WOW. Today was my first Saturday practice as a pre-apprentice on the search and rescue team and boy was it hot! I had a lot of fun, but the heat definitely took a toll on me. We were out from 7 am until about 12 pm. Thank goodness we didn't stay much longer, because the sun was out in full effect by 10:30 or 11 or so. Man, that Texas sun combined with the gentle humidity down here really will take a lot out of you! I always admire the dogs' ability to work in this heat, though we always have to be careful that they don't overheat.

I have been doing a lot of socialization with Keiko. Every day, we've done something new. This week we drove back from visiting home on Wednesday. Thursday we went to to the local feed store to buy her a collar that fits and to meet some new people. We also saw chickens, which she barked at when she first saw them. We revisited them and this time she handled it better, just looking on with intense curiosity. The employees at the store loved her! Later that evening we went to agility class, where she was loved on (and given one too many liver treats) by the participants. I really got to see her 'be an Aussie', which was fun! We let her romp around a bit and the instructor's stud dog (who is a black tri Aussie) taught Keiko a little bit about how Aussies play. I'm excited for next week so that she can get out and play with him a bit again. Friday we walked around the northern part of campus, near the dorms. We went up and down stairs, some small, some tall, some wide, etc etc. She handles the various terrain VERY well. I was very pleased with how well she took in campus. There weren't many people around since summer school hasn't started yet but we walked by a few people and some bikers passed us and she didn't bark. (yay!) We'll tackle another part of campus tomorrow, the other half of north east campus.

I keep reminding myself that she IS a puppy and I need to let her be one. She's at a bit of a frustrating age for me...four months. She's smart enough to learn things but she's not quite to the point where I can actually start really working and training her. This is somewhat of a new experience for me, since she's four months old but has no training basis on her so I'm starting from scratch but not with an 8 week old puppy. I'm glad, however, that I'm having this experience because I will gain handling skills from it! So now, I'm focusing on building her toy drive and teaching a few basic commands but keeping it fun. I will have to purchase a couple of Cuz toys so that I can tie a string to them and build some of her drive with the ball-on-a-string toy. I also have moved to only playing with her toys outside, as she was getting to the point where she would only play with toys inside and not outside. The only toys she gets inside are either her kong or her chilly bone, and those are given in her crate since she's still teething. We'll see how it goes.

Well, I'm going to go play with her for a bit. More will come later!