all in all

An entire year training at home, my first goal was to come here at the end of this year and say that I changed things, that all I did was worth it... it was! I don't have words to describe this year, it was unbelievable. My boys are greater than ever, and our love and connection grows every day.

My goal with High was to connect, we had similar passions and that brought us together, but now we have deeper reasons, there is nothing I'm prouder than my dog laying with his head on my feet right now while I'm writing this post. This is everything I wanted to accomplish with him. I love my silly dog and how after 2,5 years he've returned to the puppy mood I always loved, and his eyes show joy in everything he does... he is my dream dog.

We finally went on a competition, after an entire year we went to the Brazilian Championship for the first time. With no major expectations, since we are changing his A-frame... and he did a great job. I will not say that it's always awesome to run with him, on trainings we have a different interaction, and run as one, not aways perfect, sometimes really chaotic, but aways trying our best and running our hearts. On competitions all changes, I don't like to be on the spot light, I get to nervous and he feels it, he gets nervous too! He barks, he bites, he doesn't listen, my legs get heavy and I can't run, I forget to talk, I get lost... can you imagine?

But no, our last competition was not bad! High was awesome, he did his contacts, and got all the slalom entries right, we finished 2/4 runs. The ones we didn't finish were absolutely my fault, because I almost fall on a jump, and dropped it, on the other run he touched the contact but did't wait for the release, so I sent him back on... But I have no regrets, we can only grow, and we are working, having fun will always be my priority.

Koda is a different story, my goal was to come here and say, what I proudly say now, I did my agility and social sheltie from start to where we are by my self, I did it! I proved to myself that I can overcome challenges, and work out of all difficulties on the way to raise the dog I wanted. He is perfection on furry ball form! But yes, he is still a sheltie, do not expect to see him offering to go to anyone arms but mine. on the other hand, get a ball and he will run with everyone. I'm so pleased with all we've accomplished. There's a long road in front of us, but we've come a long way in such a short time. It's easy to run with him in agility, it flows naturally, my challenges with him will come in a different way, I don't know how, but they will, otherwise where is the fun? We had a lot of challenges, but overcame all, and I hope we continue this way.

He also competed, for the first time ever and already on the Brazilian Championship. He did an excellent job, only doing wrong on the parts I already knew he would, the obstacles he have difficulty. All in all, a perfect weekend, on the best companion we could ever wish for! I so thankful for the friends we found so far, and even though supported us all the way. They gave us strength to come this far, and keep going, and always try something new. Thank you so much.

Before the competition we spent a perfect week learning with Tiago Rocha and Dan Wroblewski. Carol Engelke was always there and helped us a lot, helped me to talk when my sis was not there hahaha. Not only them but all the Dog World team, thank you so much for everything, mostly for having us again, and for all your friendship. We love you guys!

And the final touch to the perfect year came now, on the end, and changed a lot, I decided that I didn't want to train by myself anymore, so we are training where I started, where all this craziness began, and I'm loving it, we found crazy people like us, and ooh it feels good, to share every experience, and learn together. Our journey is coming along perfectly, I'm glad that I took all the steps that brought us here. And may it keep coming next year.

It has been a perfect year! Merry Christmas to all of you!!

It's been a while!

We haven't done much...

The days are flying! and all the time I can find we use to train the boy's running contacts... no progress on them as well! we went all the way back to the floor with Koda, and High is going quite well! nothing to complain, we'll get there sooner or later.

Normal trainings are rare those days, but a strong foundation is fundamental, so we are taking this opportunity to work on that. I'll post the videos of our last training. Koda did really well, no more problems with tunnels, nor jumps. I'm also finishing his slalom  \o/ no videos though...
I'm really amazed with High's turns! all the bars were my fault, I was late! if I had done the front cross, like I did with Koda, the bars wouldn't have fallen, but I wanted to try this move... anyways, both of them did great, and I'm really proud!

Also, my pups are on Kjara's new video! it was awesome to be part of this video, both of them did fantastic! check it out =)




They are learning some new tricks! just some fun stuff to play around!




That's it! (=
Hope to come here sooner next time haha

Running Contacts

Okay, so here it is, my latest training! unfortunately I just remembered to film it on High's last run, but he did 5 nice JPs in a row \o/ and Koda did nice too, I'm proud of him! not much separation on rear legs but he was still accelerating, I need to find better set up, maybe coming from a tunnel so he'll have a faster approach... lets see how it goes  =D

under the heaven

 Today was a really inspiring day! in the morning I was seen my youtube and found a video that changed my day, more than that, it changed my mind!

 thanks Susan for your amazing words, and for sharing your knowledge!

 Then, me, my sister and the dogs went hiking =) finally the winter is over! so it was so much fun!

 When we got home I thought about training running contacts with the boys, but the truth is that I was a bit disappointed with RC, they seem so impossible, and far... and last training was terrible, with not a single hit! But I remembered Susan's video, and with it in mind I went to one more training section, with no expectations! I just wanted to have fun with them, doing what we like and simply because we love it! if it take forever for us to have those running contacts, it doesn't matter! what matters is that we'll have fun in every section, from today on! because if it doesn't happen, why am I doing this?

and today, with no expectations we had an amazing training full of jackpots!

"To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven"

we are not in a hurry, because there's nowhere we want to be, we love the present!

Life is a mystery

I know you're done! let's get out of here!!

I'm not writing much, I know! but today I'll bring some good news...

One of things I love the most about life is how unpredictable it can be, we make plans, we dream, we live... but we can never know for sure whats going to happen.

I studied in a brazilian school, called NAP, but my 1st plan always was to get out of the country to go to college abroad, if I don't have an american diploma it's complicated, not impossible though. in july I asked my father if I could go to the american school of my city and he said no, since I was going to lose a semester and it's way more expensive, but when I finish the school I would receive two diplomas, an american and a brazilian, so it would make my life way easier. anyways, I went to my normal school when the vacations ended, one week later my father called me and said he changed his mind and I was going to the american school. and here I'm! classes are good, teachers are amazing and class mates are awesome. I wake up at 5 a.m and I come back from school around 4 p.m, and still I always have a lot of homework to do, so, no free time at all! and that's the reason why I'm so absent in here...

My boys are not in second plan though, so I'm still working on a lot of different things with them whenever I find time. we've been training some new tricks, so I promise a new video soon! running contacts are also on it's way, of course way slower, but not stopped. and we have been working on a dream! I always wanted to teach frisbee to them, but I never could, even teaching so many tricks and agility foundation, it was always an impossible job to teach frisbee to the dogs, but now they are catching the frisbee \o/ not perfectly, but it's the beginning, and I'm happy! now we'll keep moving, maybe slower, maybe life twists again and we are able to go faster, who knows? what matters is that we won't stop, because we love what we do!

list of tricks for this year, let's see how far we go.

the boys are bored with all that free time! 

really bored!! lol

There's nothing like time

  People say that time is the best medicine, it's true. Time brings confidence, take away fears and build trust! today my baby sheltie is 16 months old and only getting better and better with time and patience.

  He used to be afraid of jumping, and today I raised his jump quite a lot and he was just perfect! I'm training the hand stand trick for some months now, because every time I tried to move to another step he would stop giving the behavior I wanted, I know learning is not linear, but he wasn't progressing at all! and now he's progressing every day and we are almost done =D and ahh the tunnels, he's getting better with them too! he's really less apprehensive and it's a relief.

   High also had some problems, he used to get frustrated and bite me, during our trainings, and he never cared about my body movements, he would bump on me if I was on his way... both this problems were solved with patience and persistence, but it all came with time.

   So yeah, we should not be afraid of time, it brings new adventures, a whole new bunch of bravery and when it arrives it leaves great stories behind! and never ever give up when you face with problems that apparently have no solution, time will make it all better.

training adventure

 There is one thing that amazes me about training dogs, it's how unpredictable they can be... of course once you have been training a dog you know what will be easy for him and what will be trouble, but there is always some surprise, for good or bad!

 yesterday I went train my boys for the first time in almost 2 months, I attended to a seminar a month ago with Koda, I'm training slalom and running contacts with him but that's all, we haven't trained much more than that... High was really sick this days, it was a really tough month for both of us, a lot of medicines, vet every day, steroids, corticoid, anabolic... was suspected that his body was destroying the cells it produced. After a looot of prays and dedication not even the vets believed that now he is not just alive but with all rates back to normality =)) I just can thank God for this miracle!

  It's been two weeks since High is better, so we went for some exercise, and both of them were amazing, I couldn't be prouder. For the first time ever I finished a "big" exercise with Koda, he listened to me so well, he was flying trough the field, and he was jumping that high for the first time, on the video he is not that fast because he has trouble with tunnels so I had to do a thousand tunnels before the course and we still have some trouble with communication, but that's perfectly fine for me, he's young and we have all the time we need to improve!

 About High, it's so hard to write or remember yesterday without tears in my eyes, he was so perfect, he IS so perfect! he was way slower than his normal supersonic self, but I really don't care! he was happy, healthy, barking, listening to me, and in the middle of the run I could almost see the smile on his face, and this meant the world to me! it's all that matters!


ps: Shannon is my sister's dog! the golden fish =)

agility foundation and seminars

 As I already said, agility is more than a hobby for me, it's a passion and a life style! but I'm not a really good handler, so my favorite part is the foundation... I guess it has something about my love for teaching new things, anyway, today I want to talk more about those two things: agility foundation and seminars!

 Foundation: there is nothing more important than foundation when it comes to agility, it's obvious that all of us want to go to the obstacles and see  our dogs doing it all, but why the hurry? if you think about it, teaching foundation helps with good performance in all the obstacles, makes the dog enjoy every bit of it and even makes our dog healthier, because if we didn't spend so much time in foundation we would be more tempted to put them sooner in official obstacles, what in some cases (like teeter, slalom, a-frame) is not good for dogs younger than 12 months, at least.

some things that I consider awesome to teach are:

jumps-  Silvia Trkman tight turns- cik/cap 
             Susan Salo- jumping skills

cik/cap and grids (until 3min)

slalom- it depends on your dog, with Koda I tried:
channel and 2x2 (Susan Garrett), both are awesome, but Koda did better when doing for 2x2 method, because he thinks to much... so you have to try it on and see what works for your dog!

channel (until 35 sec)

2x2

A-frame- for the health of the dogs I think no one should do stopped contacts on A-frame, so for me it would be running, there are a lot of methods, Silvia Trkman's running, box, strides...

dog walk- stopped contacts are more common on this obstacle, I use it with High but I'm thinking about other options too, well with High I'm retraining it with nothing but teaching him that he needs to run until the end and the criteria is to put two front paws on the ground, but there are a lot of methods: target (nose or paws), 4on, lure with food, and so on.
- now I'm trying running contacts with Koda, Silvia Trkman methods, and I'm in love!

stopped (from 1:19 to 2:19)

beginning of running

teeter- as all the contact obstacles, there are a lot of choices- 4on, target, lure with food... I'm trying Wendy Pape method and it's great so far.

of course those are just options!

 About seminars, there are few things better to make everyone enjoy the sport more and more, it's unbelievable how all the agility people are amazing! seminars are so much fun! we get to learn, meet awesome people and have a great time, also the memories last for life time long... so enjoy it <3

Lisa Frick and Tereza Králová seminar

Samy Wroblewski seminar

Polona Bonac seminar

life so far...

 That's the first post of the blog so it'll be kind of an introduction, just for you to know a bit more about my boys...

 High was the first dog that I really committed to train, so I was a lot lost on the beginning and it made me lose a lot of opportunities! but after I realized what I was doing, I ran after time to fix things up, and at first it was so hard because we didn't have a connection... so I started training tricks, what in my point of view is the best thing ever to build a relationship between animal and owner! at first we had a tough time because he didn't know how to think, than he mastered tricks by shaping =)
 in agility I got all the way back to fix misunderstandings in both sides, and now I really feel that so desired connection and love, High mean the world to me, and I'm so happy just to look at his amazing eyes avery day, mostly now that I can say we're walking in the right direction!
 He put me in so many situations... in the beginning we were training agility in a old fashion school, so I couldn't teach tricks, or use new techniques because "it doesn't work", and I couldn't leave my dog with other people or playing to much with other dogs because "he would lose his focus", and all this stupid things! but High have really strong heart and personality, he always used to bark while running agility and that fine, actually I love noisy dogs, but soon he started biting me, I know he did that for frustration because we did so long runs with so small rewards, but the trainer wanted me to yell at him and when he really bites, beat him... that's when I got to reality and said I'm not doing agility for that! what's the fun?
  Since then I'm training on my own, with my sister, and the support of lots of friends on the other side of my country, and that's why I say High was, and will always be, my biggest challenge... and the best one, because after we past through this, we traveled so many times to seminars that I never imagined my parents would let me go, we entered online classes, and we managed to show people from here, that it's not impossible to train a dog with positive methods, and that's actually the best way to go! We also did a lot of socialization, hiking, play times, swims, tricks, obedience, fun agility, cuddles, kisses, sleep overs (on my bedroom haha), and so on! now I can say we managed to get back all we've lost, and I'm so glad I didn't let it go!

"they enjoy the goal but not the process, but the reality of it is that the true work of improving things is in the little achievements every day, and that's what you need to enjoy. "
                                                               Before Sunset

things High love:

swimming and ball (mostly big ones)

 Koda is my second dog, and I can say he's lucky lol, because I could learn a lot with High and such mistakes we never do twice, so I managed to make a looot different with him, in all the aspects of his life. in training I decided that we would just start when he was not as much fearful and agility would come easily, so I taught him all the tricks I could think, because as I said it builds connection and with that comes trust, so it was the easiest way to overcome his fears, we also did a huge socialization, with places, animals, people, and so on... but even so he's still not sure about people, I guess it's a sheltie thing!
 Even not been into people (that are not me) Koda will obey anyone if it's to win his toy! he's a pleasure to work with because we can always see the joy on his eyes, and he learns so fast that it's almost too easy haha, because of all the shaping that we trained he is always offering behavior in exchange of everything and some of this behaviors are so funny that I cry laughing! that's also the reason of my biggest frustrations, as he's such a fast learner it's hard to understand when he's doing something wrong to many times, for example: I'm teaching him to walk in a handstand, and he knows the behavior I want, because we have been training this, but in the beginning of every section he acts like he've never done it before! I guess he just doesn't like some tricks xD it's also my fault, I could have taught him a bit less of shaping lol.

things Koda love:

me and training 

  I used to watch all this videos on youtube with people teaching agility foundation, and lots of tricks, and obedience, and I found myself so lazy, because everyone can do it all, all we need is desire! and I really wanted that, so now I'm proud of me, because now I see we are doing it all! or at least trying!