A new Attachment

During our last training session we had what I would consider a major disaster using the harness with Matthew. We were at a very outdoor festival and Matthew desperately wanted to go one way while David had Diego guiding him another way. Long story short (also I do not want to relive the moment) Matthew's strong will and bee-line to a jumpy house caused the bungee cord to wrap around an unsuspecting patron holding tight to her $10 beer in a plastic cup and down she went, beer and all (she did manage to save the beer minus a few drops that landed on Matthew). It all happened so fast that the reaction time was irrelevant. After helping this lady up and making sure she was okay, we hurried off to our car, head's held low and completely mortified. I am pretty certain that lady must have been on her 5th or 6th beer, she was WAY too forgiving.

Since that horrific event, we decided to try something else. We went to Pets Mart and purchased a leash that had a very short 1 foot long leash as part of the contraption. We cut off the long end and singed the plastic on the cut to prevent fraying. We created a Matthew-sized leash and have that connected to Diego's vest. Since Matthew is already "trained" to walk with Diego (or at least near him) we tell him to "grab the doggie" and that means he grabs his leash. Our mini-battle is getting him to hang on the whole time. We may continue modifications as we go, but this give Matthew less wiggle room and less opportunities to take innocent bystanders out at the knees.