopefully it won’t take too long to get done. Waffle is finally big enough to wear her big girl collar. The other pups have been able to wear it at 6 months but Waffle has such a skinny head that it could easily slip off. Our little girl is getting all grown-up and ready to leave the nest. Friday is going to come really fast I’m afraid. I wonder if it will be harder to had a puppy off to another raiser than it is to put them on the puppy truck back to Guide Dogs for the Blind.

Two Years Ago Today

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Beautiful Banta on the fresh green grass
It was two years ago today that we first met Banta. She came off the puppy truck with lots of attitude, ready to go out and explore the whole world. Though she was a challenge at times, there was a moment in those first couple of weeks that I saw a glimpse of the dog she could grow up to be. We so enjoyed her wonderful spirit and we know that you do to. Just wanted to let you know that we are thinking about the two of you especially on this day. I sent an email to her handler in honor of this day and here is some of what he said about Banta:
She still has the attitude that she probably had coming of the puppy truck. Boy, I am finding out how stubborn she can be. Now most of our challenges have to do with her stubbornness, and what I call retaliation for going where she may not want to go. For example, if she does not want to walk to the grocery store, she will make it a long, slow, and miserable walk. When she wants to work she is a star.  She is very destination oriented, which is good and bad. If we are somewhere new she targets every door she sees. She still makes me laugh when she is happy and jumps off the curb and I can feel her bouncing up and down as she walks. She is a lot of fun to play with, but again only how and when she wants.
It is fun to get news of how she is doing. He really understands that sweet and spicy girl. I’m so glad for the good match they are for each other. They have been working together for about four months now. Time sure goes by fast these days.

Waffle Gets Fixed

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Waffle getting snuggles from Bill at the vet

Today was the day that Waffle was scheduled to get spayed. Last night she got home from the puppy swap and seemed extra thirsty. She went into the bathroom and drank out of the toilet which she has never done before. So we gave her some extra water. She wasn’t suppose to eat or drink after midnight. I meant to make sure the toilet lid was down if this was a new trend she wouldn’t have access to it this morning. But somehow I forgot. And she went straight to the toilet this morning and snuck in about 3 laps. I was sure we would have to reschedule her surgery but they said it would be fine. When I was unpacking her bag from the puppy swap we figured out why she was so intent on getting water. It appears that she didn’t get fed before she was return last night from the puppy swap and we didn’t realize it. Because there was a baggie with one of her meals in it. Poor Waffle. Her tummy was so empty and she wanted to fill it with something so she went after water. I felt so bad because we couldn’t feed her breakfast because of the surgery.

Bill took her to Cottonwood Animal Hospital on his way to work. It took awhile because there were so many other dogs waiting to check in too. This afternoon Dr. Porter called and said that everything went well. I was glad to hear that. Then this evening the three of us (me, Bill and Casey) went to visit Waffle. She was a little groggy but she was happy to see us and went spent about a half an hour or so give her loves and cuddles. The labradoddle in the next kennel wanted some attention too but I couldn’t do much for him through the door of the kennel. Casey didn’t like it if I gave Waffle too much attention so Bill did most of the real cuddling with Waffle. Finally we put Waffle back in the kennel and headed home. Waffle was not happy about being left behind and made her feelings known. We get to pick her up anytime after 10 a.m. tomorrow and she will hang out with Bill at work because I need to go to Provo tomorrow and have other errands to run.

Four Blabs (Black Labs)

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Radison, Clifford, Casey and Hallie on the deck

Today we had four black labs at our house for a few hours. In addition to Radison and Hallie we have been puppy sitting Clifford while the Johnson’s are out of town for a few days. Then we added Casey. She has switched to Lisa’s house for last half of the swap. Lisa has been wanting to take Casey one last time before she goes back and Lindsey is really busy and having two dogs means that one of them has to be home in the kennel for extended periods of time. So it works out perfect. But Lisa was going to the temple with her family today and that is the one place that she can’t take Casey with her. So she dropped her off here. It was fun to see one of our little girls for a few hours. It was also fun to have four crazy black labs all in the same place.

Waffle

We got news about Waffle’s future today. The rumor had been going around that she wouldn’t be transferred to the high school program until the next puppy truck could bring the school dogs from Colorado in the middle of October. But we got word today that no the transfer will happen on September 30th. That is less than two weeks away. The morning after Waffle gets back from the puppy swap she is going in to be spayed. The recovery is 5 to 10 days. Then it will only be a few days after that until she will be transferred. Wow that is going to come fast.

Week Long Puppy Swap

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Waffle and Casey in the kitchen

Today was the start of a week long puppy swap involving all the puppies in the club. Casey went to spend the week with Lindsey for evaluation since she will be returning to guide dogs soon. And Waffle went to the Allegra’s to be handled by the youngest member of our club Ceely. We are going to miss our two sweet girls. A week is a long time to be away from them. Waffle is as tall as Casey now and she will probably be taller when she gets back. He neck and head are so small still that the adult dog collar still slides off her head.

Radison and Hallie sharing the same doggy bed

We brought home Radison who is about 10 days older than Casey. We have puppy sat Radison a couple of times before so it was fun to have her back. Lauren, Radison’s raiser made sure that I knew that Radison needs cuddle time every night before she goes to bed. Radison has a cute little white patch on her chest. Our second pup is Hallie who is one of the younger puppies in the club. Interestingly Hallie is Banta’s half sister having the same dad. They seem to be good pups and are getting along better with each other than I thought they might.

Casey

Also I took Casey into the vet to day to get her Rabies booster and her other annual vaccinations. We are suppose to go ahead and do these if they are due more than a month before recall. Casey’s are due 2 days more than a month so I went ahead and took care of them. When I weighed her she was just 48.8 lbs. I knew that she had lost weight (which she needed to do) but I hadn’t realized that she was below 50 lbs. now. She really isn’t a very big girl.

Utah State Fair

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Waffle and the sheep

The Utah State Fair was our outing today. This was Casey’s second time to the State Fair as we took her and Banta last year. She handled everything very well but couldn’t care less about the animals. Waffle was a different story. She found the animals very interesting and some of them were equally intrigued by her too. She did great with them and remained very calm. The rest of the fair was a different matter. Waffle had several panic attacks where she would bolt to the end of the leash with her tail between her legs and spin around when she got to the end. We couldn’t pinpoint what was scaring her but after a few moments of having her just stand quietly she would be ready to move on. Our best guess is that it was some kind of sound she was reacting to. We didn’t stay too long after Waffle started having trouble because it was clear that she had had enough.

Healing Fields

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Waffle and Bill walking through the Healing Fields

Today we took the girls to the Healing Fields in Sandy. It is right by Bill’s work and it is a fun opportunity to expose the pups to lots and lots of flags. Plus it is a neat thing to experience all the flags, each one representing a person who was killed on September 11, 2001. This year each flag had a tag attached to it with the name and a short bio of each person. The flags were also group by the location where they died.

Puppy Number Five

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When I talked to our CFR last week she told me there were no ‘d’ or ‘e’ puppies available for the October puppy truck so we decided to wait until the November truck and hope for the best. Well I got a call today from our club leader and she said that Barb had check on the younger puppies and there are no ‘d’ or ‘e’ litters for that truck either but that she had a yellow lab female that she would really like to get placed in a home next week, would we be interested. Wow! Part of the reason for waiting was because I have a couple of big projects one of which has to be done by November 15th. So after some thought, prayer and discussion I call Lindsey back and told her we would take a new puppy next week. The only other thing we know about her is that she is from a ‘y’ litter. So know we starting to guess on what her name will be. Hopefully she will be a good puppy and it won’t be to difficult to get my projects done and take care of a new little girl. So one week from today puppy number five will be joining our family.

Swiss Days Outing

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We packed up the girls this morning and drove up to Heber Valley to attend Swiss Days. I thought it would be a good opportunity to experience some new things. We park at an area they had set up in a field and rode a shuttle bus to the festivities. There were so many people it was amazing. We brought Apex here a couple of years ago but it wasn’t nearly this crowded. Casey did great but Waffle had a couple of fear reactions. One was walking by the bus. But mostly she did just fine.