Earning His Novice Trick Dog Title

Mr. N waiting for his certificate paperwork to be filled out

Mr. N earned his Novice Trick Dog title recently! I blogged about it previously as a good option for reactive dogs to earn titles.

A flyball team was sponsoring a trick dog tournament as a fundraiser where they set up props and had a certified trick instructor supervising and witnessing. It took place in a warehouse so I thought the dogs would have a lot of space but that wasn't the case. Mr. N had to do his tricks with  strange dogs five feet away from him on three sides and he was super distracted. He managed to pull it together long enough to earn his first trick dog title by doing tricks like high five, pray and play dead.

The dogs have to earn a certain amount of points for each title with advanced tricks counting for more points. For the lower titles, you just need a witness to sign off (there's rumors that this is changing) but for the champion title, you need to send in a video. So you can do them all at home normally.

The novice tricks were not challenging for Mr. N but I was proud that he was able to do them in an extremely distracting environment for him. As a recovering reactive dog, he finds working around other dogs difficult. There was a time when he couldn't have done it. Good boy!

Happy National Mutt Day!

Puppy Play Date or Where Mr. N Meets a Puppy Smaller Than Him

Mr. N rarely encounters dogs smaller than him. It's even more uncommon that he meets a puppy smaller than him. Mr. N's foster mom invited him over to play with her new puppy who is this teeny tiny Maltese who weighs two pounds soaking wet because she thought Mr. N might be a good playmate.


I was uncertain how Mr. N would react because I don't know if he has ever met a puppy smaller than him. Mr. N doesn't like big boisterous puppies (which is the usual kind he meets) so I was curious to see how he would handle the tiny puppy.

As it turns out, Mr. N and the puppy play similarly. They bounce about and wrestle and chase each other around and had a blast running around. He was extremely tolerant of the puppy and didn't correct him at all even when the puppy tried to hump him. None of the other dogs in the house really play with the puppy because they get annoyed by him or they're too big.

But Mr. N and the puppy were a great match.

 Mr. N wants to know if we can borrow him and take him home. But only if I promise that he still gets the lion's share of the attention!

Aren't You a Little Short for a Stormtrooper?

Wreath Making Workshop and Holiday Cheer

A local store held a workshop for people to make holiday door wreaths for an assisted living home. Mr. N accompanied me to supervise crafting activities. He was a bit distraught that the room was full of people not paying attention to him. He was thrilled when two little girls came in and made a fuss over him. 

The instructor set up several different stations and people set to work making bows and cutting boughs and assembling and decorating the wreathes. I mostly helped by cutting boughs but I did some decorating and assembling as well. 

One of the women had worked in retail and was an expert at making bows. 

Mr. N has good company manners but I was a little concerned that all the discarded boughs might tempt him to mark indoors. He doesn't normally but he adores "decorating" fallen branches outdoors. Luckily there were no incidents. He stayed out of the way and didn't bark or try to run outside and was a good little boy. He eventually settled down in his carrier for a nap.  

We left before the end of the workshop but the group successfully made one hundred door wreathes (one for each resident) and will be delivering them on Monday. I hope it brings a little holiday cheer to the people there. 

Some of the wreaths I made.

Whirling Banshee

Sage looks unperturbed to have a whirling banshee tailing her every move. Mr. N seems to spend half the time running airborne. Chasing after athletic bigger dogs is one of Mr. N's favorite ways to keep fit. Sometimes he outruns them and then the bigger dogs look quite confused. As one of the other dog owners at the park put it, "it's the first time he's seen a rabbit chasing a dog!"

The Magic Whispers of Old Trees

Canine #ChristmasCreep and Moving Santas

Over the weekend, I took Mr. N to a church Christmas bazaar where we got an early start on Christmas presents and took some lunch to my friend who owns a shop. Mr. N was very suspicious of the moving Santas behind him but he reluctantly agreed to pose for a photo. One of the volunteers told me that the previous day, someone had brought their two Lhasa Apsos and they had a barking fit at the Santas. Mr. N was wary but did not bark. I guess he's staying on the nice list!

How do your dogs feel about Christmas decorations?

Training Your Dog During a Hike

Whenever we go out for a hike, I make sure to have plenty of treats on me. Each hike offers lots of opportunities for training especially off-leash ones. Recall is the big one. 

Sometimes the dogs like to go running after prey. And two dogs get into more trouble than just one right? I thought that after a couple weeks of no off-leash time, he might be stir crazy and run wild but Mr. N was good. He had an immediate speedy recall every time he was called. And every time Sage was called as well... he responds to all of her recall cues. He also gets rewarded for checking in with me and he makes sure he knows where I am at all times. 

Mr. N investigating what Sage is up to.

He did roll in some horse poop (his favorite!) ... but he left it when I told him to. His jacket got the brunt of it thankfully. I thought about making him swim in the river to wash it off but it was too cold for him in the water. Sage has a much thicker coat and didn't care. She didn't roll in the horse poop but found some coyote poop to roll in instead.

He was polite with the other dogs (sometimes he is a little too exuberant at the beginning) and had a lot of fun chasing a Frenchie around. It was hilarious watching the two of them play because they looked so different. The Frenchie was stocky and very sturdy looking and Mr. N is lithe and all fluff and legs. 

Needless to say, he got a lot of treats for being good despite the myriad temptations. The dogs burned a lot of calories running around so I wasn't too worried about that. Mr. N was rewarded with Primal Pork Nibs from Chewy.com. They're pretty small and high value (almost pure meat) and Mr. N is very happy to work for them. Their only flaw is that they have to be refrigerated after opening and used within two weeks.

This post was sponsored by Chewy. They are not responsible for the contents of this article. All opinions expressed are our own. 

Don't worry. He did share some treats with Sage. Sage was very worried that she might not get her fair share. She thinks a treat in the hand is worth two in the bush!

How do you train your dogs during a hike? 

Stick Monster

I Can't Take Him Seriously

BF: I can't take him seriously like that.
Me: Is it the "waiting for Santa" pajamas or his stuffed animal looks or the tongue sticking out?
BF: Mostly him sticking his tongue out.

Can you take Mr. N seriously?