GRADUATION!
Tonight was the last evening of puppy class. We reviewed what they've learned so far and each of them received official Pet Degrees!

Class was great fun - we played games based on the behaviours they've been learning. For example, we did a variation on musical chairs where, when the trainer called time, the first puppy to perform a 'sit' won. There were races to see who'd come when called, who would walk furthest, well-behaved, on a loose leash, who would hold the longest when given a 'stay' or a 'leave it'.

Mister Fusspot had 'sit' lost from the beginning; we've finally been able to coax a sit or two out of him, but he won't do it consistently yet. However, he did GREAT at loose-leash walking and won the Longest 'Leave-It'. Each of the puppies, ours and another fellow called Maino, excelled at something, everyone winning different games.



<--- Maino

We're discussing continuing education; our trainer also offers an intermediate course. I doubt we'd do it right away, with the holiday season fast approaching [can you BELIEVE that?!?] it would be too difficult to assimilate class and training into any sort of consistent routine. But maybe after we've worked on the basics some more...and succeeded in getting Mister Fusspot to sit.

In other news, I'm lately addicted to this game on Yahoo. Not very good at it yet, but it is habit-forming.