First CPE show

It’s hard to believe that 4 years ago, I went to my first CPE show at Julie’s. Now, I have one of her beautiful puppies. I remember when I went to that show, she had an x-pen full of puppies and runs with adults in them. I called my husband and told him “you’ll never guess where I am.” He had been talking about getting a GSD puppy for a while but we were not ready yet. I did not know anything about Julie at the time, but after careful research into reputable GSD breeders, we found our way back to her. I went to another outdoor CPE show yesterday and it had me thinking back to that first show. Jackie Oricko was the judge and she was at the show yesterday. I told her how nice she was, coming up to me and asking me what questions I had and explaining the rules. I will never forget how nice everyone was, especially the judge. The weather was beautiful and the grounds were as well. I have been working towards Lucy’s C-ATCH ever since that first show. We are within 14 classes now. I hope to have it by the end of August. CPE Nationals is in 2 weeks, and my mom and I are so excited. Lucy did very well at the outdoor show yesterday, which was to prepare her for Nationals.
Lucy has come a long way from when I got her as a rescue from the Papillon Club of America Rescue. I have had a total of 14 Papillon fosters over the years. She is my only “failed” foster. She had generalized demodex, was pregnant, had not been vaccinated, and had a grade IV luxating patella. I treated her for 6 months for the demodex, did bloodwork to determine a cause for the demodex (stress and poor breeding was determined the cause, she originally came from a puppy mill in Kentucky), spayed her, vaccinated her, and had surgery done for her luxating patella. Her patella was one of the worse that the veterinarian had seen because the tibia was rotated as well, so it had to be rotated back into a natural position. Later that year I started Rally with her and was cleared for agility. She is not the fastest dog on the course, but she is consistent and she loves to please me. She enjoys going to the agility shows because she gets to spend the whole day with me.

Ember has been going to agility shows with me as well and gets many compliments on how well behaved she is. Several people say she’s not “neurotic like all the other GSD they see.” They also say how beautiful she is. She was a very good girl at the show yesterday.

Lucy at our first CPE show at Julie’s on June 18, 2009.

Lucy at a show in Schiller Park, IL.

Lucy tired after getting her Novice Jumpers with Weaves title at the Papillon National Specialty in 2009.

Lucy when I first got her. She had lost a lot of hair from the demodex.

Lucy after her patellar surgery.

Lucy and I competed in 3 shows this month, all classes are in Level 5: 5/5/13- Dexter, MI: Standard- Q, 2nd/6, Fullhouse- Q, 2nd/7, Jumpers- Q, 2nd/6; 5/11/13-Dexter, MI: Fullhouse- Q, 3rd/5, Jumpers- Q, 3rd/5, Snooker- NQ-my fault! I sent her to the wrong jump and she followed like a good girl!; 5/25/13-Delta, OH-Standard- Q, 2nd/3, Jumpers- Q, 2nd/2, Jackpot- NQ-she decided she was done after a jump and ran to the table to end the run, finishing with 40 points, when we needed 44 points. Silly girl!

I had to put a picture of Ember in this post, didn’t I?