On June 25th at the Cambridge Kennel Club dog show, Katie took first place in the Bred by bitch class. She did not get WB, but did win over the Bred-by dog for Best Bred-by Exhibitor Variety. This allowed her to go to the Toy Group Bred by exhibitor ring to be judged for Best Bred-by Exhibitor toy dog.

She took first place! We then advanced to the Best in Show judging for Bred-by Exhibitors which did not lead to Best in Show for us. But we were still having fun showing late in the day under a warm sun. She won not only a nice pink rosette, but a logo cap and a hand towel for her efforts. Best of all, she really did a great job in the ring, moving nicely and showing off for the judges.

This was a special added feature of the Cambridge show to allow breeders who are exhibiting in the Bred-by class to show off their dogs. The regular group judging with the Best of Breed winners often has many professional handlers. It is nice to see owner handled dogs getting extra recognition from time to time.

At the Memorial Day week-end BOTC show, May 28th -30th, Miss Mellie earned her MACH 3 title. Quite an achievement and she is the first Phalene to get to this level in AKC agility. She was fast and happy and earned several good placements despite a large and competitive 8″ class. (Plus another 164 MACH points!) She also managed a Q in Ex. A FAST class with a nice distance element accomplishment. She QQ’d all three days showing the consistency that has brought her to this point in her agility career. Wow. Such a rush to have this great dog to play our favorite sport with.

Not to be outdone, the rest of Team Alasera had some other great accomplishments as well. Here they are:

Ripley: Star of the now famous “Ripley Agility Adventures” video, held it together to not only get another QQ (five total now!), but he put the finishing touch on his standard run to get leg #10 for his MX title. He didn’t exactly break any speed records, but he did get 33 MACH points to add to his collection. He couldn’t resist visiting a bar setter on his jumpers run on Saturday, and he HAD to visit the judge on Monday, so those runs were a big NQ. But, hey, we are making progress.

Katie: Three words. SUPER DUPER FAST. Katie had some interesting runs at Soccer Blast but she managed to put it all together and get her final Open Standard leg to earn her OA title and the privilege of moving on up to the Excellent level. She earned another Ex. A. Jumpers leg on Monday and her time beat all the rest of the 8″ class. Over 30 dogs. She was smoking hot and Terry knows he has real contender in Katie. The rest of Team Alasera will be looking for scraps after Katie gets into Ex. B. Sigh. Katie also earned a leg toward her Novice FAST title.

Ace: Two words. Jumper Specialist. Ace nailed all his jumpers runs to earn 42 MACH points. Unfortunately, the TEETER was at Soccer Blast. Not just any teeter. THE teeter. The really scary one. So, that was a no go. He had some good moments and pretty nice runs in Standard when not refusing the teeter. Just another challenge to overcome. Hang in there Terry!

Abby: Yet ANOTHER bout of reverse sneezing kept us from running one of the jumpers runs. Too bad too, because she Q’d in Standard that day and so we missed a QQ. She had a brief lapse in judgement and hesitated at the table in Standard on Saturday, so we forfeited a Q (and hence…the QQ) that day as well. But by Monday, I had figured out how to keep her from getting too excited before her runs (which starts the reverse sneezing attack) and we easily achieved a QQ and a placement to boot. She earned another 90 MACH points. Not that she needs those anymore! She ended up with two 3rd place finishes and a fourth place finish for the week-end and believe me, that is a pretty good set of ribbons given the level of competition. She also managed to get the final leg for her Open FAST title, so she moves up to Exc. FAST class.

Next week-end is a three day USDAA trial. More fun to be had.