This past weekend at the Breezy Hill SDT Julie and her dogs did just a fabulous job. I'm horrible at remembering details and such (Julie does a nice job with that stuff, so maybe she'll recount the runs for us), but Twist and Julie won the Open class on Sunday (the highest class you can be in - what the rest of us aspire to) and went on to be the Overall Open Champions for the weekend. Their run on Sunday was absolutely gorgeous - I had chill bumps just watching it.

Lark and Julie were second in Open Ranch on Saturday and Sunday, and went on to win Overall Open Ranch Champions for the weekend.

Julie had a really nice showing with Kat this weekend also - placing both days. The pups, Pip and Phoebe had good runs in Nursery this weekend - Pip winning on Sunday (good boy!) after having struggled on Saturday. Phoebe laid out a nice run on Saturday, but had some struggles on Sunday (as did Nick).

It was a good weekend for the Twist-related doggies for sure! Yay for Julie and her dogs!

Yay! Big congrats to Julie and her gang! You guys are awesome.

woowooo! congrats. I hope somebody who was there will be e-mailing you guys some pics.

Wow, Julie and her dogs rocked the weekend it sounds like! Congrats!

Unfortunately, we won't have any pictures to share because we usually do the photo taking ourselves but were both busy running dogs. Plus it was overcast a lot, and my Rebel with the long lens just doesn't perform well in low light like that.

All I gotta say about my dogs is that I was quite proud of them, especially Twist, who's been laid off since April because of a mystery lameness and Kat whom I just haven't worked because I've been working with the youngsters.

As for Phoebe's "struggles" on Sunday, let's just say that we can best describe her run as "Phoebe's Wild Ride, or Runaway Freight Train Coming Down the Pike." Whew, that little dog wasn't slowing down for *anybody*! We actually made it most of the way around the course, but when her extreme pushiness caused the sheep to split after the cross drive panels and one headed for the pond, I figured it was time to retire, before we had to go fishing for sheep! Obviously we need to work a bit more on pace and obedience when asked to stop....

I don't know what to say about Twist, other than that sometimes she leaves me in awe, and this was one of those times. The neatest thing about her is her lovely silent gather, and I hope her pups inherited that ability, because there's nothing cooler than standing at the post, watching your dog do what it was bred to do, and do it alone and well, with utter quietness (and on sheep that have proven to be quite difficult all weekend). She's the dog who took me from novice to open, all before she was three years old. What a partnership it's been and still is. She's also my go-to dog here on the farm. She will be nearly impossible to replace.

Oh and Larky was great. This was her debut in open ranch after running in maybe 5 or 6 trials at the pro-novice level last year. She's just two and a half. I wasn't sure she was quite ready to move up, but she proved she was up to the task. She's my next open dog in the making. Maybe we can aim to qualify for the 2010 finals, since Kat will be 10 by then.

J.

Sniff, sniff. Sorry guys, my hard drive is all filled up and I'm trying to find time to delete and archive stuff so I can download stuff. I also have some pictures for a friend I need to get off there and share. I have been very remiss and I apologize!

Congrats to Julie and Twist and again to Laura!

Wow, sounds like you all did awesome! Great job!

Wow! Great job, Julie! I'm in awe as I get ready to drive up for our lesson to try to keep my dog and sheep in the same general area of the big field.

Sounds like you all did awesome. Having no Noodleman or Pip pictures kind of starts my day off slow though.