Friday, December 3, 2010

One Year Blog-iversary!

Wow! Today marks one year of blogging!

I'm pretty impressed with myself; when I started this blog I seriously doubted that I'd keep up with it regularly. This is post number 147, though, so I guess I've done okay!

To celebrate, I'm hosting a Mystery Giveaway! If you win, I will send you a special surprise in the mail.

(It probably won't be a cat, though. Sorry.)

To enter, all you need to do is leave a comment. It can be about anything, but if you need a topic, I'd love it if you told me about the coolest trick your dog can do, or about a trick you really want to teach your dog, or even about the cool trick you saw a dog do once. I'm not picky. Please make sure that I can contact you somehow (either through your blog, or leave an email address), and let me know if you or your dog have any food allergies just in case I decide to do a food-related surprise.

I will choose a winner at random next Friday morning, and will update this post when I do.

Update, Friday, December 10th:
Okay, it's time to choose a winner! I used my favorite random number generator to pick a number between 1 and 18:


And who does that comment belong to?

Congrats, Dawn! I will be emailing you to arrange for you to receive your prize! I love that you have Magic pick things up for you. I'm still working on teaching Maisy how to do that, so I'm envious!

And thanks to everyone who entered. I loved reading about what your dogs do. There are some neat ideas in the comments, and I'm excited to try them!

18 comments:

Kiyi Kiyi said...

Oooo this sounds fun!
Ok hmmmm, I would like Tibby to learn to roll herself up into a blanket.
When I was thinking about this my first thought was I would like her to learn how to come (every time), but that isn't too exciting!

Laura and The Corgi, Toller, & Duck said...

Lance's favorite tricks: rollover, beg, ruff!
my favorite tricks of Lance's: cross his paws, cop cop, squats

Vito's favorite tricks: backward circles, are you sad?
My fav tricks of Vito's: stand 4ft in a dish, jump in my arms, hug (paw on my shoulder, head down)

Tricks on my to do list: perfect Vito's handstand, hold an object in paws while begging, limp on a back leg, dig it with back feet, and a billion more...

Robin Sallie said...

Blue's "tick" it to wake the Kidlet up every morning.

Red's "tick" is to zoom around the yard as fast as he can on cue.

Via's "trick" is to be cute.

Sara (and Layla) said...

I'd post a comment, but I'm still slightly concerned you're going to send me a cat. And I don't know whether Layla's allergic to cats. Her food allergies include chicken, pork, turkey, goat, barley, corn, soy, flaxseed, peas, brewer's yeast, and dairy (and possibly cat).

Her favorite "trick" (which I discourage, but other family members keep encouraging) is to boss/chase/pounce my parent's cat if anyone yells "hey!" at him.

My favorite trick of her's is her lateral heeling.

I have no food allergies (although I can't have chocolate or caffeine), but am allergic to cat ownership.

janaARIES said...

Great year of blogging, I have so enjoyed reading about your journey. Eva's ONLY trick is shake :)

Jennifer H. said...

Fun!! We've enjoyed reading your blog over the past year, especially since my Dane Falkor can be reactive as well.

I think Falkor's coolest trick right now is weaving through my legs. We've been trying some freestyle training and I think it's neat that he can weave quite well even though he's so big!

No food allergies here and we really wouldn't mind if you sent us that gorgeous kitty cat. ;)

Louise Kerr said...

Hi Crystal. Congrats on one year of blogging. I read and enjoy them all and loved your write ups about Ian Dunbar's seminar. Much cheaper than me flying there from Australia. Keep up the good work.

Regards Louise Kerr
www.elitepetcare.com.au

Jules said...

Congratulations on your one year blogging anniversary!! I agree - the Ian Dunbar seminar write-up was excellent to read!

Hmmm....tricks. I must admit I am a woeful trick trainer. Most of the time I can't be bothered. Bug has a trick I have labeled "cute." He is in a down an start to roll to one side while waving his paw. It is cute!

Crysania said...

Congrats on your one year anniversary! I've been enjoying reading your blog.

As for tricks...the best one she has is to stand on her hind legs, which looks almost ridiculous coming from a 50 pound dog (picture here).

I've always wanted to train her to lift her leg to pee when I say "Dahlia what do you think of Cesar?" She does the leg lifting thing already, but I just need to figure out how to put it on command!

Katie, Maizey and Magnus said...

Wow a year of blogging! Since it's an anniversary shouldn't we be sending you and Maisy presents? :)) Well it's been a year I learned from you guys, so thanks for that!

Meeka's favorite trick was at feeding time. I would say, "Are you hungry?" Right up to the end she would bounce around like puppy looking for her bucket. She would look everywhere, but most of the time she she knew right where it was. Then I would say, "bring the bucket" while we walked to her food at the other end of the house.

But the best part was I would tell her, "get the handle" and she would drop it and work it around until she had the handle in her mouth. Then I would tell her, "hand it to me" and she would flip the bucket up so it landed in my hands. I swear if I dropped it she would roll her eyes, "oh man mom, you are a klutz! Here let me get it for you." She would never want me to pick it up, she always had to finish the trick by giving it to me. . . . I really miss her.

But my other favorite trick was when she wanted something and I was lazy I would tell her, "go tell ryan" and she would fly through the house to tell him. It really bugged him and made us both laugh every time!LOL

Great idea for a topic! Congrats on the year of blogging!

If you want to see Meeka with her bucket here it is: http://www.lessonsfrom4legs.com/2010/05/31/little-green-buckets-are-so-exciting/

Kristine said...

Yay! Happy Blogiversary! That's a pretty big deal in my opinion as I am the worst journal writer in the world. Somehow, though, when it is about dogs, the ideas come a lot faster.

I just taught Shiva, just as in yesterday, to bow her head and hide her face with her paw. Yay for new tricks. :-) Thanks for the giveaway, no allergies here!

Urban canines said...

Congatulations!!!

I have loved reading your posts this past year. You have picked some very interesting topics and covered them with the appropriate level of research and your personal experiences.

andrea said...

Congrats on a year of blogging :)

that's pretty neat - I look forward to many more anniversaries with you :)


(Sally's safest food is chicken - beef is a HUGE no no) ;)

Unknown said...

I haven't been with you the whole year, but I can say I've learned some pretty cool stuff from you.

Let's see, tricks...

Zeus used to sneeze on command. He was older when we got him, so we didn't really try to teach him anything else.

Jessie used to chase her tail when we'd say, "OH no, what's that?", catch it, and knock herself over. She also learned to 'fall' off the couch when we asked if she was a dumb doggy. I miss them both.

Our current dogs don't know a lot of tricks, although Lassie does offer up a paw and fetch like a maniac. We'll work on them though, and see what fun we can have. I'm hoping I can coordinate things enough to teach them all to heel in a row. That will probably be a multi-year project at the rate I'm going. LOL

I think my favorite trick ever was when we taught our dog to respond to "Would you rather be married or dead?" by falling over.

No allergies here.

Dawn said...

You know I stink as a trainer, my poorly mannered girls at the show Saturday were a clue. My favorite "trick" of Magics is to pick things up for me. When my back is bad its a huge help. Now, the next "trick" I want to teach is for Grace to sit....

Keep blogging Crystal. I love what you write.

Ninso said...

I love tricks!! How to pick just one?

My favorite of Jun's: Lifting a back leg on things like a boy dog

Lok's: Fetching things from the fridge

Elo's: Jump into my arms

Raegan said...

The trick we've been working on lately is a surprise for my aunt.

The ACD saying his prayers before dinner got a big laugh, and I want to teach that to Gatsby. Bonus points because my aunt is a Catholic nun. :D

Anonymous said...

Congrats on the 1 year of Blogging. I like your notes on Ian Dunbar's seminars.

My lab-mix, Shep, can count on cue and can read from flash cards.

One day I'll make a better video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rIjitoq9v4

- Hank Simon