Christmas 2013

Merry Christmas!  May has been such a blessing to our family, she made our Christmas memorable this year, as we did not have one meltdown and it was considerably calm.  Maybe a little crabbiness due to lack of sleep, but an overall calm we have never experienced.  God gave us our miracle in May!

 

 

 Lisa and Joe with May exploring the snow.

 Joe and May playing in the snow in our newly fenced in backyard.

 Oh May, the tennis ball is caught in the tree!

 May meets the king of our pen Zippy and all is fine!

 May submits to playing and Zippy is like no way, I'm to old for this.

 Joe and May talk to Santa!

 I think Santa really liked May too!

 May meets the cousins dog Kate and submits to playing she too thought May was crazy.

 Christmas eve with May!

 Joe gets a remote control car that May loves to chase around.

 

 Joe helps May open her gift...

 A "Jolly Ball" just what she wanted.

 May loves her Jolly Ball.

Joe with his brother Tyler, Grandma, and sister Lisa on Christmas Day! What a happy boy he is!

The long road home

The journey home started at 6:40am Eastern time we left Homewood Suites in Ohio, after many goodbyes and thanks to all the hotel staff for their gracious hospitality.  We left the Dayton, Ohio area in light snow as we progressed to the Indiana border the snow got heavier at times.  We stopped about an hour and half into our journey for breakfast at a Cracker Barrel, and "potty" stop for May.  Then onward to Chicago.  What normally is about a 5 hour drive turned into 7 hours plus the time change. We drove through much of Indiana in a Winter Storm Warning, not real bad compared to Minnesota standards but people did not know how to drive so we saw a few cars and a semi in the ditch and traffic primarily in one lane going 45 miles per hour.  I don't think we saw a single snow plow in Indiana until we got near to the Illinois border.  We arrived at Lego Discovery Land in Chicago at about 1pm. Joe had the time of his life, it was pretty cool, May got nervous in the elevator and then saw her reflection in a mirror and let out a little "boof" but other than that she was interested in moving Lego's and even watch part of the 3-D movie.  We decided not to tether Joe and May as there were rides and things Joe wanted to go on and May could not go, so next time for a place like this we could use a carabiner clip instead to make it easier for us to unhook her from Joe.

We stopped for a quick bite to eat and fuel and onward we went, we pretty much ran out of snow in Chicago, but at least we were seeing snow plows there.  We ran into snow again just outside the Wisconsin Dells, but didn't really slow us down.  We made two other quick "potty" stops and go home to Hutchinson at about 11:30pm.  May was very excited to be in her new home and meet Joe's sister Lisa.  Tyler won't be home until the middle of next week.  She got the grand tour of the house on her leash and then played around with Joe and Lisa for awhile, we'll wait until tomorrow to introduce her to the other dogs.  Got to get to bed. Goodnight.

Graduation Day!

So, there was no test anxiety for May, here she is the night before playing with her frozen peanut butter kong and taking a little nap.

So, we thought we were issue free, but no had to have some car problems, noticed powering steering going in and out yesterday, Denny took it in for diagnostic right away this morning, sure enough need a new steering pump, but good news they could get it done today.  So we got a loaner car, so the dealer dropped me and May off at the mall in time for our public access test and Denny and Joe went to deal with paper work for car and loaner and then came and picked me and May up...Great news May and I passed with flying colors no problems!  So back to 4 Paws for paperwork and graduation party.

      May wasn't sure about this different vehicle, just couldn't get comfortable, but enjoyed looking out the window on our way back to 4 Paws.

 Joe at Graduation with new friend Christopher...Comets partner.

 Families, volunteers and foster families, and college students who all helped with our dogs are all present for graduation.

 May is official!  And she's looking around the room at all her doggie friends.

 Joe prompted May up on the couch with him and commanded "Lap" it brought tears to my eyes as he sat and said "I'm mad, I'm mad, it's to loud"  without May Joe would not have stayed in this kind of environment let alone verbalized what was wrong, May's doing her thing already, she rocked it, even though I lost it to tears.

Jermey announces that we all passed and welcome to graduation!

 
 
 

 All the staff and trainers are introduced.

 And of course the most important person Karen, the founder of 4 Paws!  Thank you!

 Graduation photo shot.

 Joe signs his and May's name to the poster!

Joe and May with their official Graduation certificate!

                  Cake and snack time!  December Howliday Class 2013 we Rocked it!

       Joe with head trainer Jeremy and May's trainer Jessa!   Thank you so much for a perfect match!

                             Ok, now were just goofing around!

    Joe with Jeremy and his dog Brody.

                    Good bye 4 Paws!  We will miss you and be forever Thankful for all you do!

 

An emotional day to say the least!  We will miss our new found friends and family at 4 paws and all over the United States.    The car is fixed and Joe says he's hungry, we'll be headed home tomorrow morning.  With a  planned stop at Lego Discovery Land in Chicago!

Preparations for Public Access Test and going home

Last night in our hotel room, May was checking up on Joe in the bathtub!

 Joe and May pretending to be sleeping!

 Ok, now May is really sleeping.  She works hard, plays hard, and sleeps hard!

Day 11 ~ Today was the last formal day of class.  Today we learned the last command "Touch" which is used for behavior disruption and can be used anytime, when Joe is sitting, standing or walking.  May caught onto this one right away, I pretended to be Joe and stomped a foot and yelled a little bit, I didn't want to swear while other kids are in the room but I said it a loud voice "I hate you" and May responded quickly with a touch and touch, repeatedly, I'm sure this will be a great distraction for Joe, this will be an important command for us and one that gets used a lot.
Here is May practicing "Touch"...

 The next thing we practiced was a couple of tasks for public access.  Yes, that is a plate of people food right in front of May.  She is trained to ignore it, even if someone drops something on the floor she is taught to leave it and ignore it. 

 May rocked it, it took one small correction and she knew the rule applied with me as well.  We also were told to make sure we have something in case our dog has an accident in public, it is our responsibility to clean up, we also fail the test, but we get to try again. Otherwise, the test is all about obedience and being able to hangout by a table in the food court kind of like a restaurant for 20-30 minutes, which May has done just fine with, she goes to breakfast and dinner with us everyday at the hotel and stays right by our feet, no problem.

 Joe takes some time during our lunch break to play with some of his new found friends.

May pays close attention during afternoon class, trainer Jeremy explained everything about taking our Service Dogs home, integrating them into our lives at home, with other pets, people, riding long distances in a car, flying on an airplane, going to school, and how to handle any public issues.  Jeremy also told us that these two weeks have been exhausting for the dogs they are not used to a 10+ hour day with people continuously.  While they have been at 4 Paws for training, each trainer has about 7 dogs they are working with, they can't work with them all at the same time so they can catch a little nap in their kennel until it's there turn again.  So they are exhausted and said no matter how long the ride that our dogs will probably sleep the entire way, other than potty breaks.

     Ok, so she checks in with her family every now and then.

 Before heading home today, Joe gave May a bath and used the blow drier on her!  She really didn't mind...guess what May your probably in for a few baths at home, as we know how Joe loves water.  We know she'll be in the pool with Joe next summer too.

 Good job Joe, May smells all fresh now, and she's ready for her big day!

We are scheduled for our public access test at the Mall at 10am tomorrow morning, that will take about an hour and then we report to 4 Paws to complete paper work, take a lunch break and wait for all the families to finish up.  Graduation party is at 2:30! 

I think I forgot to mention but May has a "wart" on her lip...it's actually a virus similar to chicken pox in humans, we had the vet tell us more about it, as he looked at it again, he said it is about as big as it will get and now it will take anywhere from 2 weeks to 2 months to dry up and fall off.  It's nothing contagious just something some dogs get.  And she also got the last of her 1 year vaccines yesterday.  4 Paws is so great at knowing every little thing about our dogs and can explain it all to us.