I think showing reticence and nervousness around your dog can only be a bad thing. I'm sure the dog would pick up on it and perhaps get agitated themselves.

Back from a few days away to a happy Mr and happy dog. Jet didn't get over-excited when I walked in, but actually came and sat!!!! at my feet to say hello. We've been out for a walk and he' now snuggled up on the sofa getting his much-loved tummy tickles.

As a kind of 'welcome back' and almost immediately following my prediction that he would do this... Mr let him back into the house from his toilet trip into the garden and he trotted in, put his nose straight into my briefcase, pulled out a tissue and started shredding it. He then tried to steal my pen, then checked whether anyone was looking and took an envelope off the table with that 'chase me' grin. Life is back to normal!

Oh and the lead thing. I'd suggested to Mr that he didn't try to put Jet's lead on indoors, and apparently this has been working. Today we put his lead on the floor and waited for him to bring it to us and 'ask' for it to be put on. We then dropped it, let him trail it round, and when we were going out through the door, called him - basically asking if he wanted to come with us. He stopped, looked for a minute, then came trotting through with the handle of the lead in his mouth, quite happily

Oh that sounds great Helegant, that must have cheered Mr up too I should think.

I agree Tav, dogs need their pack leader to behave like a leader and not a wimpy member of the following pack!...which leads me on to Flossie's afternoon in Lower Slaughter (love that village name )

We started off with us doing some on lead heel work, doing figure-of-eights around some cones, some widely spaced and others much closer, so that Lisa and Michelle could see what we were like as a pair. Not at all bad, it seems, though I talk too much to Flossie (something Rebecca also said - sorry Flossie, it's ingrained after years of motherhood - must learn to shut up ) and I should carry the lead more like a shopping bag and not with my arm bent.

Lisa said (and this is the link to Tav's comment above) that I was not dominant enough - Flossie should be constantly monitoring where I am and where I'm going, because I'm the boss and she's the "servant". So we did some more heelwork making sure I kept my lead arm down by holding on to the bottom edge of my coat, and using my knee to force Flossie to change direction every time her attention wavered, or suddenly going backwards into a recall - all to make her use her brain to keep me at the forefront of her thinking!

We did some long-lead stuff they called swarming, where Lisa held the lead but Michelle and I walked around the paddock, sharply changing direction every so often so that although Flossie was "free" she needed to keep her concentration on me at all times.

Bits of other things - including an insistence on a sit at the end of every exercise, "like a full-stop", said Michelle. We are doing another 1-1 session next week, and I'm hoping we will then be regarded as good enough to join the rural companion group as they go off on proper walks with heel work and training games along the way.

It fits the bill of what I wanted from training much more than the church hall - which was very good for a foundation, but this is much more relevant to our daily life.

Flossie undoubtedly found it all quite tiring and possibly a bit stressful as she was having to use her brain a lot more than in group sessions!

Hope you enjoyed your ballet, Sharkie.