It is official. We officially have put together Team Riley with what I believe to three of the TOP trainers in the area! All of them came VERY highly recommended by numerous Dog trainers. Team Riley consists of Trisha Jennings Golden Retriever Breeder, http://www.sunsetgoldensoforegon.com/ Mary Lou Cook from All is Pawsible Service Dog School, Cindy Bruckart from Puppy Playhouse http://www.thepuppyplayhouse.com/ , and Denise Mullinex of BEHAVE http://www.behavetraining.com/.
Trisha is the breeder of our dog. :) Mary Lou is obviously the Service Dog Trainer, Cindy will be providing puppy training, obedience, back up, local support etc, and Denise has signed on to be our tracking and scenting trainer. We will be attending Public and Private lessons with Cindy and Private only with Denise. We will be working with them for at least the next two years. I am sure we will get to know eachother well!
Check out their websites if you are looking for training for your dog! Excellent!!
Here is a clip of Denise on KATU AM Northwest http://www.katu.com/amnw/segments/40711437.html
P.S. Check out Trisha at Sunset Goldens of Oregon's website if you are looking for a Golden Retriever pup! She has up and coming litters due in Dec. http://www.sunsetgoldensoforegon.com/
We attended the Buddy Walk again this year. We had the opportunity of setting up a table there and spreading the word about Service Dogs to the Down Syndrome Population for the Portland/Salem area. Again a great Buddy Walk. Team Riley grew this year! We had Trisha Jennings and family of Sunset Goldens of Oregon there with Butter to support us, The Breck and Sara Meyer family also attended with their 8 children who all love Riley dearly. Also ran into Jenny and Tarik who stayed with us! Highlight of this trip was the fact that Riley got his face painted. You all have NO idea what that meant. Riley is highly sensitive. He hates his hair, face, etc touched, messed with. He would scream if you would try and get his face painted. Riley calmly sat for about 40 minutes with Crystal Meyer and watched as other children got their faces painted by Blossom the Clown. Finally it was his turn. He got up, sat in the Blossom's chair and got his face painted into a puppy! Blossom was calm, and very gentle with him. I could see that she "understood" him. The fear was in his eyes. She brought herself to his level and worked through it with him. When he needed a break she would break. It brought tears to my eyes. This is a HUGE break through! I was so proud of him. And he was proud too. :) Blossom won't ever know it but she played a huge part in therapy for him. Thank you!
We also started the month going to the NHS play "The Butler Did it Again" it was FABULOUS! We were invited backstage to meet all of the actors! They greeted Riley and our other children and loved him! They played with him, autographed a picture for him, let him be silly, hugged him, it was incredible. These kids seriously went out of their way to make this an incredible experience for our family. Riley had never been to a play, or movie, or anything of the sort. Sitting still and quiet is difficult. Duh. But...he sat through this entire play. Laughed when others laughed, clapped when he was supposed to clap etc. We LOVED IT! Thanks so much to all of you for giving us this opportunity! A portion of the proceeds will benefit Riley. INCREDIBLE! 
Riley participated in his Mabel Rush Elementary Lion Walk! He loved it! We joined him and walked with him. He loved Maru the Lion and kept pushing his brother around the track in the stroller. Riley made it a 3/4 of a mile and starting slowing down.....finally at the last bend before the mile mark his decided he was going to sit in the double stroller and hitch a ride to the finish line! :) Silly guy. He knows what he is doing! It was a fun day!
