CHRISTMAS MEETING AT CLEARWATER MALL

Post by Barbara L.

All photos were taken by Barbara L.

Thunder & Lighting  "Take me for a Ride in your Car"

Great distraction

Ho!Ho!Ho!  Happy Holidays from the pups

Carolyn's going over our instruction




Libery, come!

Boy Scouts meet Southeastern Guidedog Puppies

Wonder who's having the most fun?

Thunder loves the attention

Coasty leeds the way to the meeting

Cheryl & Karen speak to the Boy Scouts

Lightening's idea of meet and greet

Meeting at the Sheraton

Today we had our meeting at the Sheraton Sand Key Resort where Susan works.  It was a lovely meeting with lots of fun exposures!  We started off the meeting with some Q&A from the newly revised puppy manual.  

Carolyn and Coach with his coat off about to demonstrate the over the head puppy coat move.

Carolyn is trying to buckle Coach's coat and Coach is looking out from under her arm.

Then AC Carolyn talked about how important it was to start putting on the puppy coat over your puppy's head instead of relying on the velcro.  It gets them used to having a harness go over their head. I know some puppy raisers even sew their velcro together because they have some big boys and they keep bursting out of their coats!

Some prospective puppy raisers and some experienced raisers wait for the meeting to start.

Bob gets a smooch from Liberty.

Lois and Barbara talk while Charity sits and ignores them like a good puppy should. 

Everything stopped when new puppy Cochise arrived! He's only 13 weeks old.

Newspaper stars Stephanie and Coastie sit calmly during the meeting.

Carolyn introduces Cochise to our group with Mrs. Woodman and her son next to her.

 After we did some command refreshers and the puppy news, we did some obedience.

Puppy Ava, raiser and host Susan, raiser Bob and puppy Liberty wait for instructions.

 At the back of the circle was the group of puppies: Andros, Thunder, Lightning and Cochise.  They made for a cute little puppy obedience line.

Cochise, Thunder and Andros are all practicing their down stays.

Prospective raisers Jalika and John try giving Coastie some obedience commands.  They are next prospective raisers Paul and Gail.

Brian and Fred practice the down stay with Liz and Coach.  Then they give the Come command, which the puppies did perfectly!

 Once we finished with the obedience, we went inside the Sheraton for some elevator and stair exposures.

Andros did great sitting before and after getting in the elevator.  Here he is sitting on his way out.

Andros was a trooper.  And so were the people in our elevator!  They were so nice and patient.

Here is Andros doing a great sit after getting out of the elevator.  Mom and Dad are looking very proud!

Cochise is contemplating the stairs.

After the inside exposures, we took everyone outside for some sun and sand exposures.  You know, there are some pups that get the zoomies when they see sand.  Bingo always thought sand was ice cream he could eat.

Close up of Thunder with a big sandy nose.

Close up of Ava with a big sandy muzzle.

Pretty princess Charity didn't get sand on her face!

Pretty princess Liberty didn't get sand on her face either!

Mom Karen and Liberty on the beach.

All in all it was a great morning!  Thanks so much to Susan for arranging a wonderful meeting with so many great exposures!!

Puppies and Boy Scouts

 On Tuesday we had our monthly meeting at the Heritage United Methodist Church where the Boy Scouts hold their meeting.

The group waiting in the foyer.

Michele first explained about Southeastern Guide Dogs, their mission and what puppy raisers do.  

Then as everyone was still waiting patiently in the hallway, she talked about the puppies.  She, of course, had Andros, the newest (youngest) and cutest puppy of the group.

Coach watched as Liz got her coat on.

Liz is still not super excited about this boy scout thing.  I think she is missing Essie, who just gave birth to 8 puppies!  All black, 6 male, 2 female.

 

Liz lies on the floor, her raisers Brian and Susan look on.

 Then it was show time.

Coach, a black lab; Liberty, a yellow lab; Andros, being held and a black lab;  Coastie, a yellow lab;  their raisers and Charity's raiser Lois stand in front of the boy scouts.

We brought our puppies out in front of the group and there was a short Q and A.  The kids had to guess who sponsored Lightening and Thunder.

A shot of the boys waiting patiently to be matched with their puppy group.

Another shot of chaos as boys leap up to get into one puppy group as the puppy's name is announced!

Now, I didn't shots of individual group shots (Barbara, if you want to send me some!), as I had Coach and it wouldn't be fair to just use shots of Coach's group.  But suffice it to say that when I looked around the room, fun was being had! Boy scouts were happy!  Puppies were being given an experience of a lifetime.

Puppies in the Park

Yesterday, we had our Saturday meeting in the park. We did the usual line up and drill for obedience.

Photo looking down the line of the raisers and their dogs all in a down stay to their left.

But then we moved on to practice the new come command.  At least the new way we are teaching the command: with treats!

Stephanie and Coastie, a yellow lab male practice the come command perfectly.  Coastie is waiting in front of her for the treat.

At first, all went well.  All the dogs were doing great.

Little Lightning is paying rapt attention to what raiser Karen is telling him.

Chocolate lab female Hershey waits patiently for the come command to be issued from raiser Tim.

Lightning leaps into action as Karen gives the command.

Hershey is still waiting patiently.

Liz, a black lab female is on her way to raiser Brian after he gives the command.

Then our AC mixed it up.  Change dogs, she said.

"Oh my!" If you watch the video at the end of the post, you will see that our pups were still 100% on the money for this command.  Right on!!!  Go PUPS!

Then we headed off for some duck and dock distractions and after that to some bleachers to experience metal seating.

Coach is a bit of a show off at the bleachers and he climbed right up to the top.

Lightning isn't afraid of bleachers, though.  Here he is with his front paws up on the seats.

After the seating experiment, we did puppy bingo like we have in the past.  I think I will save that for another blog post though! Enjoy the video. 8-)

New Puppy Parade: Liberty, Lightning, Charity, Hershey, Ava

We have some new puppies in our group! Five to be exact.  It's a little strange to be so generational.  We have the older dogs, who are getting things down, and then we have the little nut balls, who are just getting the hang of it.  

Although, I must admit, these puppies are very calm and collected. Not many true nut balls in the bunch! So, here are your official introductions of our newest members!

Lois holds Charity in front of her.  Charity is in a sit.  Lois is kneeling.

 This is Charity, being raised by Lois and Bill.  She is a black lab female and was born on June 28th.  She got a little timid when walking to the lake, but Lois got her over that real quick.  As you can see from the photo below, she has a beautiful sit.  I love the way she looks at Lois.

Side view of Lois giving Charity the sit command.  Charity is intently looking at Lois.  Charity's head is perfectly positioned.

Next up is Ava.  I may have talked about Ava before, but this is her official debut with the puppies.  Ava is being raised by Nancy and her boys.  Blair is the one who comes with her to the meetings.

Photo of Nancy holding Ava under the front paws so that Ava's belly is exposed to the viewer.  She has a big pink belly and is very cute.

Ava is so sweet, being a very tiny black lab female.  In the photo below, she is with Blair in the grocery store on her first visit and I think she is barely bigger than his tennis shoe!

Blair holding teeny tiny Ava in the produce section of the grocery.  Ava is in a sit by his tennis shoes.  Blair is smiling.

Next up is one of our potentially famous pups: Lightning!  Famous you say?  Well, perhaps.  Lightning is sponsored by the Tampa Bay Lightning Hockey team, but there is currently no hockey being played due to the lock out.  (wa-wah!) So, poor Lightning and his raiser Karen won't be able to go to any hockey games!  I was sort of looking forward to a meeting on ice.

Photo of Lightning and his raiser Karen sitting on a park bench.  Lightning is wearing his blue coat.

Here is a photo of yellow lab male Lightning with his raiser Karen. 

Photo of Lightning posing on the tile floor. He is lying down and looking back over his shoulder!

Photo of Karen and Liberty at the Lion's donation event at Publix.  Karen is walking up with Liberty on the leash.  Liberty is in coat.

I couldn't wait for a photo of Liberty, so I went with what I had. Liberty is the tiny yellow lab puppy in the center of the shot.  She is being raiser by veteran raisers Bob and Karen.  Liberty is sponsored by the courthouse where Karen works.

Photo of Hershey's raiser family.  Hershey is sitting in front sideways but looking at the camera.  She is in coat.

Here we have Hershey, named by the Hersh family who sponsored her, and her raiser family.  Hershey is a chocolate (of course!) lab female.

Photo of Carolyn standing with puppy Hershey in her arms.  Hershey is very small and looking into the camera.

Our area coordinator Carolyn Hersh and her husband Steve sponsored Hershey.  Carolyn is holding Hershey in the photo above.

So now you have the run down on all of our new pups.  Tomorrow I will get you the info on puppy bingo! Don't miss it!!!