decals and feetsies

Last weekend was our "relaxing" tournament of the year, one held up in Maple Ridge BC as part of a country fair.  It's a small tournament, typically only about 15 teams show up, and it's run outside on grass in the sunshine while we park the RV's a short walk away in a gravel lot.  This year we had five RV's in our group, so we parked them in two columns with one crossways at the "head" to form a nice private courtyard, and it was lovely.  Previous years have held everything from searing 95-100F heat to surprise thunderstorms with heavy downpours, but this year it was just about perfect with temps in the mid-upper 70F range and beautiful sunshine.  We were the only attendees from Unorthodogs, so I ran Ezri on an Open class team with friends from JCJ and Dogwood Pacesetters, and we had a great time and took home first place in Open on both days.  Ezri had a lot of fun, running a 4.001 in start and a 4.018 in third - not bad for racing on grass!

I took the opportunity to put up some of the new decals I've ordered in recent weeks.  First up are the set of customized border collie silhouettes that I ordered from Blakdogs on Etsy.  I put them up on the side of the RV right by the door, so that I can see them every time I come in or out of the rig.

In the closeup shot below you can see that each silhouette has a heart and the dog's name cut out of the center, and each one is done in the appropriate color we've assigned to each dog.  The wonderful artist even custom-made me one with wings and a halo for my gone but never forgotten Curzon.  I put them up from right to left in order of their appearance in their lives, with Jadzia first and Martok last, of course.  No JRT stickers available, so no Phoebe, but she's still represented in the pawprint stickers on the back windows.

I added the pawprint name sticker for Martok to the back window of the RV, and now it looks severely unbalanced to my eyes.  Clearly I need to get another dog sooner rather than later, purely for aesthetics reasons of course!

We caravaned home with our friends from JCJ, including one family that was on their maiden voyage with their brand new fifth wheel trailer.  We brought up the rear for most of the trip, and the photo below was taken as we were all about to cross the Golden Ears Bridge across the Fraser River to head back to the US/Canada border.

 
And of course, what flyball weekend would be complete without tired border collies?  I loved how Ezri and Martok slept snuggled, with a little pile of feetsies all squished together, so I had to take a photo.  His feet aren't quite as big as hers...yet!

Martok turned five months old on Saturday, and he's just a bouncing ball of energy, love, and play.  I pulled his last two baby molars this weekend, and after a serious chew session with a bully stick both of the adult teeth have crowned through his gums and are on their way up to join the others.  All he has left to lose are his two upper canines, and given how his gums are swollen next to those baby canines it probably won't be much longer until they come out too.  I weighed him this morning and he was 22.9lbs, which is still tracking right in between Ezri and Curzon's growth rates, so I'm still holding to my guess that he'll be 38lbs as an adult.

We shall see, of course.  Bigger surprises have happened in the past, after all!