Archive for category nash
Nationals – Sweeps news
Happy to say that Nash was 3rd in his 9-12 month sweepstakes class today! In large national entries, any placement is a win in my book LOL. I also showed June for Kate, since she was getting Ella ready for the ring, and she made the cut in her very large class! Hopefully we’ll have some ringside pictures a bit later. June is beautiful, needs to trim down a bit more (the girl spends her whole day thinking about food) but I’m very pleased with her. She’s a total sweetheart too and showed well for me.
2 weeks!
We leave for Nationals in 2 weeks! Eeeeek!! In preparation, Lizzie has started to, yes you guessed it, shed hair by the fistful. *sob* Nash hasn’t joined the party yet but we’ll see if that continues. In her defense, it IS 80 degrees here now pretty regularly, so I can see where she might be ready for summer wear. 
She also hasn’t quite grown in her belly hair yet, but I don’t think it’s too noticeable anymore unless you flip her over.
Nash is still in the throes of teenager-hood but is starting to show tiny glimmers of a brain and a body. He’s just barely 30 pounds at this point, so I’m very happy with where I think his adult weight will be. I’m trying to give him some showing refreshers over the next couple of weeks…I got lazy after his show debut and he’s getting some bad habits on the table. Like, wiggling when the judge walks up. The babies will be 10 months old in a few days!
Show update, and Vegas!
Nash and I headed to Louisville this weekend for a couple days of shows at the CWCCA supported entry up there. The entry wasn’t quite as large as it has been in years past, but there were still quite a few lovely specials there, and a solid entry of class dogs and bitches to make majors in dogs for all 4 days, and 2 days in girls. Friday and Saturday also had sweepstakes, which I love taking puppies to! I only entered Nash on Friday and Sat, just wanting to get some more experience under his belt before the Nationals and not really pushing for points…he still has a lot of growing up to do, but the Louisville site is great for getting puppies acclimated to large, busy shows.
Friday in sweepstakes Nash won his class and was pulled out by the judge (Emily Fish) for another look with the eventual winner, a very nice puppy owned/bred by Vivian Moran. He was second in his regular class. On Saturday we had a little better luck…he was the only one in his sweeps class (and didn’t get an award past that), but won his regular class and then went on to Reserve Winners Dog under Mary Belloff. Thankfully he showed better on Saturday than he did on Friday…he was very excited to be there, had his tail up which he rarely does, and generally had the attention span of a gnat. By Saturday he had settled down (and worn down) a bit.
Also, I was thrilled today to get some pictures from Joyce of the Vegas-man! No stacked shots, just some cute pictures of his handsome self being a dog. They’re going to dip their toes in the show ring in April!
Nashville takes on…Nashville?
Or, another day at the dog show. I entered Nash only one day this weekend because of my schedule…I entered 2 days next weekend in Louisville, and this was my tradeoff. I didn’t want to enter him TOO much before the Nationals, just on the off chance that he won, and really I just have him out so he can get used to things anyway. So today in Nashville there was a supported entry and sweeps.
No great results for today, Nash was 3rd of 3 in sweeps, and then 2nd of 4 in the regular class. I accidentally entered him in 6-9 month puppy instead of bred-by…I intended to finish him all from bred-by, whoops! Just not used to it yet. 
As it turns out today no big deal since he didn’t win, but he’s also entered incorrectly next weekend in Louisville. Oh well. The winner of his class was a VERY nice puppy who went on to WD/BOW…I don’t ever mind losing to a nice dog.
And thank to Janet, we have videos! I need to work on getting him to freebait a few more millimeters away from my legs, but otherwise I think he’s doing pretty well for a brainless puppy boy.
Baby’s first win pic
OK so it’s not great, but it’s better than I thought it would be. God, he looks scrawny. His coat flattens out quickly…I need something to keep him foofy.
Yay for pretty days
We are having GORGEOUS weather this weekend and have been taking full advantage. Most of yesterday was spent outside, tending to the backyard and playing with the kiddos…we had a flood in December which “relocated” all of our woodchips from the flower beds to various piles around our yard, so finally getting some of those raked up and tossed out. I spent a disgusting amount of time doing the disgusting job of picking up dog poop so that we could freely play. I always tend to neglect that job in the winter, plus we’ve had so much rain this season it’s been hard to find a day to do it. I will spare you all a photo of the giant bag full of poop that I ended up with, but suffice to say that it was impressive.
Charlie's attitude this morning was, umm, less than desirable.
Jack, however, was having a grand time
Today was bath day since the yard is actually somewhat dried out and less muddy than it has been for weeks. I know you all probably hate Cardi photos in the grass as much as I do, but this part of the yard is by far the best light for taking photos and I wanted to try him on the ground instead of the table. I think he looks MUCH better when he free stacks than when I hand stack him, for some reason he has a tendency to lock his back legs oddly when I hand stack him, so we’re working on that. (I’m speaking in general, not about these pictures. I hand stacked him for these) He’s starting to look like a grown up all of a sudden, is high in the rear OFTEN although these photos turned out ok I threw away a bunch that were really bad LOL. Ah, the fun growing stages of puppies! They turned 8 months old a few days ago.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Today I promised Charlie that we would make pink heart-shaped pancakes for breakfast. I didn’t have a mold really, so just poured them into heart-ish shapes…not bad, really! They were prettier before they browned but that’s ok, she was tickled. It may have been helped by the chocolate chips inside, too.
Jack wasn't sure what to think at first, but ate them after a bit
And the extra special part of today…..SNOW!!!! After hoping to get some yesterday morning and being pretty disappointed with just a dusting, it starting snowing here early this morning and gave us a good ground cover. The snowman didn’t last long as it was warming up quickly, but the kids had fun! Nash wants to spend the whole day outside. We are supposed to get some rain later (eww), and maybe more snow overnight.
Jack stayed on the sidewalk for a while...he kept pointing at the snow and saying "Yuck!". He did eventually venture out into the yard but mostly stayed in the cleared tracks, LOL.
Throwing snowballs for Nash
Charlie chasing Daddy with a snowball
Nashville takes on Atlanta
(yes his name is sometimes Nashville. Mostly when he’s in trouble.)
So, Nash’s ring debut yesterday can pretty much be summed up with the following thoughts from him:
“Look, there’s dogs!! Want to play? Playplayplayplay?”
“MOM!! There’s FOOD ON THE FLOOR!”
“Did you hear me?? FOOD. On the FLOOR.”
The worst was on the down and back when he just straight up refused to move because about halfway down there was a hotdog within eyesight. He just stood there and STARED at it, and me giving him a leash pop (or twelve) had no effect whatsoever. I think he was lucky to get 2nd of 3 in the bred-by class.
Sooooo, Saturday evening after BIS there was a free handling class, so we went and basically worked hard on “leave it”. Got a couple of other good suggestions too. Must have worked, because he was much better today! Not on the table, but that’s a different story…judge made a funny sound to get expression and Nash took that as a cue to try to jump on his shoulders. Whoops. Never did get him to stand still after that but luckily the judge was understanding. He also asked me how old he was (since he was in bred-by) and replied with “Aha!”when I told him. LOL And I was thrilled when he won Winners Dog for a 4 POINT MAJOR! During pictures the judge was quite chatty and told me several times what a “pretty boy” he is, he just loved his expression and movement.
So yay! Good boy Nash…sort of. 
We have lots of work to do, but at very least he did definitely have fun!
And we’re off!
Well, tomorrow morning that is. Tomorrow is Nash’s debut show in Atlanta, and yes I think I’ll show Lizzie too, naked belly and all. Naturally, it has been raining for about 3 days so the yard is a mud pit…I’m washing and drying dogs knowing full well that they will get filthy again before tomorrow. Sigh. We leave at about 7 am and show around 2:30ish Eastern time.
Wish us luck! If nothing else, I want Nash to have a good experience. I’m not too worried as he pretty much thinks life is a party thrown just for him, but you never know when something weird will happen to a puppy! And Atlanta is indoors, noisy and usually crowded. These first shows are so important for building that great show attitude for later, so I will be trying my best to keep it lighthearted and fun.
Eeek!
Well, I entered the Atlanta shows knowing that sometimes they pull pretty large entries. In fact, when Lizzie was a baby she made her debut at those shows and it was a 5 point major in bitches. *blink* (she was reserve both days) Now it’s her son Nash’s turn to dip his toe into the show world, and the entry was posted today…yep, a 5 point major in boys. Can I admit that I got a little tingly/excited when I made the entry for him? It was my first time to ever enter in Bred-By, and somehow that’s just really cool.
If you’ve missed it on Carolyn’s blog or Facebook, sister Lucy has done really well on HER debut weekend in Portland. Reserve Winner’s Bitch twice to majors! I’m thrilled! Many friends and family are showing tomorrow and Sunday still, so good luck to everyone!