It's time! Time to set those goals for 2026 and beyond! I decided to do away with the short term and long term goals. I'm just going to list GOALS and go from there - no timeline, no deciding what happens this year and what happens beyond. They happen when they happen, or dont. Here we go!!!

2026 GOALS

   ★  Earn Noodle's PACH (Preferred Agility Championship)
   ★  Earn Dolphin's MACH (Master Agility Championship)
   ★  Get 20 Preferred double QQ's in agility with Noodle to earn her PAX title
   ★  Earn Dolphin's TQX (triple QQQ) agility title
   ★  Earn Noodle's TQX (triple QQQ) agility title
   ★  Earn Dolphin's Rally Intermediate title
   ★  Earn Noodle's RACH (Rally Championship)
   ★  Earn Noodle's MJPB title (Master Jumpers Preferred Bronze)
   ★  Earn Bacon's show championship
   ★  Successfully compete with Pizza in agility with no visiting
   ★  Earn Bacon's Rally Novice (RN) title
   ★  Earn Bacon's Junior Hunter (JH) title
   ★  Get a good cardiologist report about Bacon when she turns 1 year old
   ★  Earn Pizza's Master Hunter lifetime achievement award
   ★  Earn Noodle's MH40 (Master Hunter 40)

I am keeping my goals a bit more organized this year, and in steps. For instance, my long term goal might be to get a Master Hunter title on Bacon, but I have to do it sequentially, so the first goal to hit will be getting her Junior Hunter, and we will adjust the goals next year. And, of course, my goals always include spending the best time in the field with my friends and dogs, and traveling to the most fun agility trials with my best friend and dogs. True friendship is so hard to find, I am thankful I found 'my people'. 2026, here we come. Let's gooooooooo!

I started the new year by doing something fun - Bacon had her Canine Good Citizen test today! She's pretty young, and by far the youngest dog there, but she did great. Her walking on leash was a little wonky, but she did a perfect sit stay, and nothing bothered her, she loved all of it. This is her first official title, "CGC" at the end of her name. Hopefully just the first of many, but we shall see.

I am so crushed. AKC just announced that they are AGAIN delaying the MACH to PACH transfer as they don't have their cpmputers ready to handle it. I am furious...I had contacted them just 2 weeks ago asking about it and I was told it was still happening in January. I entered Noodle in a local trial tomorrow (January 2nd), got my PACH bar and ribbon made, and all my friends were going to be there to celebrate after her run. Now I have to wait until AKC gets their crap together and gets the program up and running. Who knows how long that will be? I just pray that Noodle will still be healthy enough to run agility when this finally happens. We have worked so damn hard for this award. I can't believe AKC waited until January 1st, the start date of the program, to announce it's delay.

I am also irritated that now I have to wake up early tomorrow morning because I entered Noodle and Dolphin (who absolutely HATES trialing at this place!). I would have never entered this trial if it wasn't for Noodle's PACH. I could pull, but I hate wasting money like that.

On a side note, I entered Bacon in her first 4-6 month puppy show! It will be in late January. Who knows how competitive she will be, but we will have fun regardless.

I'll be the first to admit that I wasn't in the best mood coming to this trial, with Noodle's PACH celebration cancelled. I was determined to make the best of the day, but unfortunately Dolphin and Noodle had other plans.

The day started off with Jumpers. Noodle was very distracted in the ring, and bypassed a jump to wander towards the judge. I picked her up and walked her out. We cannot have that! Dolphin ran like poop. He knocked a bar from sheer laziness. Probably one of our worst runs in a long time. I KNEW he would run bad here because he hates this place, but I didn't expect it to be that bad! Time 2 Beat was next and Dolphin was even worse - he completely went around the A-Frame, cut behind me just because of lack of momentum, and then knocked a bar. It was frustrating.

FAST was better, as both dogs Q-ed. Noodle actually got the send pretty well, which was tunnel-jump-tunnel. Dolphin was uber slow, but got it. He was so slow, he matched Noodle's time on the same course, which is crazy! Standard was better with both dogs Q'ing. It felt slow, but in watching the video both dogs were better than I thought they felt. Still nothing like they were last weekend. This is just a terrible place for them to trial, it's really crowded with very little room to warm up, and we can't sit by our crates (which I do think affects Dolphin a bit). Oh well, lesson learned, we won't enter here again any time soon.

Noodle and I headed to Dayton at the crack of dawn for a rally trial. She did really well, we ended up scoring a 99 on all three classes (Master, Excellent, and Advanced. I was really happy that she was extra good on some of the elements we have been working hard at - straight fronts, moving down, and our sidestep (this one was better but still needs work).

This makes Rally Triple QQQ #19 towards her RACH! I had miscounted before, I thought she was at #17 but I was wrong (in a good way!). She only needs one more triple QQQ and 34 Master points towards her RACH. That is huge, especially since I just started doing Master a year and a half ago on a whim, with no expectations to earn the big title. It just snowballed, Noodle started doing great, and we started chipping away at the title. God willing, we should earn this title this year, fingers crossed.

This evening Bacon had her very first conformation class. After two days of puppy agility classes, I expected her to be pretty wild. She had moments of wildness - mainly when anyone got close to her (she LOVES everyone!) but she also had some moments of greatness. At the end of the evening she was doing fantastic, although she still got overly excited when the 'judge' bent over to see her. That's OK, I just love that attitude! She is still in an uneven growth spurt, but she is slowly catching up with herself and I expect (I hope) that she will look even better in a few weeks.

This morning Dolphin and Pizza had agility class - we are revisiting collection recalls. Pizza did awesome, and surprisingly even Dolphin did well (though 'collection' is a 4-letter word to him!). After class, I loaded Noodle and Bacon in the van and headed to the bird dog club for some training. I ran Noodle with a couple of friends' puppies, mainly to do some honoring practice. She actually did pretty darn fantastic honoring the pointing puppies, including her first one that was from probably 100+ yards away.

Before the training session started, I ran Bacon with the puppies (two 8 month old Brittany pups) to just run the field and burn some energy. I was pleased to see that although she was interested in the puppies and did run with them, she really didn't try to play with them or follow them. That's a good sign for the future.

After the other dogs were done, I brought Bacon out on a check cord and we put a pigeon in a tip up. I brought her in down wind and she found the scent and stopped a good 5-6 feet away. I was so excited! We ended up putting out about 5 pigeons (one at a time) and her point got more and more solid, and I had to put hardly any pressure on the check cord when we released the pigeon. Another great sign! I just love training puppies, and there is something so very special about the first time a puppy's instinct kicks in and they go on point. What a great first day!

Today Pizza and I did a 3 hour agility seminar. She was spectacular! She had great speed and drive and FOCUS for the entire 3 hours, I was really really happy with how she worked. I am so hopeful we will be able to trial soon. She is by far my fastest, most athletic agility dog...she should have her MACH by now if it wasn't for her problem with stress-visiting the bar setters. I have not trialed her in AKC in several years, and my coach and I have been working really hard the past year to get her through this issue. I think just maybe we might be getting close? We have had a setback or two on the journey, but overall we have been progressing forward. Fingers crossed!

Yesterday was Bacon's 4 month birthday! Today I did a new stack photo, she is growing out of her unbalanced awkward stage, I do believe. Today was kind of a downer day. For some reason my training did not go well all day, Bacon just wasn't cooperating and didn't seem motivated. I had very short patience, and I found myself once again stressing about her heart and health concerns associated with that. Will we even have a competitive future? Am I spending all this time and effort for nothing? I know, I know, it's never 'for nothing', but still...it's so hard for me when this hits me and reality slaps me in the face. I train and train with the idea in my head that some day we will compete and have a blast. Then I wake up and remember the real reality and I stress, get upset, and that black cloud just settles over my head. Does everyone else with puppies realize how lucky they are? Probably not, because I used to take it for granted also. Not anymore.

My friend and I got together in the evening to train our puppies. It was a great chance to work on focus, especially with another puppy working across the ring. We had several visits, and Bacon did her own visits, but for the most part both puppies stayed focused on their job and their owner. I was pretty amazed! Last time we attempted to train together it was a wreck. I guess the girls are growing up now. Bacon is now 4 months old, and Doree is 6 months.

I started off the training session with some toy work and reverse retrieve. It went pretty well. I moved on to circle work, and this is where I struggle. Bacon is circling so close to me that it's hard to move her ahead to get my front cross in. Even when I hold the toy way out, she cuts the circle really close. I feel so awkward when I am doing this, I am sure I am doing something wrong, because it feels messy. I guess we will see in our next lesson.

I did some work on backing up and she is really doing a good job backing up to the plank behind her. I guess I need to start fading the plank away so she is backing up on her own. We did a ton of training, and the last 15 minutes or so I felt I finally had her focus dialed in and was able to do some heeling practice. I was thrilled with how well she did! I am determined to train this puppy to heel well with enthusiasm. I failed on my other dogs (probably because I didn't make it a real priority), but I am making this a big focus of my training. Part of me is pushing for this because I am afraid she may never be able to do high-energy sports with her heart. The other part of me is ignoring that part LOL!

I headed out to the bird dog club and put out three pigeons for Dolphin. He hasn't worked birds in a LOOONG time, and it shows. We have some work to do this winter!

After the birds, I let Dolphin and Bacon run in the fields and through the woods for about a half hour. After that, it was time for Bacon to do some bird training! I worked her with an 8 month old Brittany puppy. They interacted briefly at the start but then both got down to business. I was glad to see this, I definitely don't want a dog that just wants to play with her bracemate at the start line.

Two different times the Brittany went on point, and when Bacon saw her, she stopped on her own. All I really had to do was to remind her to stay stopped, because after standing for a few seconds she wanted to move in. It was actually pretty easy, and I really hope this is a foreshadow of how she will train!

Bacon got to point 3 birds, and a fourth one that was loose and running around and I didn't notice (but I did see her slink down and get birdy and I wondered why...until I saw it!). She is doing a nice job of using her nose and slowing down when she gets in the scent cone. She is also doing a nice job of holding her point while Jim goes in front to flush the bird. Eventually I will try to move in front to flush, but for now I stay back and loosely hold the check cord in case I need to stop her. We aren't using any blank guns with her yet, just developing the excitement of the birds right now.

Interestingly, in her puppy class this evening, Bacon went over their wobble/teeter board and then suddenly decided she didn't want to go over it again. I have never seen her hesitate or afraid of anything EVER. Cound this be a fear period? Of course you know me, it is something I am now stressing about in my head...

My training pal talked me into joining a team for the AKC Agility League winter season. I was a little apprehensive at first because all I really need is to add one more thing to my schedule, but I thought it would be the perfect fit for Pizza and something fun I could do with her when it is too cold for field work. I was SO right, we had a BLAST! There will be a new course every two weeks that we will have to run for time and score. She was amazing!

It's been a LONG time since my training partner and I were able to travel to a trial with the boys...since the beginning of September! This was a really nice weekend to get away and have some one-on-one time with Dolphin, because he really needed it. I broke my cardinal rule of never traveling north to an agility trial in the winter, and man I regretted it when we arrived. 5" of snow, temperatures in the teens, and the hotel (which was a really nice one) did not have their parking lot plowed or their sidewalks shoveled. Good thing I brought my heavy boots and Dolphin's winter coat.

We had a great weekend, but it took a bit to get back in the groove, so to speak. We started off Friday with a Q in FAST. Dolphin stopped inside the tunnel (part of the send) and didn't come out, when I ran to the other side to see, he was near the exit smelling a wet spot. Apparently another previous dog had peed in the tunnel. I finally got him out and we completed the send successfully, and barely made it to the end. The buzzer went off before we finished, but luckily we had barely enough points to qualify. Good thing, since this was out only successful run all day. Dolphin took an uncharacteristic off-course tunnel in Time 2 Beat, missed a jump in standard that I didn't support, and then the wheels came off in Jumpers with a knocked bar, wrong end of tunnel, and a missed jump. Whoops!

Saturday went a little better. We had a perfect FAST run where we ran my exact plan perfectly, for a nice solid Q. His standard run was beautiful, other than a missed dogwalk contact that the judge did NOT call. Thank you for the late Christmas gift, we ended up Qing! Once again the wheels fell off in Jumpers with 2 knocked bars and an off course wrong end of tunnel.

Sunday it all came together! We had another FAST run that went exactly to plan. I handled a sloppy rear on the flat before the weaves in Time 2 Beat that slowed Dolphin down, but he nailed it for a nice Q. Standard went amazing, super fast with a big bucket of MACH points. I went into Jumpers a little worried as my last two jumpers runs were a hot mess. Dolphin was super fast and really charging ahead (which I love!). I had to call him off of an off course THREE times, but they big thing is HE LISTENED every time and we ended up clean! QUADRUPLE QQQQ!!! This is Double QQ #17!!! Only 3 more QQ's to go. I can smell that MACH, I can taste that MACH, I think it really might happen! What a great way to end the weekend.

I was sitting at my computer working, when I turned around and saw the three stooges on the couch in my office, with Bacon sitting on top of Dolphin. It made me laugh, and it also brought back a lot of memories of my other dogs as pups laying on their adult housemate. I went back in my old folders of pictures and sure enough, I found a photo of every dog as a pup (other than Pretzel, of course) laying on an adult dog. All were around the same age - 4 to 5 months old. Pretty funny to see how the Weims are all so different, yet all the same in many aspects. Bacon reminds me a lot of Noodle as a puppy - just so much energy with no great way to spend it. She would have been a much better summer puppy, for sure. The temperatures have hovered around the single digits to teens, and we can only go outside for about 10 minutes before their paws start freezing. That leaves a LOT of pent up energy to deal with! I am trying to do a lot of training to tire her mind out, but some days she is just so wound up there is no way she can concentrate. Spring, come quickly, please!

Bacon had her semi-private private lesson this evening. She made it 45 whole minutes before she lots her mind and ran over to another one of the puppies to play with. I think she did OK in the lesson, I have a lot to work on and it's really difficult to do that without a lot of room at home to train (did I mention I need spring to come SOON?). We need to work a lot on discrimination, circle work, backing up (fading the plank), among other things. We introduced the A-Frame box to run through. Lots of stuff that needs SPACE. Ugh.

Today was one of those days where everything just seemed to turn out crap. It started out good - Noodle had a pretty good agility class first thing in the morning. Later that afternoon I trained Bacon with my friend, working on some agility foundations. She started off OK, but quickly lost her focus, and it was really hard to get her to cooperate and work with me. I can take a thousand mistakes, but the one thing I hate the most is when my dog is choosing not to work with me. It was so frustrationg and everything I tried seemed to fail. After that, I headed to conformation handling class, and again Bacon was uncooperative - didn't want to stay stacked, was sidewinding pretty hard when I was gaiting her, pulling on the leash...UGH. I totally understand that this is a puppy thing that all puppies go through, but it's difficult to keep that in mind in the moment when you are feeling so frustrated and like all of your training just went out the window. I have a problem seeing the bigger picture sometimes, and this was definitely one of those times. I could only focus on what didn't go right (and there was a lot of that!).

Today Noodle and I headed to a rally trial abvout a half hour away. We are entered today and Sunday, but Sunday we are predicted to get 8-12 inches of snow, so I am guessing today will be our only day. The trial went...meh. Noodle was not on her A game. She wasn't even on her B game. Maybe her P or Q game? We managed to scrape through and get our last triple QQQ needed for her RACH. All we need now is 28 Master points. The dogs at this trial had a lot of trouble with the odors on the matting, and Noodle was definitely one of them. There were certain areas where she absolutely would not stop sniffing the ground, and that's pretty unlike her. It's just amazing that i managed to get her through all three courses and qualify, with her nose on the ground half the time. When she is disengaged like that it really takes the fun out of competing. I am hopeful we can try again on Sunday, but with the incoming weather I am really doubting it.

Because I needed more frustration in my life, I took Pizza (and Bacon) to agility run-throughs in the afternoon. Right away I could tell Pizza was different - much more stressed and reacting to the dogs around her crate (it sure didn't help that someone let their dog come up close to her crate right at the start). I ended up having to cover her crate to get her to settle down. The first run was a mess, very distracted and a visit to a bar setter (after which I promptly walked her out and then restarted). I should mention that yesterday in class she was awesome until she missed her weave entrance, and right after that left me to go visit. The second run I only did 3-4 obstacles and then ran back to the crate to jackpot each time. This meant I only got about half the course done. My third run was better. I strategically placed some treats hidden up high about every 4-5 obstacles. We ran those obstacles, had a jackpot party, and then ran the next 4-5, had another jackpot, etc. This worked perfectly. Our last run we ran straight through, no treats, and she was perfect.

Needless to say, I am frustrated with our giant step back in training. Yes, I know these steps back do happen and it's all part of the hourney, but man, this journey is more of a long-distance marathon with no end in sight! Have we really made ANY progress? I don't really know at this point.

I did some Bacon training, a little at home and a little at the run-throughs in between runs. It was OK. Not great, but it wasn't horrible. I feel like I have made zero progress at home with a few things like her 'hold' command, her retrieve, and definitely her circle work - that's a MESS. Her discrimination between hand and floor is getting a little better, but I have to set her up for success by making one thing easier each time, so I am not sure we are really making progress.

On the plus side, Bacon tried on her new life jacket for our upcoming trip to Florida! We leave in 3 1/2 weeks. It seems so far away, especially with this awful weather we have been having. I can take the snow and cold, but it has been in the teens and single digits for days and that makes it impossible to really get any running done outside. Dogs are stir crazy, I am stir crazy, it's a rough combination.

Not much to report here! After a calm Saturday, we had a major snowstorm hit us on Sunday-Monday. The Rally trial was cancelled on Sunday, and we ended up with around 11-13 inches of snow. The worst part about it wasn't the snow, it's the bitter cold. Temps are barely hitting the teens, with temps below zero overnights. Horrible weather, the dogs cannot get out for more than 5 minutes without their paws freezing. That means insanity in a house with 5 weimaraners. Pure insanity.

On the good news front, the AKC Agility League rankings came out today and after round 1 Pizza is sitting in 1st place for Weimaraners! Yea Pizza Pie!

Bacon and I braved the cold and snow and headed west to a dog show in Indianapolis. Other than her flight home with me, this was Bacon's first 'real' trip. She was a wonderful traveler! It was a 3 1/2 hour drive and she was so quiet and patient. She slept a little, played with her toys a little, all in all was a great puppy.

We had a bit of a snafu when I tried to get to our Air BnB that I rented. The snow was so high at the base of the drive, there was no way I could get the van in. Indianapolis has the WORST snow removal of any city I have been in! The side streets were not plowed, and they had gotten over a foot of snow. It made it pretty rough for my van that is not 4WD. I contacted the Air Bnb host and had to wait a couple hours until he was able to find someone with a plow to get it cleared for me. Made for a LOOOONG day, but Bacon was still wonderful about it!

The Air Bnb was a tiny tiny house, as in there was ZERO room to move around - just a tiny bedroom and even tinier kitchenette. This ruined all of my plans to do some training and activities with bacon during our down time. On the plus side, it did have a nice little fenced in yard for her. Temps were in the single digits and below, so we spent very little time outside.

On Thursday we showed bright and early. I had taken Bacon into the building the day before when we arrived and walked her around. She walked in a little intimidated, but quickly gained her confidence. This morning I did a lot of playing with her outside the ring and she was bouncing and happy and ready to go! Thursday's show went pretty well for her very first time in the ring. She gaited a well (a bit of pulling me around the corners), and stacked wonderfully....UNTIL the judge walked up and spoke to us. Then she got all wiggly and her tail wagged wildly and there went the stack. The judge was perfectly OK with that (which she should be in beginner puppy!) and went over her while Bacon wagged and wiggled happily. Our down and back was pretty good, and we ended up winning the breed over another Weim puppy. Bacon went into the sporting group and showed awesome...AFTER she walked in and promptly threw up her breakfast. Ugh, puppies. She was so excited and pulling so hard on the leash, she made herself vomit. I cleaned it up and she went on and showed beautifully to win the sporting group! We didn't get anything in best in Show, but she showed wonderfully.

The next day we did not show until way late in the afternoon, so we were stuck all day in the air bnb trying to stay warm and keep busy. I bought Bacon a couple toys at the show yesterday, and while she was playing with one, a baby tooth popped out. It's that time, I guess! I had planned on doing all sorts of training stuff with her all day, but the tiny house was barely big enough to walk through, so we were kind of stuck hanging out on the bed all day. Of course, this meant she was W.I.L.D. when we finally got to the show. It realy showed in her puppy class, she did not want to stack, did not want to stand still, and was really pulling and dragging me when we gaited. This judge was less amused by her puppy wiggles and love when she went over her, so obviously we did not win the breed today. However, I couldn't be happier with her absolute joy and love for EVERY person she met! She happiness was infectious.

Before I had even gotten to the show today I had already decided that we were not staying for the show tomorrow (we were only entered Thurs-Fri-Sat). I didn't think it was fair to her to keep her cooped up for another whole night and day just to go show late in the day with all that pent-up energy. Sometimes you just have to do what is best for the puppy, and I did not want to squash her spirit or overface her with all that energy that was pent up. Both of us were more than ready to come home! We left Friday evening and got back home around 8:30 pm. Overall it was a good experience for her. I see what we need to work on - standing still while strange people touch her (and resist the urge to lick their faces!), and gait nicely at my side without trying to pull me. This was good information, and we will work on this the next few weeks before our next show. Oh, and I should mention we took a win photo on the photographer's booth (pic comeing soon!) and she was amazingly easy to photograph! Could she finally be my dog that is EASY to get photos of? I haven't had one of those since Pretzel! Hopefully the picture turned out well, it's always great to have a picture of a pup's very first time in the show ring.