The Workin' Dog Blog
Hello, My name is Tinder and I am a workin' dog. I work with my owners at 7 Senses Therapy. This blog will be from my perspective on my job workin' with the kids. A quick background about me....I was born in California part of the "T" litter and I was named "Tinder". You know what Tinder means right.....no...no... not the dating site...uhh tired of people always thinking that. Tinder...you know that stuff that helps fire burn...that's me, I'm a Black Lab. Well, actually I'm a golden/lab mix, but I look more like a lab. I'm called a CCI Facility Dog (Canine Companions for Independence) and I was raised by puppy raisers in a women's correctional facility who trained me very well with Basic commands in Florida.
When I was one year old I had to leave my puppy raisers and go to "college" in Orlando, FL for advanced training...and yes...I was a little sad, but I knew I had to learn more so I could one day have an important job. I learned and learned, and practiced and practiced...I also really liked one of my trainers Jen, she was kinda like my favorite. =) I soon new over 50 commands. I heard the trainers keep talking about this thing called Team Training where dogs that were really advanced could possibly be matched up with another human for life. I hoped and hoped I would find my human if I made it to team training.
In November of 2011, the two weeks of team training starting and I had made it! I'm super smart, really I am. You know...most dogs really don't make it to Team Training. Lots of my friends had to go, but some of them did get to stay with me...even my sister Tillie. She's super cool and works with her human doing speech therapy with kids. Yeah, we like kids. I'll tell you about her another time. On the 2nd day of team training, we had to work with lots of humans. We knew all out commands, but those poor humans they didn't know a thing! Then something changed, I was brought to the front of the group to do a demonstation with this human girl. As I walked up to her, I really kind of liked this girl. My body starting wiggling a little, my ears went down, and my tail started wagging. I just really couldn't help it, something just came over me. She looked at me and smiled and patted me on my head. Yup, you guessed it...it's my girl, my girl, Lauren. Well, to make a long story short....we passed Team Training together with flying colors. We had passed our tests and graduated. I was now a certified assistance dog with my girl. We had made it, and now we're the best team! Take a look at some of our pictures from Team Training...ahhh the memories...
Man was I skinny...and not even one gray hair....wow. The dude below is the guy I call "Dad" now, he's super cool too. We are one cool family now. Talk to you guys later. WOOF!
