Just a few days ago I reported that Maggie still has two obstacles to overcome - our backdoor and standing up in the morning to go outside. Well, standing up in the morning = DONE. The very next morning she got up on her own and today makes three days in a row. Good girl, Maggie!

Thursday night we took Maggie to the park and it was busy with people and pets. As soon as we arrived a friendly lab came right up to introduce himself and to chat Maggie up with a few friendly barks. The crowd looked friendly (both people and pets) so we headed over to introduce ourselves and to see if we could entice Maggie to play with her peers. She stood firmly planted behind us watching the other dogs play fetch and run around. Her big moment came when she sniffed another dog who trotted over to say hello.

Actually there were two big moments at the park. I have to set up the 2nd . . . Maggie likes to walk right in the middle of Steve and me no matter if she's on the leash or off the leash. If we take a step, Maggie takes a step. If we stop, Maggie stops. If we accidentally get out of formation Maggie freezes - it must be a comfort thing for her. Well, to get Maggie her exercise sometimes all three of us run around the park (the things we do for this dog!). Well, it started to drizzle Thursday night and we needed to head home so we did our group run on the way out of the park and all of a sudden Maggie was running / jumping / leaping. It was like she was trying to mimic what she'd seen the other dogs do. She was playing!!!!

Ok - so now you're all thinking, "I can't believe they run like that in front of everyone else." No, no, no. Other pets and parents were already gone because they get to use the convenient entrance where you walk under a simple arm-gate that prevents people from parking in the school lot over night. Maggie doesn't like to walk under that gate so we have to walk all the way to the other side to use the "open" entrance. Some day she'll learn that that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line (or, if she's bad at math like me she won't).

This morning we went to the park and got Maggie to run / jump / leap again. Progress!