Happy 2nd Birthday Cadbury!

Wow the little man is 2 today - the time has just flown by - blimey he was small in that picture - I could not get him to stay still so tied him to a bench to take his photo on one of his first ever walks!

I love the little furry scruffy chap to bits he really is so cute and so comical and the fact that he also enjoys his agility is a bonus.

He is currently asleep on my feet under the computer chair - bless him. They broke the chocolate mould after this one was born and I am very lucky that he is my little chocolate dream.

Another Cancelled Agility Show

What a shame Derby Show is cancelled. I was looking forward to Judging and had spent some time planning my courses, this was the 3rd time they had asked me - the previous 2 years I had reasons I could not Judge there and this year I said Yes and show is cancelled due to a flooded venue - which of course is the most sensible decision for the club to make.

Also Fleet was due to be in the Adams Derby Final (for those who have not seen it a Power and Speed for Large "Novice" Dogs) and not being the sort of person to qualify for loads of finals I was really looking forward to this and was very proud of Fleet that he qualified. Maybe the Final will be re-scheduled :) Photo below is Fleet in the Final last year (he came 10th with one goony moment!)

I have loads of things to catch up on at home and will take the dogs for some nice long walks. Roger is at the Agility Club Show on Saturday - I had entered JaiJai and Josie there for him as he is due to Judge the Finals of the Easter Celebration Gamblers and Power and Speed. He will just go and run JaiJai as Josie has been in season the last few weeks. I was asked on Thursday evening if I would like to go and spend the weekend ring managing at the Agility Club Show as someone who was due to couldn't as they had a back back, I declined as going and watching other people run their dogs when I would like to run mine just did not appeal!

Digit the Smart Car

This is not really Cadbury related but he has been in my car! In fact I can fit a cage in the boot area big enough to hold both poodles - but its really not big enough for my collies!

Where I work at Police HQ the parking is very difficult with cars everywhere and not enough spaces and so having a very small car seemed a good idea so about 4 years ago I bought a Smart Car. These cars have to have a name (it says so on the websites I visited!) so mine is called Digit, getting the name as his colour is called numeric blue as he is covered with numbers.

Today Digit had to go to the garage to have a service, MOT and a few other bits done - blimey the bill was £696 !!! Ah but Digit is worth it as it is much easier to park at work and he gets me safely to work from Farnham to Guildford every day! Here is Digit:-

Newlands Part Two

Yippeeee the Show was able to go ahead, the main field was rested for the rest of Friday and all day Saturday with no vehicles driving on it and we only had a little more rain and it dried out really well. On Saturday we even carried all the Premier equipment from the hard standing to the 7 rings to save the ground from their 4x4's.

I help in the Secretaries area in the barn and do nearly all the announcements- I used to get cross that people made very poor attempts at the dogs names so I got the job!

Very pleased for our Blogger friends that did well especially Nancy and Niamh with a 1st, 2nd and 3rd and going up into Grade 6, Bernadette with Hex and Zen getting 1sts and other places and Lisa and Chi with a 2nd and Karen and Corrie with a 3rd and Lian and Saturn for 5th x 2.

Roger got 7th in Grade 3 Agility with JaiJai so he was pleased.

My dogs did not get to see me that much and I felt bad about this and it was rather a surprise to me that I did ok with them, a couple of courses I did not walk and others I only whizzed round once as I just happened to be nearby.

This was Cadburys first show in Grade 4 - it did not really make a difference to his Sunday classes as they were Jumping and Agility Combined 3-5 - he did a lovely run in the Jumping and came 2nd - the Agility I was a little unsure how to handle the part after the weaves as I had rushed to do the run and was last to go and had no-one to watch and I think I made him pop out the last weave so I just took my own line to the finish.

Rip bless him came 2nd in Veteran Jumping and and little red boy Fog came 6th. Jaf had a nice clear in the 3-5 Small Jumping.

Fleet was a very good big red dog with no "goony" moments - he came 7th in Grade 5 Jumping and just knocked a pole in his agility and he came....1st in the Grade 5 Helter Skelter - it really was not a Fleety course - lots of switch behinds and call over jumps which can turn him into a barking spinning dog - I was very proud of him :) He last won a class in July 2006 (a Novice Jumping). The course is below as best as I can remember it (thanks Lian yep just click on the course to make it bigger!)




All the organisers were very tired and I sat at work on Monday (luckily its my short day at work!) willing my shift to end so I could go home and chill out! We normally train on a Monday, but not the night after the show so it was nice to spend an evening at home.

Busy time and Newlands Part One

It has been a busy time recently with the preparations for Newlands Show. We were doomed with the weather and it was a very difficult decision to have to cancel firstly the camping and then the first day of the show, but by doing this we did manage to have the Sunday of the show.



Above is Foggy wondering why his Veteran Jumping course was looking a bit wet! No animal was harmed in the taking of the photo (i.e. he stood in the puddle of his own free will..!!)



Above is rain water pouring into the barn - while the men had to lift the fridges onto pallets to keep them out of the water and they put straw bales up against the door to try and stop the water!

To continue in part two!

Rugby

Was a nice show with great weather. I really enjoyed the courses - not meaning that I got loads of clears or places just that I stood on the start line and felt we could get round!

Fleet got a 4th in a part of 1-5 Jumping (with a twizzle), Cadbury had a 4th in 1-5 Agility on the Saturday and a Clear in a speedy 1-5 Jumping. Sunday Cadbury came 3rd in 1-5 Jumping and had a messy clear in 1-7 Agility. The trophies are really fab at Rugby "Majestic Crystal" so it was brill that Cadbury took a Rugby Trophy home with him (I must take some photos of Cadbury and his rosettes/trophies). Rip got a place in Anysize. Roger had no clears but his dogs worked ok.

What was really nice was that all the rings had finished by the Champ Final so loads of people were able to sit round the ring and watch. The Small CC was won by Nicky and her ickle OBay Sheltie Indy and Bernadette and Zen winning the Medium CC - an Obay double - I joked to Bernadette that she should breed large dogs to get the treble!

Mark Douglas and the lovely Ruby won the large CC and we celebrated with them and others till very late zzzzzzz

Below is the 1-5 Medium Jumping (as best I can remember) that Cadbury came 3rd in - it was a really interesting course. If anyone knows how I can make the course bigger please tell me!

Wellingborough/St Edwards

Wellingborough was a nice show - they are a friendly bunch and they play music over the PA all day, no places for Cads but he did some good bits just making baby errors. Fleet had a 6th in 1-7 Tunnel vision (what a fun course!) and a 9th in 3-5 Agility. Rip got 3rd in Anysize and Fog 4th. I ran Josie and JaiJai who did not go clear but both did some nice bits.

St Edwards - Blimey it was hot today - strange UK weather - its either raining or hot!

The Mediums had 4 runs which was really nice but......3 of the runs clashed badly and with not huge numbers it was then very hot and hectic! Cadbury got a 4th in Medium 1-3 Combined Agility, he seemed a bit worried on the up plank of the dogwalk for some reason and kept stopping, he is not a worrier normally so it was a bit weird but he seemd ok on the dog walk in his other class later. He also got a 3rd in Medium 3-5 Combined Agility - really pleased with this run as Simon Chandler set a course needing some handling and what I planned worked ok! Then an E in the next jumping run at a confusing bit of the course for us both!! On the 3rd run in a row Cadbury went on strike in the weaves!

Roger had a star red dog as he got a 3rd in Grade 3 Agility with JaiJai and with Josie 16th in G4-5 Jumping.

I had fun in the Anysize as I had 3 dogs entered and took them all to the ring (and groom Roger!) normally I just have 2 (Rip and Fog) but so Jaf did not feel left out as there were no small dog classes I entered him as I knew he would not be taking a place from dogs who normally run in anysize but for him he did a really nice clear and Rip came 2nd and Fog came 13th.

Tonight I was sat wondering how many points Cadbury had towards his Silver Agility Warrant (although I have not yet sent off for the Bronze which he got enough points for at the end of May) so I added up the points and am very proud of him as he now has enough points for his Silver Agility Warrant - bless him :)

Barrow

Barrow started on Friday at 10am (what a nice time for a show to start!), there had been very heavy rain over the Thursday night but the ground at the showground had held up well.

Friday - there were some really nice courses today - not easy peasy or anything just that all the ones I ran in seemed about right for the level - Cadbury got 3rd in Medium 1-4 Combined Jumping, and 7th in Medium Combined 1-7 Jumping. Fleet got 7th in 4-5 Agility and Josie got 4th in 1-4 Combined Collie Jumping.

Saturday - today it was raining on and off , Cadbury got 5th in a speedy 1-3 Graded Jumping and 8th in 1-7 Combined Agility (Judge Peter Elms - he likes poodles!), Josie was 2nd in 3-4 Graded Jumping, little Jaf bless him does not normally have to run in the rain but he was in pairs with a nice brown poodle called Lucy and he did a nice run and they came 6th.

Sunday - I did most of my runs in the morning and Cadbury came 2nd in Medium 1-4 Graded Agility, Rip came 1st in Veteran Jumping and Foggy came 4th. JaiJai came 1st in Combined 1-4 dogs (out of an entry of 251 dogs and yippee he kept all the plastic poles up!), Josie came 6th and 7th in Jumpings (a theme here her contacts are very naughty!).

At Lunchtime the rain started very heavily and did not stop - mid afternoon I decided to pack the caravan away and not do my last runs as the rain got heavier and the ground could just not drain away quick enough. Sadly they then announced a lady who went off to hospital in the morning had died and the rest of the show was cancelled.

So apart from the sad ending we really enjoyed our week in the Lake District it was lovely to have some agility and some time to explore and Roger and I were really pleased with our dogs who all worked really well.

This is a photo of the view from the showground

The holiday bit!

So Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday were days off so we went exploring!

Tuesday we went to the Lakes and to a very pretty village called Grasmere, my favourite shop in the world is in this village as its a shop that only sells Jack Wolfskin things, we also found a brilliant walk for the dogs, heres Josie with some lovely scenery.



On Wednesday Roger, Claudine and Carlos wanted to go and climb a mountain - I am awful at climbing mountains so I said I would stay with the dogs so they took Rip, Betty and Jag and the other 8 dogs stayed with me.....at the Venue on the Wednesday all for charity they had training sessions with various people, I did not book to go on any but had a little wander round to have a watch and in the afternoon once the mountainers were back there was some fun competions and I had a go in a couple of these. The Mountain they climbed was called Inglebrough Hill and it was 723 metres high and here is Rip at the top.



On Thursday Claudine, Carlos, Roger and I went to White Scar Caves at Ingleton, these were fascinating and went about 1/2 a mile underground and there was a guide to take you, here is a silly photo of us before we went in



Roger and I then went round the very pretty village of Ingleton and had lunch before taking the dogs for a lovely walk along a river.

Well not much about Cadbury in this post! Barrow report to follow!

Lune Valley

Well we arrived back ok from the North, blimey it seemed a long way to tow (and I do all the towing!), but not as far as Bernadette and Dennis had to tow to Scotland! I am glad we went for 10 days as it made the long tow seem worth it! It was just under 300 miles each way....

So the first weekend was Lune Valley - we arrived the Friday evening and found a nice spot to camp next to a hedge and by a walk through to the rings the space was a really good size and when you are there for so long is really nice. The weather was not too bad we had a few hours of drizzly rain each day but compared to what some other parts of the country had we felt we were very lucky!

Saturday - Roger got a 4th in Large Grade 4 Agility with JaiJai which was really nice as they had not had a clear round for a while as JaiJai has been getting faster and less accurate! Josie had a 9th in Grade 4 Jumping.

Cadbury got a 2nd in Medium Graded 1-5 Agility, Rip a 3rd in Veteran Jumping, Fleet a 15th in Grade 5 Jumping and in a tricky Grade 5 Agility a 14th with 5 faults for a missed a-frame. Fleet ran NFC in the Adams Derby as he has already qualified and did a stunning run which a friend on the scoretable later told me would have put him 2nd, not sure if it was due to us running NFC or because I always enjoy Doris Stokoes courses.

Sunday - Roger had a fab day Josie had Grade 4 Jumpings x 2 and she came 2nd twice! Both times beaten by one of Jaqui Tarns dogs.

Cadbury got 3rd in Medium Combined 1-5 Agility. Fleet an 11th in a 1-5 Combined Agility.

Today was Rogers Birthday and we had a BBQ with Claudine and Carlos - there was a bit of drizzle but Carlos is an expert with his Gas BBQ and carried on cooking under a brolly!

Monday - today was Josies 3rd Birthday and Roger was a beaming chap as Josie got 1st in Grade 4 Jumping.

Cadbury got a 3rd in 1-3 Combined Agility and Fleet got a 4th in a class called Lucky Dip Pairs - I had heard about this class but not having been before had not run in it, Graham Pennington who was quite a character in the North and who was from Lune Valley Club (and helped to start the Agility Eye Magazine) liked people to get to know each other so you enter as an individual and then get paired up - Fleet was paired with Sarah Bell and Buddy - we do know Sarah and Buddy who is a gorgeous tri-colour (like a sealight) Sarah had to go back to work so her hubby Mike ran Buddy.

More to follow on what we did on the days off and a Video below of the Lucky Dip Pairs (sorry I am too impatient to wait for the image!)