Final Preparations

Well, we are getting down to the final preparations for the New York show. Tomorrow, I'm taking Katie and Travis hiking. Both of them are working really well except Katie is still having problems with articles. It seems that she cannot function if the article exercise follows other exercises. If I get out the articles, she can do them. But if we work on some heeling, retrieve a dumbbell, and do a moving stand first... then she seems to fall apart. Everything else looks great. I think she will do especially well in Open. Even if she fails the articles each day, it really doesn't matter. She has her UD and working through this problem is probably going to end up being good practice for me. "Train without ego" is very important. Also if she fails, I just need to bite my tongue and pretend like it was all good when we are in the ring. She just needs to relax, be happy, and get her confidence back.

Travis has looked great all along. I hope that he can sharpen up his sloppy obedience for just one day next week... preferably Wednesday.