Weight Loss

Here's a few awful photos of me yesterday, but they prove the weight loss I've been so shamelessly proud of- nearly 33% total loss since about May. I'm wearing size 4 jeans and my goal is to be in 2's by my Birthday in June. I can already pull my low-riders off without undoing them... :-) Yes, I'm as tired and wore out as I look- but that's what nights do to ya! Hopefully that'll change soon... (more on that later) First picture is little miss Ivy who is so silly when I pick her up. She thinks she's to stand on my head!


The Cruz-man and a couple other goof balls.

My man- the ever-faithful and best posing Border Collie ever. In the past I have taken group photos of the dogs for different things and have to take a million to get a good one- however, Cruz is exactly the same in every picture- posing like a pro! LOL!

So funny that I have two clone puppies. They are both their mothers through and through. Clare has a bit more white than Deal, but her build, temperament, and so far her working style are all Deal- and Ivy is a spitting image of her mother in every way!

I'm not sure Clare is even going to be as "big" as Deal. I guess I grew 'em little. I bet she doesn't weigh more than 25-28 lbs. Same with Ivy, she is small like Cruz and Gwen, but maybe weighs more than Clare. Cruz is only a little over 18" and neither Gwen or Ivy are as tall as he is.

Christmas Break!

The kids begin Christmas break tomorrow! I felt really bad for Dylan. He said last night his stomach felt weird. He was looking forward to the classroom party today and my heart sank when I called home at 7am and heard Dylan had the "poops". :-( I bought some medicine to help ease that along with the usual jello, crackers, and sprite. I also bought him some sharp cheddar cheese. I slept on the sofa while he watched tv most of the day. Thankfully by the time Charlie got home around 2:00 he was feeling better. Of course now he says he "so hungry". I'm glad it was short lived. Sick kids on holidays or school breaks is unfair! I remember a Christmas about 3 years that we all got sick, and it was a wicked sick, beat the crap out of you sick! It started with Dylan on the 23rd and went thru everyone, including my visiting parents. I got my round on Christmas Eve- lots of fun trying to cook a nice meal for everyone else that year! Yuck!! Now I have nearly 3 dozen cookies since Dylan was unable to take them to his teachers- I guess I'll take some to work. The kids have a 16 day vacation because both Christmas and New Years fall on days that add a weekend to the break. It'll be a nice break for them. They both got some very nice things for Christmas that they really wanted, so hopefully boredum won't set in too soon. Charlie's big items were new parts for his Vex robotics set. It's quite the robot. Myth Busters did an episode where they tested different robot systems, and they thought the Vex system would be a joke but they were very impressed with it. It's the system that high school and college robotics clubs use. His remote is programmed via code! It's over my head! LOL! Dylan big item is a mountain bike so he can ride easier on the grass etc. We did better with Christmas this year. I think it's the first year ever that we did not use plastic for gifts!

I work Christmas Day night, but the store closes at 6pm on the 24th, so there's no night shift Christmas Eve. So that's not too bad. Being a newbie, (not quite 9 months) I did not even bother to put in for days off around Christmas, I haven't "earned" that, imo. Rodney, one of my asst. managers told me last night that I need to be a department manager. I would enjoy that job I believe. I know I have that checked on my career preferences, but I'm not sure if I have it checked as current or future interest. Barry is going to show me how to set a geographical profile. I would like to stay at the Franklin store, but I'm willing move- to certain cities. Some cities- like Hampton, Newport News, Norfolk etc I would not go to. But I would go to Suffolk or Petersburg/Colonial Heights. Dept. manager is a pretty typical route to being an assistant manager (if that's in your future plans). Who would have thought that I enjoy working enough that I'm thinking of making this a permanent change. I'm thankful I work at a place that recognizes associates that work hard and show potential for moving on. I know when I went from break packs/GM stocker that Rodney was bummed to see me go, but he understood I was ideal for the new overnight In Stock position. It will be similar when the time comes that I leave the In Stock position. I know many other employers will simply hold back their employees because they are so good at their current position. This has happened to my brother who works for a mid-west store that is similar to Lowe's and Home Depot. Ben probably has about 10 more years left in the Navy and how great it would be for me to have a decent paying job for those 10 years. I still want to be a farmer "when I grow up", but that isn't in the cards until the kids are out of school and Ben is done, or nearly done with his Navy career. In 10 years we won't even be 50!

I'm not much of book reader, mostly because I don't really know what I want to read- what I get into. The movie, Twilight looked very cool and I heard the book was better than the movie so I picked it up at work one night. I'm really liking it and I'm turning the pages pretty quickly. I get so darn sleepy when I read... I'm about half done. Yesterday Ben brought home the 2nd book, New Moon for me. Now I really wanna finish the first one. I'm not going to see the movie until I'm done with the book. I like Vampire story lines, with their forbidden love etc... Angel and Buffy The Vampire Slayer were thoroughly watched in our house! We own every season of each show. I had a pup named Angelus. ;-) Another favorite, although it's not about Vampires is Supernatural. It's a really cool show about 2 brothers that are demon hunters. I don't get to watch much primetime tv, so Ben always buys the season dvds for me and I watch them on my kitchen tv while I'm cooking or cleaning in the kitchen. It doesn't take me long to burn through a season!

I'm having a hard time getting our family membership taken care of at the Y. Apparently it's a grant type of thing and they have not done one like this, so I just keep stopping in to see what's up. We get a free membership because Ben's duty station does not have a gym. I drive past the Y everyday to and from work. I'm doing my floor exercises at home, but I'd like to add some things. I'm starting to get some nice definition in my arms, shoulders, and back. My abs are about 90% of what I want. My thighs have greatly improved, but it's still area that needs the most work. I still really like my Bean and Iron Gym. The pushups on that iron gym are absolutely killer, but they are clearly producing results! I do sit ups and leg lifts with the Bean. When I ordered the Bean I also ordered the resistant band set and it works great for my arms, shoulders, and back. And really, when you use good form, it works your abs too. I haven't used the the iron gym as a pull up bar yet, but I think I'm almost strong enough to start doing that. With 45lb. weight loss, (I'm 5'2") I'm no longer going by weight. Now I'm simply looking for "form"- for lack of a better word. I lost almost 30% of my peak body weight. Amazing, as I never really "felt" as heavy as I'd obviously gotten. I also don't really know when or how I let that happen. I'm now back to the same dress size my nearly 15 year old wedding dress is. People at work continue to comment and ask how. I did nothing fancy or impossible. I cut back hugely and did some very doable exercise. (of course working as physically hard as I do from 10pm-7am is an added "bonus"- I no longer have much, if any, sit on my butt time) I've made myself very aware of the calories I take in and try to only eat calories that are going to do something for me- in other words very little, if any snack kind of foods. For a good while I wrote down what I ate, and that helped- seeing it in print. That was 2 fold as it helped me at a point when I got pretty obsessed and was close to over doing the cutting back. I would write down what I ate and would notice I hadn't eaten sometimes in 20-24 hours... You don't do well on that, your body simply goes into storage mode, but I had gotten to a point where I wanted nothing to do with food... I guess it was a stage. What I've done for myself is not a diet, it's a whole new way of looking at food and how I look. I am so happy to once again look like how I feel. :-) Well, it's 8:05, so I have just enough time to do a few exercises, take a quick shower, turn dogs out- put them back up and then head to work.

When Common Sense Goes Out The WIndow!

I guess by this point in my life people should never surprise me, but it still happens! Case in point is the lady that "ordered" Sly when he was a couple months old. She wanted him as a goosedog. He was not going to another handler, he was going to be her dog. I wrote a simple contract. It covered only the basics- it covered that payments could be made and the pup would be paid for before he left. It stated he would have the work done she desired (short outrun, simple flanks, basic ob., etc), it stated no refund would be made unless the dog could not perform the tasks desired or he was injured and unable to work. And of course that his papers would be transferred. No "finished by" or pick up dates were mentioned. In October I let her know he was not ready for much herding work (he was not yet 10 months)- the desire was there, but he was not ready for training. I told the lady that if she wanted to take him she could have him for $800 instead of $1000 and that she could bring him back in a few months and I would finish his training- this way they could bond. Or she could just take him for the $800 and put some work on him herself. She informed me that she had hurt herself and could not get him Oct, Nov, or December. She had already backed out on me in buying a different dog just weeks before, and with no warning she was not coming to buy the dog. I allowed her to put that deposit on Sly... So she has $500 towards Sly, but it's really only $250- if I had stuck to my contract with the first dog she would have simply been out $250- I did not have to transfer the money, but I did. Now remember while you read this that she said she could not get here before January 2009 and that Sly's training as been ongoing...

She is threatening to take me to court (in Ohio) for breech of contract. What? Somehow she thinks that I have not upheld my end because the pup does not yet have all the herding training I said he would have. Yes, I said he would have it- but I gave no dates- none. I had verbally told her maybe around 10 months, but that was not a "he'll be ready by" kind of statement and it was NOT put in the contract. First she said she would take payments until April to return the $500. (why would I return the money, I have not failed on my end) Then a few weeks later, she emailed me and said I had until January 2, listed her investigator and attorney, and said she would be filing if she did not receive the $500. I did not reply. Then last week I got an email from her saying we could "settle" this if I sent her $250 within 2 weeks.... I did reply this time saying I was not returning anything. I told her she owes me $500 and I owe her a started pup- simple as that. There is nothing wrong with Sly in the least- he was just simply not ready for "training" on sheep until recently. I like him very much and he's going to be a very nice young dog. I almost wish he wasn't going anywhere. I'm afraid that this woman is going to be unfair to him because for whatever reason she has a real issue with me. He is plenty nice that I would keep him on if he were mine. His temperament is stellar and his herding abilities are nothing but positive.

She went on to say that she has "well known trainers that have written books" that told her every pup should easily have an outrun and flank commands at a distance by 10 months and that I am a poor trainer because Sly did not. (and that she was told if he was the kind of pup that couldn't handle training pressure at 8-10 months it was not a dog she would want! (for goosework!) ) I told her I would be coming to court with numerous articles stating how every pup starts different and an early or late bloomer really has little to with the finished "product". I also asked her, why, if I was such an inept trainer would she order a started pup from me? I told her I'm a better trainer for paying attention to the mind set of the pup and that my dogs are the proof of my training. And again, please remember she claimed she could not get here to pick him up before NEXT month yet anyway!! He is coming on nicely now- now he is ready for training and to stretch out the distance some. He's very natural with very nice feel for the sheep. By the end of January, first part of Feb. he'll be a very nicely started dog with loads of potential.

Also know his price does not change no matter how long he stays- he was priced based on what he could do, not his age, or how long it took. Moneywise, having him set to go at 10 months vs. 13-15 months makes sense- but I was not going to ruin a nice dog for the sake of a sale. If I had put in the contract a specific age or date and I did not provide that, then yes I would say she would have the choice to either wait or have her money returned- but I did not- because I know you cannot do that with a puppy! At this point I suppose I could send her the lousy $250 and keep Sly so this all just goes away. But I'm holding my ground, Ben is behind me 100% and we're both content to make a trip to Ohio... Is this the most ridiculous thing you've heard!? I'm still lost as to why she thinks I owe her money?

How and why do people end up being so unreasonable and have absolutely no common sense about things!? Ugh! She's not scaring me, but I admit she's putting a bit of damper on my spirits and faith in people! This, coupled with the bs that has been going on at work, I wonder what people are thinking! I guess so many people want something for nothing. I'm also reminded that you can't trust anyone! Anyone could flip on you at any time, and that's really sad. This whole experience has put a bitter taste in my mouth to ever give someone the benefit of the doubt when it comes to the buying of a dog. I guess now I know why so many people have books for contracts- because if you don't, this is what will happen! People are not honest!

I'll try to get a video of all 3 pups today if the rain holds off. All 3 are very nice. Ivy is very fast with big square flanks already. She casts like her mama, but she does not swing to their heads and freeze like Gwen did. I'm really, really excited about her! Clare has wonderful feel for her sheep and has quite natural pace in a fetch. When she flanks she's bending off her sheep beautifully. Sly is very natural like MaryJane. He covers very nicely and is perfect at balancing. He is also very, very sensible to his sheep. I always use Cruz to help keep the sheep in a small enough area for the pups to work. He is a moving fence on the high draw side. Right now I do not have dog broke sheep- just light lambs that run past me. Last night one lamb broke away and when Cruz went to bring it back, Sly went along. He wasn't wrong, so I let him be. I expected to have to call him off once Cruz started bringing back the single. I was pleased to see that he mirrored Cruz. The lamb of course would not turn around, so both Cruz and Sly just calmly pushed him backwards towards me. Pretty nice for a pup! Calm, quiet power from a just now 12 month old- delightful! :-) Many pups would just continue to ring a single as it's quite a high pressure situation and when a sheep won't turn around it takes a lot of patience on the dog's part to keep walking on with gentle authority.

I had yesterday off, so I have the day to get some things done. I need to wrap gifts. The kids and I made cookies for their teachers and bus drivers last night. Barry helped me the other night check the right things on my career preferences for management. I have to take a "test" on the computer and have to be on the clock when I do it. We were way too busy that night and it's not something I want to rush through, so maybe I can do it tonight. Depends on how many other ICS people are on tonight. I really like what I'm doing right now, but if I'm going to stay working I'd like to do something more.

Took The Plunge and Didn't Drown!

Cruz and I jumped in yesterday. That is, we ran our first Open run! It was a good outrun distance, but doable. There was a Maltese cross rather than a shed and that was a fun challenge. We had to put them thru a specific chute, then turn them to the outside of the field to put them thru a different chute. These were FAR from "gimme" sheep! They would get up there and stall out and were professional "squirters"- meaning they'd get right to the opening and either beat the dog or the handler by slipping by. You could stomp, jump, and do just about anything with these ewes and they would hardly flick an ear! They were good sheep IMO, but not easy- as it should be. They stayed well at the top and if the dog would drive with authority they drove nice- but they had no problem turning right around and looking at a dog either! Naturally the outrun was my concern. Sending to the left gave the dog much more room, but it was slightly rolling- just enough you could lose sight of the dog, and that worried me, as I knew I would most likely have to help him some. Sending to the right made the dog tighter as the fence was there, but the fence also flared out towards the top and the dog could in fact do a very nice O/L. It was flat so you could see the whole way. My thought process was that Cruz would be able to follow the fence/woodsline- as he's used to following a woodsline on one side of the big field across the road here at home. I was bummed when he really had no clue where the sheep where even sending him right. I had to help a lot and it still was not a nice outrun. 13/20, which frankly I thought was more than fair. 8/10 on the lift. 17/20 fetch. We had to straighten the first part of the drive, but the rest of the drive and crossdrive was stellar. I think it was 26/30. After the cross drive panel we had to make a hard turn to the inside of the field to come back to the cross that was up by the post. I had one sneaky ewe, that unfortunately was the leader. On both portions of the cross she beat us- we got 2 thru each time, so it 5/10. We had the pen (also far, far from a gimme) all lined up and they were nice settled and time was called. Darn- 0/10. The extra help on the outrun was probably just about the amount of time we would have needed for the pen. We ended up with a 69 and a very respectable run. Several people commented on Cruz and our team work. It felt good that people who know what they're looking at (who didn't know us from adam) recognized his talent and my handling skills. Many people assured me that if I just keep sending him (successfully) at increasing distances he'll get the outrun. Even with the outrun loss, if we had made the pen we would have probably placed in the top ten, I think an 82 won and the scores were very tight. Placing was not even in my mind. All I wanted was to look like we belonged out there, and indeed we did. There were close to 25 entries I believe.

Deal ran in Ranch and I was fairly disappointed with her. Her outrun was crap- which she never does. I can always trust her in that once she sees them she rights herself. Well even with my assistance she went out like junk and her lift was awful. She checked up, flattened out and refused to listen to me to fix it! I was dumbfounded! She didn't give me very good fetch line flanks. The drive was the same as Open. She didn't do badly (we cleanly made both panels) until the turn after the crossdrive. She did not want to come off the pressure and give me the flank, so she ended up with the sheep quite past the panel and way out to nearly the fetchline. She would give me a half hearted flank, but was flat and would commit to flanking as far she needed. We timed out. I wasn't angry with her, but I was disappointed in her. She caught me off guard with the outrun BS. She can get locked in and not want to come off the pressure in a drive flank, but it's been quite some time since she has never given it to me after an additional stop command and big flank command. Oh well, she is only a dog! :-) The lady after us (we exhausted for the next person) ran her sheep into the exhaust fence and then sheep went running up the other exhaust fence line. Deal did a very nice job at peeling the rattled sheep off the fence and quietly bringing them the distance back to the exhaust pen, so at least she got a chance to do a little practical job and do it nicely. ;-)

I have to admit I was a bit concerned about the drive with Gwen with these sheep since they were so prone to turning around on the dog. That's what puts her into "freeze mode". I remembered how Carol had told me to use tiny little flanks to help unlock both Gwen and the sheep when that happens. I've been doing at home, and it's really starting to come together and it's working. (She will hold heads- no back down- but she doesn't like to walk into heads). Gwen's outrun/lift was stellar and it was a perfect 20/20, 10/10. Her fetchline flanks were perfect. I don't remember what the fetch points were, but not much off. The sheep went wide on the post turn (they were getting drawn to the exhaust by now). We straighted the line nicely and she really didn't bog down in doing that at all. (good girl!) She drove nicely and then at the turn after the panel she had a yee-ha moment and dove in. She grouped them right back and on our merry way we went. I want to say the drive was 15/20 or so. We got the sheep nicely to the pen and 2 went in. I should have bumped her 2 steps to the right, but I kinda let my guard down and the 3rd one squirted by! We got them all back in, getting a 7/10 on the pen. I was so proud of my freckle face girl! :-) We placed 3rd in a big class- 15 or so. Had all 3 gone in right off the bat so we got a 10/10 pen we would have been 2nd.

This was a very nice trial, with decent sheep on a nice field. It's a 5 hour drive, but it's worth it. We're definitely going back in January!

Ella and Mary Jane did very well. Perfect outrun and lift, good fetch. Ella got a little trial field frozen and let the sheep get on the wrong side of the post, so she had to re-do the turn. The rest was very nice. They worked the pen well, but alas no sheep in the pen. Ella was nervous and kinda forgot to "own" her side and let the sheep go right past her a couple times. She did a very nice job with her commands with Mary and other than letting her come just a bit too far on a few of the flanks, she was about perfect. Even novice was a big class of nearly 15. Ella got 5th! :-)

It's a beautiful day outside, so that's where I'm going! I forgot my darn camera yesterday, which really stinks because the pen and the cross was right up close- could have gotten some very good shots! I'll make sure to take it in January!

Tired, but oh well

Whew. This has been a long week, but things have a good out look. Because it's very personal, I won't be going into detail about it, but on Tuesday afternoon Ben was admitted to the hospital and will be there until Monday. He is better and all will be fine in the end. Of course this put a huge kink in our routine. My 2 days off this week were Sun-Mon. So Tuesday night I brought the boys and all their sleeping and school stuff to Tony's. Of course he would watch them for me, but he leaves for work at 5:15am, so he normally gets the kids up at 4:30am to take them to the sitter. Instead, his mother came out to the house in the wee hours of the morning. The boys still got up at 5am and I'm sure it was late when they went to bed, as it's hard for them all (7 in total) to settle down enough to sleep when the routine has been changed. They stayed at Tony's on Weds. night also. Wednesday the boys went to his house at 5:00pm because I needed to go visit Ben and visiting hours are only from 6-7pm. I ran around starting at 2pm (I slept from 9am-2) in order to get my usual stuff done, the boys, all their stuff, and food for dinner for all 7 kids to Tony's by 5pm. I drove an hour to the hospital, stayed an hour, and drove an hour back home. Was home long enough to turn dogs out and head to work. I went to work at 9pm instead of 10pm so I could leave at 6am. Tony's Mom was at the house again Thursday morning, but Charlie had an important Gifted field trip and if I left work at 7 and he happened to miss the bus I would not have had time to get him to school in time, so I was to Tony's by 6:45am. Last night the boys stayed at the neighbors- after Dylan's Christmas concert. He had to be at the high school (30 minutes away) by 6:30. It was a nice concert and was done at a little after 8pm. Ben and I were going to drive separately so I could just head to work from the school- since it's only 10 minutes from work. So instead, I drove the kids back to the house, let the dogs out, and left back to work after not quite an hour at home... My truck has put on a lot of miles this week! The neighbors woke the boys up at 6:20am and the boys walked across the yard to get ready on their own for school. I called them from work at 6:45am to make sure all was okay. I slept like crap today and I'm already tired and have nearly 12 hours to go! :-( The 3 of us went to see Ben tonight. We had to leave by shortly after 5pm. Charlie doesn't get home till 4:20... He just enough time to take a fast shower and scarf a little dinner! Dylan and I ran around and got all the animals square. I "slept" on the sofa from 10-3:30, but kept waking up. The dogs woke me a couple times because the VDOT guys were doing something on the corner. Then a board and train dog arrived... I could have slept a lot more than I did! The kids are going to the neighbor's again tonight-in about 10 minutes. I have the weekend off- thank goodness as I won't have either call in to work or interrupt someones weekend. It's been a long, stressful week and I am ready to relax, not drive ANYWHERE, and get some much needed rest! I hope the weather will be decent so I can work some dogs. I've had a stressful week at work as well due to an assistant manager and co-worker conflict in which I had to be called into the office as a 3rd party witness. My co-worker now "hates" me, but I guess that's okay. He was wrong. The store manager has always liked the work I do, and how I conduct myself and was hugely impressed on how I handled and spoke of the situation on Tuesday. He said I need to be in Human Resources... I asked him how I go about moving up in the company. He said to catch up with him, tell him what it is I want, and he'll make it happen... Pretty nice to hear. I'm not sure if I'm a human resources kind of person, but maybe I am and I just don't know it. I've pretty much been put in charge of the ICS group. We all have a job to do and we all know what it is- but I am the one who's being held responsible for the percentage that we all get. I like my job right now, but if I'm going to stay at the store, I'm not going to stay a "grunt" for very long. According to Kevin, that won't be a problem. :-) Nights are good now, but in a year I'll want days and the boys will be old enough that they can handle to occasional times Ben and I would be gone at the same time during the day.

If the sun is out over the weekend I want to take some new pictures and maybe a video of the pups. It's 9:05pm, so I guess I need to let dogs out for a bit and head to work. I am SO tired. I have a feeling I'll be sleeping at lunch.