Didn't go

... to the trial today. Something just kept telling me not to. I have to admit I was pretty concerned about going that far for that many hours and leaving the boys here alone. When I entered the trial I didn't know Ben was going to be gone. I woke up this morning with just enough time to quick get ready and head out, but I laid there and thought about it and thought about it and decided to skip it. Maybe I should have gone, maybe it was good I stayed, who knows... This is my life. Not complaining, but little do I get to do without sacrificing something. On top of not knowing if it was a good idea to leave the boys for what I'm sure would have been 12-15 hours, I felt a little guilty about going and leaving them alone... I worked two shifts of 11-8 last week, so I they had to do their homework, chores, dinner, etc all on their own. I felt a little selfish when I pondered still going to the trial. So I didn't. Today was a lose/lose decision and I chose to stay home with the boys. We did get a lot done. The boys got their rooms clean and I got everything except the kitchen clean. The kitchen's better than it was, but it is not done. I blew up at the boys a little today and I banned them from bringing anything of theirs to "my" part of the house and said that daily bedroom checks will be enforced. It's so hard to follow through, but I am so over spending so much of my days off on house work- or worse, doing something fun or something else I that has to be done and letting the house once again get put on the back burner... Ugh. Raising kids correctly is hard! LOL! Especially when you don't want to live as their maids. I love being their mother and doing the things that mother's do, but I am tired of being their maid and I'm tired of them treating our home like a hotel!! Ben and I have worked on this in the past and it will stay good for awhile, and then we quit following through. I vow to never again fail to follow through!

Yesterday I had fun taking some pictures of the dogs using several of the different non-auto features on my camera. I'm really impressed- especially since it was a COMPLETELY overcast day- not much light to work with at all. I can't wait to try it again on a well lit day! :-) As you can see I'm in the process of writing a little profile about each of my dogs. I'll continue to take photos of them all and get their profiles written. I have pictures of Deal and Kit already prepped. Yesterday I let Logan and Emma come in the round pen with the geese and Cruz. Logan looked on for a bit, then squeezed through the cattle panel to watch from what he thought was a safer place! LOL! Emma knew she needed to do something, but wasn't sure what. This is when I love geese. No worries of pups being stepped on, or suddenly scared by a normally quiet sheep that decides a pup is fair game... Additionally they're exciting to watch when they move. (from the pups point of view). I never said a word to Emma and only quietly flanked Cruz when Emma would think about walking into the geese and needed a little back up. It took a bit, but the light came on and she was great. If first impressions mean much she's going to like to drive like her grandsire and she's going to have great stock sense like her sire. I'll wait about a week and then let her in again. She never lost interest- not even when I scooped her up- she watched them the whole time I carried her to the gate. Good Girl Emma! :-))

Well, off to bed cuz it's a... holy cow, quarter to 12!! Oops. 6 am will come quick! LOL!

Toss

Toss. My silly, good hearted, out for a good time, dedicated to me heart and soul, dog. Off sheep Toss is a goofball! He loves to have a good time and is always the one that finds something unique to do, or at least find a special way to play along with the usual games. During games of fetch with the pack, he is the only one I have that'll go get the "sinkers" in the 85 gallon stock tank. You think he's not really paying attention, but the second someone drops the toy that doesn't float in the tank, Toss is on it with no prompting. He will stick his entire face, head, and ears under water if that's what it takes. Running with the atvs, yup they all do that, but he takes that to another level. First off he truly races the atv. He would have been an awesome race horse! LOL! So far, even on the smooth tractor service road in the field I cannot out do him! (Ben can, but I can't) He is hard core fast when there's a reason- and he has the stamina non of my other dogs have. I've often wonder if that's not his highly Imported breeding? His other atv/bicycle running trick is to find something to carry. Anything! He does this when we zoom around in the yard and we can't do much more than about 15mph. One day I watched him run and run and run (with the atv) carrying a 2 foot piece of a treated 4x4 post!! What in the world?? LOL! It must have weighed 5 lbs! Recently I about peed myself because I had not yet picked up my BIG orange cones I use to really dial in my driving whistles. There he was running with the boys on their 4 wheelers with this great big cone in his mouth- nearly covered his whole head!! Toss is also my love-bug. He is a big sap and loves to sit with me and bury his head into my arm pit. As a younger dog he only had eyes and ears for me. He was my dog, and no one else could tell him or ask him anything. As an adult he has outgrown that to the point that he will listen to anyone and would probably work for most anyone, but he is still very much my dog. He adores me. ;-p Because of this trait I had to learn that when Toss was being too much or just plain not using his head I needed to be his rock and be the one who kept their head. It took me a fair amount of time to learn that if I got angry and loud with him it would only spin him up even more and make things even more intense. (on sheep all fun and games end, and every fiber of his being is replaced by intensity to work) He taught me a lot about being a quieter, calmer handler/trainer. I owe that greatly to him and him alone. He was such an intense youngster, coupled with his straight forward type of approach, we had a lot of stressful days of training. Toss took some time to learn how to properly outrun, but once he had it short, it carried over very easily to longer distances. He is a stellar driving dog. He is a big reaching dog in his pace, even at a walk. Currently, he's working very hard to thoroughly learn his whistles. He's doing very well. There's no question he's going to be a wonderful Open dog. He is not a dog that is going to stall out or grip out. Along with whistle work Toss' sessions are greatly centered around keeping his flanks square and not leaning on his sheep. Toss is a lot of dog on sheep, but with growing skills and maturity on both our parts, I'm learning to really appreciate that. If I remember to keep focused and quiet, he is quite responsive to do things my way. :-) It seems impossible, but Toss was born in Nov of 2003. Yes, almost 6! He still seems like such a young dog. He was a loooong to mature dog. Toss is nearly all Imported lines. On his top side his sire, Lacy's Brand is a ##Sweep ISDS 180949 grandson. Also on his top side are Kathy Knox's Ettrick Bob AIBC 92561, and Amanda Milliken's Hazel ABC 15278 and Imp. Boy ABC 39773. Toss' bottom side is 100% Imported. Nearly all the blood on his bottom side is from Wales and include such names as J.R. Jones (multiple times) and J.M. Baker. Like so many imported dogs, he is not without the blood of Supreme Champion, ##Wisp ISDS 161487. I have two females from Toss, both out of Deal. One female is quite a lot like Toss, the other like Deal. His granddaughter, Emma is fast becoming one of my all time favorite puppies. Only time will tell what she turns into. I'd like to cross Toss again with a female of my own, but that's 2-3 years away. Unless something were to suddenly to happen to him, I can see him running and working hard for many, many more years.

Mary Jane

Mary Jane is probably one of the most natural dogs I know. This is a wonderful trait, however it can also be difficult at times. Her outrun was pretty much built in, very little time was spent stretching it out. Lots of time has been spent on the lift however. She does not, at all, like to stop at the top, and she's too much dog to allow that. It has been a lot of give and take to get her to be trust-worthy about stopping at the top. I would still not trust her much past 150 yards to stop at the top. But it's coming. She has lovely natural pace, one of her best traits. Driving and drive flanks have been some work. Mostly again because of her reluctance to stop. She has learned to be quite a lovely penning dog, and can now be nearly 100% trusted. As a younger dog once she was a stride too close, she would surely bust in on the next flank. Lots of time and patience was spent on this. Surprisingly (or maybe not so), penning and chute work is now one of her strong suits. She is a dog that gains the sheep's respect without them being rattled. She is one of my few that can work my ram during his "ugly" months without having to fight him. Once she gets into the flow of driving, she has a wonderfully strong, steady pace. She's one that keeps marching right on. The biggest trick with her is not letting her get to the "I've had enough now" level. She will not quit, but she will stress and is unable to really think if she feels I am asking too much of her. Having Ella work her for the last year or so has been great. Mary's made great strides with this, and it's been quite some time since she has felt I've asked too much of her. Weather Mary will take the pressures that go along with the kind of training one must be willing to accept in order to be an Open level dog is the only thing that would hold her back from being a very nice Open dog. Everything else is there. Including the bloodlines. Mary's from very strong western working lines. As well as from dogs that were proven on the trial field. Mary was born in 2004 and is a Granddaughter of Joni Swanke's Belle ABC 146325. Belle is a very well known and a very well proven bitch that has produced talented young dogs such as Haley Howard's Moss and of course Joni's own Lew and her"one of a kind" Chip. Mary also closely has dogs such as Emil Luedecke's Ben ABC 164512, and Bill Berhow's Nick (3 time Finals Champion/3 time Meeker Top Ten) in her pedigree. Mary's dam was a hard working farm dog that is now living the retired life on the Eastern Shore. Mary's sire, Lacy's Ted was handled by Alasdair MacRae several years ago as a Nursery dog and finished very well at the finals. Mary has had one litter crossed with my Toss. The owners love their pups. Because I really only care to breed when I, myself want to keep a pup or two from the litter, it will be some time before Mary is bred again- if she is. If she's bred again I'd like to find a dog much like her in the way of being very natural- but be a bit more of a dog to handle. Because I have such a preference for biddable dogs, I don't think I have a male quite strong enough to cross with Mary. Off sheep Mary is a fun dog to be around and is the never-met-a-stranger type- and she's perfectly beautiful. To me when people think "Border Collie", she is the picture.

Gwen

Anyone who knows me even just a little knows how much I adore this little bitch!! She just makes me smile no matter what she's doing. Off sheep she is so clever, fun- loving, and sweet. She is incredibly personable. She has a perfect temperament. If she had been trained in agility I have no doubt she would have been awesome! She is crazy fast and the most athletic dog I have ever met. I can visualize her flying across the dogwalk like it's 10 feet wide. Over jumps she'd be a bar hugger and one of those dogs that can land and turn all in the same motion- she would waste no yardage. She's one of those zero to 60 in 2 seconds. She would have been a super fun sport dog no doubt. On sheep I adore her as much as I do off sheep. From day one I have LOVED working her on stock. She was born with an outrun and square flanks. She is fast and responsive, which takes finesse handling, but man is it fun! I hardly have to blow in my whistle with her- I've learned to be very, very gentle in my commands or she over does it. What I blow is what I get. That's an unbelievable thing when you as the handler have it together! Gwen has never done anything but aim to please, and she has absolutely no quit in her- none. Our only work-through area has been with her not wanting to disturb her sheep to the point that she would stall out on the drive. (to the untrained/unfamiliar eye it looks like too much eye, but that isn't it. She has so much respect for their "bubble", that in a drive she can loose confidence in walking into that bubble. She never stalls out or curls in at the lift, and she never gets stuck on her belly at a high pressure pen, both of which can often times be due to eye.) This little glitch is fast becoming a thing of the past, and I have no doubt she will work entirely through it. In the grand scheme of things she is still quite young. She was also forced to take time off to produce and raise a litter of pups. And of course I do not have a big area here at home to work daily (or even weekly much of the time) on her distance driving. Gwen is a 2005 daughter of Del'Mar Dan and HatsOff Kate. Del'Mar Dan is sire by Imp Jim CABC 128108 and out of Imp Nell CBCA 148. Both Jim and Nell were owned by Dave Ellison of Kamloops, BC. Jim is the sire of Del'Mar Turk of RMS Border Collies in British Columbia. There are several nice Del'Mar bred dogs floating around out there on farms and kennels that work at home as well as trial. Gwen's Dam is by HatsOff Bill and out of HatsOff Wynn. Many of Bill's off spring can be found at Oaktree Border Collies, as well as many other operating cattle farms and trial fields in the Oklahoma/Arkansas area. Gwen's own parents live and work on a cow/calf farm in KY. Gwen herself is a wonderful cowdog for the little time she has had on them. Really a true natural. At the 2nd cattle trial she was at I got several compliments about her- one of which was the assumption she was from a Steve McCall breeding. The best compliment was about how responsive she was. :-) She is more comfortable on cattle I believe, than she is on sheep. She works sheep great, but being a cowdog is her calling. Unfortunately for us both there is very little cattle trialing in this area, and even less availability to work cows to train. Gwen is going to go a long way as a trial dog, there's no doubt- and I will enjoy ever minute of getting her there!

Better Day

Yesterday was a better day. Still so much to do, but it didn't seem as overwhelming. I didn't get much extra done before work, but did get my usual evening animal chores done so I wouldn't have to do them at 9:30pm. I colored my hair and made the kids after school chore lists and that was about all I had time for. Today I let myself sleep in. I needed it terribly. My Emma alarm clock went off right on cue at 6:30, so I got up and let everyone out and promptly went back to bed. Work up at 8:45! Kinda late, but it was nearly midnight before I went to bed last night and I have been on the go during my days off for a few weeks straight now.

Work was a bit rough yesterday as my shoulder is really starting to hurt badly. One of the end caps that I had to change out yesterday was a whole pallet of the huge cans of green beans. Great. I talked to my assistant manager about what would happen if I can't do stuff for awhile and she said to get with personnel so she can pull up my actual job description. I wouldn't be able to do it if I had to have surgery I'm sure. I do get 12 weeks of job security (unpaid of course), so at least that's good news. It would probably really depend on the people I work for though. My assistant seem to think as long as I could keep doing the stuff in the IMS screen I'd probably be alright. We'll see. It kept me up a lot last night, the worst it's been.

Gwen is in here with me right now because she's coming in and her and Toss were doing the "I like you, you like me" dance on the porch. No one paid her any mind yesterday and she's not bleeding yet, but she's on her way. She's such a funny little thing. She's so full of personality and is such a sweet heart. I know it's not fair to have favorites, but I do, and she's one of them. Both on and off sheep. In the future I would like have a Gwen X Toss pup. They are both very nice dogs and compliment each other. I suppose you could get a Gwen or get a Toss, but if you had a blend that would be one hell of a dog!! Her maturity and natural outrun and feel for sheep combined with his straight forward approach and love for driving!? Yup, that'd be one hell of a dog no doubt!! And fast, holy crap would they be fast! I suppose they'd ALL be freckle faced with really, really fun personalities! LOL! I really, really, really like Gwen a ton on sheep, but I am going to wait and make sure she comes fully around on the bubble crap on the distance drive. Both Carol and I believe she will. If I don't cross her with Toss in the future, I may cross her with a dog named Keen that came from Canada that is highly imported bred with all the "right" names. Carol runs him right now and he's a very nice dog. She thinks very highly of him. She calls him Cruz with more push. Like Toss would, Keen would compliment Gwen in that he's a very forward type dog. That's a year or more away thought, so no need to ponder it too greatly right now.

Well, I need to get to things. I have to get to the feedstore before noon and I have a few things I want to get at the hardware store. I'm getting to the end of my paycheck though, so the hardware stuff may have to wait. I'll probably take Gwen along with me so she doesn't have to be in her kennel. She likes to ride- well at least ride with me. ;-) I always feel bad for the girls when I have to lock them up! :-( What I don't feel bad about is locking the boys up as well when the girl(s) gets to the "good" days and the boys are SO obnoxious that I can't trust them. (ie dig into the girl(s) kennel, fight with each other, etc).

I was thinking about moving the geese around in the round pen for Emma and Logan today. Maybe I can get one of the kids to video it. I have no idea if the interest is there yet or not. It's a good ear day for Emma, looks like both her ears will be prick, or at least 3/4. She's going to be such a neat looking dog! Logan's are currently "wings", so we'll see what happens. I've seen a lot of wings on puppies turn into prick ears. If nothing else, at least they are not down. It's just not a look I like. Not that it really matters one bit, it's just nice to have to the look you like you in a dog you like the rest of! :-) I've been following the Finals blogs. It's fun to read about the runs. No matter the skill and talent level of both the dog and handler, there is always going to be such an element of luck involved. I think that's what keeps it from being the same 'ol, same 'ol. No two sends to the sheep are ever going to be same, and that's where a handler's skill and a dog's talent shine- when they make it look like the same run as yesterday, last weekend, etc. I've enjoyed the write ups about the runs that were either a very low score, DQ, or RT, but the writer was very impressed with the handling, the dog, or both. Sometimes a no score run was really the best run of the day, and the good handlers recognize that. At least in my area they do.

Well, I best get off from here so Freckles and I can run to the feedstore quick.

Just Great...

Well I'm pretty sure I have at least a partially torn rotator cuff. (but I'd bet it's terribly torn) I hurt my shoulder really bad nearly two months ago, and it has only gone from unbearable to awful with time. I can hardly pull my own shirts on and off and I have to be really careful with what I do, or the pain is almost drop me to my knees. (sometimes I sound like I have turrets or something, because I appear to spontaneously curse!) This sucks for me, as I'm a bit hard core and I am not used to not being able... The worst though is sleeping. It's miserable and the last couple of nights I have woke up in a position I can hardly move out of... I guess it's time to go in. We have FULL medical, yet I don't go. To give you a reference, after my postnatal (I did go to all my prenatal appts) with Dylan I hadn't been until last fall. (Dylan is now 11). But I can't keep this up. It's not getting better. I've given it plenty of time to heal. If it was going to heal on it's own, it would have by now. I read about the pain, and what I have is textbook and now my gut is in knots over how it's fixed, and even more about how LONG it takes to heal. Just freakin' fantastic!

I had "one of those days" today. Everything right now seems over whelming. I have a very full plate all the time, and sometimes it seems like too much. As I wrote earlier, Charlie had his orthodontist appt on Tuesday. On Wednesday, some of things they put on came un-done. Great. That's another 75 mile round trip and at least a half day of school for Charlie, and will have to be some lost hours for me, as I work M-F next week. I feel like they should credit our 4 digit bill a good 30 bucks! RRRrrrr! Work right now also seems over tasked. It just seems like there are too many people that don't give a shit, that the people who do are never going to be able to get their areas right... We met our new store manager (informally). He's a 61 year old retired Marine who did 2 tours in the recon. division in Vietnam. He doesn't seem very military though. He was very pleasant and seems rather personable, but we'll see. It seems like I can never caught up in my house and that's a constant frustration for me. I get home and take care of the kids (making sure homework, showers, pet care, projects, AR book reading etc are done), make dinner for all, take care of the dogs (maybe work a dog or 2), then clean up dinner, and then *poof* I'm out of steam. Like right now I should be cleaning something, something, anything... but I just don't have it in me. But maybe it should be. Maybe I need to push beyond what I do. This is one of my biggest issues- I never think I do enough, try enough, or am good enough at everything I want to do. Anything that's not perfect I take the hit on. I feel like everything is on me, and anything that's not done is a reflection of my failure. Blah. I toyed with the idea of staying up half the night to clean, but I'm opting to get up at either 5 or 6 and dig in. I work 11-8 tomorrow, so I have some extra time in the morning. I'll be draggin' come 8 tomorrow night, but I have the weekend off. It'll be busy though. Saturday will be house work and dog work. Sunday will be an early start and long day as I'm going to NC to a trial. Then I work M-F. Thursday is the State Fair, so I'm bagging out that day. To add to it, Ben is on the ship right now. They were supposed to leave Monday for 2 weeks. Well, shit happens and they are maybe leaving tomorrow- still for 2 weeks. Yeah, great- so now we're up to almost 3 weeks. Most of the guys have been working till 3pm and coming home. Not Ben though, they've had to stay. So he's been gone since Sunday morning (because he had duty) and is only 40 miles away... It was hard not having him here tonight when I had myself in such a this-is-too-much frenzy... he is always the one who reminds me to not over think the little stuff- which I do horribly! Not only do I not see the big picture (which is a lovely picture for us), I put on my big 'ol crap-glasses. These are the glasses you put on and all you see is crap... Ugh, I hate that about myself.... Off to bed so I can get up and hopefully get enough things done before work that I will feel a little better about myself tomorrow...

Who's Like Who...

It's always so interesting who pups take after. From Deal's first litter, the 2 males are very dark and built like Deal. The female (Kit) is all Toss, in looks, in working style, and temperament. Her 2nd litter of 3 females produced all dark, "Deal" types- except that Lokie got coat. (throw back to Deal's sire). The Cruz X Gwen pups are half and half. One male and one female are marked just like Gwen and act more Gwen than Cruz- especially Ivy. Ivy works just like her mother and she is all Gwen temperament-wise. The split face pups look like Cruz in the face, and are like him in temperament. Wren works just like Cruz did as a young dog.
In these 2 pups I see one throw back to their grandsire, Toss (Emma). And one throw back to their sire's side, which is HatsOff (Logan). Logan has a very HatsOff type head/face and he has the same eye color as several of the HatsOff dogs I've seen. None of my dogs have that eye color. Emma is very intense like her grandsire, Toss and is fearless like her granddam, Deal. She is going to be a handful on the field I suspect. For as intense and confident she is, she's also very loving and reacts appropriately to a correction.

Logan reminds me quite a lot of Cruz in temperament as pup, although so far he is much friendlier to people he doesn't know. Like Cruz, he seems to have an on/off switch- which is so wonderful. He seems quite laid back much of the time, but it takes only a toy or an encouraging word and he is spun right up. Only time will tell how they turn out, but right now I'm enjoying them both very much. Maybe in a week or so I'll let them loose while Cruz moves a few sheep around. It's always fun to see that first glimmer of "this what I'm here to do". :-)

I've been reading my camera book and starting taking some "non auto" pictures. I only took a few yesterday, but I like this one of Edge. I like how the blurry leaves are the same color as his coat. I took the photos using both the jpg and the raw form. I don't think my laptop can support my camera software, but I'll try it on one of the boys' computers. Sounds like you can do a ton with photos taken as a raw.