And proving once again.......

That a tired dog is a good dog!!! An afternoon of swimming excitement really takes the edge off of any mischief.........

Another Day on the Water

Jet Boys

Here's a scene you don't see to often, dogs riding on a jetski. Our boys happily ride along on our jetski, especially since they know it means it will be a day of swimming. This is the Potomac River, north of Washington, DC and Great Falls. This part of the river is wide and pretty shallow. It has lots of islands where we can beach the jetski and let the boys run wild. It is located close to home, so it's a convenient place to play in the water. The jetski is a big three-seater, so Jimmy rides in between us on the seat and Wilson prefers to ride in the footwell with his face pushed out into the wind. Of course, we are very careful, and hold on tightly to their vest handles, and drive slowly......

An easy swim with the vests still on......

Keeping their distance!

A "Stay" Trifecta

Buddies

Tiny little guy

We saw this little fawn on our morning walk this morning and yesterday morning as well. He was all nestled down in the brush. I was only about five feet away. I didn't even notice him at first but Wilson sure did! He headed deeper into the woods when Wilson got too close. He must be quite young as his body was no bigger than Jimmy's, who isn't a large Cardi at all. Sorry for the glowing eyes but the sun wasn't up enough to light the woods so my flash was triggered.

Impulse Control!

What's Out There?

A Good Start to the Day!

Beach Boy Wilson

Early morning in Myrtle Beach, SC. I love to be up for the ocean sunrise!

Here's another lovely start to a day....sans dogs however.

And a final shot of a sunrise from our condo balcony....great way to enjoy that first cup of coffee!

Loch Ness Jimmy

This picture reminded me of a sea monster.....What do you think? I do know he can be a little monster at times!

Double Trouble

Wilson and Jimmy have only one dog in common in their five generation pedigrees. Wilson's great grandfather and Jimmy's great great grandfather is CH Rhydowen I Be Jammin. Until this dog, there is no overlap. I don't know if these divergent pedigrees are what account for their VERY different temperaments or not.

Wilson is a very reserved boy. He really prefers that no one other than John, me, or our neighbor's young daughter even touches him. Most strangers get a "stand back" bark if they insist on getting too close. While Wilson does love his morning walk, he is definitely not a high energy dog. After his walk, he is content to nap the day away. In agility, he is the steady and careful type. I am always ahead of him on course. Also, Wilson has no fear of thunderstorms, the lawnmower, the vacuum, or John's noisy Harley.

Jimmy, on the other hand, loves people. If he's in a room full of strangers, he makes his rounds, trying to get each and every one to pet him. He particularly likes men. You can walk him five miles and he's still raring to go. In agility, he gets totally amped up! It is a challenge to keep up, and very difficult to get in a front cross without getting in Jimmy's way. He weaves like a border collie. Loud noises are a problem for Jimmy, esp. thunderstorms, which cause him to pant and shake. The vacuum, the lawnmower, and the Harley are all very scary.

For the most part, the boys get along well. There are never any food fights and they can share a bowl with no issues. Jimmy adores Wilson, but also has a bit of jealousy over toys and training. They play chase in the yard most days and wrestle alot.

What they have in common is the ability to learn new things quickly, both have a great sense of humor and love to make their humans laugh! They definitely keep life interesting and fun.
I have tons of photos of the two together as they love to pose, and both have a great stay. Here are just a few:



This was shortly after Jimmy got home on his very first day with us.

In the kitchen, hoping for a treat. They learn the art of being cute at a very young age!

Frogging!

It takes two to get that big stick to shore!

This was taken recently, on Jimmy's 2nd birthday.

Jimmy

Jimmy is the first dog I ever sought with an actual purpose in mind. After getting hooked on agility, I wanted to try my hand at training a new dog now that I had the worst of the learning curve behind me (or so I thought!). I actually toyed with the idea of going to the "dark side" and getting a border collie, but I worried I wasn't up to the energy and focus of the BC. So I stayed with what I know and love, and looked for a high drive Cardigan. I think Jimmy could be described as a "border corgi"! Not only is he the classic black and white coloring, he is a perpetual motion machine, never tiring, and would work all day. Here he is a week or two after coming home, probably around 13 0r 14 weeks.





Jimmy is a smart little guy and breezed through PuppyKindergarten and CGC Obedience. We posed him in cap and gown to celebrate passing his CGC exam at just 9 months old. I am not sure he was too pleased with his outfit.

Here he is at the 2008 CWCCA Nat'l Specialty in Kentucky. I like this photo for the way it shows off the white on his chest and throat. His registered name is Fine Creek's Sharp Dressed Man as a play on his formal-wear coloring.

I've learned that it is hard to take pictures of black-faced dogs. So often it turns out with no detail, and more of a silhouette. I liked this one because he's eyes are sharp and clear and the slight brindling on his face is visible.

One of Jimmy's funniest quirks is that he LOVES to watch TV! The very day we brought him home, he noticed the TV and he's been watching it ever since. I'm not talking looking for a second and moving on. If he sees animals on the TV, he flies over and plants himself in front of the screen for as much as 5 or 10 minutes, wagging, barking, bouncing, standing on his hind legs to get closer. It can even be animated animals. We watched the cartoon movie "Bolt" one evening and Jimmy watched almost the entire thing without losing focus. Boy was he exhausted when it was over!

Wilson

Wilson came to us assigned with a mighty task. His job was to mend our broken hearts due to the passing of dear old Dylan. He had some very big shoes to fill, that was for sure! Without even knowing the job before him, he managed to be quite successful. It's very hard to stay sad when there's a puppy in the house! Here he is at about five months old:

We drove to Lexington, Kentucky to pick Wilson up at a large all-breed show. This was my first time at a big dog show, well, any dog show. It was very interesting. I started Wilson into obedience lessons as soon as possible, thinking maybe I would try to compete with him somewhere down the road. Wilson was a quick learner, but was oh-so-bored with the repetition. At the other end of the large barn we were training in was an agility class. It looked like so much fun! Wilson trained in obedience as far as his CGC and we made the switch to agility. I am so lucky that there is a fantastic agility school just 15 minutes from my house! After about a year of lessons, Wilson and I gave it a go at our first AKC agility trial. Little did I know just how addicting agility is!
Wilson is now Caduceus Castaway Wilson AJP OAP NFP CGC. He is pictured below displaying the proud result of that first trial:

We spend a good bit of time in Myrtle Beach, SC. It's a dog friendly beach town and we really enjoy it there. I have many, many beach theme dog photos. This one is from when Wilson was about a year old. If you go to the Dogster website and use their favorite breed search on Cardigan Welsh Corgi, it brings up a description of our breed, and it uses this photo as their example of what a Cardi looks like. I guess that counts as Wilson's 15 minutes of fame!

In case anyone is curious, Wilson's parents are:

CH Sisterwood's Winsome Will X CH Aberdovey Kee Bear Ms Marcus

The Best Dog Ever

Before launching into the life and times of my current Cardis, I want to pay homage to Dylan, the Cardigan that started my love of the breed.

When I got Dylan as a very young pup back in 1986, I didn't even know what a corgi was, Pem or Cardi. I was going through a rough patch in my mid-20s and about the only thing that cheered me up was a sheltie pup my parents had just acquired. As a birthday gift, my parents volunteered to pay for a puppy if I found one I wanted. Now keep in mind this was the 80's, with no internet yet, puppy mills were still a dirty secret, and buying a puppy at a pet store had none of the stigma it has now. With an itch for a puppy, it didn't take long for me to find a little pup that called to me at a local pet store. He had the cutest little split color face, huge paws and a wonderful brindle coat. Adorable beyond words! I forced myself to sleep on it, and if he was still there the next day, I was going to make him mine!

Dylan turned out to be an eager to please, easy to train delight, but boy-oh-boy I wish I had known about crate training way back then! He had tons of energy, and it needed an outlet. I would keep him in my bedroom when I went to work as it had a hardwood floor. For some reason he wouldn't pee on hardwood, but he would pee on the carpet in the rest of the apt. One day I came home to find he had tugged my queen size four poster bed to the middle of the room, and stripped it of all the sheets. From all the tugging, a seam had split, and from there he pulled out a bunch of stuffing. It was quite a sight to behold, and hard to believe such a small dog could move such a big bed! I did know that puppies needed to go to obedience training, so I enrolled him in a 6 week session sponsored by the county. He was both the class clown and the brightest pupil. He made it so easy, he loved to learn. From the beginning he was a great off-leash dog, with a tendency to herd you home on the return from a walk, tugging your pant leg to keep you moving along. His one true passion was to play frisbee. He would give you every trick in his repetoire just to goad you into throwing the frisbee. There was a stream in the woods behind my apartment, and after several rounds of fetch, he would fly down the hill, frisbee in mouth, to cool off in the water. Sure enough, he would let go of the frisbee and it would sink to the bottom. He had no problem plunging his head completely under water to retrieve his beloved toy.

Time moved on, things changed, and through it all he was my very best friend. If we are lucky at all, we each get to have at least that one special dog pass through our lives. Dylan was with me for just two weeks shy of seventeen years and saying goodbye was very difficult. Almost six years after his trip across the bridge, I still miss him. I wish I had a better photo to share but I didn't get a digital camera til well late in his life. He was a beautiful boy and I am so grateful he was in my life. I owe him alot. ....Thank you, Dylan, for everything!

Just Do it Already!

I set this blog up way back in February! Since then, I've been trying to figure out how to begin. Well, here it is 4 months later and the only thing I use my blog for is to see which of my favorite Cardi-blogs have recent updates! So without further ado, here are some pictures from the agility trial I attended this weekend:

This is the long driveway headed in to the fields where the agility trail was held. It is such a lovely setting. On the left is my young boy, Fine Creek's Sharp Dressed Man CGC, aka Jimmy. On the right, my seasoned competitor, Caduceus Castaway Wilson AJP OAP NFP CGC, aka Wilson.

This picture of two emus was taken sitting on the tailgate of my parked car. It was just a small bit of the eye-and-nose candy available to the dogs who came to compete on Saturday. Before I knew what he was doing, Wilson had enjoyed a good roll in emu pee. Very smelly stuff!

Next on the list of fun things to see and do......llamas!

The first llama evidently showed enough interest in Wilson that his buddies became curious. While Wilson was able to take the llamas in calm stride, young Jimmy found them much too stimulating to be in close proximity, thus no photos of him in this scenario!

This is my favorite shot from the day and definitely the highlight for Wilson and Jimmy. The agility trial was held at a lovely farm bordering on the Chesapeake Bay. This dock was part of the farm and had lovely waterviews and a nice sandy beach. Wilson's one true passion in life is to swim so he couldn't have been happier than getting down to the water after his runs were through. Posing for this picture was painful as he just wanted back in the water!

And finally, here's Jimmy enjoying a good roll in some dried fish guts. Tongue out and happily grunting!



So, you are left wondering how the agility trial went......Wilson did great in Novice FAST-P, taking first place to complete his NFP title. In Excellent Std and JWW, his weaving troubles persisted so we NQ'd in both those runs, although other than the weaves, he did a nice job.