Next weekend will be the start of the 2014 PBGVCA national specialty. The show is in Camp Hill, PA so it’s really close to home for us. It will be a busy week since Dave and I both have a number of volunteer jobs throughout the week as well as showing and care for all of our dogs.

Last week started the pre-nationals tradition of absolutely everything going wrong. The RV generator died, the oven at home spontaneously caught fire due a bad heating element, and the washing machine started taking 6 hours to do a load of clothes. In the middle of that, we lost the show site for the national agility trials. After a lot of scrambling and some trips to Best Buy, the trials were moved to an alternate location, the oven is fixed, the new washer arrives Tuesday, and we were able to borrow a generator until ours can be repaired.

Nationals will start a tour of the Skycastle kennels and a visit with Wally’s relatives, followed by 2 days of hunt tests. All 6 PBGVs are entered both days of the hunt. Wally and Muse are running brace on Sunday and the other 4 girls are a pack. On Monday we’ll run as 2 packs of 3. I think the dogs would all work well together, but the rules don’t allow packs larger than 5 dogs.

Because of the change to the agility schedule, Tuesday is a day off now. This will be a grooming day and otherwise a chance to get some rest before the other events.

On Wednesday, we will have back to back agility trials. This may not be ideal, but it was the only both trials could be held with the last minute site change. I’m a little worried about making time at the second trial, but the rest day after the hunt may help. Chili and Salsa are just entered in standard and JWW since they have their T2B titles. Maya is in those classes and Time 2 Beat. C.C. is making her debut in the Novice Jumpers. She definitely isn’t ready to do contacts in competition, but her weave poles got a lot of practice in the basement during this long winter, so I hope she’ll be ok in JWW.

Thursday is the regional specialty, Friday is the MNJPBGVA specialty, and Saturday is the national. Wally and C.C. are entered in Beginner Novice obedience and Muse is in Rally Novice at the 2 PBGVCA shows. I wanted to do Graduate Novice or Open A with Maya, but her whining on the out of sight stays is still a big problem. For conformation Wally and Muse are in the hunt classes and Maya is in veterans. This will be Muse’s last show for a while, because she was bred to Wally 2 weeks ago.

I’ll try to post updates each day, but the week will be busy, so I’ll do my best.