Gypsy starts level 2 lessons

I've been watching and reading the level 2 material for about a week now and got started with Gypsy yesterday. The first lesson is the 7 games with an obstacle. Gypsy and I did this on the 22' line, with one of our picnic tables. (No photos today.... I was alone again. Just a portrait of Gypsy saying hello over the fence).

Friendly game was me just sitting on it and rubbing her. We walked past it a few times and I put some crunchies on it in the middle she had to reach across to get.

Porcupine game: I couldn't think of anything to do except to porcupine her around the table (I had her facing the table and had her yield her around the table by alternately applying pressure to zone 1 and zone 3 - both sides).

Driving game: drove her up to the table from zone 3 to put her nose on one of the benches, drove her front end around in a circle starting and ending with her facing the table.

Yoyo: I yoyo'd her away from the table with me standing on the bench and the again between the deck and the table (combination yoyo and squeeze!).

Circle game: I had her circle in front of as well as around the table. I combined this one with trying some transitions (lesson 2) in the circle as well: walk-trot-walk-trot. She did pretty good too! Lots of stopping when I asked her to go from trot to walk though. That's OK, she was always checking back and asking questions which was really cool. I don't think it'll take her very long at all to master these transitions.

Sideways game: Again just sideways facing the table, both ways. She's a star at this!

Squeeze game: We did the squeeze between the table and the deck. We also tried this between the swings on the swingset. She didn't get more than her head between the swings at first, so I helped by draping one of the swings over the ladder on the side (to widen the opening) and she rushed through the first couple of times, but then relaxed a little and made it through a little more relaxed the next two times. Such a star!

We also did a few more "put your nose on this" around the yard. This is driving her from zone 3 (making her go first) toward a particular object and essentially steering her to put her nose on something. It really tests your communications skills!

Part of level 2 is to improve your communications skills to the point of not having to use the carrot stick very much. To help me become more aware of how much I use the carrot stick for communication, I have to put a bell on the end of it. Throughout this session, I definitely had that bell ringing too much. Not so much with the circle game or the yoyo, but definitely with the driving, squeeze and sideways game. Anyway, I'm sure we'll get there. Gypsy is doing just awesome!