Pool Day (26 Weeks)
Yeah pool day!!
To start with, we took our 26 week family photo. Kaner turned a full 6 months on May 19th, which is also a full 6 months since Auggie was diagnosed with CHF.
We made it a full six months, everybody is happy, everybody is healthy, everybody is still alive.
So we got out the pool to celebrate.
Heat and humidity can be hard on a dog with CHF. The rule is Auggie can only stay out when it’s hot if he keeps himself cool in the pool.
So far he’s totally okay with this rule.
EVERYBODY IN THE POOL
Payton loves his pool.
Even the baby wants to play in the pool.
Family photo in the pool.
Hi I’m a cute puppy in the pool!!
Payton also really loves towel time. Like a lot. Like maybe more than playing in the pool itself.
Being dried off is the bestest.
YEAH TOWELS
Oh my Auggie.
Auggie had a fantastic day. Pools are actually pretty great. Yeah.
He did it!!!
PAYTON JUMPED INTO THE LAKE!!
We went out last weekend and tried to get him off the baby dock (it’s maybe a foot to the water, and only about a foot of water) and he wasn’t really game. I lowered him in so he would see it wasn’t deep but he still wasn’t game. He DID want to go play in the shallows, there’s a place where people can slide their boats into the water and he was all about playing there, but jumping into the lake… nope.
So I tried again today since it’s supposed to rain and storm all weekend. The first time he actually FELL in. OMFG hahaha. But the second time he actually edged up to it then hopped/slid in. At first I thought it was an accident because he looked shocked when he was standing there… but then he came around the dock and up onto the shore and looked at me, and I was going NUTS and gave him a whole handful of cookies… and he ran back to the edge, looked thoughtful for a second, then hopped in. Again I shoved a handful of cookies in his face, while he was in the water this time – the time before he looked so shocked he didn’t want them – and he came running back up on the shore again, ran to the edge of the dock, looked at me like “Do you see this??” and JUMPED IN.
And he did it again, and again, and again. And every time he came back to the shore like =D =D DID YOU SEE WHAT I JUST DID MOM
I only let him jump in about six times, he kept wanting to jump in but I knew rain was on it’s way and I didn’t want to over do it the very first time. So I toweled him off and we came back home (and just beat the rain.)
I can’t stop smiling. I was so proud and excited I almost cried.
HE JUMPED IN THE LAKE AHHHH
Payton AND Auggie at the lake!
I was packing our swimmy bag and put Auggie in his crate. He cried like he normally does when I’m going somewhere with Payton and without him. Mom and I went outside to put our sunscreen on and he started crying louder. “I think he wants to go, but he has no idea,” I said.
We came back inside to grab our stuff and Mom said “He wants to go…”
So we took Auggie with us.
Payton went in the swimmy first of course.
And yes, if you’re wondering, I convinced my mom to go because I REALLY wanted her to take photos of Payton swimming.
Cute puppy <3
My little guy. He looks so proud of himself when he reaches the shore. Like =D =D =D LOOK WHAT I CAN DO
Then… guess who had to swim next.
“Okay, I THOUGHT I wanted to go… I didn’t want to go.”
“OMG I thought I would never make it to shore.”
Payton actually chose to swim OUT away from the shore today. Especially after I had just taken Auggie in. Because while I was in the lake with Auggie Payton was on the shore SCREAMING “THAT’S MY SWIMMY GET OUT OF MY SWIMMY THIS ISN’T FAIR.”
I have no idea what’s going on here but I think it’s a cute picture of us so there.
Happy swimming Payton…
So yeah, this is how Payton swims still, LOL. Flailing a bit, butt sinking down, searching a bit for when he hits the ground to push off – it’s like a hop-swim. Sometimes if he’s in really deep water he will even out and just swim. I think he just needs more practice in deep water where he has to REALLY swim rather than shallows or my little pool where he can kick off the ground… or maybe not, since he loves the pool too, and who am I to tell him what not to do when he loves it?
He really does love it.
THE BUMPER! We had major success with the bumper today. He played with the bumper IN the water which he wouldn’t do last weekend.
AND he would even reach down and grab it from the water and retrieve it for me! We celebrated each retrieve with a huge game of tug. There is no public dock for me to use here, but there is a ledge. I decided the next best thing was to put Payton on the dock, toss the bumper into the lake, and tell him “get the bumper!” He would jump down off the ledge then run into the water to get the bumper and bring it back to me. Hey, it’s close, LOL.
Auggie LOLOLOL. I don’t know why I always find Auggie’s disdain so amusing… sorry Augs.
So my mom came up with this GREAT idea… racing. LOL.
I call Auggie my little tugboat… because he just churns along, smooth and steady. Honestly Auggie is the far better swimmer of the two.
And Payton meanwhile tries to catch some air when he swims LOL.
Auggie won EVERY race we had, by the way. Including when Payton had a head start. LMAO. I’m not sure if I should say “oh Payton” or “oh Auggie” here.
I do believe this photo sums up both their feelings on swimming quite well.
My dirty FILTHY dog!
I’m totally sending this one to his breeder. “Oh his sister is winning at conformation shows? That’s awesome! Here’s mine.”
And if you’re curious how he got that way – like this. Including rolling ON HIS BACK and wookie noising. NOW I definitely know I should say “oh Payton.”
I feel like Payton is coming along well for sure. I’m hoping to take a few trips to the small dock at a local lake (not nearly as big as this one and I can’t swim in it) and see if I can’t get him to jump off the dock and snag me the bumper. It’s not into deep water but it’s a dock nonetheless. Baby steps. The Dock Dogs event I want to take him to is in TWO weekends… so we shall see.
Trip to the lake, round 2
Equipped with a better life jacket, we went back down to the lake today. My mom kept insisting it would be too cold (it has been chilly the past few days, getting downright cold at night) but I had faith it would be warm enough. Sure enough, it was really quite lovely – and being that it only got up to about 80 (as opposed to 100 from last time), hardly anybody was on the beach and fewer people were out on their boats, so it was just generally quieter and calmer.
I got him there, strapped on his life jacket, went out until I was about chest deep in the water… and let him go. And he swam. Pretty well actually. He still kind of bobs his butt down, checking for ground – he knows eventually he will hit shallows and he can start walking, so it’s a kind of funny swim, but swim he did. And I’m pretty sure he liked it, more importantly. I still can’t get him to grab his bumper, or ball-on-a-rope, when he’s in the water, but we were playing in the water (I was splashing him and he was biting the water.) Also, he has learned that when he hears the sound of a boat, he needs to IMMEDIATELY run down to the lakeside because that means a bunch of big waves he can play in are about to hit the beach. It’s actually hilarious and I love it. Seriously, we were sitting up on the little ledge drying off, a boat went by, his ears pricked up, and he jumped down and almost dragged me to the water so he could play in the waves. He likes to go in the water about chest-deep but he still isn’t sure about swimming out on his own. He tried it once or twice and changed his mind and turned back around immediately and went back to shore. I’m not terribly offended by this, the idea of Dock Dogs is to get the toy and come back to the ramp anyway, not just swim out to the blue beyond LOL.
ANYWAY. The pics. I was desperate to get a photo of him swimming so I took a chance and carried my point & shoot out with me… and luckily I did not drop it in the lake.
Playing in the waves.
Getting his feet wet then coming back on the beach.
Dirty dirty puppy!
This is Payton’s face as I am carrying him out into deeper water… not kidding LOL.
SWIM GO GO SWIM SWIM SWIM GO GO
A better one – for some reason he doesn’t want to swim to me, he wants to swim next to me, so this was hard to get. He REALLY has fun if I put him in the water then I swim along next to him. He starts smiling and he swims faster like it’s a race. Obviously I couldn’t take a picture like that though (I dunno how to do a backstroke or anything!)
Little paw prints in the sand. Just for my scrapbook.
His life jacket was off so he could dry out a bit and a boat went by so DOWN BY THE WATER WE GO sans life jacket.
He even climbed in without his life jacket on, which is good news. I didn’t ask him to swim without his life jacket because I could tell he was getting tired, and I didn’t want him to get tired and start sinking without the jacket – so we left it on to make sure it was a good experience until the end.
Poking around in the shallows some more…
More dirty puppy.
This happened a lot LOL. Unfortunately I can’t take him off lead here so it just kept happening… I always had to make sure before I let him go to swim that I had the leash so he wouldn’t get tangled in it. =P
Life jacket… doing it wrong. I asked him if he wanted to go back in and he hopped up for me to put his jacket back on, so we went back in one last time.
Before we left. I ‘shopped out the stupid lead because it’s otherwise such a great photo. ;P He really, truly does like the lake. I’m glad.
And finally:
THIS is the best swimming shot, but unfortunately it was blurry. =< One day I will have somebody come with me and stand on the shore and get shots with a zoom lense... one day...
Pool today
“This would make a cute picture, right? Smile, Payton!”
He was giving me kisses before but once the camera came out he stopped, haha. I’m trying to get him to kiss me.
Now let’s get Auggie in the picture!!
Payton was licking my hand LOL. Apparently kissing my face is a no-no but kissing my hand is okay.
I’m not sure what the heck is going on here. I’m giving swim lessons??
I think I need to ‘shop Auggie out for one of him from the first two. =P
“Are you sad Auggie?”
“Everybody look at the ground.”
Poor Auggie LOLOLOL.
They both look so sad here hahahahaha! Payton had an eye goober I had to get. =P
See, they’re NOT miserable, I swear!
Repositioned Auggie so his paws were up on the side, and he starts looking at the ground again trying to decide if he wants to jump out or not.
LOL I’m not sure what’s up with Payton’s face here. “This is my look of disdain.”
We decided to try and get Georgie in the picture…
Earlier we had her and Payton in the pool together to see if they would play, but Georgie just discovered she can climb UP on Payton. Soooo that’s what she did.
And then…
…she tried to kill Payton.
Seriously, I can’t believe we got this photo. She decided to jump out using HIS HEAD as a springboard and his head went underwater. Poor guy!!
I promise to never let Georgie in the pool with you again Payton.
Training Challenge 07/20/12
I haven’t posted one of these for a few weeks, mostly because I was recovering from our last agility/rally trial, partially because it’s still really stinkin’ hot outside and it makes it hard to do much work out in the yard, and also because I’ve been busy juggling a few other things. I don’t want to jinx it so I won’t say more just yet, but really fabulous things might be about to happen for the Sheltiechick crew!
So this week, instead of breaking it down day by day, I think instead I will just make a general goal. I have been working on teaching the dogs to swim and yesterday I decided to start adding in more as it relates to Dock Dogs. I bought a small plastic footstool that sits inside the pool (actually, it floats, so unless a dog is sitting/standing on it, it’s floating around the pool…) and had Auggie standing on the stool, click+treating for him nose-bumping our ChuckIt amphibious bumper. Being the rock star that he is, very quickly I had Auggie nose-bumping the bumper when it was floating in the water. Next step will be to get him to actually mouth the bumper.
Payton’s turn was next, and the poor dog made me laugh so hard I almost fell down in the pool, because he was trying to do his pivots in the pool. He kept thinking his back feet should be on the bottom of the pool and his front feet on the stool, and he should then pivot around the stool, right? No, Payton, no! Poor guy. Payton will actually fetch the bumper for me on land but he doesn’t want anything to do with it when he’s in the water, so I think I need to train a “grab the bumper” outside the pool (rather than just “fetch the bumper”) and then move back INTO the pool and generalize “grab the bumper” to him standing on the stool in the pool.
Of course, my parents want to re-roof the house this week, so the pool is due to be emptied and come down. I’m thinking this coming weekend I might actually go to the lake again and see if we can get some swimming done there. I think Payton will do much better now with his new life jacket, and could benefit from being in water that’s actually deep rather than a pool where if he tries he can actually put his back legs on the floor and just flail around with his front legs. Auggie, meanwhile, is doing awesome, particularly if I put a life jacket on him. He doesn’t seem to really need it, but with the life jacket on, his swimming became much smoother. Unfortunately he wears the same size as Georgie but they don’t fit the same, so I will have to buy a third life jacket if I ever intend to have all three dogs in life jackets at the same time. I could order one of the Outward Hound jackets in pink for Georgie and give Auggie her orange one…
So that’s the training plan this week – “GRAB THE BUMPER!” Low key but still a goal regardless.
Swimming Shelties
I have now become obsessed with the idea of having these three be a Dock Dogs team. Wouldn’t that be fabulous?? I wonder if Miss Pepper would like to swim too…
Apologies for my pasty legs, melanoma runs in the family so I don’t tan, deal with it =P
Auggie went first. I tried the life jacket on him but really, he didn’t need it. So I just swam him without the life jacket on.
There’s a lot of flailing rather than smooth paddling… I think it’s because they can almost touch the bottom of the pool so they are trying to kick off the bottom rather than just swim.
Swim swim swim swim!
Payton was running around the pool the whole time barking THAT’S MY POOL GET OUT OF THE POOL HE’S IN MY POOL GET OUT OF THE POOL
Scrawny soaking pup!
Payton is still in his life jacket most of the time. I bought him a brand new Outward Hound life jacket that I think fits him better as opposed to the Premier Fido Float we used at the lake, and I think it definitely works better. However, Payton can definitely touch the bottom of the pool, so is kicking off the bottom. It’s not all the way full so this next weekend I will top it off and see if that makes a difference.
He kinda likes it though I think.
Holding him to try and get him to use his back legs more…
Paddle paddle paddle paddle paddle paddle go go go go
Seriously, I do think he likes it. I’d let him out and he’d run off to go shake, but every time I called him he came running back even though he KNEW I was going to put him back in the pool. Either he likes it or he’s really dumb LOL.
I like pool. maybe.
My cute puppy <3
MISS GEORGIE
Georgie is the smart one of the bunch… the boys will swim to the edge of the pool. She doesn’t bother, she just turns around and swims to me like “okay now pick me up.”
She is so cute I almost can’t stand it… seriously. In her little life jacket. Also an Outward Hound model. OMG.
Go! Swim to your mama!
But I’m getting water up my nose!
Little princess paws…
PICK ME UP
No life jacket! Go rock star princess, go!
She actually almost hopped out of the pool here hahaha.
One more time! Go little girlie!
SPLOOSH
Her ears are hysterical here.
Why? Why you do this to me??
THE END.
Payton went swimming
Ssssssorta.
Yesterday while at Target buying a pool for our backyard (this has become an obsession) I ran into a friend I met through agility. She moved out of town, not too far away, and just happened to be in town visiting her parents. She told me there’s a lake near where she lives and she has been taking her portie there and it’s a great place.
Well, I was told I couldn’t set the pool up, at least for now. And I was bored. So I packed Payton into the car and drove down to this lake. It’s about 90 minutes away, if that, so not too far really.
I took him in the water and he wasn’t really sure what to think. There were plenty of people out on boats and whenever a boat would go by (the boating section is on the opposite side of the lake from the public swimming beach) there would end up being sorta large waves rocking over to our side of the beach, and that confused him. So I took him back out and put the life jacket on.
He WILL swim, but it’s a terribly ungraceful splashing swim. I took the life jacket off and he hated that, his head dipped under water a few times too, so for now life jacket only. I ended up putting my shirt back on because I thought he was going to yank my bikini top off flailing around LOL. People were super interested in us, I kept hearing “I thought all dogs could swim!” Does it look like he can swim? LOL. One guy and I think his teenage son were talking to me about it while they threw a football back and forth, and Payton was watching them, and the guy said “Will he float in that if you let it go?” So I let it go to show him, and he was holding the football, and Payton started sloppy-splash-flail-swimming to the guy because I think he wanted the football hahahaha. OH PAYTON, you need to try that with SINGLE guys who are MY AGE, but nice try honeyface.
I tried to get him to go for a tennis ball but he was having none of it. He wouldn’t even swim out to get closer to me – I left him standing on the beach and floated out in the water and he just stared at me. I said “what if I was drowning out here??” and he just stared LOL.
We went back to the beach and sat down for a bit to get a drink, I pondered what I could try differently, then we went back in for a bit. This time he walked into the shallows all by himself and played around a little, he even walked in until he was about chin-deep, but he stopped there. Like he’s thinking about it, just not sure.
We sat on the beach drying off and I asked him if he still had fun or if he hated me now, and he gave me a kiss, or maybe my face just smelled like fish (we found half a dead fish near the shore and I was SO glad I left Auggie at home.) Picked up a few shells that had washed up on the shore and went home. Not too bad, we only spent a couple of hours there and I spent three-ish in the car, but it was really fun anyway.
I’m hoping my dad will change his mind and let me set up the pool in the backyard so we can practice more. =P
Here’s the photos I nabbed – none of Payton in the water since I was out there all by myself and wasn’t taking my camera in the lake, even if it was my crappy point & shoot…
Attempting to get a photo of us together hahaha. The lake was filthy, by the way. We both got right in the shower after getting home and my swimsuit was almost BLACK inside. Grosssssss.
“I don’t like you much right now mommy.”
Just sittin’ there, watchin’ people play in the water…
It was SO nice down there… even though it was still about 100 degrees back home and even hotter the further south you go, the air off the lake was fabulous. The sand seriously almost burned my feet though. But other than that it was super lovely!
Layin’ on his towel drying out, watching the people hanging out away from the water…
That’s it, nothing very exciting. =P I’m frickin’ exhausted right now but Payton’s like YAY YAY YAY PLAY PLAY PLAY YAY YAY YAY. stupid puppy.
