I'm just so proud of my pupper that I could burst, so I thought I'd share here. You guys know how much I've gone through with her and you celebrate her accomplishments almost as much as I do!
Last week we finished one of our Rally classes. It had turned into a more advanced level Rally because we'd all taken Beginner and were doing so well. Well, that class ended and 4 of the 6 dogs stayed at that day and time, but Ginger asked me and one other woman to switch to another Rally class so our old one could go off-leash. No problem.
So we started our new Rally class last night. There are only 3 other dogs in there which is nice (the last class was a little full and it made for snug quarters and a touch of nervousness on my behalf when doing run-throughs). One of them is Ruby, the reactive golden/greyhound (that's what I call her mix) that was in our last class, then we have a chocolate Lab who seems quite smitten with Inara, and a Cairn Terrier. Our first class with a small dog! I was a bit nervous, but what little faith I had in my dog!
It was a little chaotic when the class first began because Ruby and Inara feed off of each other a bit. Inara settled down way faster than Ruby did (what??? I no longer have the most reactive dog in class????) which was good. Ginger did her quick little spiel telling the other owners that Ruby and Inara have space issues that they need to be mindful of when working their dogs. She actually apologized to me before class for making that spiel because she doesn't want me to feel bad about it. I laughed at her. I'd be more upset if she DIDN'T tell the other people.
We're working on pretty advanced stuff: sits/downs/stands in motion, fancy turns, and we just started the beginning work of sits/downs/stands from a distance. Inara is a champ! Ginger used her as the example a couple times, mainly for the activity where Inara is in a sit, I take a large step to the right, and she has to scootch back into heel position. She actually does that really well!
Then we did a couple run-throughs. Usually our first run-through Inara kind of l0llygags around the ring, not quite as focused as I'd prefer. Last night though? Show dog. Eyes on me the whole time, prancing around, doing a left u-turn with no issues (woot! we can turn left now!), passing by the other dogs w/o a glance, etc. Stellar.
Even when the Cairn started to wander towards us, or the Lab's owner was playing a rowdy game of tug, she just purposefully looked at the distraction and then poked me in the leg with her nose - "mom, I just looked. Where's my treat???" It was perfect.