Picture Post

Here are a couple pictures from Paris first walk. I must say her loose leash walking is much better after getting back from GDB.

[Paris laying next to a river. It's been raining a lot so the river is much higher than normal.] I loved this sunset. It didn't come out very well in the picture but the sky was a bright purple and pink.

[A picture of Paris head from below with big white, purple, and pink fluffy clouds behind her.]This is the latest trick I am working on with Paris. I want her to learn to ride a skateboard. At this point she will get her front feet on it and stand there for a bit. Once it moved she hops off but eventually she will get it.

[Paris standing with her front feet on the skateboard.] And she can roll over without a cue now. She loves this trick and will usually offer it when I ask her to do something else. It cracks me up.

This video is of her getting her front feet on the skateboard.

P.S. I LOVE THIS DOG!!

Images from Pet Life

Paris is adjusting to pet life amazingly well. She loves all the freedom and "rule breaking" that is involved. I have invited her onto my bed the past few nights and she hesitates at first and looks at me. I think she believes it's a setup. I love that she waits for an invite though. We've been on a couple walks (those pictures in a later post.) and today I think I am going to get her licenced in our county so we can go hit up the dog park sometime. . . anyone got advice on dog parks? I've never been to one so not sure what to expect. I am just hoping she comes back when she is called with all those dogs to distract her, and I hope she doesn't embarrass me too much. Anyway, here are some pictures from her first few days of pet life.

"Mommy may I please play with my froggie." [Paris thinking about stealing a toy off of the top of the kennel.]
Within the first few minutes in the house she ripped the rope out of the Jolly Ball. She really enjoys picking it up and running around with it though.
They pretend not to like each other but I caught them both snuggling together on the dog bed. The little stinkers both looked up when I got the camera out though. :D
[Paris and Picassa sharing the dog bed.]

I got all of the paperwork from GDB in the mail with the adoptions forms and everything and there was a plate to put on her collar. Prudy wore hers on every collar she had and I intend to do the same with Paris. I love how shiny it is! It says: I'm proud to be a Career Change dog from Guide Dogs for the Blind. And it has their phone number on it too. Here is a picture of it after I attached it to the collar.

[Paris LOVES the bed. Here she is as comfy as can be. I love that you can see Picassa in the background. She is a little jealous. She gets really upset when I do training sessions with Paris and she gets lots of treats for doing her tricks.]

I think pet life is okay for The Paris.

She doesn't love the Mamma at all. . .

Paris and I relaxing on the couch. She has her head tucked under my chin and looks as content as can be.
I think pet life is agreeing with her.

A few more Paris Tricks

I've been working on a couple more tricks with Paris since this morning. She is doing so well and I am amazed at how quickly she picks up on them. These are still in the very beginning phases but they are still fun. Here is a little movie I made of her new tricks. The first is "which one" where I put a kibble in one of my hands and then she sniffs each one and puts her paw on the one with the kibble in it. Then she gets the kibble. This one she picked up on in about 10 minutes. I thought this would be fun for therapy too, letting the kids put a treat in their hand and having her pick. I bet they'd get a kick out of it. The other is crawl, I lure her with a kibble to get her to army crawl across the floor. She is pretty goofy with this one but she loves it. The last clip is her dive bombing me because she knows she needs to stay close to the ground. I really missed her enthusiasm about everything. :D

Return of The Paris

I just got back from picking up the Paris. When we pulled up they had her tied to the back of the van. I got out of the car and started walking up to her. She just stared at me until I started talking to her and then she went crazy and started jumping all over me. (Video Below)

[Paris jumping up on me.]
[Paris with her feet wrapped around my waist and me giving her a big hug around the neck.]
[Paris jumping on me some more. She almost knocked me over.]

[Paris looking up at the camera, it looks like she is winking (her right eye is closed) and her tongue is slightly out.]

[It looks like Paris is barking but she was taking a treat from the puppy truck driver after showing off her new trick. (video below)]

After Paris calmed down a bit the puppy truck driver was able to talk to me about Paris. She was the only puppy on the truck on the way out so she got to sit up front with the drivers the whole time. They loved her and said she was really well behaved, that's my girl! They also said that the kennel tech that worked with Paris loved her and wanted to adopt her if I didn't take her. She wrote a sweet note on the back of Paris' info sheet saying how much she loved Paris. After that I got a few more pictures of Paris before we headed home.

[Me and Paris kneeling in front of the training van.]

[Paris jumping up on me some more.]

[Crazy Paris is standing on her back legs jumping toward me with her mouth slightly open.]

[I like this one, Paris has all four feet in the air and she is crashing into me, you can tell her tail is going a mile a minute.]

[Paris sitting nicely and licking her lips.]

[A close up of Paris' sweet face.]

[I picked up Paris and held her on her back, here is a close up of her face.]

[We went up with Mitch and Meade and his parents so Paris got the back of the SUV all to herself. Here she is standing in the back before we took off.]

After we got home I let her meet Picassa. They get along really well and Paris is really good with her. [Here they are doing the circle sniffing.]

Then it was time to switch her collar. GDB sent her home with a pink collar and pink is SO not her color. I love how the new green with white polka dots collar looks on her.

[A profile of Paris wearing her new green polka dotted martingale collar, she also has a blue GDB tag silencer.]

Then I got out Paris' new toys. She is a big fan of her frog and her ball. I am glad she likes them.

[Paris with the frog sticking out of her mouth.]

[Paris with her Goose between her legs. She is not really sure what to make of it, but she's got a huge smile on her face.]

[Paris really likes the big tennis ball, she likes to make it squeak. Here it's in her mouth and she is swinging her head to make it squeak. It took a few tries to get her to squeak it, she would make it squeak once and then drop it but she got the hang of it.]

Here are a bunch of videos of Paris' return. I've already started working a few tricks with her and she is picking them up really fast. What a smartie!!

Here she is with her Frog toy she is looking around while she makes it squeak.

Her intro to the ball. She would squeak it and then drop it and I had to coax her to pick it back up. She really loves it now!

Paris showing off the trick that the kennel tech taught her. It's "head down" she lays down and you tell her "head down" and she does it. It's really cute and I am hoping to convert it into a sitting command so she'll put her head in someones lap. I think it'll come in handy while doing therapy work. :D

I am also starting her on "roll over" she is picking it up really fast. This video is after about 10 minutes of working on the command. I love it and so does she! She does much better than Prudy ever did. :D

She is also learning crawl and she loves that one but it's hard to get a video so that one will come later. I am so excited about our next years together. I couldn't be happier to have The Paris back, she is a stellar dog and just what I need right now. Hopefully she can make some appearances at puppy class when we don't go on outing. She would really like that. I am going to stop rambling now and go play with my girl some more. Happy weekend everyone!

TOMORROW!!

Paris comes home tomorrow!! Well, 18 hours, 49 minutes, and 42 seconds to be precise. I am so excited to see my girl again and spoil her rotten for the next 30 years. I have tomorrow, Monday and Tuesday off work to get her all settled and be able to spend some time with her. I can't wait!!!!

[A picture of Paris from below looking out in the distance. She is in the autumn leaves and has her puppy coat on.]

A Talk with the Vet

I just got off the phone with the vet at GDB. She was really nice and explained what Paris' eye condition is. When the puppy's eyes are developing inutero they have what is called the Hyaloid Artery, it goes from the back of the eye to the front of the eye and helps the eye develop. Usually during the fetal development the Hyaloid Artery regresses (disappears/goes away/retreats) and creates a clear central zone of vision from the back of the eye to the retina. In Paris' case the artery did not go away so it is creating a blind spot in both of her eyes in her central vision about the size of the head of a pin and causing small spots of blurry vision around that. She said the blurry vision is like looking out of dirty glasses or a dirty windshield, so it's not that bad. It also won't get any worse, and it's not hereditary so none of her siblings should be affected by it either. I am so happy to know exactly what is going on with her now and know what to expect in the future. And, since no post is complete without pictures here is Paris laying down in my room being goofy. Her head is up, mouth open and ear flapped over her head. P.S. I hope that all made sense. . . I had the vet explain it to me three different ways the first couple were really confusing! :D

Official Return Date . . .

I talked to my leader today and finally got news about when Paris will be coming back home. Usually the trucks come from California and since Paris is in Oregon that would not have worked. But, the timing worked out perfectly since Oregon needed more puppies to fill the June 13th recall, so a truck is coming from Oregon next Friday (the 11th) and my girl will be on it. Only ten more days until I see her smiling face again!!!