Hello, my name is Jared.

I am now the oldest Belgian at Valley Belgians. I share my humans with my daughters, Halle and Murron, and Cisco the token Terv.

I came to live with Dollie and Rich when I was 9 weeks old. Okay, I got spoiled going to the office with Dollie everyday.  I was a good puppy and chewed my chewies (well, except that one time I chewed a keyboard cable...but I prefer not to discuss that). 

Now that I am grown up, I get to sleep on the waterbed with mom and dad every night.  I have really gotten rather lazy and like to sleep in, but dad eventually kicks me off the bed.  Sigh.  A belgian needs their beauty sleep. 

I like going to shows with mom and dad. 

My latest dog feat, which happened in October, 2009, is that I am now a CHAMPION!!!  Mom is very excited and keeps telling everyone about it. If you scroll to the bottom of this page, you'll see with my Aunt Julie, taking the final major win to get my championship.

I suspect mom will probably special me (what they call showing a champion dog) in the winter and the spring. In the meantime, I am nice to other dogs at the shows and am pretty laid back in general. I am pretty athletic, can jump pretty high (don't ask about the 48" expen escape incident at the Harrisonburg show) and love to go for walks with mom and dad and Cisco. Mom just sighs.

Take a look at the pictures below to see how I have grown up.  The last two pictures show my mom and dad--you can certainly tell who I took after! 

 

 

Here I am at the tender age of 9 weeks (February, 2001).

I was the model puppy--sleeping quietly under mom's chair everyday.

P.S.  Don't ask about the keyboard wire incident...I was too young to know about computers!

 
Here I am at nine months, taking my first point! 

Mom was so proud of me!  The reason I ended up with a point is because I beat Morgan!!  ha ha ha !!!

I did so well at this show I decided to totally misbehave at the next day's show and for some reason, I didn't have to have my picture taken.  Wonder what gives?  Oh well, there will be more shows!

 

Here I am at 2.5 years of age. 

I am a very fussy eater--and being thin doesn't help in the show ring.

Then mom finds something I like to eat with my dry kibble--Trader Joe's Canned Dog Food!  Yum!  Look at the next page to see what happens after 5 months of good eating!

 

I am winning dog shows!  In the month of November, 2003, I won two of the three dog shows at VA Beach (don't ask about my little corner jumping routine, but I think my feet were off the ground a total of ten feet.  Mom was embarrassed.  The judge was amused.  He gave me the point.

This is me getting a four point major!  Mom was just so happy I think she grinned for three days straight.   

Jared getting his championship with Aunt Julie Here I am in my New Champion photo with my Aunt Julie--who likes to show me. Last year I almost pulled of quite the coup by almost getting Winners Dog at last year's Nationals. I received second place in the Open Dogs class and the judge had a rough time selecting who she wanted.

I came close to getting Reserve Winners Dog at the Nationals as well, but the judge selected the Bred-by-Exhibitor dog. That's okay--she made sure I stayed in the ring so that prospective judges could see a good example of conformation.
 

This is my mom, Sara Lee.  She is a bit out of coat from having us, but she is still beautiful!

My mom won Best in Breed at the Nationals several years back. I wish I could follow in her footsteps, but I have great hopes for my daughter Murron. 

Don't tell her I said that. She's got a big enough ego, walking around with her own Tiara.

This is my dad, Holland.  Aren't I the spitting image of him? He won Winners Dog at the Nationals when he was two years old!