#mutt life

[eightbigpaws]

I’m so done being in recovery I wanna walk with boys I wanna play I wanna take Kaamos back to obedience classes AAAAA

[eightbigpaws]

Real actual competitive obedience class tomorrow and I am ball of anxiety.

[eightbigpaws]

Back in England.

Life update under the cut, pic of boys along canal in their new jackets they got from partner’s dad for yule for those who don’t care about text and life shit.

I miss Finland tbh, it was great to be there for yule despite all the stress about dog care.

I might get place in competitive obedience class, we went to see the lady who teaches them this monday and she was lovely, tiny and fairly old woman. She seemed pleased with us too, it is mostly up to if she will have space for us.

Kaamos is enjoying agility, me not so much. It requires fast thinking and I am simply too dumb for that. I am not good with something that requires this kind of fast pace. Plus it gets Kaamos super hyped, and one of the dogs there probably contributes a lot to his recent habit of growling at dogs we pass on street. I might give it up if we get place in the obedience class and get more serious about obedience. On the other hand I want to give it bit longer to see if I adjust. 

I’m planning to take Kaamos to show ring this year too, encouraged by his breeder. I’ll probably aim for “just try it” show first, they hold those for beginners where they basically walk you through the whole thing. 

Life is slow but weird. Rakki opened two yule presents without permission. I love dogs.

[eightbigpaws]

sateenkaarimato replied to your post “Real actual competitive obedience class tomorrow and I am ball of...”

I was really nervous going to my classes too but they ended up being super fun and the trainer and other people were really nice! Good luck!!!

Thank you! 

In the end it went brilliantly, Kaamos was charming and Good Boy and the teacher and otehr students were super nice too (also one of the other students was my “civilian” obedience teacher!).

Lookign forward to next week :D

[eightbigpaws]

Incredibly disappointed rn. The dogcare my ex-coworker owns where boys are now while we are visiting finland texted us today that Rakki is too stressed to be there and that they've taken him to father-in-laws place. She's sent us message everyday so far (3 days) saying everything has been great so this definitely came out of the blue. Not to mention that they went from "is there anything i could do to stop him from beeping?" To "I've taken him to your father in law cause he's too stressed." Within an hour without giving me chance to see her first message.

Luckily father in law wasn't too displeased this time, but she better return the cost of the remaining six days, especially as i'm pretty sure from what she described was not stress but Rakkis "give me food/play/attention" whine that i had told her of beforehand.

We're back to square one and have no one to trust with the dogs for holidays again. I wish we lived back here in finland so i'd have my reliable family looking after them.

[eightbigpaws]

There's absolutely gorgeous gsd bitch in gsd rescue and I wish I could take her 😭

[eightbigpaws]

Whining about holidays under the cut.

So we are going to Finland for yule/midwinter celebrations this year, first time since I moved to uk. Yay!

Dogs can’t come because expensive. Not Yay.

So I sorted them to sty with fiances dad except he didn’t want to take them for ten days. Fair enough, even tho he could have been nicer about it. Whatever. So I have friend/ex-coworker who is in dog care business, so I asked her if she can take them. Sure no problem she said. So we sorted it all and i paid for the boarding.

Except this morning I got text from her saying she can’t take the dogs for the full ten days after all, because her niece is gonna visit with two babies and apparently is worried about the dogs being there. So now I need to sort out three days somewhere else for the boys. And I’m getting annoyed and sad. I just want to visit my family for holidays first time in four years. And I don’t get why sorting things out is being so hard??? Sure they’re big dogs but??? Apparently I’m used to different family than what I have here in uk, and I’ve never had dog boarding cancelled on me because of business owners niece.

I want to move back to Finland. I feel alone and stranded in here.

[eightbigpaws]

Uhhhh we might be starting foundation agility with Kaamos next month...

I completely and utterly blame this on @twobigears and her agility videos!

Also catchup under cut.

I have been super inactive here over summer omg. it has been awful sumer to be honest, way too hot, we haven’t been able to do sny long hikes that I wanted to because it has been so hot!

On the positive note Kaamos has been breezing through his basic “civilian” obedience classes and we only have gold level left to clear before considering the competition levels. I kinda want to do that but I am not sure if the local club offers those and I am not experienced enough to do that on my own. Plus I like the motivation you get from trainer (and group if there is any).

Kaamos has grown into tall lanky teen and he is already about inch taller than Rakki. My baby boy is over year old now HOW!?!? But on the less nice side he is super lanky no matter what and how much I feed him and even tho he isn’t starving he is definitely bit bony and I keep fearing people will attack me over it because there are so many obese dogs around people keep commenting on Rakki being thin when he is in fact in good shape.

Kaamos is being bit of a teen and has been barking/growling at other dogs when we walk past - exactly the same Rakki did in his age- but we are slowly getting over it. We also practise focus a lot because he has that “shepherd stare” going and of course that is not great.

Rakki is growing older, he has gotten bit stiffer in joints I think and I have discussed it with vet. We agreed to try him on joint supplements to see if they will make any difference, but they don’t think he is in any kind of pain, just bit stiff. He is also greying strongly on the face, people who know him keep saying he tries to turn white like Kaamos xD

Hopefully once Kaamos is bit older we can start thinking about bikejoring and maybe next year I will gather courage to take him to the showring as well. The breeder has already said she will give me a hand if I need it so that’s a huge relief.

WSS have been getting a lot of attention in UK this year and all puppies are reserved for at least 3 years forward pretty much. There is only 3 breeders in the country but that still sounds wild to me. Still, I know all the breeders through the breed club and I am relieved to be in certainty that none of them will sell pups for people who just saw a car advert (why did they change the eyes blue???) or something similar. The breed club is very attentive about this.

But yeah. Wow. Agility. 

I am not sure I am at all prepared, but I am also kinda excited xD