Yesterday was Tuesday, you know what that means.

Yup, Tuesday night tricks class.

We were a little bit late and Ariane was handing out hula hoops.

 

I don’t know about you, but hula hoops aren’t my thing.  Don’t get me wrong, I can do a mean impression on the Wii balance board, but put a real hoop around my hips and all bets are off. (You might want a video camera handy though, it would probably be very amusing.)

Thankfully the hoops were for the dogs, not for the people.

 

No my sweet, they are for jumping through.

What?  You’re asking me to jump through hoops? WTF is that about?

Well that’s how it would have gone down if Delilah could talk.

Thankfully she cannot.

I don’t have any other pictures of her using the hoop, but try to visualize it.  Stand the hoop up, slide just a bit of the hoop between your legs and hold hit there.  This frees up your hands.

Then using a treat lure your dog through the hoop, and toss the treat away from you.  In this manner the dog understands that you want them to go totally through the hoop.

You can call it whatever you like, I’m using “HOOP.”

Boring.

No comments from the peanut gallery Delilah.

Once your dog is comfortable going through the hoop you can raise it slightly if you’d like.  For Delilah I had to throw the treat quite a distance, because if I didn’t she didn’t pick up her feet properly.

Ariane says it is because she is focused on the treat, so it makes sense to toss the treat.

 

I also used the hoop to lasso her, when she got away from me once. 🙂

Another trick we learned is Peek-a-Boo.  This is when you lure you dog around your right side and they come to a sit between your legs.

I hope to get a couple of videos together maybe this weekend so I can show you how it looks.  The key to this trick especially with a dog the size of Delilah (or if you have super short arms)  is to use two treats.  With one treat you lure her around your right side.

(No, that is not flabby stomach hanging out of my shirt, it is the design of the shirt, it’s got patches of flesh color on it. Which isn’t to say that I DON’T have flabby stomach flesh, it’s just not hanging out of the shirt.  give me some credit, I have a little class.)

Timing is key. When she reaches my side, I should  step to my left with my left foot and reach between my legs with my left hand, thereby luring her through to complete the trick.

If I’ve done it right, she will be sitting between my legs.

I’m hoping the finished product will look way more polished than this when we’re done.