This week past week, our house and business were bustling with Valentine activities.
There was love in the air. I have young children, and that means helping them prepare Valentine cards for all their classmates. That wasn’t enough for my boys. They made handmade cards for family members regularly during the days leading up to Valentine’s Day. I loved it. Candy, chocolate, cupcakes, and other fun treats showed up in unexpected places all week. It’s a good thing everyone, both at my house and at Clever Canine, has a sweet tooth. One of our creative clients brought in a Valentine craft for us to do with our dogs during one of our classes. Then we did the craft with our daycare dogs and sent the little gifts home with the daycare dogs’ parents. One of my favorite moments was when I walked into my office to find a sweet Valentine gift from my dogs left on my desk. I smiled and thought about how much I love my dogs. It’s probably a little crazy, really. These dogs are family. I let my dogs have quite a few privileges that I think some people would be surprised by. I love my dogs, and I want them near me. I enjoy sharing my space with my dogs. But I’m careful to keep things balanced. I make sure my dogs understand the rules of the house and have structure. With that structure comes the freedom for them to live life along with my family and me. Often, we have people come in to talk to us about what’s going on with their dog, and they seem nervous to tell us that they allow their dog on the furniture, or that their dog sleeps in bed with them, or that they share human food with their dog. A lot of people are worried that we will tell them that they will never be able to have fun with their dog again. Actually, it’s the opposite! If you know how to teach your dogs the rules. If you know how to instill structure, then freedom and fun come with it. Freedom and fun are just some of the rewards of dog training if you are willing to put in the effort. Let us show you how we can help you have a great dog. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training!
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It’s the Super Bowl.
My house and family are ready. We are stocked up on all kinds of snack food and pop. There will be no healthy family meals today. Chips, dip, and pop is fine with me. My kids have been looking forward to this all week. My family has been discussing the teams, the players, the coaches, and the fans. We’ve been watching fun pre-game clips. We are excited about the halftime show. Will there be a tribute to SpongeBob creator, Stephen Hillenburg? Who’s going to have the best commercial this year? The excitement is building. Then there’s the game. I enjoy watching football. Maybe it’s because I relate to the referees. Atlanta won’t be the only place where the referees will be working tonight. My husband and I will be refereeing tonight too. Our house is bustling with seven of our kids, our son’s girlfriend, tons of food, and a whole lot of dogs. Someone needs to make sure they don’t burn down the house, and the dogs don’t eat all our food. We aren’t magicians but do make it work. Here’s the thing, both dog training and parenting are a whole lot like being a referee. We make sure the players follow the rules. We make sure things run as smoothly as we can. It’s not a perfect analogy, but it’s a good one. A big problem I see with people who come to us for help with dog training is that they aren’t consistent with the rules. Many people need help knowing how to communicate effectively with their dog. We can certainly help you with that. We can help you set up the rules. We can help you train. But you need to be like a referee to get good results. Be consistent, and you will be surprised at what your dog can do. Let us show you how we can help you have a great dog. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training! There is a show business saying; "Never work with kids or animals."
It’s certainly true if you’re worried about always performing well and never being embarrassed. Any seasoned parent will tell you that kids do and say the craziest things. I’ve lost track of how many times my kids have done or said something that made me look like an idiot. Just this morning, I was taking a video of a dog I am working with, so I could send his family an update on his progress. Right at the end, my little boys started arguing in the background-- over cereal. Why? Because they are brothers and they find ANY reason to argue. Guess what, I still sent the video. I just added an apology for the argument at the end. This is my life. I’m real about it. Do you know what else I’m real about? I’ll let you in on a secret. My dogs aren’t perfect. Yes, my dogs can do some really cool things. They better be able to - my daughter Lizzie and I are trainers. But they have bad days and so do we. Sometimes I think that our clients believe that we are magicians. But we are regular people who have very real dogs that have very real personality quirks. It’s those quirks, those difficulties that test us as trainers that make us better at helping our clients. I was talking with one of my trainers, Kaytie, about this the other day. We were talking about some of the training issues we have had with our own dogs and how that helps us to relate so closely with our clients. So often, people walk in with their dogs and feel like they have to apologize for their dog’s behavior. They are embarrassed. They are afraid we are going to judge them. Honestly, most of the time we are thinking about how we have been there. We weren’t always trainers. We understand what you’re going through. That’s why we do what we do. Is your dog not listening to you? Are you being dragged down the street when going for a walk? Does your dog jump on everyone that comes for a visit? Is your dog stealing food off the counter? Is your dog aggressive at times and you are worried he will hurt someone? Let us show you how we can help you have a great dog. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training! Do you have a special one?
I do! I have a few actually. Don’t get me wrong. They’re all special. But these are the ones that need just a bit more - a bit more help, a bit more encouragement, a bit more guidance, just a bit more. This week I have been reading over my youngest son’s MET (Multidisciplinary Evaluation Team) Report in preparation for his IEP (Individualized Education Plan) meeting. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, be grateful. I’m referring to the overwhelming world of special education. I’ve been swimming in a sea of words and acronyms I don’t quite understand, and I certainly can’t remember. What I do know is that my little boy needs help. He doesn’t learn the same way that most kids his age do. So, I’m preparing for the upcoming meeting with the school teachers, counselors, and therapists to come up with a better plan to meet my son’s needs. Thankfully, this isn’t my first time through the special education jungle. My husband and I have been parenting special needs kids for over 20 years. Even with my previous experience, this is going to be a tough one. That’s OK, life is about learning and growing, and my family and I are ready for the challenge. But how does this relate to dog training? Well, sometimes life gives you easy stuff and sometimes there’s more to the story. Some clients come in with perfect little puppies that seem to never do anything wrong. They love everyone and everything. They are not afraid of anything. They go through puppy class and then enjoy the rest of their life next to their owner’s side being perfect and sweet. I have kids that remind me of that. They are never really in trouble, get good grades, and make responsible decisions. Then there are those that are not as easy and need more help. The clients that come in with puppies or dogs that have tougher stories. Maybe they pull on the leash, bark at other dogs, are terrified of the neighbors, charge out the front door, run in the opposite direction when you call them, and try to bite the mailman. They need a bit more - a bit more help, a bit more encouragement, a bit more guidance. Our job is to help you come up with a plan for your dog no matter how much help you need and walk side by side with you, helping you and your dog. Are you ready to learn and grow? Are you ready for the challenge? Let us show you how we can help you have a great dog. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training, As I sit down to write this today, I am distracted by some of the random thoughts that have gone through my scattered brain lately.
I keep returning to a moment last week during a training session when one of my trainers told a client that this is the first job that he's had that he loves. He actually enjoys coming to work every day. That made my day. That isn’t to say that my trainer doesn’t have bad days here. I’ve witnessed some of his bad days myself. But it sets my mind at ease to know that my trainers like their jobs. There’s more than that though. A big part of success in anything is your mindset. Where is the focus? That’s why life coaches recommend that you start your day writing down 3 things that you are grateful for. It’s a great way to set a positive tone for the day. If you’ve been reading my e-mails for a while, you’ve probably already guessed that I’m all keeping a Grateful Log. If you read about my bullet journal a couple of weeks ago, you might have even guessed where I write it. So, the question I always write here is: what does this have to do with dog training? A few things, actually: 1. One of the first things we work on when training a dog is focus. Just like our focus makes a difference in our success, a dog’s focus makes a difference in theirs. We need their attention to be on the right thing to make progress. 2. An important key to every training session is to end it on a positive note. Even if everything else about the day has gone wrong, training needs to be a good thing to your dog. It’s their job. Always make the end of the training session enjoyable, so the dog wants to work next time. 3. This one has to do with service dogs. We get a lot of questions from people worried that the dogs in service work don’t get to enjoy life being a dog. That’s not the case at all. A properly trained dog loves its job. A service dog would rather be working than doing anything else. It’s not that service dogs don’t get downtime- time to relax or play. It’s just that a service dog that loves his job is not happy doing anything else. The concept is the same whether you are trying to have a better mindset yourself or you have a dog that you need to train. It’s about having the right focus. Is your dog not listening to you? Are you being dragged down the street when going for a walk? Does your dog jump on everyone that comes for a visit? Is your dog stealing food off the counter? Is your dog aggressive at times and you are worried he will hurt someone? Let us show you how we can help you have a great dog. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training! We celebrated a big birthday last week.
Zack, my husky/ lab mix turned 13. I’m going to let you in on a secret. Zack is a feisty old fella, and he’s starting to drive me a little bit crazy. Zack has always been a pretty good dog. He has never been pushy or needy. He was always happy just to be with his family. He has never been one to jump up on people, chew our stuff, bolt outdoors, or cause any trouble. He is good with kids, cats, and other dogs. Zack learned at a young age that he wasn’t allowed on the furniture, so he never tried. Even when we changed the rules a few years later and started allowing our dogs up on the couch with us, Zack would not climb up. Zack was off leash trained at a young age, even ignoring people walking past with dogs on a leash or random children running through our yard. All around, Zack has been an easy dog. But in these last couple of months, I’ve noticed some changes in my easy-going, old guy. It's as if he has decided that he doesn't have to follow the rules anymore because he's old. Lately, Zack has been barking a lot. He barks at random noises. Noises that never would have bothered him before. Often, he barks and runs to the door as if he heard someone knock, but no one is there. Zack also barks to get my attention to go out - a lot. He needs to go more often than he used to and he is not as patient about holding it. Apparently, increased urgency isn't just common in older people. Who knew? When Zack is out in the yard, I have to call him several times and often I have to walk toward him before he responds. It’s as if he is completely ignoring me - or he doesn't hear me until the treat bag opens. He’s never done that before. And my personal favorite, the other day I walked into the living room to find Zack curled up comfortably in the armchair. He looked up at me as if he was almost interested in whether or not I cared if he were on the furniture. I smiled at him, and he went back to relaxing where he was. So, here’s the thing, I can train Zack, so his new behaviors are better - less bothersome. The old saying, "You can’t teach an old dog new tricks," is not true at all. But one of the first rules in dog training is to rule out medical issues first. And with Zack, being that his behaviors are new and consistent with old age, it makes more sense to use training with accommodations. As dogs get older, their hearing changes so sounds are perceived differently. Zack can still hear, but things don’t sound the same as they used to. It is essential to be patient with him when reminding him not to bark at strange noises and to come when called. An important key to dog training is that it should never be cookie cutter. There are a lot of techniques that work with most dogs, but a trainer should look at each dog as an individual and find a plan that works for him. I’m going to let you in on another secret. I act like Zack is driving me crazy, but I love that old guy. In fact, I have a huge soft spot for old dogs in general. Zack’s geriatric ways bring me a lot of joy. Do you need a personalized approach to training your dog? Let us show you how we can help you. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training! This year, my husband got me something for Christmas that I absolutely love.
He got me a bullet journal and archival pens. In case you don’t know, a bullet journal is a plain journal that you fill in any way you choose. Most often, the journal ‘s pages have dots in a grid pattern. The dots serve as markers similar to lines on stationery or graph paper. What I love so much about the bullet journal is that I can design it any way I want to. I have spent so much time looking for a planner that will work for me, but nothing has ever quite fit. This journal will be a planner and habit tracker designed specifically for me. It’s the perfect time of year to be designing a new planner. As the new year approaches, it seems only natural to be evaluating habits and planning new ones. Anyone who does dog training sessions with me will hear a lot about habits. Dogs form good and bad habits just like we do. The problem is, they can’t use helpful things like journals and planners to help them break bad habits and build good ones. They don’t think about the upcoming new year and make plans to change. They don’t even comprehend that their bad habits are a problem. It’s up to us to help our dogs change. It’s up to us to help our dogs build good habits and break bad ones. Dogs are going to build habits. If we don’t do the work to train them and to lead them, we probably won’t like the habits our dogs build. The good news is, whether your dog already has bad habits that need correcting, or you just need a little help with getting your dog to build good habits, we can help. Let us show you how. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training! This past Tuesday was average by most accounts. It was so average, we were having tacos for dinner at my house. We are divided on which of us prefers hard shells and which prefers soft. After twenty-two years of cooking dinners for my family, I just want whatever is easiest. So, I told my daughter to heat the hard taco shells in the toaster oven while I worked on everything else. That worked out well for a while, until my younger kids wanted someone to read a story to them and my daughter volunteered. That’s right - the same daughter that was heating the taco shells, took off to read a story to the little kids. A few minutes later, I started to smell smoke. A taco shell had produced a tiny little flame. I called for help as I unplugged the toaster oven and began to put out the fire. Older kids ushered the younger kids and the dogs to safety as my husband and I worked to make sure that the fire had been completely distinguished and then tried to rid the house of smoke.
It’s crazy how fast a fire goes up. As anyone who has had a dog with behavior problems likely knows, a dog’s behavior can be a lot like a smoldering fire. If you don’t stop the problem when it’s small, it can quickly get out of control. When an owner brings us a dog that has recently begun a nuisance behavior, we can often help solve the issue relatively quickly. If the dog has been given long enough to allow their behavior to become a habit, then it becomes far more difficult to deal with the problem. Instead of a small fire inside of a toaster oven, we now have a raging house fire. It’s not that a house fire cannot be extinguished, it is just that it is going to take quite a bit more time and effort. We can help you with whatever size problem you have, from a little smoke to a full on blaze, but the sooner you come to us the easier the issue will be to manage. Let us show you how. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training! My teens, though seemingly normal, don’t always have the most traditional taste in artwork.
While it is quite common to find posters of favorite bands, video games, pop culture icons, or sports teams hanging on the average teenager’s walls, my teens opt for a more educated look. One of my boys, who is a huge history and geography buff, decorates his walls with maps, flags, and historical posters. There was even a time that he was hiding photos of historical figures in our framed family photographs. So, I probably shouldn’t have been surprised when another of my sons came home from school the other day carrying a huge wall hanging of The Periodic Table of Elements. I was more than a little confused when I asked him where he got the thing and what he planned on doing with it. My son looked at me like I was crazy. The physics teacher gave the poster to my son and he had every intention on hanging his new treasure on his bedroom wall - of course. Isn’t that where you normally hang a giant poster of the Periodic Table? I believe I laughed and called my son a nerd. He knows that’s a compliment coming from me; I have been a nerd my whole life. I love to learn new things - to read, to study, to explore. Learning is a such a great adventure. I want to share the joy of learning with everyone I can - my children, my employees, my clients. This leads me to a topic we don’t talk about around here much, our education and credentials. Honestly, the important thing is whether the work we do is helping our clients, so that’s what we focus on. We don’t talk much about our training, certifications, ribbons or other accomplishments. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have them. On a rare occasion, someone might contact us and ask for our credentials and we send them. But, in general, that stuff just hasn’t come up. That is, until the other day when we received a random 1-star review in the middle of the night, from a person we had never heard of, claiming that our staff had no training. I spent the day laughing. If they had only asked. As far as I’m aware, we are the only dog training company around that offers not only paid internships, but we also pay for our staff members to earn their training certifications in a variety of topics ranging from agility and sports to nutrition. We require that ALL our staff, even our office staff, be trained in dog behavior and safety. Many of our staff know dog CPR and First Aid. We always encourage continued training and we hold staff training sessions to practice old skills or learn new ones. We take education very seriously - for both our staff and our clients alike. We Can Help You Does your dog not listen to you? Does he or she jump on guests every time someone comes to visit? Does your dog pull you down the street every time you go for a walk? We can help you. Let us show you how. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training! The other day I made a fool of myself in public.
Yup, it was a stellar moment. Let me tell you a little bit about it. I was at one of my least favorite places, the Social Security Office. It never fails, no matter how much documentation I bring in, it’s never enough. Not once have I been able to walk in and have the process go well the first time. To be fair, I never bring a standard case to the Social Security Office. I have adopted several older children with complex histories. The list of documents that the courts and adoption agencies give you to know what to bring to the Social Security Office is useless. And finding a list online of what I need in my unique situation is difficult at best. Changing my children’s names and social security numbers isn’t as cut and dry as getting a replacement card. This time though, I was ready. I had documentation in abundance, above and beyond anything they could possibly ask for- or so I thought. I dutifully waited my turn and confidently handed my paperwork over to the staff member. Then the questions started. Another staff was called in to assist. Court documents were turned away as unusable. Something was wrong with the name I was providing. I needed to provide a letter from the school stating our child’s pre-adoptive name and new name. What? Since when is that necessary to get a Social Security card? How are the court documents not enough? My patience was gone. So was my usual cool and calm demeanor. I began yelling at the staff members standing behind the window. I knew that losing my temper wasn’t going to change anything, but it didn’t matter at that moment. We’ve fought long and hard for this adoption. It has taken so much longer than it should have. There’s a lot of painful history caught up in the battle. I was so relieved to finally be able to finish the last piece of this adoption and start life with our son finally sharing our name. That all crumbled in front of me and I was angry. I loudly complained the entire way out the door. Now, of course nobody could know the whole story of what really went on. All they knew was that some woman was leaving the building and making a scene the entire way out the door. Here’s the thing, outwardly I was angry. I was angry, true, but I was also disappointed, frustrated, fearful, and sad. Anger was just the easiest and safest emotion to show at that moment. Oftentimes, aggressive dogs behave similarly. Most of the time, dogs that show aggressive tendencies are actually fearful. It’s just safer to show aggression than fear. When we train an aggressive dog, we work to teach the dog alternate behaviors to aggression. Once a dog doesn’t have aggression to fall back on when they’re nervous we can start to see the root of the problem. Quite likely, it will be fear. That’s when we work on confidence building and relaxation training. Nothing is a quick fix. Training to overcome fear and aggression takes time and effort. But it is achievable. If you have a dog that has shown signs of fear or aggression, contact us. We would love to help you and your dog experience the world in a new, confident way. Let us show you how. The first step is to schedule your free, no obligation evaluation. Click here to schedule your evaluation online now. You pick a day and time that works best for you. A trainer will meet with you and your dog (and anyone else that you would like involved in training) and go over some history, find out your training goals, and discuss training options. We can usually provide you with some free tips to help you start seeing immediate results. You can find out more about all our training options and get any questions you have answered. There is no pressure or obligation to buy anything. Here is the link to schedule your free evaluation: https://www.cleverk9mi.com/schedule-evaluation-session.html Happy Training! |