milestone series
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How HHN Became the Final Test of Service Dog Distraction Training If you’ve been following our journey, you already know that about a year and a half ago, right after Lady Priscilla passed her public access training readiness test (to start training in non-dog friendly spaces), we headed straight to CityWalk. At park closing. Right…
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This week’s class was held inside Home Depot — a fitting location for a program that prepares dogs for both the AKC Community Canine (CGC-A) and CGC Urban (CGC-U) tests. While most classes separate those two titles, this one does both. It blends advanced obedience with real-world, unpredictable environments — from crowded aisles and loud…
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Sometimes, when Lady Priscilla flops into a Lay (our cue for “down”) with too much flair or strings together a combo of tricks no one asked for, we catch ourselves grinning. It’s not disobedience… not really. It’s declaration. Like Haley in the Stick It movie, she’s showing us she knows the rules well enough to…
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Lady Priscilla completes her canine good citizen test — the AKC’s first step toward becoming a trusted public companion. We’ll walk you through how it went. If you’re just joining her CGC training arc, start with Five Feet, Four Dogs, where her breakthrough moment in class changed everything. It didn’t feel like a test. Not…
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We walked into our final CGC class not quite knowing what to expect. It wasn’t the official exam — just a dry run of the CGC test for dogs — but if you know our trainer Jenny, you know that “dry run” means prepare for the toughest version possible. In the real AKC CGC test,…
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The Pace of Progress in CGC Training Dogs in an AKC Canine Good Citizen class often surprise their handlers. Just when you think they’ve plateaued, they level up in ways you didn’t expect. The challenge is figuring out when to ease off the gas… and when it’s time to speed up. We knew CGC would…
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CGC Training: A Turning Point We had been in CGC training for exactly two sessions. Just seven short days between “Is she even ready for this?” and “Wait…did she really just do that?” Lady Priscilla came in hot. Her training had been going well at home and in public, but performing her skills in a…
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Mapping the Fog: Bringing It All Together This post on final service dog prep for HHN concludes the 5-part series. Don’t forget to start at the beginning, if you haven’t already! Or check out Inside the Fog to find out how it all came together. By this time, it was early October and HHN was…
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The Accidental Curriculum: How Real Life Became Haunted House School If you’re new to this series on HHN service dog training, be sure to start at the beginning with Part 1! Around this same time, I discovered a service dog blog by a trainer who lives in this area. She says that in addition to…
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The Training We Didn’t Know Was Training: Learning in All the Wrong—and Right—Places If you’re new to this service dog public access training series, be sure to catch up on Part 1 and Part 2! These early chapters follow Lady Priscilla’s progress as she prepares to navigate Halloween Horror Nights with confidence and calm. Thank…