I hope this Blog proves to be both fun and educational for anyone interested in Showing and/or Breeding Dogs. Spend some time with us and you will really understand the time and effort and emotions that goes into this hobby. Join me here for the good times and bad times, the joys and sorrows, the wins and losses. Welcome to life at Vista Dei!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Here are some pictures of Hector and his "brothers" in their halloween pumpkin outfits - thanks Denise L for sharing!

Not sure if Hawaii is in the future travel plans, but if he goes, Hector will knock em out with his grass skirt!

Hector recently attented a black tie event (seriously) for I think it was Animal Friends in Pittsburgh where he was the mascot in his Tux and Tie outfit!

Posted by: Vistadei at 07:02 | link | comments

I have had several people asking about Dew-oh and how she is doing, you will remember she is our girl who had the spinal injury earlier this summer.  Dew-oh is still with us, she is doing ok.. not "right" but..  She can run and play, but looks like a "Jerry's kid" with her movement way off, like she needs corrective shoes or braces on the back end when she runs.  One time when she was playing she launched herself onto a chair and was so excited by that, but was never able to do it again.  Once in a while she will try to stand on her hind legs to give me a kiss, but she falls if she does that.  Sometimes when I get her out of her crate she collapes in the rear, but I just set her up on her feet and off she goes.. she can go outside with the other ones and run and play, gets knocked over easy.  She did learn with great effort to come up the 3 steps into the house.  I hear this is about miraculous progress for a spinal injury to heal this far, but it is still heartbreaking sometimes, just want to hold her and help her, but she is doing ok on her own. If you were to leash walk her on a flat sidewalk, you would not actually see that anything was too far wrong.  It is the running and jumping and then of course not being able to get up on anything that it becomes apparent. She appears to be in some pain in certain situations, but not enough that I feel her quality of life is too compromised, she has some trouble when she goes from standing to laying down, you can tell she hesitates and does it carefully, and she can not sit, it is either up or down.  Overall better than I had feared when it happened, but not as good as we would like it to be.

Posted by: Vistadei at 11:13 | link | comments (2)

For the last 2 days I have been attending a very intensive handling seminar at the Beaver County Kennel Club put on by world famous conformation handler George Alston.  It was long and exhausting, we were down there from 8 am to 5 pm, with only very short breaks for potty and a half hour for lunch, so the days were full of information and actual hands on learning experience.  I had been a little worried about taking it, as we all have heard that George can be mean, and bring people to tears, but I was very pleased to find that yes he was very direct and didn't tolerate anyone talking or running in and out or being late, but that was actually very benificial to the rest of us who had paid alot of money to be there and wanted to learn.  Yes, he did use the word "stupid" but again, it was with a bit of a twinkle in his eye as he showed how to correct the "stupid" mistake that was being made.  I learned alot of stuff that I had never seen done before, but I am not sure that doing it in the ring is going to make me better or just make me stick out like a sore thumb, but I guess the only way to know is to try and do it and see what happens.  My attitude did change I think, conformation has never been my favorite part of dog showing and breeding, but I really guess I didn't know what I was doing.  I wandered in the ring and hoped the judge would like my dog.  Now I have seen that it is just as much a sport of control and timing, at least as much as is required in the obedience ring, where you train some specific behaviors at home, then hit the ring with the confidence that your dog will know his part if you can pull off your part in giving the correct cues at the correct time.  This might make conformation more enjoyable for me than the feeling I usually have that it is a random draw, gamble type activity.  Probably the one thing that worries me most is that the shows have dwindled down to about nothing this time of year, and I am afraid I will loose the skills I learned if I don't put them into practice.  I think I will start going to the handling run-throughs our club has each week to try to imprint what I learned through repetition.  I also signed up for a repeat of the same seminar next May which should give me a refresher right  when the shows start up again in the spring.  Overall I would recommend taking the seminar if you are committed to conformation handling, it would be too much if you just had a causual interest in the sport.  I forget the exact cost as I sent in my deposit and balance over a period of several months, but it was somewhere in the range of $200 for the 2 days, and if you consider how many entry fees you blow by "stupid" mistakes, certainly will be a good value IF I learned enough to make a difference.  Time will tell!!

Posted by: Vistadei at 07:44 | link | comments
seminar reviews

For the past 2 weeks I have started helping out the instructor at the CGC class (Canine Good Citizen) held at the Beaver County Kennel club.  It certainly is different teaching vs training your own dogs!  It is a neat experience and I plan on continuing.  It is fun and certainly eye opening to work with different breeds, that have different temperments and for me, the difference in the physical strenght of the dogs has been interesting.  The first night I took each one for the "three minute seperation" exercise and in the begining I walked through the class on the training room floor and took the leash from the owner and well tried to walk with the un-trained dogs back through other dogs and to the area I was keeping them for the 3 minutes apart from their owners.  The first couple dogs nearly ripped my arms out of the sockets, I think one was a happy pittbull who was strong as an ox, and then there was the 120 pound Newf, WONDERFUL dog but I was leaning all my weight back against him and still going along where he led instead of where I had in mind!  He was great staying with me while his owner stepped out, leaned against me the whole time, I was sitting down and my knees were well below his belly, he just kinda straddled me on the chair like he was on my lap and leaned in for a good slobbery petting!  Speaking of slobber, I think I fell in love with the blood hound that was there, his lips and ears were like the softest velvet covered in slobber and he kept snoooof snooofff snoooffffffing me because he smelled my treats.  I gave him some then the snnnoooofffffing turned into pure love and pawing and more snoooofffing, and I was well slobbered at the end of 3 mins, but it was so neat compaired to my dog that have hard mouths and take treats with snappy teeth to just be snooofffed by a velvet mouth dog!!

Posted by: Vistadei at 07:46 | link | comments

This past Sunday instead of exhibiting a dog at a dog show, I went and worked at the Beaver County Kennel club's conformation and obedience show in Aliquippa PA (Racoon twp)  I ended up most of the day working at the judges luncheon, I wasn't sure if I was going to get off work at my REAL job for that day,so didn't want to volunteer to steward or something out with the rings then leave them short if I had to work. and not make it to the show  So I made a fruit salad and then volunteered in the dining room setting up, during lunch and clean up afterwards.  Lots of grunt work behind putting on a show, but it is fun and always interesting to learn more about shows from the other side of the gate.  This coming weekend I was planning to go to MI for some UKC shows, but things just don't seem to be falling into place for that, unless I take off at the spur of the moment and just leave and start driving, sometimes I do that, and with my daughter at home she can take care of the dogs, and UKC allows day of show entries, so I still have till Friday to make up my mind.  Darby needs 2 more wins for his Grand Champion title.

Posted by: Vistadei at 08:04 | link | comments

Hey Lookie!

Got another picture update, this time from Maria with Gabby!  I am so excited to see Gabby I haven't heard from them for a while.  Gabby was from the L5 litter and her littermates are Destiny, China, and Luke.

Posted by: Vistadei at 07:51 | link | comments (1)

Over the last couple months, I have been getting in new pictures and updates on some of "our" dogs, Dogs that have been bred and born here at Vista Dei - updates sent to me by their loving families!  This is probably the biggest reward I have in breeding to see the dogs loved and enjoying life and bringing love and happiness to families.  I have wanted to share the pictures with you all, but had not had the time to re-size them for the internet (to load faster and fit on pages) but I did that this morning, so I hope you enojoy these pictures and updates as much as I enjoyed receiving them. Keep Scrolling down - down - down.. I broke them into quite a few new posts!

Posted by: Vistadei at 11:49 | link | comments (1)

Thanks to Linda and Kalyn for these great pictures of Shelby (she is Cricket, Diana and Dew-oh's sister)  I think that Kalyn might have had something to do with the Hawiian Lei's but I can't be too sure, Shelby might have just dressed up on her own..

Kiss'n Grandma!

Posted by: Vistadei at 09:38 | link | comments

Rose, Ray and Cricket have been on an adventure of a lifetime this summer.. if Rose would like to write a story of where and what all Cricket did, and send it to me I would be happy to post it here..  But for now here is a picture of Cricket doing the nearly impossible.. Being in 4 different States at one time, Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico!   

Posted by: Vistadei at 09:34 | link | comments

The L8 litter just celebrated their FIRST BIRTHDAY a couple weeks ago, hard to believe it has been a year since we had a litter here!?!?  Here are some pictures Denise L. shared from Hector's birthday party..

Sure wish'n I didn't have to share ma presents wif ma brothers!

Yeah.. Chased off one of 'em and still guardin' ma stash!

Took ma cake under the tree to eat it,

better gobble quick cause here they come!

Aww Right, you can play wif ma toy, but only cause I love you so much!

Posted by: Vistadei at 09:25 | link | comments

Here is a picture of Tim and Regis and the Judge right after they completed their MACH last month!  I think that ribbon is bigger than the dog, don't you?  Just for those who don't know, the pole that Tim has in his hand is the last bar the dog jumps when they earn the MACH title, they get to keep the bar, tassles are put on the end and people sign it... hey, I didn't get it sign it.. humph.. maybe someday they will bring it by and I can?

Posted by: Vistadei at 09:17 | link | comments

Thanks to Sue, Mary and Alena for sharing this picture of Sampson and Aslan.. yes that is TWO dogs, not a mirror!  Hope they are enjoying their new home and the move wasn't too much for any of the family!

Posted by: Vistadei at 09:10 | link | comments

Thanks to Dave and Denise S. for these pictures of their Frisbee Nuts!!  Decker has really taken to playing frisbee in the year since he moved from my house to theirs, guess his son Drifter taught him the ropes, or the "disk" as the case may be! 

And another of Drifter

Posted by: Vistadei at 09:05 | link | comments (2)

Here are some pictures from Sue and AJ - this is Abby, she was Puppy #1 from our L6 litter (the other littermate sister are Stella and Kiwi - so you remember the litter)  These were taken when she was still a "tween ager" but Sue and AJ came across them and thought I would like copies and they were right! They say she is a real doll.. looks to me like she is enjoying life at their house!

Posted by: Vistadei at 09:01 | link | comments

What a lovely fall weekend!!  Wow!  Took 5 of the dogs on the Pet Walk-A-thon on Sunday to benifit the Beaver County Human Society.  Met up with Dave and Denise at the walk, of course they had Drifter and Decker (to add color to my plain brown crew!) and their Collie, Spirit too!  I had Darby (of course he HAS to go with his mom everywhere!) Daisy, Diana, Darlin and Destiny.  I thought it would be a good time for Darlin' and Destiny to learn to walk in a group and stay in the group around other people, kids and dogs.  People seem to get a kick out if it when my dogs walk in their group, I just loop the handles of all 5 leashes on one wrist and they walk in a fan shape group, mostly shoulder to shoulder side by side with no pulling or fussing and it makes an impressive sight! hahahahah  the younger 2 hadn't done that before, but they fell right in line and kept up and did very well.  Supposedly the walk was 4 miles, but it sure didn't seem like it.. maybe because we were talking and having fun?  We crossed paths with a couple riders on horses, and that was the first time mine had seen people riding I think, it was no problem.  Dave had to spend some time combing burrs out of his when we got back to the vans, somehow all 3 of his found every burr along the way and brought them back, doing their part for ecology dispursing seeds etc.. hahahah  Everyone was really intrigued by Drifter and Decker's flashy colors, (Sable merle and blue merle).  We had a blast, and got a T-shirt (that is prettier this year than other years) and helped out a good cause.. and enjoyed a beautiful day in the park.

I have been getting alot of pictures in of "our" dogs, Cricket, Shelby, Hector, Regis, Drifter, Decker.. I have to take some time to re-size the pictures and then I will be posting them here, just haven't had time to update the webpages, barely got the Beaver County Kennel Club website up to date before the meeting tonight, I was a good 6 weeks or more behind on THAT!  man, time is flying by me this summer..

It has been a whole year now since we have had any puppies here at Vista Dei.. mostly it was because I wanted a summer to run and play with the dogs, taking them to shows, getting some titles finished up and youngster's started in training without being tied down to a litter socializing puppies etc.  Also the breeding between Darby and Delight (our visitor from MI) didn't take, and there were no pups, and Destiny's heat wasn't very good so I am sure she isn't going to be having pups this fall.  HOWEVER.. we have some exciting plans for this next spring, and are planning several litters for 2008, it will probably be our busiest year of puppies if all goes as planned, so stay tuned...

Wow, I should post more often so I don't have 2 weeks worth of news in one giant posting.. but one more thing!  Regis has started to run USDAA agility (it is another organization, like the AKC but devoted entirely to agility with lots more challanges and games)  Christy reports another great weekend!!

Posted by: Vistadei at 07:56 | link | comments (1)