Last day of vacation

It has been a long time since  I have blogged, but here I am on the last day of my vacation.  I have a bought of insomnia and I am in our trailer with Chad, Aydon and the six dogs - did I mention that it is 3:55 am, so it seems like a good time to write something down.
This year so far has been pretty great.  I have done some obedience trialling with Ribbon in Open and she is doing amazing.  I am working on her utility - which she is really enjoying and coming up in September we are entered in some more Open trials, plus the HIT of HITS, which is being held in Ancaster this year.  Ribbon is competing in the Novice division, even though she qualified in Open as well.  - More about that event later
I have been doing some herding with Maddie and we even have some placements from the Pro Novice class.  Make no mistake here with our team I am not the Pro!! However we did have one run that everything went great and I felt like we were a team.  We were sitting in first for a long time, but ended up in 5th out of 46 dogs, so not bad really!  It felt good to see it all come together.  The other runs had some great parts and not so great bits - if only I could remember the correct flank commands!! I am also on the quest to learn how to use my whistle.  I have learn how to use it and also be able to produce the whistle commands that Maddie is already trained for.  I didn't really think it would be so hard.
Maddie is really healthy, fit and so much fun to live with.  She has been with us for over a year now and I can't imagine life without her.  We have a few trials coming up in the first week of September and then we are going to try a AHBA trial, since there is one only 20 mins. from my house.
Gali is doing great, we haven't been showing very much, just lots of walks and demo time at the training hall.  We hope to finish his RAE before the end of the year.  I haven't been pushing too hard to finish it, since it gives him an opportunity to go to more dog shows and enjoy himself
We are in Kincardine, camping.  We go home today and I am looking forward to my own bed, but it has been fun.  The dogs have enjoyed walking on the trails and swimming in the lake.  Ribbon has dumped all of her coat this week, but boy does she love to swim!  Maddie even joined in on the swimming.  She would rather stay on the shore or just in the shallows, but because of the sand bars she would come out further and then swim a little and return to the sand bar.
Lastly the new book is almost done.  We have one more photo shoot and then all the laying out stuff can start.  So with fingers crossed I hope it will be out by October.  Officially it is called Rally On - Second Edition.

Happy Training!