My Mr. Y

Well now that it has been over 7 months since I got my puppy I figured I should probably announce what his name really is and information about him!

His name is YOAV! (Yo-av) and he is freaking amazing. He was born to Yoga and Bartley on February 12, 2015.

Yoav's dad Bartley front view

Yoav's dad Bartley Side view

Yoav's mom Yoga front

Yoav's mom Yoga, side view

 . He has four other siblings. 3 brothers and 1 sister. The males are Yankee, Yonder, Yamal, and of course Yoav. The female is Yucca. Yoav looks almost identical to his mom.

I received Yoav on April 17, 2015. He was flown in with two other puppies on Delta Cargo. I was unable to pick him up from the airport but my mom and sister went for me.

Yoav sitting in the crate he arrived in

Yoav meeting my sister

Yoav eating his first meal

Yoav sitting after his first meal

I'm holding Yoav after his first bath

Yoav pouting on the steps. He hated going down them.

 Yoav was a cute little puppy. He loved to cuddle and to be with people. He hated his kennel. He used to constantly bark in it. The first guide dog puppy meeting we went to was with our CFR and she requested that the pups all get put in to their crates. Yoav decided he wanted to be the center of attention and barked the whole way through. He still doesn't love his kennel but he will at least sleep in it without barking. He has gotten a lot better.
His kennel started out too big and would relieve in the kennel. Luckily he grew out of that. Overall he was pretty easy to housebreak. Besides the fact he would drizzle if you didn't take him out fast enough.
When he was little he was also terrified of stairs. He would refuse to go down them. Eventually he would go down the cement stairs but if there were more than 4 stairs he would refuse to walk. He was very scared of things when he was a baby puppy, but has since grew out of most of them.

When I first got him I was still finishing my semester at college, so I was gone for two weeks before I was able to come and raise him. My mom and sister were willing to help me out a lot during the summer, and also those two weeks I was in school.

More pictures and information to come about the last 8 months!

But until then here is a cute baby picture of Yoav!

Yoav as a small puppy laying on a striped rug waiting to be taken outside.

~Katherine and Yoav

I'm Back!

I have been away for about 3 years, but I am back! I am more keeping this blog for my own sake, but anyone is welcome to follow along on the journey!
I'm going to be a puppy raiser for Guide Dogs for the Blind again. I started attending puppy meetings at the beginning of the year and was planning on getting a puppy at the end of May, but my leader and CFR let me know that there is a puppy who needs out of the kennel who'd be perfect for me.The puppy will be arriving on Friday! It's a Male Yellow Labrador with the litter letter of Y! I am so excited to be part of this great organization again and thrilled to be getting my puppy so soon!

Until Friday,
~Katherine and soon to be Mr. Y

9 month day Hazelle!

Today is Hazelle's 9 month old day! As of right now I have no idea where she is located and no idea what she is doing. Hopefully I will hear soon considering it has been a month since she has officially been Cc'd and they have not told me anything!
Hope everyone has had a Happy New Year and had a great Holiday break!!

~Katherine

Rio day 1

Well today I got Rio and he is quite the handsome fellow. Me and my family took him to the mall and he was super good the whole time with no problems. We came home and had a couple of dominance problems with my pet dog and him but those are pretty much now taken care of. He had a couple of problems with our cats at first but the cats didn't let him get away with anything. We let him run around in the backyard a couple of times and that pretty much wore him out. He is much calmer then Hazelle and almost as calm as Breeze. The only problem is when other dogs are around.
While I had Rio on tie down for dinner he was missing all the fun with my other animals  

Graham and the kitten watching Oreo.
Oreo is hissing at the new kitten and wanting outside.

Handsome Rio making a funny face at the camera

Rio with a dorky smile on

Happy Rio on a dog bed

What a handsome boy!

Hazelle News.

On Sunday November 13th my dog Graham bit Hazelle over food. We told our leader who then told our CFR, together we decided that we needed to transfer her just because Hazelle is already skittish and they were worried that she might get even worse than that but they were not quite as worried that she would be in danger.
 From the start Hazelle has not been an easy puppy to train and she has hated going out in public. We have told our leader multiple times that she just did not want to go out in public and that she hated wearing the head collar.On Saturday November 19, 2011 we had an evaluation with our CFR which also happened to be the day we transferred her. Our CFR then took her back home with her and has been evaluating her since then. I didn't end up having an actual evaluation with her but I knew that she was going to be evaluated when she got back to Colorado. So for the past couple weeks she has been evaluated. December 1st we got the news that she has officially been Career Changed we are not exactly sure why but our leader later told us that she had so many problems there was no way that they would all be fixed by the time she went to Formal Training due to the fact that we had to transfer her for the reason we did we are not allowed to keep her. I have never really bonded with Hazelle which is another reason why I probably shouldn't keep her but I also think that is because she never wanted to go out into public so I just felt she hated it. I think she is an awesome dog and has a really sweet attitude but just is not the right dog for me. She will be placed by GDB. Although right now I am not allowed to raise another Guide Dog they are allowing me to puppy sit. I will now be talking about my many adventures with guide dogs from my group! My first pup I get to watch is Rio over Christmas break. I am super excited!!

Hazelle almost 8 months old

Hazelle right before we left to evaluations.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              
~Katherine

Pumpkins

Well on Saturday my family decided to go get some pumpkins. Here are a couple of pictures of Hazelle at the pumpkin patch! :)

Hazelle in front of a big pumpkin

Hazelle in front of some pumpkins and a scarecrow

On a side note: I got another stubborn dog who doesn't like taking pictures.. They are no fun...

~Katherine and Hazelle

Updates on Breeze and Hazelle (long post with lots of pictures)

Well as some of you might have noticed I am a terrible blogger but I decided to update you on Breeze and Hazelle since it is almost Hazelle's 6 month day and it was Breezes 19 month day (forgot to mention that she graduated as a Guide dog a day before she turned a year and a half.)  As most of you probably know Breeze is now a working guide dog. Her partner and her live in Idaho. He has 2 kids and a wife. As I met him and got to know I realized what a great thing I did for him and his family and what a great blessing Breeze will be to his life. He is the perfect partner for Breeze. Breeze was already so attached to him when I met him and I am sure they will have many adventures together in the future. About a week ago I got these cute messages from his kids saying how much they love her and that they are thankful for having Breeze in their family. Those messages made my day and I finally got over the feeling of wanting Breeze back because I knew that their family needed her more than me. Now onto Hazelle.
Hazelle is a trouble maker and I have failed to get you all "acquainted" with her. She is this adorable puppy that is a pretty awesome house dog and was a much faster dog to house break than Breeze. The biggest conflict we have with each other is that Hazelle hates the head collar and refuses to wear it. When I say refuse I literally mean refuse. She will not walk with it on and if you put it on her you will literally be pulling her everywhere which makes me look like the cruelest person alive and I would get many comments about it. We have worked and worked with her on it and have done food protocol with her but she does not want to walk anywhere with it on. We have decided to not mess with it and decided that maybe we will try it again in maybe a month or so. The problem with not having a head collar though is that she pulls sometimes and she sticks her head into anything and everything but I guess we will just have to work through that. She has gotten a lot better out in public but gets a little scared depending on the place you go. I have taken her to one class with me and have not tried taking her to my high school because it is so big and crowded that I am worried it will scare her right now but I might try it in a couple days/weeks. Here are 6 things I love about Hazelle or need to work on with her.

1. She loves to cuddle and will sit in your lap if you let her
2. She is super soft and super cute
3. She is a smart puppy which sometimes can be bad but it also means that she learns her commands fast
4. She has pretty good house manners except when it comes to slippers..
5. We are working on her loose leash walking without a head collar which she is pretty good at and only have to correct her once or twice.
6. She watches TV and is curious about everything. She will sit and watch you, see what you are doing, that sort of thing.

And since I have not put many photos on of her here are quite a few. Also some photos from Breeze's graduation.

Hazelle laying on the floor around the time I got her

Hazelle is naughty and took this pillow off the couch and put it on her bed.

Hazelle being a good girl

First time Hazelle wore a vest. She was around 3 3 1/2 months old

In the car on one of her first outings with a Halti on. 

As you can see it does not fit so we took it back and got a gentle leader. :)

Hazelle learning how to play tug

Hazelles first outing just happened to be at a shoe store.
Which also happened to be one of Breeze's first outing.

Hazelle almost six months old

Almost six months old and playing go to bed

Hazelle loves her dog bed

Cute little Hazelle

Now some photos of Breeze's graduation day:

Breeze laying down by her partners feet after she had gotten over the fact of seeing me again.

If you notice Breeze has gotten a lot more brown spots on her

Breeze in Harness isn't she just gorgeous!

Breeze guiding her partner down the hall

This is Kyle he happened to be the demo dog at Breezes graduation which
was a nice treat because I puppy sat Kyle a few times and I loved him.

The training board

Breeze's name under the In Class dogs :)

~Katherine and Hazelle

Phase 8

Breeze is in phase 8 as of Thursday August 18, 2011 around 3:00 PM (when I got the phase report info) on the Oregon campus.
 As of Thursday August 18, 2011 at around 11:00 PM Breeze is graduating on August 27, 2011. My family was on vacation when we got the phase report and the call telling us she was in class so my group leader had to email us the information of what happened.
    Breeze has been paired with someone who was originally with another dog but that dog didn't work out so the blind partner was paired with Breeze instead as a last minute placement. We knew that Breeze would be easy to pair and so we knew that when she reached phase 8 we would get a call soon after but we didn't know it was going to be the same day.
I was glad when I got the email saying that Breeze was going to graduate on the 27th because I had conflicts for every other graduation after that up until the last week of October (which we knew she was not going to wait that long to be paired.)
I am excited to go and meet her partner and figure out where she will be working. Right now my family is trying to figure out the best way to get out there since graduation is the Saturday after my school starts.
 More info to come later when I find out more.

Breeze around 11 weeks old with her cute messy face.

Breeze about a week before she went to formal training.
(Sorry for the shoe and leg.)

3 Months old today

Hazelle is now 3 months old and I am finally starting to like her (not that I didn't like her before but we have been having a rough start)! We started out with some problems crate training her and so every morning no matter how early I woke up I would have to clean out her kennel. We took her off her food and right now have been transitioning back onto normal food. She is quite smart and calm but is pretty vocal and can get kinda mean. 3 things that I love about her are:
1: She loves to cuddle and loves to be held.
2: Her head tilt when she hears different sounds.
3: Her squishy face. It is all wrinkly and so when she is looking at you she looks like she is a million years old! Bonus: She watches TV! It is pretty hilarious.

Hazelle sitting in my yard. 3 months old

Hazelles cute face!

~Katherine, Breeze, and Hazelle

Phase Report

Breeze 41Y4 LAB F 0 
Barley 40Y8 LAB M 0 
Batik 41Y3 LAB F 0 
Becky 41Y2 LAB F 0 
Bronte 41Y5 LAB F 4 
Bruno 41Y1 LAB M 1

Well here is the phase report of Breeze and her siblings keep going Bronte and Bruno and Go Breeze, Becky, Batik and Barley!!!

~Katherine, Breeze, and Hazelle