Flashback to My Dog Adventure: the weekend

This was the final installment of notes I sent to the folks back home during Team Training. I know I had planned to write more after this but adjusting to life with Dash kept me pretty occupied for quite some time. 

Sunday, May 13, 2012

Hi everyone!
Well, Dash has been by my side 24/7 since Friday morning and I have to say, I like it! It has been so fun to see his true personality expose itself now that he is out of the CCI environment. It's kind of like the difference between a kid's behavior at school when teachers are around every corner versus at home where rules exist but it's okay to let loose a bit. :-)
We've gone on a few field trips. Yesterday our whole class had lunch at Cracker Barrel right around noon. There are high expectations for these dogs in public (especially restaurants) but Dash did a great job of tucking under the table and not even sniffing the ground for any morsels that may have been dropped. I was a proud lady!
Today was our first day without class since Monday and it was a thrill to sleep in and take it easy! Week one was truly exhausting for the handlers and the dogs! After a slow morning we (my mom, Dash, and I) headed out to Target for our first unsupervised field trip. Again, a complete success! I even had Dash retrieve something off a shelf for me!  
Once we got home we played fetch until he lost the tennis ball under the bed. Silly guy! 
It's safe to say that we had a fantastic weekend and we are ready to head back to class tomorrow. We will learn a few more skills this week and have more chances to fine tune the things we have worked on so far. 
Just 5 days until graduation day! Woohoo!
All our love,
Emily + Dash  

Flashback to My Dog Adventure: days 2 & 3

I woke up this morning with the folks who are attending Canine Companions for Independence's Team Training on my mind.  One of the most important events of the two week course happens on this, the first Wednesday - Preliminary Match Day! The first two days each student works with numerous dogs to give the trainers a chance to determine who works best with whom. It goes without saying that it was not hard to get up and to class in a timely fashion on Wednesday to finally get some insight into what they'd observed and find out which dog we could finally begin to give our hearts to! Below I recount my experience of Preliminary Match Day! 

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Hi everyone!
I'm so excited to share this latest installment of the doggy adventure with you! Briefly, yesterday was a challenging day for me! I had a chance to work with four different dogs throughout the day - Tamali and Dash again, and also Pluto and Juanita. The morning lecture that day was on how to give the dog a correction when it did not comply with a command. It takes both a vocal correction - "no" - and a physical correction - a quick pop of the leash. Needless to say, my physical corrections were less than effective, which can cause the dog not to put much stock in my leadership and therefore decide to ignore almost everything I asked! All of that to say, I left class yesterday a bit frustrated, very tired, but not at all without hope that things would get better and that this was nothing insurmountable.
Today was a whole new ballgame! (Side-note - speaking of ballgames, Go Tribe!) Today was the day we were assigned our dogs! Just to add a little suspense to the big reveal (ha ha!) I will tell you that I went into this thinking that by the end of the first day or two I would have a definite favorite and a definite least favorite. I was prepared to give myself talks on not getting to set on one dog because I might not end up with that dog at all! I did leave Tuesday afternoon thinking that I worked better with some dogs than others (Juanita, Dash, and Ansel) but I was not head over heels. I knew that the trainers knew so much more than I and just trusted they would pick the right dog for me! They have been working with the dogs for the past nine months so they know the temperaments and abilities of each dog far better than I! Soooo..... taking into account temperament, abilities, and size .... I was assigned .... the best, cutest, sweetest, smartest, best smelling, high achieving, wonderful, terrific, astounding, charming, handsome .... DASH!  
And you wouldn't believe how well today went! It was as if over night the trainers told the dogs "Okay, this is your for-real handler tomorrow, so you might as well do what she says!" As soon as Dash was presented to me in all his black lab glory, he sat, on my command! We spend the day learning new commands together and bonding with each other. Such a sweet and FUN time!
Of course I am attaching a few pics, and I will try to get a few more on Facebook in the next few days (a little incentive for those of you that don't have an account yet!)
Thank you all so much for your words of encouragement and prayers! They have helped to cheer me on!
More to come soon ....
Love,
Emily

Flashback to My Dog Adventure: day 1

This week all across the country Canine Companions for Independence is holding Team Training, a two week class culminating in the graduation of new service dog teams. I went through this in May of 2012 and thought this would be a fun chance to look back at some emails I sent out to the folks back home.  

Monday, May 7, 2012

 Hi all,
Today was the first of many training days! We spent most of the morning hearing presentations on things like what the dog expects from its leader (me!), and the way a dog thinks- very reactionary! 
After lunch we got to practice a few commands... on our human trainers! Finally, after getting the trainers to obey our commands (not always easy- they know how to imitate the worst of dogs!) we got to try the real thing! I worked with three different dogs- Dash, a black lab, and Tamale and Ansel, both yellow labs. It was interesting to observe the different strengths and weaknesses of each dog. The commands we practiced were sit, down (lay down), let's go (what many refer to as "heel"), and shake. Basic stuff but still a thrill when the dog responds well!
Tomorrow should be a similarly formatted day, but with new commands and possibly other dogs to work with. I'll write again if anything exciting happens or else stay tuned for Wednesday when we are given a tentative assignment for which dog will come home with us!
Much love to all,
Emily
PS. Meet Tamale in the attached photo!

Less-Words Wednesday: Happy Dashiversary!

This past Sunday was the second anniversary of Dash's and my graduation from Canine Companions for Independence, better known as our Dashiversary!

To celebrate, we spent the day with our Canine Companions for Independence family in Columbus by attending a graduation event. Fifteen dogs were placed in our region(!), but other graduations took place nationwide. 

Dad, me, and Dash. Shout out to Pluto for the awesome bow tie idea. Dash was stylin'!

After the ceremony we were invited to a dog party at our friend Roxanne's house!

But first. sustenance!

Q: How do you get 16 dogs to lay still for a photoshoot?
A: Not only are these all service dogs or service dogs in training, they have also been running nonstop for at least 2 hours! I'm pretty sure some of them were relieved to take a load off for a moment!

After a few hours of Dash romping with over a dozen of his best friends and lots of fun conversations and good eats for the humans, it was time to head back to Cleveland. The moment Dash jumped on the back seat of my van he was out like a light!

The following day Dash had what we refer to as a Play Hangover. He was still exhausted!

The past two years have absolutely flown by. My love for Dash is beyond words. I am so grateful for his companionship and the many ways he has enhanced my independence. I am not exaggerating when I say that I still get a complete thrill out of so many of the tasks that he does for me and I continue to be amazed at how quickly he learns new commands. I can only imagine what he and I will accomplish together in the years to come. 

2012 - 2013 - 2014

Opening Day: Dash Roots for the Home Team

The day Dash and I graduated as an official team, I had the opportunity to meet and eat lunch with his puppy raisers, Jim and Sandy. Sandy made me a beautiful "baby" book, and we looked through it together as they described Dash's puppyhood. One of my favorite pictures in the book is of Dash at a minor league game, getting some face time with the mascot.  I immediately envisioned Dash lunging up to catch a home run ball at Progressive Field!

He's more of an observer than a "lunger"!

Sure enough, Dash has joined me at a number of games over the past two years. But after this past winter of wickedly cold weather, I had no intention of bundling up for the Indians Home Opener. It's funny how just one day of sunshine and warmth can change one's mind and attitude, though. So, high on Tuesday's sunshine, I jumped online and got tickets for my mom and I. Somehow I allowed myself to only see that Friday called for temperatures in the 60s, and not the part about there being an 80% chance of rain!

Still hopeful (and in denial!), we gathered our things on Friday and headed off on our adventure. Thank's to last year's day in Cleveland with our Northern Ohio Volunteer Group for Canine Companions, I knew I would have no problem riding the RTA downtown with Dash. What a great way to avoid the traffic and expenses of parking downtown on game day!

After an unexpected setback due to an out-of-order elevator at Tower City (I'll just pretend that's all I have to say on that matter! Grrrr...), we made it to our seats around 3:45. We were slightly disappointed about being tardy to the party (game time was 3:05), but quickly realized nothing had happened yet. This was surprising as the sun was shining and after hiking from Tower City, Dash and my mom was actually pretty toasty!

A long-sleeved shirt was plenty!

We were informed that the reason for the delay was, as every Clevelander would expect, a fierce storm was coming through the area, bringing cool temperatures in its wake. Sure enough we looked up to see a dark bank of clouds rolling in. Although our seats were technically under cover, the wind in our faces made it clear that we were not in the splash-free zone! We, along with basically everyone else in the stadium, sought cover and protection from the wind.  Within moments we went from feeling overheated to bundling up in every item we had (thankfully) brought with us!

There comes a point that one doesn't care how foolish she looks, so long as she is warm! Clearly, Dash has a bit more dignity that I do!

After about an hour, the storm had passed and we returned to our soggy seats to finally see the Opening Day ceremony.  It was great to welcome the team home and, as always, I teared up during the National Anthem.  And then the moment we'd all been waiting for ... PLAY BALL!

Unfortunately, by this time I was chilled to the bone! After the first two hitters I relented and called it quits, knowing we still had to trek outside (stupid broken elevator!) to Tower City. We were home in plenty of time to watch the Tribe bring home a W, 7-2! 

It will be a Home Opener to remember, but we are really hoping for more memories like this one from last year:

We were made for sunshine!

Less-Words Wednesday: Where Ya Been?!

It's been quite some time since I last posted (oops!) but that's not to say that nothing has happened since last November! Here's a brief synopsis of each month:

December:
Dash was very into Christmas, as you can see! His favorite gifts were a squeaky moose from Aunt Carol and Uncle Dave, and a HUGE bag of tennis balls from his cousins (my nephews) Case and Tyce. I don't know why I don't have a photo of the balls but trust me, by the end of the holidays, tennis balls were in every room of the house! 

January:

We rang in the new year with our family.  Dash loved waking up to his cousins!

Making sure nobody disturbed baby Tyce ... or two of his new tennis balls!

Dash and his favorite playmate, Case. Dash knows that Case is good for a game of fetch at any time! This may or may not account for tennis balls in every room of the house (bathrooms included!)

February:

This year Dash, my sister Julie and I spent our Valentines day with our Canine Companions for Independence family at the most moving graduation ceremony I've been to since I got Dash. Eighteen people were placed with their dogs - about half of which were children!

"Our graduation invites are here! Can we go?! Can we? Can we? Please!!!"

We are always thrilled to get a chance to visit with Dash's puppy raisers, Jim and Sandy. Dash most definitely remembers them and goes into full happy puppy mode whenever we see them!

March:

Unfortunately, along with so many others, I spent a good portion of February and March feeling pretty yucky. I was so thankful that Dash has such a mellow temperament and was more than happy to go into snuggle mode.

We did a lot of this!

See? Total snuggle mode!

Thankfully, I was able to recover in time to speak at the Making Miracles Happen fundraiser for Canine Companions! 

(Not the best sound quality, sorry!)

And last but not least, we celebrated Dash's birthday (and MLB Opening Day!) on March 31! The big 0-4!

A new squeaky toy from a co-worker. Believe me, the sad eyes are only because I stopped his play to get a picture! Kids these days...

April:

Hey, it's only April 2! But there's a lot on our calendar so stay tuned for more!