Day 9 - Memorial Park (Sparta)

After a fun weekend of playing, we moved back into another week of work (and playing). Jedi continues to do well during his time in the puppy pen and I continue to do as many meetings outdoors as I can. I'm going to be pretty tan this spring from all of our time outdoors, that's for sure.

When work was done, it was time for our outing of the day! Today I loaded up Kizzy and Jedi and we took a short drive over to Memorial Park here in Sparta. This was the first time I put Jedi in one of the big crates in the back, and I had the two dogs share one crate. While Jedi has never gone to the bathroom in a crate, he's also never had a lot of space in one to do so. Not to worry, we didn't have any issues. He also seemed to appreciate the sprawling space. Maybe he's starting to get too big for the puppy crate?

I parked near the entrance of the park to give us the most wandering room. I let Jedi drag the long line again today, figuring he would still have freedom to explore but we'd be "legal" in the city park. We started out by the playground equipment where there were a couple of kids playing, but Jedi didn't seem to notice them (too many new smells to check out).

This park is along a lake, but the fence provided a barrier between the dogs and the water. I'm not sure if Jedi knew it was there, but I didn't have to haul him back from the edge like I did at the river the other day.

We walked past the golf course, but there wasn't a lot going on there. We made our way around to the ball fields where there was a game in progress (looked like younger kids). This was a great experience for Jedi, as he got to hear the ping of the bat and cheering noise from the crowd.

On the way back to the van we ran into a couple of younger girls who asked if they could pet the dogs, so that was Jedi's people experience of the day (not like he has any problems with people, but always good to meet new humans). Then we stopped and explored the playground equipment and walked on the bark chips a bit to experience a new surface.

Before I put him back into the car I decided to have a quick tug session to reinforce playing in a new place again. I took this video to show that Jedi has taught himself to let go of a toy when I say, "ready," but then he decided to show the other fun thing he likes to do with this toy. So far this is the only toy he does this to. I guess he really likes it.  :o)