Tag Archives: positive reinforcement training

up north in Alaska!

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It’s workshop season! And what a great start. A trip up north to Anchorage and Wasilla for a variety of topics, freestyle, cross training, team success and treibball. Ask anyone who wants to book me, it takes a lot to get me to leave home. But in this process of prying me away from my comfort, I seem to almost always love every minute, and meet some of the nicest people, from literally all over the world.

I love giving workshops, I love teaching, and sharing, and learning from those I am teaching. It is truly a full circle experience. The bonus to working with such a group of talented folks is that the level at which you can teach is that much higher, and the conversations that much better. Working with talent is always a gift in my opinion.

The groups I worked with in Alaska were so deeply involved in the dog world in one way or another, or another, or another! Mushing, dock diving, obedience, tracking, agility, SAR, hunting. Talented and committed.

The Alyeska Canine Trainers club in Anchorage have an amazing facility. Karen gave me the early morning tour, lucky me! And we tried to use it all, but it is huge. I would be lying if I didn’t say I had facility envy on some level. Folks came from all over Alaska, even Juno. When I asked Martha how she got to Anchorage, she looked at me quizzically and said, “you either fly or swim really hard” and then she had a great laugh!

I was fortunate to get some time watching the Alaska Dogs Gone Wild Fly Ball Team, and to visit the Alaska K9 Aquatics center.

Dinners, driving up the Cooke Inlet to the Alyeska ski resort, which by the way was the only 1 hour of sun I saw while I was there, and then off to Wasilla for a Monday Treibball workshop!

The photos can do the rest of the talking. Awesome all the way around! Just click on the photo to enlarge and follow the arrows.

Thank you Karen and Claudia for arranging everything and taking such good care of me! Nancy

there doesn’t seem to be a correlation …?

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I’ve had the funniest morning. Not necessarily ‘hahaha’ funny, maybe, but more of a curious and curiouser kind of morning.

While I was out and about doing errands I found myself in a conversation with someone. It was light and airy, nothing too deep. My training business logo is pretty much on every jacket and sweater I own, but since they have been there for nearly 10 years, sometimes I forget that I’m branded.

Paws and People logoThis person pointed to my logo and said, “boy I bet they get a lot of yoga people for clients”. Without explaining that this was in fact my business, I simply said “huh, why do you think that?” And without even stumbling for words, which I think I would have done if I were in the other persons shoes, “well you know, it’s all that touchy stuff, all about the body and meditating and being nice, no meat, save the dolphins, ride your bicycle, recycling, being nice to the planet stuff. And if you are giving dogs treats and talking about their feelings, and being nicer, and don’t raise your voice, which is what that business does, WELL, it’s pretty much the same thing.”

I did laugh, audibly, maybe a bit too much actually. I had no response, none. How do you do a quick and witty come back to something so similar to a SNL skit. Every generalization, and assumption in the book, yet no correlation, and this person took them self pretty seriously, factually even. Has the human race peaked, or was I meant to stumble upon this person?

So through the rest of the morning I have been thinking, a great deal, about how people treat their animals, and does it in fact dictate, correlate, with their life style?

I don’t think it does, at all. I truly believe it is the core of the person, the character, the moral compass with in. Whether we are born with this knowingness or learn from those around us, I don’t know. The outward lifestyle, in my experience does not translate into how someone will treat an animal.

I’ve had  tattooed, motorcycle mechanics, with a huge beards come in with their sweet little puppies, bags full of treats, and train with complete devotion and tenderness.

Men and women handlers/cowboys. Dirt, jeans, scruff, huge trucks, ropes, sometimes guns. Bulls and rams that need to be moved, and they work with grace, and understanding and efficiency. And they sometimes worship and stand in awe of their dogs and their abilities.

I’ve watched teenage handlers, braces, pigtails, nice button down shirts, hang their dogs on pinch collars to get them to sit.

I’ve had 20 something year old boys, who are into the cool, fast, and adventurous life style, take the time to train their puppy with kindness and love. Even buying a cute pink harness.

I’ve had yoga instructors come to train with me who think nothing of slapping on an electric shock collar on their dog when running off leash on trails.

I’ve seen scotch drinking Grandpa’s train their little dogs with such love, patience, and acceptance of mistakes. And I’ve seen sweet apron wearing Grannies chuck their dogs across a room when a down wasn’t perfect enough.

I’ve experienced Mom’s of young children who are devoted to parenting, being there for every moment, and providing an enriched environment, move their dogs to the yard because they can’t be bothered. Move as in, never in the house again.

I’ve watched organic gardeners who reuse, recycle, and renew for the earth, put their dogs in small pens with electric fencing all the way around, and feed them food with no more nutritional value than a leather boot.

I have stood behind people at COSTCO with a shopping basket filled with every organic product in the store for humans, and on the bottom of the shopping cart is a giant bag of cheap crappy dog food, and a bag of chemically laden rawhide chews. Just because someone is doing right for the humans in the family, does not mean they know anything about dog health or nutrition.

There is no correlation that I have found between someones chosen life style, appearance, or health choices, and how they treat animals.

As for me, I’m most certainly not a perfect person, and I don’t think I would fit a persons ‘description’ of what a reward based trainer should look or act like. So if you should run into someone with a jacket with our logo on it, it might be me. I’m tall, sturdy, and direct. I drink wine, I laugh from deep inside, and I dress semi homeless when I’m working. I enjoy people from all walks of life, I have opinions, and I read a lot. I like jokes that are outside of politically correct. I eat healthy food, and I eat fast food french fries because they rock! I love dog sports and training for the highest level of competition. And I treat animals with respect and kindness … from deep inside of me, because that is where the feeling comes from.

Cheers, Nancy

can’t trick a trickster!

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Being open, observant, and creative when training is so important. So important. But even so, every once in a while, a puppy will come along and teach me a new way of looking at something, and I get to see life through new eyes. I don’t think there is anything more refreshing than being ‘schooled’ by a puppy! It keeps me very honest.

So, we were teaching ‘touch’ in my tricks workshop. Blue ‘X’ on hand, ball, wall, door, floor, etc. Generalizing touch, and using it for various applications. All of the dogs were having fun finding the blue X’s, touch + YES = reward… Woop! fun, fun, fun.

Little Riffle, a six month old Portuguese Water Dog, who has been through a variety of our classes and is really fun to work, touched a few times, and then lay down to watch the other dogs. If I could have set a bucket of popcorn and soda next to her, it would have truly been like she was at the movies, 3D glasses would have made it complete! She enjoyed watching the other dogs more than working, or perhaps that was her work?! She wasn’t casually glancing, she was taking note, and watching carefully.

When we were ready to take a break, she went around and started ripping/peeling everyone’s X’s off the wall, off the ball, and off the doors. Systematically. Peel it off, drop it, move on to the next. She had taken note of where each one was. I watched.

This little trickster had seen something totally different in this ‘trick’ than what we were seeing and practicing. My definition/criteria for this trick was, nose on X with a bit of pressure. That was not hers. I still wonder if she didn’t just take pity on the other dogs for getting this ‘touch trick’ wrong, and went around to show then the ‘right way’, duh?!

We saw this, an X on a door with blue painters tape -

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Little Riffle saw this -

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I was inspired to see where we could take this trick, morph it, and put it on cue. Her owner was at first a bit frustrated that she wasn’t ‘touching’, but quickly said, “yes, let’s try something new with this tape trick”.

So we went into my office and lined the wall with strips of painters tape, and tipped or rather peeled back a bit of the edge -

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This is her first go with this new trick, PEEL. Keep in mind, her first go at it! She ended up doing five full rows in about a 10 minute period. And each repetition became more and more accurate.

This young puppy had such amazing persistence and perseverance for this game, or rather, new trick.

But I think what we all learned was, sometimes what we see and ask, is not what the puppy see’s and hears, at all. If there is no openness to change things up on the teaching end, then conflict and frustration can set in. There needs to be a mutual starting point. Sometimes we have to come at it together, start from a new angle, morph things a bit so learning can happen. And in turn, the relationship grows, because it’s being done together!

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Will this trick ever be applicable? Who knows, maybe opening presents and Christmas boxes for a commercial or movie, it would make a great trick. But maybe it is a trick for tricks sake. Building vocabulary, building a behavior, becoming a better teacher, creating a learner.

So here is to creative thinking, always learning, and trickster puppies!

Nancy

 

treibball workshop – so awesome!

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We had such an awesome treibball workshop today. Five teams, five different skill levels.

Because treibball can be such a strange concept to some handlers, and most dogs, it’s fun to take the time to go over what works and what doesn’t. We started today with ‘teacher/student’ work, and training each other. Great for timing, marking and learning how to communicate without a lot of clutter. Limit variables, ALWAYS limit variables.

One thing I have learned about treibball, or any sport for that matter, is to get rid of the variables when teaching new concepts. Hmmmm, did I just say that again? Create an environment where choices are limited, and both handler and dog can focus together.

Reward the behaviors you are looking for, ignore what you don’t want, and manage the environment. Training happiness, and treibball fun!

We had -

Zeus – the Rock Star Pug – he is our ‘border collie in the witness protection agency!’ He has as many if not more behaviors than most of the working dogs I know, and works as hard as his little body will let him!

Cate – The Grand Dame of the group, and one of the best hard pushers in Montana! Now to convince her owner that they should compete, hmmmmm

Edge – Baby girl at one year old, and she rocks this game. If she stays with it, everyone watch out! ‘The Force’ is with this girl!

Timbre – eager and awesome and wanting to work. She is as smooth as butter, fast, and lethal with distance.

Ruff – Two years ago all he wanted was to play with his friends, now he wants to play with his Mom with treibball! Distance, pushing, waiting… the whole package!

Bailey – the Bomb! That little tiny body carries a world of energy… blind finds, multiple balls, distance. Small but mighty!

 

being wrong … a great place to learn

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I’ve had a fortunate life when I consider all of the amazing teachers I have had the privilege to learn from. From formal school settings, to personal interest, to accidentally stumbling upon someone who taught me when I didn’t even know I needed a teacher! They have shaped the way I see my world, and how I act in it.

I was once told by someone, “if you can remember one sentence, just one, from every teacher you have ever had, or each lecture you have ever been too, you will be a very learned and wise person”. Sit on that for a moment, it’s incredibly sage advice.

When I was young I didn’t get to choose my teachers, they were given to me. Teachers who shared their love and fascination of Sasquatch, to Marine Ecology classes on Mexican beaches. Math teachers who pushed me because I loved it so much, to bookstore owners who fueled my desire to read everything. My track coach who taught me about potential, to wise Grandmas who taught me with very few words, about the world and life in general.

But recently, as in the last decade, I have been choosing my teachers, and choosing carefully. I have specific things I want to learn, and specific teachers I want to learn from. There is a certain freedom when we get to choose our teachers, more than I ever thought actually.

I made some time in my schedule and signed up for a class I had been looking at for a couple of years. Professionally and personally, I was really looking forward to the challenge. I bought three very thick and daunting books. And subsequently, reading glasses. Because there would be participants form all over the world, we set up a weekly conference call group. I studied, read, and tried applying what I was learning just to try and make sense of it all. I’m a visual learner, big time, theory only goes so far with me, I need to see it in action. During the conference calls we were all required to participate, weigh in, and answer certain questions. No lurkers. We were learning together.

Because of the subject matter, sometimes there wasn’t necessarily a right answer, but rather, several possible right answers, and enlightening, even heated, discussions. We were required to explain how we came to the answer we felt was correct.

On one occasion, my professor said, “please don’t feel the need to be right. Being wrong is OK. If you are wrong, I can teach you, and explain, and walk through it with you. We can discuss. Being right all of the time means there is very little discussion, and you won’t get a sense of the bigger picture.” I learned a lot in this class, a lot. But it is this statement that has stuck with me, and what I remember most.

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This is so applicable to our dogs and other animals living with us, maybe even more so.

Within a managed environment, teaching is what it is all about. And teaching really only happens when there is something to be learned. I have never looked for perfect or ‘always right’ dogs. If a dog doesn’t understand what I am trying to convey, then it is an opportunity for me to break the steps down, make it easier, and to really teach and share the bigger picture. We come at it together. It’s a process, and hopefully good for everyone involved.

Being wrong should not equal bad, when it is in the educational context. Being wrong should not warrant a correction or punishment. Being wrong is a heads up for me to be a better teacher, and to teach. Being wrong is a great place to learn.

Be kind, be thoughtful, and be a good teacher~ Nancy

10 year anniversary for Paws & People!

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As I get older there is something special about waking up and having a fresh start, but a fresh start that the whole world shares. Happy New Year to everyone!

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2013 marks Paws & People, LLC ten year anniversary! Lots of special activities happening this year, and a new focus for our future. I want to share some things I have learned over the years, I think it’s the best way to talk about this occasion …

I have learned that training is not business and business is not training. Each one needs to be nurtured in their own way in order to have success.

Believe in what you do, but be able to back it up with knowledge, passion, and experience. The more you learn, the more you do, the more you enjoy it, the more you can offer.

I have learned that when you work with people and dogs you need to remain open and honest with your mind, body, and words. You need to be the least confusing part of the puzzle.

Listen with open ears to what is being said, watch with willingness to what is going on, but believe and act on your educated instincts. Never negate those feelings, they are almost always correct.

If a person or dogs body language is closed and is telling you to stop, even though you may see half a smile or a little tail wag, stop, that is all the information you need.

I have learned that too much of a good thing is not always good. Always strive for balance in business, relationships, and training.

Always be curious. Always. It is a good way to keep passion in your business and training.

I have learned when another similar business opens in your area, and uses your business as their model, don’t be offended, but don’t take it as a compliment either, they are trying to use your success for their own gain. Imitators can imitate all they want, but it’s your passion for what you do that is the real success, and that can never be imitated.

Listen to music, good and varied music. It keeps the heart open, the body loose, and the environment fresh.

Learn to focus with distractions, it’s simply a reality.

I have learned that every business has a slow season. Allow this season with grace. Use it to renew, to relax, and to rejuvenate.

Allow people to thank you, and allow yourself to feel this honest gratitude.

I have learned that word of mouth is the best advertising for a business. You will continually attract people that you will enjoy working with. Always thank those with a ‘big mouth’!

It isn’t about the numbers game. Strive for quality of clientele, not quantity of clientele.

Guarantee nothing, to others, to animals, or to yourself. But rather support and coach with knowledge, skills, and creativity. This is important in business and training.

And sometimes, just like in daily life, in business you get knocked down, but you have to get up quickly. Take a deep breath and spring board forward. Don’t hang on to the dirt from falling, let it go.

Focus on the prize. Always. Put your blinders on to the fuzzy, distracting, often times negative stuff, and focus on what you want for your business. Let the other stuff go.

Being open with others does not mean that you lack boundaries. Allow everyone in your business and training programs to know your rules, protocols, and procedures. It keeps everyone honest, and know one has to guess.

I have learned if I am taking a deep breath, life is good and it is happening. Always breathe.

Drink tea.

If you need help with your business or training program, seek out a mentor or professional you respect. It will catapult you to the next level.

And after a while you hit your stride. It feels good, and smooth, and effortless. But I have learned that this is not the place to be complacent. This is the place to reevaluate your business, move forward, maybe choose a new focus, or add new programs. Shake things up for yourself, and your business. Hitting your stride is a platform in which to grow again.

I have learned that what started out as my business has grown into a family business. A dream.

I hope you can all be part of our anniversary year. With love and gratitude – Nancy

walking the Grande Dames

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How do you know when your teaching, training, and/or work has paid off with your dogs? How do you know when there is an understanding of a concept, or a behavior, important to the success of your team? How do you know when you and your dog have a mutual understanding, a relationship, a healthy functioning relationship?

This afternoon, when all seemed fairly quiet in the neighborhood, I decided to take the two Grande Dames for a walk. All three of us needed some fresh air, our legs stretched, and a bit of time together. Harnesses on, leashes clipped, poop bags in pocket, little baggy of left over turkey, coat, glasses, gloves, and ready to go!

I use to walk them together when they were much younger, but in recent years, I usually take one at a time, or one out with one of our male dogs. You see Franny and Ocean aren’t a good combination anymore, not in the past eight years anyway. They have had enough bad experiences while out on walks to last a life time. So they formed an alliance in a way, an alliance in the sense of, ‘take no crap!’ It’s like walking Dyna & Mite. Individually great, but together they can be fairly explosive, especially in an unstable environment, like in a neighborhood with off leash dogs. They really don’t want to engage with other dogs when out on a walk with me, and truly they just want to enjoy their time.

So off we went, it’s so special to walk with my girls, and I feel that every time I leave the house with them now. Franny has slowed way down, Ocean still has a great deal of pep in her walk. But they both enjoy sniffing and marking, and that we did!

Our walk was uneventful and relaxing the mile out from our house. Cool air, a bit of snow and ice on the ground, lots to smell. However, on the mile back things were a bit dodgy. I try to always take the path of least resistance. The girls, especially at their ages, don’t need any explosions, or the stress that comes with them. So we try to avoid conflicts. I will detour, wait, and sometimes even throw food at an on coming dog to keep them away from my girls.

So my original questions about “how do you know…?” Well, on our way home, the girls and I spotted two dogs behind a wood slat fence starting to fence run on our approach, and set up on us. Both girls stopped and looked right up at me! You could not wipe the smile off of my face. “Thank you” was the first thing that came out of my mouth, and then a piece of turkey for both girls. We crossed the street and kept walking, without conflict. When we crossed the street, a young black lab came roaring down it’s back deck stairs, into a yard, and right up to the fence we were just passing, and started to off load verbally on us. It caught us all off guard. Franny jumped sideways and went piloerect (and that was it which shocked me), Ocean gave that young dog a hard stare and low growl (and that was it which surprised me), then they both looked at me, “You two are freaking awesome today, thank you!”, a small piece of turkey and off we went, crossed back to the other side of the street once more.

I was so proud of my girls, and grateful for an almost conflict free walk. They had a lot of choices with the situations they were put in today. And it could have gone a totally different way. They have, enough times, made other dogs regret their choices for surprising them, again, when they are together it can be explosive.

We came home relaxed, happy, and filled with fresh air. These Grande Dames mean the world to me! May our walks continue …

Nancy

why I love treibball!

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Last year, the spring of 2011, I kept hearing about this new dog sport from Germany, something about urban herding, balls, goal keeping, etc. Everyone was spelling and pronouncing it a bit differently, lots of different opinions were floating around, good and bad, and I couldn’t seem to obtain clear information. In all honesty I wasn’t looking that hard, I was busy with other dog sports and family stuff. But it piqued my curiosity on some level.

I love YouTube for a lot of reasons; music, comedy, movies, and dog sports to name a few. Some of my good friends from various parts of the world I met through YouTube. One  evening I settled in with a glass of wine and searched for TREIBBALL. I was truly surprised how many videos came up. I watched about twenty videos before I came to one that made me smile and move in my chair, that is always a good sign by the way!

YES!

A woman, her dog, a soccer field, and a dozen or so exercise balls. I was hooked. I could sense that this was a team sport all the way around. And it only took this one VIDEO to turn me on to a new dog sport challenge. What I liked about this video was the trust at a distance, and that each team mate had a job and/or task to perform, independent of each other. I love, love, love freedom in training once there is a partnership and trust. For me it is being able to read each other, understand each other, and work through concepts together.

The history, where did it all start? Jan Nijboer, a German trainer came up with treibball, a combination of what he felt were complex behaviors that included soccer and herding skills. Mental and physical work for a dog. Today he runs the International Natural Dogmanship Center where he trains people to train their own dogs. Thank you Jan for your creative way of thinking!

I was looking for, and needed a breath of fresh air in my own personal training program, something to challenge me and add new skills. I also wanted to try a new sport that wasn’t concussive for my dogs,  and that all of my dogs could learn, even with their varying ages.

I am a visual learner. I can watch something, and in my brain, some place, it all makes sense. (OK, my neuropsychology friends, tell me why?) Dogs sports, cooking, knitting, gardening, but not carpentry. That my dear friends, I suck at!

So we went to work. We had a bunch of beach balls at home, the benefits of having kids. We also had a couple of exercise balls, the down side of aging and squeaky joints!

The kitchen, our favorite training ground is where we started touch on the ball. $eeker can be a bit grippy, so I wanted to make sure we had a solid foundation and new understanding of the balls purpose. Ocean has a HUGE fear of balloons, so this didn’t go well. I had to leave the balls out in the house and yard as ‘ornaments’ so to speak. I let her observe the other dogs practicing touch with the balls for a few days and asked nothing of her. When she was comfortable and offered a touch, we moved forward with that. Being able to observe was so helpful for her.

What hit me right away was that the balls were not the focus, the TEAM or handler/dog relationship was the focus. The balls were a way to access each other. I loved seeing that.

My dogs all have distance skills, or what we refer to as ‘go to’. Distance is different depending on the context of the task at hand. Whether it’s hiking, freestyle, agility, or games in the yard, ‘go’ means ‘keep going until you hear otherwise’. Distance is so fun to play with, and when you have distance combined with understanding of behaviors and vocabulary it’s feels like freaking magic! Here is a VIDEO of our distance/mat work that we play with all of the time. If your dog has a plethora of behaviors while performing in front of you, can they also do it 30,40, 50, 100 feet away? Fun all the way around.

Ah, the pushing. This was tricky at first as I had four dogs and four different styles of pushing. $eeker took to it like he had just stayed up all night and watched every treibball video on YouTube, AWESOME. Story was offended that I was asking him to move something with his face. He truly had a look of disgust when we practiced this. So I let him come at it his own way. He will push to get it rolling and them guide it with his chest. He wants to see me, and he wants his face off of the ball. He took the longest to learn this concept. Ocean was initially a light tapper, but once she got into it she knew instinctively how to guide and direct that ball right to me, my little perfectionist. Franny, well this is where her game stopped. Repetition and tasking are not her things. While she is still a great toucher when the ball comes out, she believes the ball should move on it’s own if the ball wants to move, she’s no baby sitter, and for sure no ball slave!

Then I started to put all of these skills together, and play, play, play -

  • go to mat
  • go to mat and lay down facing me
  • go to mat/down with duration
  • go to mat clockwise and counter clockwise
  • go to amt with balls all around the yard
  • touch ball
  • balance with ball, handler/dog opposite of each other
  • fun games in the garden with pushing and distance runs
  • playing new games with counter and clock outruns
  • playing games with ‘wait’
  • playing games with discrimination and multiple balls
  • playing games with directing the ball around objects
  • playing with blind finds
  • playing with control or driving the ball to the handler
  • changing up ‘push’ with ‘bring it’, ‘drive it’, ‘find it’
  • working on multiple ball brings before reward
  • games with more distance
  • keeping motivation high
  • short games at first
  • introducing balls on windy days
  • playing in all weather
  • games, games, games

I can say that out of all of the activities we do, my kids and husband love playing this with the dogs in the yard. The equipment, balls, are light and colorful and you can kick them to the other side of the yard for the next dog to bring in. They all love doing distance work, again it feels like magic. And the dogs love it!

I have quite a few VIDEOS logged on my own YouTube channel. Check them out if you love this sport!

For me, this sport has all of the components to be challenging, interesting, intense, and fun. I love that once I send my dogs out to their ‘place’ behind the balls, once they are released the game is theirs, making choices and decisions on their own to get the ball to me. Awesome! For my dogs, it allows me to see their abilities to solve concepts, reason, work through problem solving, work through frustrations, work as a team, and when finished have that look of being completely satiated! Woop!

Nancy, pushing on!

a recent session at our Dog Gym

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It’s kind of a relationship thing.

I work with my dogs every day, and work holds many definitions in our household. It can be any variety and/or combination of dog sports, hiking, yard work, fetch games, play with a purpose, family room tricks, nose work, find its, etc. Always varied, always creative, always something that my dogs and I look forward too. And it’s everyday. My dogs deserve this from me at the very least. Besides work being exercise that we all need, it is also glue for our relationship, relationship in motion so to speak.

Our YouTube channel NANCYSPORE has a glimpse into some of the things I do with my dogs, I think I have over 180 public videos posted on there. Some are for my own reference, some to support our clients during their classes, a few are tutorials, and some were posted because of a request to see something in action. I’ve loved doing all of them.

Anyhoo… here is one that I posted last night. A friend that I met on line a few years ago wanted to see what’s up with my training these days ... Happy to oblige, we had some fun!

Nancy, who is grateful for great partners!

 

 

dog tricks are fun to work on …

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… especially when there is house cleaning and yard work that needs to be done!

My two favorite training places are the kitchen and family room. And they become even a bit more favorite when the chores around the house pile up.

I’ve been working on, body work tricks, meaning my dogs using my body as a prop to work off of. We do some vaulting but not too much. Their size and their ages keep me from too much air born stuff.

I piled on the shirts, sweatshirts and extra thick socks. For those that vault and do body work tricks, you know why extra padding is a good thing. For those just starting, well, sometimes your dog will grip you so they don’t slide off. Skin melts like butter with powerful dogs. Just saying! Have fun but wear padding …

Today we were working on Hug From Behind, Hold the Hug, and Paws on Feet. Needless to say it was way too much fun … and the laundry is still waiting.

Nancy, have fun with your dog today!