Well, our break was quite nice.  Christmas went well – the puppies even got presents!  My in-laws gave them a little bag o’ fun toys, and we got them a couple of really awesome raw bones.  They were in doggy heaven!!

When we were Christmas shopping (the Sunday before Christmas… so much excitement), we went to a shopping center in Richmond called Short Pump.  It’s a pretty schwanky outdoor mall, and they let people bring their dogs.  Most stores even let the doggies inside.  Tom said “Holy crap.  Our dogs would tear this place apart!”  And it’s true, they would NOT be able to handle it.  All the dogs that we saw were very well-behaved and not phased one bit by all the commotion.  They were, after all, urban dogs and thus quite used to lots of people and other animals around their world.  City dogs can go to the mall… Country dogs cannot.

And that got me thinking: what are our expectations for Sally and Lucy?  Obviously, taking them to a posh outdoor mall is not on the list of things we can realistically expect from our dogs.  At least, not without some serious work.  And I asked Tom: is this something we really want to be able to do with our dogs?  He didn’t even have to think – Hell no! he said

I’m still thinking a lot about what our expectations are for our girls.  I guess what I want, ultimately, is for them to live outside and run deer off the property and keep squirrels away from the garden.  I also want them to walk nicely on their leashes so we can walk and jog and maybe even go hiking.  And, beyond that and the normal expectations (you know… that they don’t bite people and that they are happy and fulfilled), I don’t really  have any expectations.  While I admire dogs and owners who do pet therapy and police work, I know that is not in the cards for us.  Not even close.  And that’s ok.  I mean, I love our puppy girls and I love working with them and playing with them, they don’t have to be super-dogs in order for us to enjoy working with them.

Anyway, in my mind, they are already super dogs!

Ok, maybe not my whole mind… but I have lost my patience.  I’m going to be taking off until Jan 2nd in order to find it.  I am really starting to see that I need to be concentrating more on the “Zen” and “Art” parts of this whole dog-ownership adventure.  So, I’m going to find myself.  Hopefully I’m not hidden too well.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.  We’ll definitely be seeing you again after the first of the year (quite possibly “new and improved”).

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night chewy rawhide

As I’ve mentioned previously, I am a big fan of Cesar Millan and his philosophies in regards to dog behavior.  And he walks lots of dogs all at once.  And, on his show, he has said that if you own multiple dogs, the whole pack needs to walk together so that everybody learns how to get along.  I’m all for this.

However, none of the dogs that Cesar walks and none of the dogs that he has worked with in the episodes I have seen have been 8 month old littermates.  When you adopt littermates, I have found, some things have to be done differently for awhile.

The biggest issue is the bonding.  It is critical for any dog to bond with its owner – otherwise you’ll never get it to follow your lead.  With littermates, they already have this really strong bond with each other.  To get them to separate a little and bond to their owners, you have to do a lot of things with them individually – one of these things is walking because a lot of bonding happens on the walks.

The other issue, which frankly is almost as big, is that it is difficult enough to walk one dog amongst lots of distractions, much less both dogs.  When one dog sees the neighbor’s cat, spots a running squirrel, or hears the train coming she will start to get excited and I can get her to settle down enough to keep on walking.  However, when her sister is right there, then the sister gets excited, too, and both dogs then think that it’s time to play.  It’s not twice as much work… it’s about five times as much work.

A big part of this whole process, like I’ve said before, is not just about the dogs learning, but about us learning as well.  And something I’ve learned is that I am only one person, with limited abilities to be perfect.   So, I can only do so much at one time – and I am capable of remaining calm in the face of only so much frustration (and I have learned that frustration is probably my biggest weakness in all of this).  And if that means that, right now, I’ve only got enough in me to walk one dog at a time, so be it.  We will work our way up… and it may take a year, and I’m ok with that.

One day we’ll all walk together as a family.  That is a big goal for all of us – I’ve just begun to realize that it’s just not going to happen overnight.  So, for now, we walk separately.

Today’s walk was good and bad.  The good thing is that Tom and I got up early (for the second time this week… we are making progress in this department as well) so that we could each walk one dog before their breakfast.  For one thing, I think it’s really important to walk them before their breakfast.  It seems to help regulate their digestion, vs. walking after breakfast, and it helps to reinforce the whole “will work for food” attitude that dogs have.  And, for another thing, if we do it this way then I don’t have to walk both dogs.

I was thinking about it yesterday, and I realized that not only is it physically tiring for me to have to walk both dogs (each dog gets walked about 2 miles… that’s about 4 miles a day for the puppymom – I enjoy the exercise but that is a LOT), but it is mentally exhausting for me to walk both dogs.  And, frankly, it’s a little unfair to the second dog.  Walking one dog is mentally a lot of work – which is not a huge deal if it gets to end there.  But it really sucks big time if, after being worked mentally like that, you have to go right back out and do it again.

We have come to the conclusion, though, that these dogs MUST be walked every day – otherwise they get too full of pent-up energy and become unruly.  Then ol’ puppymom becomes frustrated, and the cycle begins…  So, exhaustion is no excuse – these doggies must walk!

Anyway, back to today’s walk.  I had Lucy, and I took her down to the track at the elementary school.  First, she got carsick on the way there.  Fortunately, it didn’t happen until the very end and I was able to get her out of the car so she could wretch in the parking lot and not on the sheet covering the backseat.  Bonus!

So, we’re on our second lap around the track, and she’s lagging behind a bit, but I give her a little tug on the leash and she catches right back up to me – figured she was distracted by all the buses and cars coming to drop children off at school.  Got around the track a third time, and realized just how wrong I was.

Lucy and Sally have both perfected what I like to refer to as “pooping on the run”, kind of like a horse.  I don’t let them pick the time for potty breaks, and so sometimes they just can’t hold it in any more… and then you walk around the track again and find a nice long trail of doggy doo-doos.  (Don’t work folks – usually I am able to allow them a potty break before this happens, so it’s not always like that… but every once in awhile, like this morning, they just get sneaky.)

So, on our third time around, I realize that I have about 10 feet of dog plops to clean up, and no sooner than I pull the plastic bag out of my pocket, Lucy starts going all nutty.  Again, I figure it’s all the distraction with people dropping off their kids – and, again, this would prove incorrect.  There was, in fact, a stray dog hanging out up by the track.   So, do I clean up poop, or do I try to deal with this stray dog?  Either way, I have GOT to get Lucy to settle down.

Impossible.

I won’t go into any real details, because frankly there aren’t that many – but the long and short of it is that the stray dog was not very interested in coming up to us… she looked kind of shy, not aggressive or anything… she was not wearing a collar.  I barely got Lucy to settle down long enough for me to clean up her mess, and in all the insanity I managed to get doo on my hand.  Gross.  I was so mad I was on the verge of marching her right back to the car to go home.  I could feel major frustration coming on, and having an audience was only making things worse for me.

But, on our march back across to the other side of the track, Lucy calmed down a bit.  I thought “Ok.  Quite obviously I just need to resume my leader attitude.”  And I did… and she was no angel, but she was walkable for the duration.

So, we improve.  Slowly, but surely.

And Tom said that his walk with Sally went really well.  Said it was the best walk he’s had with her so far.  She is getting a lot better.

They seem to do that, though… one week, one dog will be the shining star and the other dog will be a terror… and then they will switch places.  They like to keep us on our toes – it will be the only way they can train us successfully

Unfortunately, I had a meeting to go to yesterday afternoon, so I wasn’t home when John, Judy, and Magic first arrived.  I heard all about it later, though.  Much excitement, from all 3 dogs.  That made me feel a little bit better – even a super-well-behaved dog like Magic gets excited

But by the time I got home, all dogs were napping.  Very good sign!  It’s pretty obvious that dogs have learned to be comfortable with each other when they will relax enough to get a little nap in.

Tom explained the basic rules of the house when the guests arrived – no wrestling inside; no barking inside; no aggression over toys, bones or food; our dogs don’t get people food; no doggies on the furniture; and we have a zero tolerance policy for teeth on people (this one is pretty obvious).  And John and Judy not only made sure their dog followed the house rules, but they helped enforce the rules with our dogs as well.  We all have the same basic philosophies as far as dog-owning goes, and nobody was afraid to correct the other person’s dog – we all knew what the rules were and we all stuck to them.

I was so proud of our doggies.  They did SO GOOD yesterday.  Lucy and Magic even became little doggy buddies.  Sally and Magic got along fine, but they had to learn a few boundaries with each other – mostly Magic putting Sally in her place, and I figure Sally could use a little bit of that.  I think Sally is a little much for most dogs – even her sister can’t stand her a lot of the time.  I think that Lucy and other dogs just think “Goodness gracious, Sally!  What’s all this damn barking about?  We just want to hang out and play a little, and you’re spoiling all the fun.”  It’s like having that one friend in high school who you really like and you know is a great person, but she just. won’t. shut. up.

I also think that their stupendous behavior that had to do with a couple of things we did before anybody showed up – and I think these were the two most important things we did all day.  First, each dog got a nice, long 2 mi walk.  By the time our guests arrived in the afternoon, Lucy and Sally were just nodding off for an afternoon nap – nothing like introducing dogs when they’re nice and tired.

The second thing we did was to have a quick discussion, just me and Tom, about what we could honestly expect from our dogs yesterday.  They have not met many dogs, and until this point meeting new dogs has been very stressful for everybody involved (fortunately, no aggression – just a LOT of excitement).  So, we decided that we can just only expect so much from a couple of crazy coonhounds in one day, you know?  And we reminded ourselves that the number one thing we can do is to remain calm, and resist the temptation to let frustration creep in, no matter how many times we had to remind them of the rules during all of the excitement.

And, really, that’s what this is ultimately all about.  Tom and I are here to guide our dogs and teach them the rules they’ll need to play by to grow up happy.  Lucy and Sally came to us so that they could teach us patience, persistence, how to be nice without being permissive, and the joys of the rewards that all this learning brings.  And what a lot of learning we have left to do…

I told Tom yesterday (or maybe it was the day before yesterday… or maybe it was this morning… who can remember these things when the days just seem to run together) that if I could just somehow know that all this hard work we were doing was going to result in obedient, happy dogs, I think I would be ok.  I’m not against hard work – in fact, I’m quite familiar with it.  Without it, I would have never graduated college, never survived moving out on my own, and would have never made it through building the house we are in.  But, somewhere in the inner depths of my mind, I have this nagging fear that we are going to do all this hard work – but we are going to do it somehow very, very wrong.  And, by 3 years of age, when our dogs should be fully trained adult dogs – they will only be unhappy.  I fear that they will never truly bond to us (ah, the baggage of adopting littermates), and maybe one day they will snap and eat one of our arms off.  (I watch way too much television.)  But, seriously, I worry.

And I do have to be honest here with myself.  I mean, frankly, we have come a far, far distance since Lucy and Sally came to live with us 4 months ago.  They are still a little bratty on their walks, especially when there are so many cats, squirrels, and barking dogs to get excited about, but at least we can walk them.  This is a vast improvement, one must admit, over the days where they were trying to rip our arms off the entire way.  And, 4urpets had a recent post enumerating the words she has taught her dogs.  I made a list of the words our dogs know now, and it was longer than I had expected.  *Giving self pat on back*

But, in spite of our meager progress, I can’t shake this nagging, this deep, annoying whining about how we are really just fooling ourselves.  These are not dogs who are learning.  These are dogs who are planning.  You know, “OK.  We learn to sit.  We play her games so we can get fed until we have finalized the escape plans.  If all else fails, BITE HER.”  I know dogs don’t really think this way, but I like to think that Lucy and Sally are exceptional pups.  And I’m pretty sure that’s going to bite us right in the ass.

Friday afternoon I had about hit my limit.  Between exhaustion, the weight of non-doggy-related BS my husband and I are currently dealing with, and having to stay strong or whatever to be a good leader for my pups, I was pretty much on the verge of just packing a bag and running away.  I considered leaving a note, and then I thought “Why spend the time?”  I didn’t have the energy to write I note.  I just wanted to be… somewhere.  Anywhere besides here, dealing with all of this.

Of course, I didn’t do that.  But I did seriously consider that it might be time to find a new home for one of the dogs.  I mean, could I really keep going on like this?  Totally exhausted, cranky a lot of the time, getting frustrated on a very regular basis, and still trying to deal with my life outside of the dogs… And, was this healthy for the dogs?  I mean, aside from the fact that it would be undeniably easier to deal with just one dog, would it be better for the dogs to be getting more individual attention?

While I hate to admit it, I already knew which dog it would be, too.  Lucy.  Face it, it is much easier to find a home for a dog who hasn’t bitten anyone.  Plus, Lucy is the more distant of the two, so maybe she just needs a different set of owners… and a home without her sister.

And I thought of all the things I would say to whomever would be the lucky family to take her in.  She loves rawhides – she’ll eat the entire thing if you let her.  Don’t feed her peanut butter – it makes her throw up.  She likes tummy rubs.  The easiest way to clean her feet is to get her to lay down and be calm, then don’t make any fuss and just do it.  She loves cheese, but she can’t have any right now – gotta wait until her skin infection clears up and her meds are over so we can make sure she doesn’t have a food allergy.  Speaking of which, she can only have chicken-based protein (chicken-based kibble and treats, chicken, eggs), which is why cheese is a no-no right now.  And don’t go overboard on the treats – gives her the runs.  She is very smart, but quite stubborn.  She will act like she doesn’t know what you’re asking her to do… but she’s just trying to get one over on you.  She likes a nice comfy place to sleep, and she LOVES to cuddle you.

And I cried.

When Tom came home, I was pretty distant and cranky.  I didn’t want to tell him what was on my mind because I was almost positive I didn’t mean it.  But maybe I did.  I didn’t know.  All I wanted to do was go to bed, and not have to worry about getting up.

But, of course, Saturday morning came.  I went to Charlottesville to go running with my friend, another dog owner.  I didn’t tell her what was on my mind, either.  I just didn’t have the energy to get into it.  (Of course, she is one of my three faithful readers, so she will have the whole story now )  I went on my run, talked about other things, and tried to just… not think about it.

Then I came home.  Tom had to work Saturday, so I knew I was going to have to come home after my run and take both the dogs for a walk.  And I walked in the door, and I looked at Lucy in her crate… and my heart just did a 180.  I just thought “Of COURSE she’s staying here.  Duh.”  I took her out for her walk, and it was glorious.  She did really well, and I just felt really good.  Same thing when I took Sally out.  And they, of course, were totally pooped after that and were pretty good the rest of the day.  It was wonderful.

I told Tom what I had been thinking the day before, and about how totally different I felt at that point.  I am so in love with these dogs – I ultimately want the best for them, and I think they can get that here.   I was so thrilled with them.

Plus, zero potty accidents.  Go doggies!

Then came yesterday.  Tom and I decided to walk all four together, as a family.  Oh, my goodness.  It went alright, until the first distraction – our neighbor’s dog.  We got through that, and then a couple of cats ran across the road.  We almost got through that, and my father-in-law drove by, stopped to talk to my husband, and then honked when he got out on the main road.  Oh my GOODNESS.   It was VERY hard not to get incredibly frustrated.

But, we survived the walk and made it back home.  The puppies slept all afternoon while Tom went to work for a bit, and I did some errands.

When dinner time came for the pups last night, we hit another road block.  Sally growled at me when I approached her bowl as she was almost done eating.  I gave her a nice, sharp, corrective “Hey!”, and she just growled again.  I corrected her again, and she seemed to settle down.  So, I squatted down in front of her and put some extra food in her bowl with my hand.  She accepted that.  Then I just put my empty hands in front of me, a little bit hear her bowl, and she went OFF.  Growling and getting tense.  So, I stood straight up, leaning over a little bit (I didn’t want to get bitten in the face, but I also didn’t want to back down from her… so I held my space, but I just stood up to do it), and she seemed to back down.

This morning, however, was a little bit of a different story.  I went to approach her when she was ending her breakfast, and she started getting tense and growling, and I corrected her with a “Hey!” and she didn’t even pretend to relax.  Then she started trying to nip at my legs.  Tom came over and stomped his foot and I tried to get her to back down, but she was so worked up.  And, I have to be honest – I got pretty emotional and a little freaked out by it.  She eventually did back down and submit (to Tom).  I was so upset, it was all I could do not to lose it in front of her.  I went inside and took a deep breath and let myself cry a little bit.  I just couldn’t believe it.  We had made sooooooo much progress.  So much progress.  And then it all seemed to just go out the window.

I know that with any process, you can expect occasional regression, and I know that it is totally up to me because my behavior is what creates her behavior – if I act calmly and let her know what I want, she will respond appropriately.  It’s just so hard sometimes to not give up.  It’s so hard to not just quit.

Meanwhile, while Tom and I were trying to get Sally under control and creating all kinds of chaos and noise (which, looking back, was obviously not an ideal way to deal with the situation… like I’ve said before, Tom and I are learning in this process as much as the dogs are), Lucy got this look like “Oh crap.  What’s going on?  What’s going on?” and she went to hide behind the barbeque grill, her favorite place to hang out.  I feel bad for her… she’s rarely the one who’s causing the trouble, but she gets just as startled by the noise that’s created when Sally is testing the limits.

I don’t know.  I do love these dogs – each for very different and wonderful reasons.  I think they each have the potential to be awesome dogs and incredible companions.  I just wonder… a lot… if I have it in me to get them there.

I will leave it on a good note – I took them each for their walk today, and they each did wonderfully.  Sally did so good on her walk, in fact, that I got so lost in thought that I almost forgot to give her a sniffy break.  It’s just another proof of how dogs live in the moment – one minute, she’s ready to bite my shins to get me away from her food, the next minute she is content to walk by my side, completely relaxed.

I have been meaning to include a major milestone in one of my posts, and I’m finally remembering to do it today.  It has been well over two weeks since we have had any morning barking.  HOORAY!!!  I don’t know what happened… I guess one day their bladders just got a little more accepting of the humans’ wake-up time.  Actually, I think we had one day earlier this week with some minor yapping in the morning, but it was incredibly short-lived.  I am loving it.

Starting this week, we have been putting them in their crates after breakfast.  Then, after I’ve had my breakfast, I will usually take them for their walks or at least for a potty break.  Because us brilliant humans did some reading on the house-breaking, and apparently the key is having a schedule and making sure the have an opportunity to go outside at key potty-times, such as about 1/2 hour after eating, right after any naps, and about 2-3 hours in between any of those events.  We are rockin’ this potty thing.

Anyway, this morning, after breakfast, they were quite content to chill quietly in their crates.  I guess they are getting used to the routine, and maybe all this walking is finally catching up with them.  Woohoo!

And I must say that, while I am tired after our walks this morning, I’m not as tired as I was yesterday.  Perhaps the puppymom is getting more fit.  Excellent side benefit!

Oh, yikes, I hear some odd whining.  I really better go check on that.  Later!

I also took them each out on an extra walk in the afternoon because Tom and I were going to have to go to a planning meeting for the business he has with his partner and thus the pupsters would have to be crated for the evening, and I wanted them to be worn out.  I guess they were… at first, anyway.  But when we got home they were CRAZY with energy.  Unfortunately, we were not.

How are they so energetic?!  I mean, I realize that they are basically pre-teens at this point and should be full of energy, but my goodness.  They each had about a 2 mi walk in the morning, and about a 1-1.5 mile walk in the afternoon.  Unfortunately, Tom was only able to help out by taking a dog in the morning, so puppymom got to walk about 5 miles yesterday, on top of the fact that we were up by 6:30.  I was exhausted.  But when we got home, Sally was just like “Hey!  You’re home!  Let’s get this party started!”  Are you serious?

But, truth be told, I did let them take a longish nap yesterday afternoon, so it’s probably all my fault.  Le sigh.

Today, though, I am not making that mistake.  They each had their 2 mile walk this morning (and I walked both of them today, making me pooped), and they have yet to nap… mostly because they’re still all full of energy.  I’m trying to make them hold off and maybe they will be less insane tonight and hubby and I can enjoy a little calmness in the household.  Or, Tom is right and they have built up an immunity to the walk and we will never be able to drain their energy again.

Right now, they are happily chewing some beef knuckles while hanging out in their respective crates.  Puppymom at least needs a few minutes of not having to keep an eagle eye on two doggies who love to pee in inappropriate places.

Speaking of which, we had zero accidents yesterday, and zero so far today.  I attribute this to my zealousness of potty breaks.  As far as I’m concerned, unless they are sleeping, they probably have to go to the bathroom.   But, as with all things… we are just going to have to utilize our awesome human powers of patience.

Also, I think we are going to need to invest in some baby gates.  Because I think it would be easier if I could contain them to one part of the house so I can keep an eye on them and get some housework done at the same time.  That’s the thinking anyway…

I was incredibly surprised when we actually got up at 6:25 this morning (I know it’s not exactly 6am… but it’s an hour earlier than we usually get up) and got about our business.  Sally promptly did her business outside, and then we loaded up in the car and off we went to the track.

The track at the elementary school is what I call a 5-lap track, meaning that it takes 5 laps to make 1 mile.  My plan was to walk 3 laps to warm up, run 5 laps, and then walk 2 laps to cool down, 2 miles total traveling distance.  But, this part of the plan was foiled shortly after we got there.  I got her out of the car, fairly calmly actually, and then led her over to the track.  Well, attempted to lead her.  She pulled and yanked and tried to sniff and look around for the entire first lap.  But, she didn’t get what she wanted.  I just kept correcting and moving on… she was not going to get the best of me.  (See, I had already thought ahead about this and had planned how I would react if she behaved this way… score one for the puppymom.)  Kept my patience… for about 4 laps… and then she finally realized, “Oh, hey, I get it.  You’re in charge here, too.”  Cool!  So, we did a 5th lap walking so that she could get into the groove of walking like a good little puppy.  Then, I decided I would only run about half a mile (mostly I decided this after I started running and realized that I had started out wayyy too fast to keep it up for an entire mile, so that was totally my fault and, while I wish I could, I can’t blame that part on the dog ).  So, we ran and it took her almost an entire lap before she decided “Oh, ok… I see.  Even when we’re running, you’re in charge.”  Then we did our cool-down laps, which were fairly good until the train started coming and she got pretty uptight.  We are working on their reactions to the train going by, but they just get real fidgety about it.

But, overall, I have to say, it was a very good excursion on our first time out.  Well, that’s not completely true – this is technically her second time to the track.  The first time was shortly after we got them, before I knew better… and I took BOTH of them and they were no good on their leashes yet and I got frustrated like crazy after about 1.2 minutes and I thought I was going to have to just let go of the leashes… but fortunately I didn’t do that.  I would say that after a couple more crappy runs, Sally will be greatly improved with this new on-leash situation.

And, one day, Lucy will be ready for this step.  She is just not quite there yet.  Although, Tom said that Lucy did pretty alright on her walk this morning.  Still having her moments of being a pain in the ass (they both are… it’s the puppiness), but definitely having her moments of getting with the program.

The greatest part of my idea for this morning was that, after we both got done exercising our respective dogs, we fed them (you know, the whole work and then eat philosophy that dogs live by), then they went to their crates while I ate breakfast, and then I took them out for potties.  Totally getting them started on a schedule for house-breaking.  Because yesterday we had an accident in the house.  And two on the porch.  So, we are working really hard to get started on a good, reliable schedule so that we can minimize the accidents in the future.

And now it is SNOWING.  I am so excited.  This is the puppies’ first snow, and I cannot wait to take them outside to romp around in this new white frozen water stuff.