Recap of Luther's National week!

A recap of Luther's National Week:

4/25/2010 - passed ATTS Temperament Test right before we left for the National

4/26/2010 - finished his Rally Novice title

4/27/2010 - Runner Up Black Dog in the National Megan Competition (a Champions Only Match, in formal attire, with classes separated by color and gender.)

4/29/2010 - 2nd Herding Titled Dog!

We are thrilled with his placings all week!!!

Congrats to our partner, Rita of Cornerstone!

What a great showing for Cornerstone Cardigans at this year's National Specialty!

The run-down:

Cornerstone's No Intro Needed, aka "Nick" - 2nd 9-12 Puppy Dog (Ch Raglan's Oliver At Raglan PT x CH Cornerstone's Laura of Castan HSAs)


Cornerstone's Revelation at Raglan, aka "Rosy" - 1st Bred By Exhibitor Bitch & 3rd 12-15 in Puppy Sweeps! Bred by Rita Hellegers, owned by Rita & Amy Hill. Rosy is Zsa Zsa's littermate.

Cornerstone's Wonderful Thing, aka "Tigger" - 3rd 12-18 Dog! Bred by Rita Hellegers, owned by Rita & Jill Rauh. (CH Cornerstone's Sudden Heat x Cornerstone's Champagne On Ice)

CH Cornerstone's Double Diamond, aka "Dee Dee" - 4th 9-11 Veteran Bitch! She is our late Demi's dam.

Happy Happy!!

Today was a wonderful day for Holly and Visions Cardigans at the CWCCA National. In the annual Champion only Megan Competition, Luther, Ch Visions I Have a Dream CGC, PT, TT*, RN* won Runner Up Black Dog!!!!!!

Holly is, needless to say, on cloud nine!!!

I only wish I could have been there to see it.

- Katrin (Visions Reporter)

* titles pending confirmation

Two Titles in Two Days!

Yesterday, Leonard & I were up at dawn and headed north up to Mahogany Ridge where Out of the Pits sponsored an ATTS Temperament Test. It is the only TT in our area all year. The group was wonderful, and when I explained that I need to leave the same day to drive to our National Specialty, they were nice enough to let Luther be the first dog.

When we arrived for the TT, I had several people ask if he was "the famous Luther". It seems one of the volunteers, Sheila, trains at MR and owns Zsa Zsa's sister, Abby, whom we had met up with last summer! Luther had his fan club ready and waiting for him.

While I was in the walk through, Luther was with Leonard, charming up the crowd ringside, including getting scratches from the person who was to be the "weird stranger". I had a panic moment wondering if he just made friends with this person, would he still want to protect me?

Luther is not be fooled. When the weird stranger made his stick banging approach in the test, he was very alert and at the end of the lead barking. Good boy!! We passed nicely and we should receive his TT certificate in 6-8 weeks. I know Luther has a phenomenal temperament and now I have official documentation to prove it!

We then said good bye to Leonard and left the test site to head to Gettysburg. The route I was taking took me right by the town a Cyber Foaling & Mare Stare message board friend lives. Cheryl is also a professional photographer who took some lovely photos of Miss Olivia. We met at a truck stop, played with the dogs, and had a wonderful converastion! I did meet Cheryl's husband, a friend and their dog too! What a nice bunch of people. It was a perfect break during the trip.

I made it down to Gettyburg in good time yesterday. Today we played in Rally again. With no training for the past two weeks, and practically no warm up (all my fault folks - blame me and my stupid back) Luther did Q! We have a beautiful Q rosette and a New Title rosette too!

Luther is now CH Visions I Have A Dream PT, CGC, TT*, RN* - *pending confirmation.

My "kids" and their "humans" have done very well so far here at the National. So many Q's and nice placements I have lost track right now. All I can say is I am so very proud of ALL of you!!!!!

My bad back is back...

After a month of lifting and lugging, between the bathroom renovation and expanding the dog yard, my sciatica reared its ugly head. Today is day 2 of muscle relaxers and NSAIDs and I do feel better then I did yesterday. I go again for a follow up adjustment tomorrow with the chiropractor. I have been "laying low" and not doing much, though there is loads to do before I am scheduled to leave on Sunday. Hopefully if everything keeps going in this positive direction, I should be OK for the National.

Bathroom Renovation - weekend 4

Friday night, Leonard put up the concrete board for the surround, and I helped seal the joints and holes with silicone.
On Saturday afternoon and Sunday, Shaun joined us and he put up the tile! Shaun is Leonard's sister's life partner. He did a GREAT job!

The wall without grout.
The finished surround. Again, my camera is not good at capturing colors. The grout is NOT white but a "summer wheat". And it is still making my "glass green" walls look gray. *sigh*

I am in LOVE with how this is turning out!

While Shaun was busy tiling, Leonard & I started the NEXT project - expanding the dog yard! I will have more photos next week.

Emma is official!

You can see her hip results on the OVC website by clicking here.

And a little bit of paint...

What a difference a coat of paint makes! The bathroom is so much brighter now. Too bad my camera didn't capture the pretty pale green hue. Hopefully better pictures to come once the surround has been tiled.

Fundraising ideas?

I belong to a lovely, but small, obedience club. Basically they hold classes year round, one AKC Obedience/Rally trial a year and 1 basket raffle at the dinners held twice a year. I left the annual meeting tonight (with 3 plaques ), knowing that they could use extra funds.

I am in need of easy fundraisers that will not upset people who are set in their ways with how thing should/should not be done within the club.

My favorite idea is to do rally & obedience run throughs.

Any other thoughts of easy fundraisers?

An Award! And Happy Easter everyone! (and Passover too)

I am a little late on the Happy Passover (please forgive). And I wish everyone a Happy Easter too!

I have been behind on the blogs but noticed we won an award (or two) from Katrin at By My Side.

Here are the rules of the awards:

• Paste the images of the awards on your blog
• List 10 things that make you happy and do 1 of them today
• List 10 bloggers who brighten your day (for the Happy 101 award) and 12 bloggers who brighten your day (for the Sunshine award)

Here are 10 things that make me happy:

1. Being with my husband.
   
2. Playing with the dogs.
   
3. Horses!
4. Spring time!
   
5. Puppies!
   
6. Competing in rally.
   
7. A good movie.
   
8. Driving the Element.
   
9. Being creative and enjoying graphic design.
   
10. Finding the time to enjoy a good book.
    

Now to list 12 bloggers deserving of this award. This is tough because a lot of bloggers I read have already gotten it, or I enjoy too many deserving blogs. So, if you read my blog, you've won the awards!

Day 2

And another rally leg! Luther did GREAT! I'm very tired but very happy.

The Scores Are In!

Katrin here, the Visions Reporter, to tell everyone that Holly and Luther got their 1st leg on their Rally Novice title today at the Salt City Cluster with a score of 94!!! This is Holly's 1st time back in the obedience ring in 14 years and Luther's very 1st time in the rally ring!

They will be back to try for leg #2 tomorrow!