On Tuesday June 8th, Soccer began again for the summer for our kids and BHRR’s Potter just sensed it!!! He made it clear that he was not going to be left behind and planted his butt sitting at the front door beside the kids bags. He is just obsessed with balls of all kinds with tennis plus soccer balls being his all time favourite! Yet, when he comes to the soccer fields, he is so incredible with his self-control plus restraint in not trying to pull my arm off to get to all the soccer balls and to also play with the kids! He is given a soccer ball at the end of the game and just has a blast and I am so happy to have him still here with us to enjoy the games again this year!!! He often can be found sitting in my lap or quietly laying on the ground watching the soccer games. So many recognized him and it was amazing how open and honest the kids were with what had happened to his leg and how reserved and ‘will stare when I think no one is looking’ the adults would be. Sooooooooooo, I just walked with Potter and when I would ‘catch’ someone’s eye, I would ask if they would like to pet Potter, tell them who Potter was, that he was deaf, how we communicate with him and what happened with his leg. By the end of the 1.5 hours, not sure how many parents were watching the soccer games  😛   – 7 fields(14 teams) just in my daughters age range alone as that was where I was sitting and Sean was with Mason in the ‘big gang’ soccer fileds. After the soccer games, Sean & I took the kids out for a rare ice cream treat and Potter was a big hit at the Kemptville Dairy Barn, with many coming up to him and saying they saw him on the soccer fields earlier. The only incident came when a lady and her partner drove in and they had a GS and a Cocker and I was not liking the body language of the GS nor the Cocker. However; the man kept the GS on a tight lead and was quite responsible. The woman however; comes right up to us and says, ‘hey, can they play’ as I jump up and pull Potter to safety for just as she is saying this, her Cocker lunges and snarls for Potter. AND good ‘ol’ Potter who just loves all people and dogs and being a special needs(deaf) and therefore finding it a bit harder to read other dogs ‘cues’ for he cannot ‘hear’ the dog and ‘read’ the body language as effectively due to being deaf(getting much better with training at BHRR) and that he had limited social training and interaction before he came to BHRR; he is still learning much about reading other dogs body cues etc.; just wanted to play and ‘box’ the Cocker. AND as she said ‘oh’ and then turned away dragging her Cocker, I said to Sean….’watch this’ and the woman while saying ‘no, to her Cocker; just enabled the dog by picking the dog up and coddling it for demonstrating inappropriate behavour. She kissed and snuggled it and I could only stand there and shake my head slightly. It is so common to see people do this, especially with small dogs for many( NOT ALL yet many) truly do not believe that those small/toy dogs also need proper training. As for Potter, he was most disappointed that he was not allowed to play!!! BHRR’s Potter was scheduled for his annual Tuesday June 29th yet I canceled it due to a conflict and will reschedule for another date when I am back to work at KAH on this Monday. He is not due until early July as is for vaccines. I also hope to get back to updating blogs/pictures within the next few days as this past week has been most stressful with some important family matters to tend too. We thank everyone for their continued support shown.