cold day in the city..

It's hard to think that we haven't been down to NEADS since November!!! With the holidays and our trip to DC, there wasn't time to do a December check in, and I remember thinking as we left in November, "it will be the new year before we are back", that seemed like a long time away, but here we are, and it wasn't that long. We are in a stretch of cold weather... and this was the temp as we pulled out this morning... brrrrr... hope Dave has "inside work" for us!!!!!

We met at NEADS, did our usual "round table" discussion, and then it was onto the mall. (whew --- way to cold to go in the city today!!!) The mall had (has) all sorts of training opportunities, so it was a good day of work. Another glass elevator... what is it about this area and glass elevators... we don't have them around here....







Along with watching the dogs work, hearing about where they are at.. Dave also takes pictures each month to go into their files. This is Marv, he's only about 8 months old, and he's huge!!!! Each month he gets bigger, we fondly call him "pony"....

Rylie was pretty un-impressed with the mall and the elevator. I like her quite attitude, though I do worry a little about her "drive"... she is very laid back, which is good, but she is a lab and I expect a little more excitement out of her. I actually told Dave that I wished she had a "little more", but he doesn't seem concerned.

Dave likes to switch dogs and handlers around. So, I wasn't able to work Rylie, but I got lots of pictures of her working with others. She doesn't care who she is with, her work is her work, and she does it well for anyone.

Even though the puppies are not allowed on escalators, being around them is a good thing. They do make all sorts of noises, and people riding up and down look different. Moxie and Rylie dealt with alot of escalators when we went to DC, so this was "nothing" to them.

Regular stairs are another good working tool. The puppies need to know how to stop cold on the stairs and wait, they could be matched with someone who might lose their balance on the steps, or someone who might need to lean on them while doing stairs. Here Marv and Rick do a nice job of "waiting on the steps"......

Now, Kathleen and Rylie start their "stair stepping" . Rylie did pretty well here, but she could use more work. She tends to take one step ahead and I need to work on her keeping back.

Here's something that you may or may not notice.. a "scary lion" in the window. I see so many things differently when out working with the dogs. This would more than likely be something I would walk by and never even notice... but a puppy might!!! Actually none of our puppies were even concerned, but these are the kinds of things we are always on the watch for.....

And kids, especially little ones, often run out of no where to see the puppies. Right now, we aren't too concerned about the dogs ignoring other people, we work to keep their attention on us, but being so young, it is expected that they will be distracted. Fortunately all our dogs love children, so this isn't a big deal. As the dogs get older though, they do have to learn how to not be distracted with things of this sort.

It's hard "not to see us"coming... we do bring a lot of attention to ourselves when working like this. (even more reason to have THE best behaved dogs in the world!!!!!)











By the end of the day, Rylie gives me this look like "I've been good, I've worked hard... let's head home".. though she certainly isn't as tired as she was when she was younger. When I think of it, I figure she and I have about six more check in's together and it will be her turn in time. Basing your life on "what service dog you had at the time" sure shows you how quickly it passes. but that's still a whole summer away.......