Happy Birthday, Yancie!

Yancie is the big 7! She is the only one of her siblings to have graduated as a service dog and I couldn't be prouder of my "psycho puppy". She is from a litter that was bred from Guide Dogs for the Blind in San Rafael. She was the pick of the litter and brought to CCI. One of her sisters went on to be a breeder for GDB.

She is such a love bug and hope she is having the best birthday with Jessie and Gayla. She lives near San Jose and I get to here from her often.

Happy Birthday, Boo Bear! I love you!

Genevieve's Report

Genevieve is in Advanced Training right now and I FINALLY got her progress report! (I asked for it after a while and they found it. :eyeroll:)

She is doing great though! Woo. They say she is highly motivated. (That dog would run into high traffic for a treat.) She has "low response" to "novel stimuli". Really? Once you've lived in my house for a few months and done everything she's done there's nothing that shocks you after a while. LOL. She is still up for a breeder and is in good health. She doesn't like correction but that's normal to me, she's a sensitive dog. She also plays well with others! I don't think any of my dogs have been marked "plays well with other dogs" in the first report. I think it's because I don't let them play with other dogs a lot because I don't have many dogs in the area that I trust. Now that I have Belle though she helps determine polite play for the puppies.

Belle is doing great and Weather is just excited to be alive. I don't think that dogs tail EVER stops wagging. It's odd.

Weather graduated from "Petsmart" last week. I take her there for socialization and she gets to work around other dogs. However, she trains at a totally different level than the other dogs. I think I will enroll Belle in the next course so that Wei-Wei has someone else who trains at her level. One cool thing they do is they give us a little hat to "graduate" with. She's cute right? And, of course, she is the most compliant dog about wearing the hat.

I am also growing plants! I am working on making the backyard more dog friendly. Here's my gnome guarding my little plants.

Wei-Wei and Beana update!

Wei-Wei (aka Weather) is now 5 months old and very excited about that fact. She continues to be a sweet and cuddly puppy who loves to please. She's a little unsure of herself but doing well overall.

Somedays she loves her cow and will spend a lot of time sucking on it, much like her half-brother Pismo.

Other times... her cow is put in time out. She purposefully strode over there, set her cow down, and went back to her bed. I still don't know what the cow did.

Her water bowl is a source of fascination.

Belle is growing into an elegant dog and she still plays very nicely with her stuffies. One day I'll put up the videos of her doing her extra tricks. She has finally mastered opening the fridge and is currently working on pulling open the backdoor. That has become a useful trick with all the work I do back there. And of course the ever useful "fetching the remote".

Belle may not have liked her in the beginning but she likes her much more now.

EMS Introduces Trained Dogs to Cut Costs

Canines have been used for police work, search & rescue, tracking, service dogs, and a variety of other tasks. Now they’re assisting EMS and doing so at a much lower cost.

See their new employees at work!

Breathe, damn you, breathe!

There's your laugh for the day.

Taken from Just One More Pet.

Quick Trip to Disneyland

Last Wednesday, my mom decided that we needed to take the world's quickest trip to Disneyland. We took my visiting cousins, grandma, and two dogs. While on the trip we celebrated Ava and Sammie's birthdays. They were both excited to wear their "Happy Birthday" buttons and get many comments from cast members throughout the weekend. I guess we could call this trip a "Princess Trip" but with me on it? Not really.

I was excited to find out that these kids were brave ones. They were ready to completely skip the "baby" rides for the big ones like Big Thunder and Space Mountain. The first ride, as always, was Pirate's of The Caribbean. Then we moved over to Big Thunder. The kids were sad to see that the Matterhorn had closed.

See what you did Disneyland? You made a little girl sad! And on her birthday weekend! Her sister is not a good actress and could not stop smiling.

All of us on Space Mountain, Sam hadn't arrived yet. Notice their hands up?

After a few more rides, we rode the top story of the Omni bus around the park.

After a break at the hotel, we went over to Disney's California Adventure.

On the first day, we went on the Hollywood Tower of Terror. The girls still didn't love the ride but went on it without crying or complaint. That's all I ask.

After riding, we went over to California Screamin' and Ava, despite her initial fear, loved it. The photo we had was of her looking over at me, asking if she could "do it again!" We went on a few more rides before heading back to the hotel. We met some online friends too.

We went to Club 33 for lunch and it was very good and had the same great server from last time. The kids (grandma and mom too) were very well behaved.

Ava was so surprised by her birthday cake, to share with Sam. The look on her face was so worth it. They blew out the candles and the poor waiter kept trying to keep them all lit while we sang to the kids. When asked who deserved the biggest of the little slices, Josie raised her hand. LOL.

Belle up on the Club balcony.

Up in Club 33 the girls took a picture in front of Walt's picture of him in the club.

We went on a few rides.

We went on several rides throughout the day before I headed back to the hotel for a short break and it began to downpour. I headed back out and met the family in DCA for 3 rides in a row of California Screamin'.

Another great picture after getting off of the Jellyfish Jumper. The excitement on Josie's face was worth it to endure that mild humiliation. She thought it was a great ride.

We went back over to Disneyland to ride a few more rides but we eventually headed home.

While waiting for the Club to send out cake to City Hall, the girls went over to get a picture with Mickey and Minnie.

On the last day of the trip, we decided to make that day a "shopping day". I stayed on Main Street, with it's light traffic and quiet atmosphere, Weather would get an experience. It was a quiet morning so she went. She was beautifully behaved and had a great time. We went into two stores and she kept her nose to herself and even laid down while I browsed.

This is her first of many entrances into the park.

The most interesting things Weather saw were two ducks and the horse. She was very good at just watching them walk on by. She was curious but sat and watched quietly.

We walked down to the castle to take the picture and then went back to Main Street.

On our way out of the park, we saw Cruella DeVil and I just had to stop to take a picture. Weather, of course, never meets an enemy.

A few photos...

Well, she's made it. My two previous dogs that didn't graduate had given me a call by now. Zastrow for medical problems and Pismo for behavioural issues (I saw that one coming from 10 weeks old ;-} ). The other three went all the way. I got the letter stating that she was having fun and who her trainer was. I forgot to mention in my last post that I received a great compliment at graduation, an acclaim that I raised the best dogs, LOL, and that I should write a book.

These are a few photo's of Genevieve's favorite things...

Her kennel... This is her squeezing into Wei Wei's kennel.

Her bowl... She walks around looking like she's asking for donations.

Running around outside... as long as it's not raining, muddy, or too hot. She is a Diva.

Laying on Belle's tushie...

Sleeping and wearing her sweatshirt... She gets cold easily.

Her bowl and swimming across the floor... She will get on her back and wiggle across the floor. It is very odd.

Her black Kong that she destroyed... and her bowl is nearby.

The best thing ever: sleeping, Belle's tushie, and her bowl nearby. She's an odd one.

Genevieve's Turn In

Genevieve's turn in was a week ago and, of course, it was another difficult turn in. It was another rip-my-heart-out blast. They are never easy and don't get easier with time. She was very well behaved and has proven to me with her maturity that she was ready to move on. It doesn't make me miss her any less though.

I brought Weather (aka Wei Wei) with us. She was by far the cutest puppy there! It shocked me how big Wei Wei is sitting next to Diva. They are about twenty five pounds apart in weight! That's it!

Isn't she adorable?

While there I spotted Yancie's brick! Genevieve sat right on it, I'd never seen it before.

Aren't they cute?

On our tour of the CCI kennels, we found out who Diva's room mate would be. So I searched and didn't find the dog amongst the tour groups, but miraculously she was sitting across from us in the graduation auditorium! How fortuitous! Her name was Marilyn, she looked a little like Belle so I thought that might be of some comfort to Diva.

I was also summarily impressed by the kennels. I have heard of them but after 7 dogs have never toured them. They had a great kitchen, raised beds for the dogs, bathing rooms, and just an overall impressive facility. I've never been farther than the offices so it was nice to see. It was funny to think that each of my puppies had gone through that bathing room and vet's office. Their vet's office is in a whole other league.

Also at graduation was Lacey, Caren and I didn't know we would both be there so missed out on meeting. That really depresses me, I wish I had asked her. ::sigh:: I would have loved to see Lacey.

This is Genevieve's slide show photo. Her baby one and one of us in Club 33 with Mickey and Pluto (some of her best friend's at Disneyland).

I managed to contain my complete breakdown until I got to the car. I didn't want Diva to worry. The last I saw of her she was leaping to go with a trainer. I saw her roommate turn in right before her so she wasn't alone in her kennel at least.

I can't wait until they see her start stacking the metal bowls. She does not like eating on tile or concrete and will pick her bowl up to move it. She has figured out how to put them together and take them apart. They started releasing dogs from training yesterday so that gives me some hope for her. She wasn't tossed right away. Diva has some mild fear issues but she recovers really well. Sunke had less fears but he had a harder time recovering so we'll see how it goes.