#100DaysofTEAM
Day 39
Sei and I worked hard on engagement homework this morning while Perrin and I tried linking some of the retrieve bits together out in the driveway. I love how excited he gets about his retrieve 
Engagement
Training Log – October 1, 2018
#100DaysofTEAM
Day 35
First day of the October FDSA term! Sei and I are in Engagement at gold, so there will be quite a lot of that for the next 6 weeks. Today Sei and I did engagement for our class (his pivot pot was actually being used for bread baking, so I had to chose something else!).
Perrin and I worked on go arounds…with a toy! My toy dismissing puffin worked for a ball! Enthusiastically! He is adorable ❤
Training Log – September 15, 2018
#100DaysofTEAM
Day 19
I tried two run throughs with Sei today. The first one we had a platform malfunction (my top layer came off), and then I messed up the order. The second one went alright. I am holding my arms wrong for the fronts, but we got all the way up to the back-up before an NY in Sei’s behaviour. And look at that pivot! The beginning of that pivot felt terrible, but it looks alright on video. After this I did some work on his Go Arounds, because that seemed like a fundamental misunderstanding (where as the back up was more of a misalignment on my part).
I was also going to work with Perrin on a run through, but he just wasn’t feeling it today. It was already really hot by 9am. So we just did a few things he knows. I really have to get his platform fixed up so that it won’t slide. Putting the yoga mat under it won’t work for actual run throughs. I hate having to move it.
Training Log – September 13, 2018
#100DaysofTEAM
Day 17
Kind of feeling down about dog training today, so we just played together and worked on engagement. Perrin’s was the kind we can use for TEAM, Sei’s was more boogey-dog style, but his was a great session in its own right! No longer feeling down about training 🙂
Training Log – September 9, 2018
#100DaysofTEAM
Day 13
Perrin’s day off yesterday seemed to have refreshed him. He had been having difficulty with the transition from Back Up to the Vertical Target, so that was what we planned on working on. But he nailed it! So I just kept going. And we made it to the end! COLD! No pre-practice or prior attempts. Some mistakes on the human end (putting the cone in the wrong place, switching between two differently sized dogs is hard for my poor brain), but Perrin definitely understood each exercise. I guess we truly are at the point of just trying to put it all together now!
I tried using Sei’s original platform today. We have been using Perrin’s and it is really too big for Sei. He had some difficulty finding Front in the beginning, but he is starting to figure it out. I am having some difficulty figuring out where to put the platform for each exercise so that the camera angle is right, so Sei and I experimented with the first 5 exercises to try and get that sorted out.
Training Log – September 3, 2018
#100DaysofTEAM
First day back at home in a month. Among the other challenges living here presents, I have to get a feel for these spaces again and how to best organize things for TEAM. I also have some different props we have to get used to again.
Day 7
Sei learned his pivots on a pot while we were at home, so I decided to see how that transferred back to the normal prop I used for pivots. It is much shorter, so I wanted to see how that went. I decided to work on a pivot refresh, and exercise pair 1 & 2.
All three of us struggled with this today. Perrin’s enthusiasm led to the disc not staying in place and non-straight heel positions, Sei got super confused about pivoting with me vs sitting on ‘find heel’, and I have a bad attitude about working here. That led to the 1 & 2 exercises being a mess. I just cut my losses, gave the dogs a cookie, and I will regroup tomorrow.
Next time I will try using the platform for the Find Heel rather than the pivot platform to hopefully clear up the confusion for the dogs.
Adventures in Dog Training 