Gracie Update

Recently I've sat on the couch watching TV with a dog curled up on either side of me.  I'd think back to a year or more ago when this scenario would have been impossible!  Gracie took forever to calm down enough just to relax next to me.  She's come so far!  While still a pain in the butt sometimes, I can't imagine life without her now.

A few weeks ago we arrived at school for an open agility session.  I went in to set up our spot and found I was the only student there.  I went back outside to get the girls and walk them around a bit before heading in.  When we got inside I heard a thunder of paws coming down the far stairs as all of our instructor's dogs had gotten loose!  Instinct sort of took over and I grabbed Gracie by the chest so that she was standing on her back paws.  I kept talking to her as she let out some low growls, but she didn't fight to get away from me.  There were close to a dozen dogs running around us: a Border Collie, a sheltie, two German Shepherds, and several English Toy Spaniels and Cavalier King Charles Spaniels.  Gidget was a little overwhelmed but was handling it well.  As all the dogs were sniffing Gidget and Gracie, Gracie's tail started wagging a bit and the growling subsided.  By the time the instructor had all her dogs rounded up Gracie seemed almost happy, no growling and some good tail wagging.  I was so proud of how well she handled that surprise situation!  The familiar environment and the fact that the dogs weren't barking much and were quite friendly helped her tons I'm sure.  Once everything had settled down again Gracie was happy and ready to do some agility!

We haven't had much in the way of positive or negative dog/dog experiences since then.  I've accidentally let Gracie out of her kennel at class with another dog a little too close for comfort a couple of times with no reaction from Gracie (yay!).  Other than that life with Gracie has been fairly uneventful thankfully.  She is doing great in class!  I saw the fastest weaves I've seen out of her in class a couple weeks ago and she's completing 12 poles the majority of the time now.  I'm so proud of my Gracie!

I'm really behind on my class updates.  I think I have 6 course set ups to sketch out on Paint, half of those only have 1 course on them though.  Hopefully I'll get to them soon since we have open agility and class this week plus a trial next weekend!  Happy agility!