This is Wilma and me after the doggy dancing competition. Wilma´s got her prize on her chest.
It´s been some time already since our doggy dancing contest, but now since I just registered us for another competition that will be held November the 2nd in Janakkala, 2 hours from us, I thought I could write a bit about the previous competition. It was quite an experience I must say 
At first I was not planning to attend at all but then my dog school teacher started to talk to me about it. She would also come and some other dogs& their people from our training group. I did absolutely not feel ready for it yet, but all the more she talked to us about it, the more also felt tempted to give it a try and so I made the crucial phone call and our name was on the list. We started with doggy dancing last March so we´d been training once a week for 6 months, though I must say that for the most time we have not been training at all at home during the weeks. In the beginning we did, but when summer came we just went to the training group without having done anything at all at home. We also could not make it every Saturday during then summer, because we were gone quite a lot during our summer holidays.
…but then it was September suddenly and our teacher just blurted this out to me: “If you won´t register to the contest with Wilma, I will! We had really not been training almost at all during the summer, but now we had a good reason to continue. We made a simple coreography to this music that we had chosen, but it took for a quite long time to decide which movements we would make – how I shall move and what Wilma will do, so actually our program was ready only one week before the contest. During the last week we practiced quite a lot and I was afraid that it was a bit too much for Wilma, because on Saturday evening she refused to do anything! She is so used to getting a reward (a piece of sth delicious, like a piece of mince meat balls or a little piece of sausage) after every movement that she had difficulties understanding I want her to do the whole programm with a big reward only at the end and nothing before that. She was protesting the evening before and already in the beginning of the song she was just standing there and staring at me when I did my best to motivate her to do her part even if I could not give her anything. She must have thought “This is criminal – why does she not give me ANYTHING!” I did not feel too encouraged after the last training. I don´t know what happened during the night ( I did pray though, but don´t know if God is interested in doggy dancing competitions, he he) – but the day after she was like another dog at the competition. She could not have been happier. Whatever the reason is, she was gorgeous. She did absolutely everything I asked her to do and quickly and with such a joy. Her tail was wagging so much that it looked like it is the tail that is wagging the dog and not vice versa 
She clearly enjoyed the loud music and she was on a good mood. And after she had done so well, at least 5 people from our dog training school (who had been in the audience) including the teacher rushed to Wilma hugging her and petting her and praising her. She got so much positive attention that she must have felt like a queen. And I am 100% sure she sensed the atmosphere and knew exactly how great she had just been. You should have seen her tail then… By the way the dog school teacher also was competing on the same level as we – they became 3rd. Come to think of it, we were not so much behind them and she is my TEACHER. I´m so proud of Wilma.
In doggy dancing there are 4 levels – this was just the beginners´ level. But since we got so high points we will now have to move one level up so next time the quality of other competitors is higher – and no, I don´t feel ready for that. This is so funny, I would never have imagined that I will end up dancing with my dog. It was the last hobby that I can think of inside the dog training field. Reason: I cannot dance myself! And I definitely do not look like a dancer. But since Wilma was so good I must give her another chance – And I must say it was so much fun being there. The atmosphere was good. Absolutely everybody were encouraging other competitors and it didn´t feel so serious situation, but it was possible just to go there and have fun with the dog. Some were very good – some dogs started sniffing around in the middle of their programme (I was sure Wilma would do this but she didn´t), but I saw some really good dogs too. On upper levels there were some that were just awesome. One starts really asking how on earth a dog can learn such things and how much do they practise…
