Tatum Tot Spice

Archive for the ‘Learning’ Category

Well, the Mum says that she is packing up me and Chase and we are going to go to a Flyball Seminar this weekend.

The Mum says it’s a really long drive, about 7 hours. And I don’t know how I’m gonna play with Chase in the car because the car is really small, but the Mum says I can get out sometimes and take breaks and stuff. She says that we will mostly sleep the whole way there.

I am nervous ’cause I haven’t slept away from my new home since I got here in September of last year. But the Mum says we will have fun because we get to stay in a Townhouse with the other flyball team people and dogs, and it won’t be as scary as a hotel with the people walking around. Because I really must bark at people when they walk around. And Friday I get a seminar day all to myself but it will be a strange place. I’m so glad Chase and the other dogs will be with!

Wish me luck, we leave tomorrow!

Wow the Mum wants me to learn so many things! But I am not only beautiful, I am also very smart. I like to touch her hand with my front feet now. When I do, I get the click and the treat to happen. And when I get on my mat, the Mum has made it harder. Now I have to do something else, and I think it’s the lay down but I’m still figuring that one out. Sometimes I’ll stand on my mat for a while before I lay down. Sometimes I paw her and I’m not sure which she wants! But I’m learning fast, and soon I’ll be knowing it all and I will get to teach the Mum.

After the Mum teaches me with the clicker then she teaches my new brother, Muffit! Did I tell you I have a new brother? Well, his name is Muffit. The Mum calls him WhosaMuffit but that’s just weird. I guess he lived here a while a couple of years ago, then went to a new family. But they didn’t end up wanting to let him live there anymore, so they put him in a really icky place, a scary place, and he got really sick until the Dad found out he was there (’cause of some chip thing) and went to get him out.

So now the Dad told the Mum that he’s going to stay! Yay! I like him and he is fun to play with, as you can tell from this picture. And he is not sick anymore which is good, his runny nose was kinda gross.

So the Mum has been doing more clicker stuff with me. It’s so fun I don’t want it to stop. Why does she have to stop? And then work with Muffit, Chase and Levi? She should just always work with me!

I figured out that touching her hand with my foot makes the click! So now I do it a lot. It’s fun. And then she put down this white cardboard thing and I touched it with my foot, and it made the click too! And then the Mum got me a new mat.. it’s a Mutt Matt and it’s neat! And now when I get on it the click doesn’t happen.. so I stand there for a minute and then when I lay down, that makes the click! This collie likes her mat!

It kinda sucks that just standing on the Mutt Mat doesn’t make the click anymore, but I can lay down, too. That is also fun so I’ll just do that now.

The Mum put the white cardboard on the flyball box too, and I would touch it to get the click to happen. But she’s still not sure how to get me up on there with all four feet. So when until she figures that out, I will just eat cookies.

The Mum is confused about how to teach me a good swimmers turn on the box so she is trying some different stuff. There is this blog that has information on clicking and the swimmer’s turn, and the Mum wants me to read it but I don’t want to so the Mum is gonna clicker train me somehow.

So she put a treat in her hand and I wanted it so I just nibbled at it with my teeth. And she was talking and said to herself she said “hmmm, I don’t want you to learn how to nibble fingers” so instead, she put the treat in her fist and then she moved it away from me when I was laying down.

I’d move a bit to see if I could get it, and sometimes she would click, and sometimes she would not. Could it be from when I moved my foot? I don’t know yet but I’m thinking about it. I gotta figure out what she wants me to do. She says we will work on it again later in the day and maybe take some more pictures of me because I’m so beautiful.

Yesterday me, the Mum, Chase and Levi got to go to an agility trial. It was fun. I checked every human out to see if they had Livers. And guess what? They did! Amazing. People are not so bad when they have yummy Livers. The Mum said Chase and Levi had lots of fun too and did really well. She also said I did well too!

It got scary when we walked to the car because stupid Mum dropped my flexi leash. And I dragged it behind me and I panicked! Oh man! It was scary. I tried to run back into the big building but hit my head on the glass and then Aunt Astrid caught me up. I was pretty afraid for the rest of the night, but when we got home I just wanted to play with Chase and then eat dinner then sleep ’cause I was tired.

This morning the Mum took me and Tony out for a walk. It was fun at first but then got stressful ’cause of all the cars going around. I wanted to go home so the Mum took us home, and when we got home I wanted to play with Chase again. The Mum says play relieves stress but duh, I already knew that!

It was a fun couple of days. The Mum says that I won’t be as nervous the more i do stuff. I sure hope so. I don’t like being nervous.

The Mum gave me a bath today (because Chase peed on me yesterday), and it royally sucked. But then the Mum says how gorgeous I am and she brushes me and scratches me. But I already know I’m gorgeous. But I kinda like the Mum too, and the rest of the pack. It’s a pretty good life here.

So the Mum pulled out the clicker today and wanted me to learn something new. Man, so many new things! The Mum said Lucy knows how to do this and she’ll show me later.. but she wanted me to try it first on my own.

So out come the liver treats too.. man those are good. The Mum just bakes them in the oven for a while then cuts them up, and we all stand around and I want to eat them, and sometimes I want the other dogs to go away… oooo the Mum is telling me I am blogging about the chimes, not the liver! Okay well anyway so she led me toward the Chimes with some of the yummy liver and made them ring. And it was kinda freaky I didn’t like the noise much.

So after the Mum put all those Livers on the chime, she walked away and sat on the couch and watched to see what I would do. Well I knew that darn liver was on the chimes.. but when I tried to get it off on my own, it would make funny tinkly noise. And the Mum says that’s the point, but I didn’t really like it. So I wanted the Mum to hold the chime steady so I could just eat the Livers off!

Well after I wouldn’t get the livers off, the Mum let Lucy come out to show me how it was done. Oh My Gosh. Lucy just ran right over there and tinkled all the chimes, not afraid at all, to get the livers off! She would push it with her nose then look at the Mum, and the Mum would give her more livers. And if Lucy didn’t get livers fast enough, she would push at the chimes again and again and make them fly all over the place! Wow Lucy!

I am not as enthusiastic when it’s just me and the Mum like Lucy is. Lucy danced all over wondering what the Mum wants her to do so she can get some livers. But me, I am not so sure about being alone with the Mum yet, and not so sure about what is going on. So I’m a bit more slow and I think more (thus I get a thinking award yay!). But the Mum says it’ll come, I haven’t lived here too long yet, and it’s all good and yummy and fun. And then after I got to play with Chase on the couch and that was super fun!

Oh, the Mum says that she wants me to ring the Chimes to tell me when I need to go out potty when the dog door is closed. Whatever. I just stare at the door, and that works!

Oh, and the Mum is going to Los Angelez tomorrow and taking her computer with her so I won’t be able to blog until she gets back! Boo!

Went to puppy class yesterday! That was fun. There were a lot of dogs there. My buddy Rift was there and I wanted to play with him. And my friend Anya was there, the little tiny rotty girl. And there was a big fuzzy black Bernese Mountain dog who was cute and I wanted to play with her. The only little puppy was Anya, but still it was fun. And I got to meet Luna, she is a really pretty border collie girl. The humans were talking about poor Luna. There is probably something wrong with her tummy. Usually the humans give us yummy treats to let us know we did something good. Well, Luna has a hurt tummy, and treats make her sick, and so she has been avoiding things that she gets treats for! Isn’t that awful! It’d be no fun at all if treats made you sick!

So luna gets to go to the doggie doctor to find out what is wrong with her poor tummy. She was so wiggly and fun, I wanted us all to play! The the Mum and the Teacher Lady wouldn’t let us. Booo!

And now the Mum says maybe I can’t go to the semeenars for flyball with Chase, cause another fllyball dog on the team, Chase Me, might go instead. Hrmph. Oh well, we will see if I can go or not. If not, I get to stay home and play with Lucy, Levi and Angel. Yay for Play!

Okay so the Mum set up this orange cone thingy in the basement today. She was reading these white papers I really wanted to eat earlier today, but she wouldn’t let me she said they were important for flyball. I’ve been to watch Chase do flyball and it looks fun but I want to play with the other dogs instead of go over jumps. But it’d be fun to chase the other dogs down the line of jumps!

Anyway so the Mum put the cone and I wanted to sniff it so I did and whaaa! I made a click! Then I got a piece of liver. So I stared that the Mum’s hands and then she put them behind her. I hate it when she does that. I don’t like looking at her face or eyes much yet so I look at her hands instead. They hold the treats anyway. But then she put a piece of liver on the cone and when I went to eat it I made the click again! And then she put the liver on the cone for a while and so I kept making a click when I ate it. Was fun! And then she’d put the cone waaaaay over on the other side of the room and I wanted to go check it out to see if it had liver on it and guess what? It did!

Some of the time the cone didn’t have any liver on it but I went to see anyway, and when I touched it with my nose I made the click happen and then went back to the Mum for the liver. Yummy! The Mum says that this is gonna help my flyball as well as my obedience go outs. And even my distance work for agility. I dunno about any of that yet I just like to go and get liver from the cone, and make the click happen.

Then the Mum wanted to play and chase me around the house but I just wanted liver and I was kinda tired. The Mum said I’m supposed to get really excited and run to the cone and then run back really fast. But she was using liver, not toys, and I don’t get fast about liver. So she says soon we’ll have to stop doing the liver and just use the toy to get me super excited. After we did the cone stuff and some weird stuff with cheese on a stick I only played with Chase and the Mum outside in the yard for a few minutes. Now I’m sleeping on the couch next to the Mum. We gots to chew yummy bones again this morning and oh I should put up a picture of me chewing that the Mum took! I’ll go do that too.