ramping up for spring

Now that the weather is improving and days are getting longer everyone is showing increased interest in training their dogs.

In addition to our twice-monthly workshops, we have Thursday evening fun runs which show increased attendance. And, in response to our private lesson sale, we’ve got an increased number of private lesson scheduled.

All of this is falling at the same time as our increased work outdoors for regular maintenance AND our beautification projects AND Bud’s work-study program. This week we’re also expecting Bud’s brother and sister-in-law for a “chores visit,” where they stay in our lower cottage as a bit of a vacation and help with projects we can’t do by ourselves.

While this flurry of activity swirls around Country Dream I’ve also scheduled myself to spend 3 days this week accompanying my mother to meetings with her attorney and to the final hearing for my parents’ divorce at the end of this week — Friday the 13th (sounds ominous, right?).

This event will end a 60-year argument between my parents, hopefully. I’m sure there will be lots of loose ends to clean up, but we’ll at least have properties divided and disagreements settled. I imagine it will be years before everyone is speaking to each other. I understand from conversations with others that mine is not the only dysfunctional family.

In shelter news — I’m not going to get to the shelter this Friday but will try to go on Saturday.  This has been a really busy week with lots of projects, most involving a 20-minutes drive. So I’ve spent a good deal of time on the road and I’ve hauled mulch from the free pile half-a-dozen times already this week.

There’s been some difficulty getting possible breeds listed correctly on Petfinder.com and on the shelter website. I don’t think it is just that the person listing the breed isn’t overly educated on dog breeds, but there’s also an effort made to entice possible adopters. I, on the other hand, believe in calling a dog what it probably is, with the idea in mind that there are people seeking out dogs of every breed or combination of breeds.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. I thought about creating a notebook of breeds for the folks at the shelter. That’s probably going to take more time than I have.

Camp season approaches and we’re going to offer mini workshops at lunchtime this year. They’ll be intro to tracking or rally, obedience for agility or rally, puppy training, etc. Bud will be taking a break so I’ll be the instructor. I’m looking forward to seeing how these are received.

Tags: agility camp, dog agility, dog performance sports, Marsha Houston, rally obedience, Shelter dogs