Monday Round-Up

I always hesitate to overly recognize a dog, fearing that others will think ribbon-related accomplishments are what matters to me.

How can I adequately convey that what I value for our Kaibab dogs are interesting lives, and that I know well there are so many ways that can be achieved. I fear that my words may not be adequate — but I mean that most sincerely.

Abbie’s interesting life involves being a canine big sister to Hal, and being loved to pieces by her humans. Ze.D is beloved by his two dads and has an extended canine and feline family as well; he also gets more exercise than most of his littermates — or any of us! Abbie and Ze.D’s lives as valued family members and companions are not less-than simply because there are no ribbons or recognition for their accomplishments.

Creating puppies that have the abilities needed to fit into family and community life is no small feat, and the measure of our success in achieving that goal is in the charmed lives those dogs live as beloved companions to wonderful humans. There may not be ribbons for those dogs — but just know there is plenty of appreciation for their wonderful lives.

Ruthie, Jordan, Zimmer, Lucas, and Tika are leading their humans on wonderful learning adventures. Each of those teams will be reflecting their interesting lives through continued participation in dog events.

Every Sparkler is in his/her perfect home and living his/her perfect life.

It is also true that as a reputable and ethical breeder of Bernese Mountain Dogs, the dogs who are actively competing are our “face” in the larger breed community. The competing dogs are the more visible proof in the pudding, so to speak, about how we are doing in achieving our commitment and responsibility to produce Berners who accurately reflect the Breed Standard.

Kiri is one of the Sparklers who carries a particularly heavy mantle in this regard. Actively competing in both the breed ring and performance events, Team Kiri represents us as breeders, and our larger Kaibab Community — especially, the Sparklers (our J Litter).

Team Kiri is giving our community much to celebrate together, and she is representing Team Sparklers well. Over the weekend Kiri (always owner-handled) picked up six more points towards her Bronze Grand Championship — only nine more points to go (a dog needs 100 for Bronze).

Last weekend Kiri earned her AJP (an excellent level agility title) plus her first PACH points.

And we recently learned that Kiri is the BMDCA’s Top Novice Agility Dog AND the Top Open Agility Dog for 2019.

WOWZA.

This is Kiri and her uncle Tristan (iPup) in their holiday photo showing off their excellent core strength…

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Congratulations to Team Kiri — and thanks for making the rest of us look good from the comfort of our pile of snow…

Claire resting after hearing about her sister’s recent activities!

Claire resting after hearing about her sister’s recent activities!

Happy Monday doing whatever fun and interesting things you have planned for today.

Monday Round-up and Specialty Stuff

Let’s start off by congratulating Team Kiri (Sparklers) for a great weekend — Select one day and Best of Opposite the next. Kiri will be in Best of Breed at the Specialty — she will represent the family well.

Beautiful!

Beautiful!

Sparkle’s potential pregnancy has changed our Specialty plans — that and Dear Husband’s aversion to ticks.

Sparkle will stay home with Dear Husband, who gallantly agreed to avoid ticks by staying with her. Since it will just be me traveling to Minnesota, Daisy will also stay at home — she was only entered in one event and I do not want her sitting in the cabin by herself while I am out and about with the other two dogs.

And so I will be bringing just Harper and Claire — but they will be busy girls. In order to maximize our remaining training and conditioning time, I made a schedule…

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Note that in addition to my own dogs, I have included Sundance on the schedule — that is Suzanne’s lovely Tag son who got a Reserve Best in Show over the weekend! This is Suzanne’s first foray into tracking and Sundance drew a track at the Specialty — I am so excited for them and am committed to helping them be as ready as possible for that day.

Schedules help me stay focused and clear about what needs to be done — and I love checking boxes.

Have a great Monday! I have to get started on my day so I can check off all of the little boxes (actually, they are tiny clipboards) for today.