Birthdays are a good time to reflect on the past year and dream about the year ahead. And since Izzy turns 6 today, I thought I’d take a moment and look back on the last 12 months of her life. I’d say she has a pretty fantastic life! While there were a couple of bumps in the road, mostly though, she’s living, well, a dog’s life!

It was just about a year ago that we found a small tumor on Izzy’s neck. You can read more about that HERE. I’ll never forget when the vet came out and told me surgery (to have it removed) went well, but was dicey for a while. Turns out the tumor was right over her jugular vein, so she had to make her incision very very carefully. The biopsy revealed that they got all of the cancerous cells. I’ve been very diligent with checking Izzy to make sure there are no other tumors. So far, I haven’t found any. I’m keeping my fingers and toes crossed in hopes we never find another one again.

Those of you who know me, know that Izzy and I run as a team in agility. Two years ago Izzy was having issues with the teeter. It got to the point that she no longer wanted to run agility at all. She was fine with all the other obstacles, but something about the teeter really scared her. So I took a step back and re-evaluated our training. After a brief break, we started training again, by going back to the basics. It wasn’t long before Izzy was having fun and slowly but surely, I helped her overcome her fear of the teeter. She enjoys it so much now that sometimes she runs onto the course looking for it, other times, once she’s gone over it, she runs back to do it again! That’s quite the change from the last trial when she ran out of the jumpers ring because she was so paranoid the teeter was on the course. We’re still working out a couple of small kinks, but I am considering entering her first standard trial in the fall. In the meantime, this process has made us a better team, and we both have enjoyed the time we’ve spent together training.

I’ve been considering offering a limited edition “Dog days of summer” mini session. Each dog would get an ice cream cone (suitable for dogs of course!) and I’d photograph her before, during and after eating the cone. You can get some really funny expressions! For Izzy’s birthday, I thought I’d do this for her and give this concept a trial run. I think it turned out great! If you are interested in having your dog participate in this event, let me know. If there is enough interest, I just may put something together and make this happen. Needless to say, Izzy enjoyed her birthday treat! Here’s to another year of, well, living the dog’s life! Happy birthday Izzy!

Trina Bauer photography | Happy birthday Izzy!

If you enjoyed this blog post, you may enjoy reading what I did for Izzy’s 5th birthday. Click HERE to find out what that was!