For once I have more images of wyatt to share, I thought it would be a nice change.

Trying to force myself to change angles a bit, as I become the zoom

Love this shot, so happy I challenged myself to change angles… and thankful Luna held still for me… and thankful for overcast snow sky.

Hope everyone is making it through these storms safely… we got off easy with our 2 inches of snow topped by about an eighth of an inch of ice.  Hopefully we can get out for some exercise tomorrow as I don’t think my dogs will be too keen on napping again.  More shots from our walk can be found on my photo blog.

Have a great weekend

These were shot with my new 50mm lens, I made a big photography change this year, more info on my photo blog.  Long story short I no longer have any Canon gear, and have switched to Nikon.

But nobody is complaining around here…

Well maybe Luna was a little… mostly because she wanted the treat..

Here she is “quiet talking” for me… which has started to become a default for her when I am working with her, rather than the usual full bark and smacking.  Guess we were getting somewhere with that trick afterall.

Tricks are something Luna and I will work on more this year… Call it a resolution if you will. But this year I am making a point to do more training/tricks with Luna.  Heaven knows she needs it.   I am usually horrible at resolutions, but hopefully this year will be different (don’t we all say that?)  One way I plan to accomplish this is to buy a trick book I have been eyeing for a year… and try and work our way through as much as we can.  I also want to sign up for a class with her, there is a local kennel club within walking distance, probably something for Rally.

Have you come up with any resolutions for you and your 4-legger??  I hope everyone has had a great 2012 so far. Off to get all these hooligans out of the house for a walk.

]]> http://akgvizslainspiration.wordpress.com/2012/01/14/new-headshots-for-the-new-year/feed/ 12 AKG fin_2695 copy FIN_2642 copy fin_2683 copy fin_2674 copy fin_2676 copy fin_2679 copy http://akgvizslainspiration.wordpress.com/2011/12/10/4-leggers-get-decorated/ http://akgvizslainspiration.wordpress.com/2011/12/10/4-leggers-get-decorated/#comments Sat, 10 Dec 2011 15:06:44 +0000 Anna http://akgvizslainspiration.wordpress.com/?p=836 Continue reading →]]> The dogs had quite an exciting night the other night… they got to get all dressed up in their LED finest.

Oh and the antlers couldn’t be left out either…

Not to be outdone Wyatt joined in the fun too… anything for some roasted chicken

And one of my favorite outtakes

“What do you mean this isn’t how you wear them?”

Thank you to all who sent holiday photos in to Life + Dog Holiday Contest .  As of now they have raised upwards of 86,000 meals for homeless animals!

And now we shall go see if we can get the red truck started and go get some fresh cold air for a couple hours.  These 4-leggers have been far too wound up lately, we’re all due for a good walk.

Have a great weekend

There is a great magazine that we ‘like’ on Facebook, called Life + Dog  who is hosting a special theme this week for their weekly  Foto Friday contest.  Here is some info about the Holiday theme this week:

Friday, December 9, 2011 – Theme: HOLIDAY DOGS (Celebrating the holidays, dressed up, sitting by the decor…)

Prize (for fans): A HUGE assortment of holiday gifts from our holiday gift guide “Pick of the Litter” column in Issue No. 8. In addition, as a part of IAMS Home For The Holidays campaign, IAMS will donate 100 Meals to homeless animals in need for EVERY photo submitted! Let’s have thousands and thousands of bowls of food donated because of LIFE+DOG readers!!!!  Remember, one photo maximum per dog, but as many photos as you like, e-mailed to fotofriday@lifeanddog.com

Tonight we plan to work on our 2011 versions of holiday photos… Here are last year’s…. shield your eyes if you need to.

Hopefully this year’s will be better, I have learned a thing or two since then.  Location is the difficult part this year.  I no longer have my parents large house to work in, nor do I even have a tree this year. If this rain looks manageable tonight I will try and venture out to a friend’s house to take over her place with the Lunatic in hopes of getting us both some Christmas shots.

What are your plans? Do you dress up your pets for the holidays?  Do you send our cards with their photos on them?  I find that some people as they get older will just put the kids, dogs, or both on the card rather than theirselves… what’s up with that?

If you do dress them up or pose them with holiday decor, please send the photo in to Life + Dog and help some other animals.  You do NOT need to be a facebook fan of their to submit a photo, but hey why not?

In other news you will be seeing another post on raw feeding/supplementing my 4-leggers.  I was inspired by some recent posts on facebook by a pet photographer whom I admire, Scruffy Dog Photography, I want to share more info on the subject… it probably will mostly consist of photos of my dogs, as well as some links through Scruffy Dog… so if you have a strong stomach stay tuned.  It should be interesting to say the least.

PS. thank you wordpress for creating the drag and drop photo uploader… saves me tons of time.

Can you see it??  It’s tucked into her inner left thigh… pardon the crappy photo she was not into being cooperative and the phone was having a bad day.  Luckily the vet was not having a bad day though, her tattoo turned out nice and clear. A little larger than I had thought it would be but I guess that’s better than having a tattoo which leaves you guessing about numbers and letters. And from the initial look at the x-rays they took of the hips and elbows everything looked just fine.  We will have to wait for the official rating to come in the mail.

So why get her hips tested you ask?  First and foremost I have always planned to do it, it just has taken me nearly 4 years (well 2 technically as you can’t officially test before 2 years old).  That is not really a reason I guess.  I like contributing information and research to disease/genetic research.  And I feel like owning a purebred dog, it kinda is my responsibility to do so in the ways I can, especially if I decide to breed her.  Now before anybody gets on their soapbox about me breeding her or not… know that I am still on the fence about whether I will end up breeding Luna.   But I not only think it would be a good thing for her mentally, but I also do feel she has some things she would be contributing to the breed.  However, timing will probably  also be a big factor on my decision and it’s something I will probably have to decide in the next year.  But before I would ever breed her I want her to have a clean bill of health.  We have gotten an eye test, a cardio test, and now a hip/elbow test done and she has passed all with no problems.  We will continue to train and test in different venues but at least I know she is healthy and sound in body.

(the photo above is also sort of ironic, as that is probably the laziest sit she has ever done… normally she has amazing posture all on her own as you have probably seen.)

More OFA facts can be found on their website.

Now back to work in the rain… yep it’s raining cats and dogs yet again.

Introducing…

 CH Dynata’s Bound to Inspire JH CGC

Yep, we got off our butts and went for our Canine Good Citizen title, and she passed!!! Not without some Vizsla flair though.  I must admit, I dealt with this test much like I do most tests, I crammed the day before and of.  But despite my bad studying habits she passed with style.  It went down something like this. (skip the reading if you want, couple photos on the bottom)

~*~Approach a stranger and sit while mom says hello : NOOO PROBLEM  (she could care less about the guy, which is so hit or miss with her because she goes nuts for people sometimes, but maybe it’s based on how the person acts around her)

~*~Have stranger ask to pet her and remain sitting and calm : CHECK (she did a wonderful job with her “wait” and was very calm as he pet her… he helped by being calm, thank you stranger sir.)

~*~ Have stranger groom/check ears/ and paws:  I LOOOVE GROOMING (sooo she saw the brush, then she saw him pick up the brush, then she thought the brush was for her and wanted to check it out, then as he squatted down she lost it a bit and gave him “hi fives” “paws” and wiggled to see if he would give her the brush…. soooo we came back to that one.  In the end I had her stand like at a show, and have her examined and sure enough she stood there like I knew she could and let him do anything he wanted)

~*~ Loose leash walk including a right turn, halt, left turn, and about turn:  FANTASTIC (despite the gazillion feet, butts, treats that had touched that floor from all the other agility and CGC classes on the floor before this, she heeled like a pro)

~*~ Demonstrate: Sit, Down, Stay and Come: NAILED IT (I has an inkling  she would nail this section as her stationary obedience is one of her strong suits)

~*~ Walk through a crowd loose leash :  I CAN DO THIS TOO!  (I was not worried about this section much either as she has worked in a lot of crowds, where I usually am trying to take photos at the same time as handling her. She sniffed in passing but otherwise paid people no mind)

~*~ Approach a stranger and their dog, have the dogs sit as the strangers say hello and have the dogs remain sitting only showing mild interest in the other: WHAT DOG?  (AKA she did better than I ever thought she would/could here.  It was as if the dog did not exist.  This was one area I really was worried about, as Luna can sometimes be a bit of a boss with strange dogs.  It is one area where she occasionally still tries to challenge my leadership.  But this is one area I have really challenged her in, often incoorperating her into the work I do with my training dogs. This has really helped her chill out and realize I can control the dogs in the picture and she doesn’t need to step in and correct them… long story short I was thrilled with how she did with the dog portion.)

~*~ Seperation from owner for 3 minutes:  PASSED with attitude  (sooo, despite the running, walking, and heel work I did with her in efforts to wear her out that day, Luna still had energy to spare.  Most of you already know how vocal Luna is… this sometimes can be multiplied drastically if she has to wait for things in a public setting.  Long story short, she could care less if I left, but she did not want to let her distaste for having to sit relatively still go un-vocalized.  But the fuss she did kick up was in no way due to me being gone, and the evaluators realized that too. When I was told to re-enter the picture she remained calm as she was supposed to not worried at all that I had been gone.)

So in the end I felt she did really well, and I am very happy to cross this off our list.  I was fully expecting to not have her pass, and have this test end up being a learning experience for us. We have never done any formal obedience classes or prep work for such a test.  This has totally sparked my interest in some Rally or obedience work with her.  But our focus for now will be on finishing up more hunt training.

So during her breaks from the field she can go back to

begging for cheese.

This is one of the first phone photos where I have actually captured a bit of the “looks” she gives me.

Like this one from the chair by my computer…

Maybe this is what she wanted… to be covered up. She has me trained well

]]> http://akgvizslainspiration.wordpress.com/2011/11/05/more-letters-for-the-lunatic/feed/ 3 AKG lunapark_8702 copy IMG_1437 LunaBWchair_7959 Lunacover_7968 copy http://akgvizslainspiration.wordpress.com/2011/10/13/official-dog-show-photo-of-the-new-champion/ http://akgvizslainspiration.wordpress.com/2011/10/13/official-dog-show-photo-of-the-new-champion/#comments Fri, 14 Oct 2011 00:37:33 +0000 Anna http://akgvizslainspiration.wordpress.com/?p=817 Continue reading →]]> Well here it is…

Luna’s official show photo for her Championship.  Nothing like a nice photo to finish off her championship (is that even right to say? the photo didn’t do it, the win did).  Sometimes show photos can turn out pretty wonky, which makes sense when you consider they usually take 2 and you have 3 people, a dog and squeaker toys involved it’s a wonder they turn out at all sometimes.

As of now the jury is out on showing her further.  If I make it to nationals in May I may throw her in just for kicks, and maybe I will even show her myself now that the pressure is off.  But we will see where things are at when the time comes.  For now we will sit back and enjoy rooting other family members on towards their championships, outside the ring, camera in hand.

I apologize for being so silent on the blogs lately.  My back has thrown me through the ringer for no apparent reason, and the computer chair only makes matters worse so computer time has been drastically limited.  Hopefully things will be back in order soon.  I created a post through my iPhone but somehow managed to delete it before I published it and have not had the motivation to try again.

In other news, the 4 leggers have been hating the rain, but loving the goodies I scored at the grocery store.  Last night I stocked back up on beef neck bones, a couple turkey necks, ox tails, and a new addition of sliced beef feet.  So the freezer is officially restocked with raw goodies to occupy the restless pups.  Hopefully Luna and I can get out this weekend to try out a new rollerblade location with a friend… Along with other vizsla tiring activities in hopes of taking the edge off incase we are able to test for Luna’s CGC (Canine Good Citizen) on monday if there is still room in the test.  I have high hopes for her passing whenever we do get around to testing this month.  I took her to home depot to run errands with me and she sat nice and politely as a man pet her.  This was one area I have never really worked her in, but she did wonderfully. The heal, stays, comes etc she should do just fine in.  I plan to test her a bit more this weekend out and about town when we go pick up more dog food.  Wish us luck!

What are your weekend plans???

PS… if I did not already correct Luna’s official name… it was brought to my attention I forgot her JH title, so it goes as follows

CH Dynata’s Bound to Inspire JH

Soon as the weather clears and life/back is back to normal we will try and finish up the last bit of hunt training so she can test for her SH title.

Before….

After….

Notice anything different? Besides the ribbons and location… Does she look more proud??  She should, she is now an AKC Champion… So from now on she prefers to be referred to as CH Dynata’s Bound to Inspire JH . But you don’t have to listen to her, you can still call her Luna, Lunatic, or Looney tune.  No but really, Luna finally did it, she finished her championship this weekend.  Both Saturday and Sunday she took Winners Bitch for 2 points each day to finish her championship with 1 point to spare.  Can we get a Whoooooooooo.

I was not able to attend the shows, so Luna rode up with her uncle Jack (seen above).  Saturday’s judge was Canadian which tickled me that they liked her since I have family up in Canada.  Sunday, Luna was put through the Costa Rica rigors with front and rear end checks as well as the usual movement requests around the ring.  I was thrilled a foreign judge took a liking to my little girl too.  I have nothing against the usual judges of the area, it’s just nice to see how she stands up to foreign opinions.

Jack also pulled out some big wins on Sunday, going Winners Dog then Best of Breed followed by a 4th place placement in group!!! Way to represent Dynata Family! Thanks to Callie and Andrew for hosting Luna this weekend and spending hours on the road, I’m glad she behaved for you.  Congrats on your boy’s wins Sunday!  Thanks to all my friends and family and especially the Dynata family for all of your support as we worked towards this CH it really was great to have so many in her corner. And thanks to the handlers who have helped in her journey as well, Patty, Barbara and Melissa to name a few.  It was a team effort

As soon as the official show photo comes in I will share it with you all. I hope everyone has a great week

Notice anything different??

How about now?

Okay, I’ll tell you.  Luna got a new collar!  You should know by now I’m a sucker for collars, as seen in a collar post long ago.  And my friend Nicole, knows me way too well.  This was a birthday present to me, from Silly Buddy, a new awesome collar for Luna.  It’s a purchase I would not have been able to justify. So thank you dear friend it is a lovely gift.

Do you have any guilty vices for your pets? Collars, toys and chews are some of mine, but all but the first make the dogs very happy too (or do all 3??).

Here is a quick phone pick of Luna’s collection, minus 1 lilac collar from her puppy days, pardon the crappy color quality and all the dog hair.

Left to right: Silly Buddy collar from nicole, purple “crazy” collar from Mackenzie Collars after her first major win, pink hunt collar gotta represent in the field, daisy martingale on clearance, purple braided plaid from a co-worker, purple puppy collar, teal clearance reflective collar, and magenta puppy collar.

Not bad for almost 4 years worth right? I should deconstruct some of of the puppy collars and use the hardware to make new collars for her.

Want to see what else we have been up to? Check out the photo blog for some home made goodness. Hope everyone is having a good weekend we have rain, thunder, and lightening here.

Hey if you miss my work that bad just go check out some archives, or Luna’s blog (though it needs to be updated too).

In other random news, looks like we had an earthquake at home.  Hope everyone is okay, kinda wish I had been there but SO glad to be on vacation.  The weather here has not even gotten warm enough for us to want to venture into the pool. Hopefully it will though.

Alright, off to the Grand River

Hope everyone is having a great week

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