Karma’s big Minnesota weekend!

What an amazing weekend!  We hadn’t made big plans for Memorial Day weekend, and were thinking about going to Wyoming for the dog shows up there, but then we got an invitation we just couldn’t refuse…Jill (Karma’s co-breeder, Cruiser Vizslas) wanted us to come out to Minnesota for their local Specialty Show!

We were dying to meet Jill in person, so we enthusiastically accepted the invitation and made plans for the trip. Jill even figured out a handler for us and said her friend, Eva Phillippi, would handle Karma for us. Eva (Northland Weimaraners & Papillons) handles her Weimaraners and Papillons, and isn’t a professional handler, but she is extremely talented.  And it turns out Eva actually handled Karma’s mom, Holly, so it was really cute to have her handle Holly’s little girl!

We arrived on Friday around Noon, and Jill had us come over to where they were all camped out.  She fired up the grill and let us join in with the whole extended family on their great spread.  After lunch we headed down to the ring to kick off the Sweepstakes competition.  Eva handled Karma beautifully to a first place in her class and then to our amazement, Karma went Best of Opposite in Sweeps!  It was so thrilling to watch Eva and Karma pick up this win as it was very stiff competition!  While sweeps is designed to give bragging rights to the “younger” dogs, there were still 24 Vizslas entered! Karma hasn’t had a heat cycle yet, so she hasn’t fully filled out, and hasn’t been picking up big wins against the fully developed girls we’ve been competing with lately. We keep entering her, since we enjoy going to the show to hang out with our Vizsla friends, but fully understand the judges *probably* won’t pick our puppy.  So, to see Karma take a huge win against her age group was so awesome!  Judge Marcia Joslyn commented to Eva that she had a “very pretty girl,” when Eva was in the ring for the class competition and then pulled Karma out for her BIG PINK RIBBON!!  It was definitely the highlight of the trip 🙂

Friday afternoon for the Twin City Vizsla Club Specialty, Karma looked great again for Eva, but the judge did end up picking a more mature female for WB.  But, since it was a Specialty, Karma’s 1st place ribbon for her class is a big, beautiful, blue one!  So we left on Friday with two beautiful rosettes and huge smiles on our faces! Another highlight on Friday, was when Karma’s half-brother, Chai (Holly’s 1st litter), picked up a 5 point major to finish his title!

Saturday, the V’s showed late again, so we were able to have lunch with our new family at their campgrounds.  On the menu today were “Walking Tacos.” You’ll have to be initiated into the family to find out what these are, but they were delicious!  After lunch we headed down to the ring and watched Karma and Eva. Literally two minutes before Eva handled Karma, she was busy in the Toy ring, handling her special, Bandit, to a Group 3!  Jenny was sweating at the thought of having to handle Karma, but Eva made it back in the nick of time!  Karma stacked up perfectly, but the judge went with the Bred-By girl who picked up her 2nd major. That was pretty exciting to see–we are definitely ready for that day to come for us!

All day Friday and Saturday, Eva was encouraging Jenny to enter Karma in the Match on Saturday night to get some handling practice.  So we entered her, and Jenny and Karma made their debut in the ring.  Beside the fact that Jenny faced Karmie’s tail towards the judge after the down-and-back, it went pretty smoothly.  In Jenny’s defense, Karma’s never-ending-wagging tail is one of her cutest features 🙂 The judge picked Karma for her class and then brought back in the other 4 class winning Vizslas. There were three boys and two girls in the ring for Best of Breed, and he picked Karma and Jenny for Best of Opposite!  Jenny was ecstatic that Karma won two pink ribbons, two days in a row!

Sunday was an early day with the V’s taking the ring at 8:00 am.  Marc and Jenny got up early to pack up the car and headed over to the fairgrounds.  Today was Karma’s best day yet.  She and Eva were flawless in the ring and we were hoping the judge would find her, but the big girls won again.  We are thrilled that Karma looked so great in the ring and really feel like she is right on the cusp of some big wins!

After saying our goodbyes to our new friends, we headed back towards Colorado.  Right when we stopped for the night, in the booming metropolis of North Platte, Nebraska, we got the call that Jill’s girl Star had just started whelping her puppies!  There are two precious little boys so far, and we can’t wait to hear how the night turns out!