2016 Summer Fun

With no summer vacation to Farragut this year for August 20-28 I bounced around between Calgary and the Pass for a week of "holidays." Finally hit up Island Lake Lodge on some decent days for photos and hiking. So nice up there!

Evening on 21-Aug:

Lunch time on 28-Aug:

In honor of the original photo from 2 years ago where we briefly saw Island Lake Lodge (and were  promptly hooked on the views) the original 3 came hiking and we did "family" photos again - Nike unfortunately doesn't do family photos yet!

The in no apparent order:

Off Leash Fun

To celebrate the beautiful day on Friday (and to tire out certain unnamed puppy's) we headed out to Wet Noses for some field time.

Fitting in

Since Nike doesn't have her full set of puppy shots yet, this is as close as I want to come to running around fields where I know there have been other dogs. Also, the fact you rent for a hour and you get the fully fenced field to yourself is awesome. Means I can work on recalls with good levels of distraction, but not be too worried about puppy misbehavior.

The dogs were crazy. Spencer was zooming around for nearly 45 minutes before he toned it down a little! It makes Nike SO MAD that she can't catch him (which might be good, since she should start to run more efficiently and less bouncy!)

Hopefully signs of future friendship?!

She's only "caught" him since he stopped and changed direction to come back

Penny is the only dog who will play with Nike in the house. So the girls stick together a bit. Penny runs naked now though, as Nike will grab her collar and drag her around the house!

Not to leave the rest of the dogs out ...

SO MUCH happy!

Aww Fluff <3

Baby fluff!

Piglet!

Fullerton Loop - May 2015

It's been a month, but hey! At the beginning of May, we did our "usual" hike out in Kananaskis just to kick off the season.

Weather wasn't really the best that day, but at least by the time we were finished the loop the snow had all melted. I had thought we might be safe for snow, since we did wait until May to head out and the hike isn't very high up, but no dice it seems!

Well hello snow, did you miss the memo? It's spring!!

Such mucky dogs! Poor Baxter had dirt dreadlocks by the time we got home, and Spencer looked like he was pin stripped up his sides where the dirt and mud dried. Usually I can brush them out once they're dry and avoid having to bath them. Not this time! Had to take Baxter in to the actual dog wash - the kitchen sink wasn't cutting it!

SO dirty!

Maybe the trail was a *little* muddy ...

Good times, even when Baxter accidentally jumped in a slushy stream and ended up in freezing water up to his shoulders. Good thing he is mostly water proof. I figured it would be better to keep him moving and his muscles warm rather than head back to the car and worry about hypothermia etc.

Penny did come as well, but princess' don't do mud or snow and still look photogenic or happy. Mostly they look like they want to bite you, and the one cute group picture I had of the dogs didn't end up turning out. So no Penny pictures. She was there hiking away with us though!

Small dogs, Big mountain

The dogs and I hiked Nihahi Ridge in Kananaskis Country on the long weekend with an agility friend and one of her friends.

In the hiking guide it was listed as "moderate." I, uh, think it was *maybe* a little more moderately strenuous, but we did manage to get up the ridge. Neither the dogs, nor I would have managed the scramble up to the summit, but that was okay. It was plenty high.

PLENTY high enough ...

It was actually pretty cold (not exactly a shock considering this is the May Long Weekend in the Rockies and it usually snows ...) After the switchback climb to the top of the meadow though, it sure seemed warm enough!

I didn't break out the camera much, too busy climbing and trying to breathe. There also wasn't a while lot of a view due to the low cloud ceiling and the blowing snow. At the top the Chi's got a lot of comments about how big of a hike it was for little dogs. They're dogs too!! (Penny got picked up in a couple places, but they did really well.)

Apparently it was too cold to look at the camera at the top of the ridge where the trail turns into a scramble up to the summit though ...

Camera? What Camera?!

So not looking at the camera

This is right. Right??

Peeper! aka "Poor Penny"

I can't believe it's been 5 years already?! When the heck did all that time pass??

Why haven't I posted about her birthday before?! Oops! I guess, technically I missed it this time too, her birthday was actually yesterday, the 14th of April, but close enough!

Penny - 5 years old

There is a running joke in my family about "Poor Penny" because she doesn't do sports, and I must not love her. For the record, she doesn't do agility because she has bad depth perception and will crash bars at 6" which is really scary when you're tiny.

She's very different from the boys. WAY more independent. Barky too. REALLY does not care what I think. I did "everything right" with her. Puppy kindergarten, basic obedience classes, puppy agility. Lots of socialization outings. Still not a lot of desire to please. Very much a "love the one you're with" attitude.

Training isn't made any easier by the fact that she's tiny. Can't get in a lot of food reps before you're done since the dog is full.

Or dropped crumbs/cookies on the floor in those group classes. I think she's still received MORE reinforcement off the floors in all those classes than she has from me. Hard to block the dog from getting the wrong reinforcement without kicking the tiny Chi puppy in the head so she's VERY WELL patterned to vacuum the floor of errant cookies that dog!

Tiny baby Penny

Despite everything, she's a sweet little dog. So friendly. Love, love, loves the people. Maybe lacking a little in the impulse control department, but at 5 lbs it's a pretty manageable problem.

Happy Birthday Teensy-tiny!

We went down to the lake for her birthday on the weekend. They haven't brought the water up yet, so the dogs were zooming around on the beach like crazy.

Josaphine Falls & Lilly Lake

Down river

Josaphine Falls

From our hike to Josaphine Falls and then Lilly Lake near Elkford BC. A gentleman ended up at the trail head the same time we did, he had been down to the information center first and they warned of bear activity in the area. He wasn't going to hike because of it. As we were a large group (5 adults and 4 dogs) we did the hike anyway. Didn't see any bears, but we were a little worried walking through all the berry patches!

The dogs were a little sad that they had to stay on leash for this hike, but I wasn't chancing them taking off after a bear, or dragging one back to the group.

 Lilly Lake

 Elkford lookout point

Fireweed. We did this hike late Aug/early Sept - I want to do it earlier next year when this is really in bloom. It's amazing. Apparently Fireweed only grows where there has been a fire. Sure makes the clear cut areas look WAY better.

Lilly Lake

Mooch

From the blooper reel. Poor Penny, just not the most photogenic dog. It's usually her that is an issue in my group photos. From eyes shut, to looking in the wrong place, to odd placement of the dogs. Ahh Peeper!

Hey. You! Over here dog.

I didn't quite mean sit like that ...