Brrrr.

Good grief. Winter has arrived at Shadowbar. East wind. Icicles on horses merit blanketing. Miss Kitty, the barn puss, is using her heated blanket in her quilt-covered house. Kennel dogs are quite happy to be locked inside and let out every 2 hours for the bare necessities. Hoping the dog obedience dvd they are watching is being taken seriously. We are hoping to have our Due South Scent team enter the Ev Kenny Show Feb. 4th and 5th in Calgary. I have been painting dumbbells as some of the dogs have munched theirs whilst practicing. I hope Donna is happy that the snow will make ski-jouring very, very possible. I know I could have used dogs and skis to get around the Crowsnest Pass this morning easily. I am not ready for the new year to begin. I am still having fun with the old one.

Stay warm. Cuddle up with a cat and a good book. (I am presently reading the e-book, Fair Game, and it looks to be a good read. ) Dog-wise has a pile of e-books on training as well. Stay warm.

The Pres

Club Days in January

Fun and games begin at the Cowley Hall on Saturday, January 8th, with Obedience set to go at 9:00 sharp with 10 minutes set aside for heeling drills and sits, downs, moving stands, circles left and right, about turns, left about turns, u-turns, & 180' pivots as a group followed by Novice, Open, and Utility Practice.

Barrel Racing is at 10:00 in preparation for Pet Expo. Our goal is to have our dogs run the course smoothly.

Scent Hurdle begins at 10:45 . We are registering our Due South Team and must practice as a team.

Judi, Sharlet, Denise, Judy, Liz and Lee, please try to be there for sure. We need to measure dogs for jacket sizes. In the meantime, buy a white golf shirt which we will have embroidered with our

SAWHDA Due South logo so we have team uniforms. We will wear blue jeans to go with the shirts.

We need all this to come together rather quickly and we need to decide if we can attend the Ev Kenny show

in early February. We will be ready. Wicca will not be with us for that show. We will be jumping 12 - 16 inches and need to work on cadence for that. It is not fair to ask the dogs to think on their feet when it comes to adding 4 inches to the height.

New rally O exercises and signs and a discussion of the new "retry" rules for novice, advanced, and excellent, will take place afterwards.

See you all there. Happy heeling.

Vista Village Photos

Examples of the beautiful photography by Char Kabatoff.

If you are thinking of having a photographer at your doggie events, please

let us know and we'll have Char contact you.

Joan & Judi with Zsuree and Drummer Boy

We had the best time this weekend. Sixteen dogs were on hand for the Christmas Photo Shoot at Vista Village in Pincher Creek. SAWHDA members bring their dogs to the assisted living centre and residents and guests are invited to have their photos taken with the dogs in a Christmas Setting. Then we have the photos developed into 5 X 7 prints and we return them to the centre so that they can be put on display.

Thank you to Russell, Nancy, Shirley, Barb, Sharlet, Tubby, Kerri, Carol, Joan,and Maureen for bringing your dogs. I am sure that nobody could believe that that many dogs could zip in and out of the photo settings so quickly and that all the dogs would get along. Our training truly pays off in a situation like this.

And thank you so much to Char Kabatoff for her terrific photograpy.

I do believe that this is the singularly most wonderful thing that we do as a club for others and it couldn't happen without the dedication of our volunteer members.

Remember, for those of you who can make it, we have our Canine Christmas Fun Day at the Cowley Hall from 9:30 - 11:45 on Sunday, December 12th followed by brunch at the Cowley Restaurant. We hope you can join us.

Our next regular club days will be January 8th and 22 starting at 10:00 a.m.

We will attend Pet Expo Calgary this March so if you aren't going to Camrose, and you don't mind spending money on a motel, we would love to have you join us. We will offer two shows a day plus a clicker training demo in the demo booth.

Practices will take place during club days and we will post the events we are practicing.

More later.

Super results from the Obedience Trials at Calgary this weekend. Jolene collie, Kort, and Amanda's Cardi, Pixel, both will sport a CD title behind their names and congratulations to Sarah and Kaleb on their CDX. Excellent job.

Happy heeling.

The Prez