Speaking Dog

Now that we are in a house with a fenced yard and a open, spacious floor plan, I feel like I’m better able to work with the puppies. Teaching them that I am the alpha figure and they don’t so much as breathe without me saying it’s okay. I think I like having dogs because I can have complete control over them... unlike children who have agency and will do whatever they want to do despite my commands and instruction. I can get the dogs to sit, but can’t get my kids to sit? Maybe I was meant to be a dog... I speak dog a lot better than I speak kid.

 

 

 

 

Lucy and Doc. Lucy wanted desperately to eat the camera.

Today (and probably for the rest of the week) we’ll be working on “lay down” and “don’t eat something off the floor unless I say you can.”

Practicing “sit, stay”

So far both are going reasonably well. Well, you know, as good as can be expected when your puppies are only 13 weeks old and have spent most of the last several weeks of their lives in a small crate or tied to a dog run without much human interaction (due to our lack of fenced yard and my inability to leave my children inside my parents house without supervision).

Practicing “lay down, stay” – I still have to show them what “lay down” means every time, but they will “stay” laying down after I get them there... except Doc who is too giddy to stay doing anything for long... dumb dog. Look at those paws on Lucy! She’s going to be a monster!!

At this house, the kids hang out in the kitchen/living room which are relatively child-proof, and I can see them through the big sliding glass door in the kitchen. The shaded porch in the back is the prime spot for training, and I can stick the puppy not in training inside the crate with a blanket on top so they don’t freak out about not being with their littermate. 

Practicing “don’t eat it until I say you can” – basically I lay a treat down in front of them and make them “sit, stay” until I tell them to get it. If they start sniffing the ground, that’s a no-no “tsch” and they get fingers in the face. They’re doing really well. Except once I tell them they can eat the treat, then they are constantly sniffing the ground to find more treats... so, we’ll be working on this a lot more. I was impressed that they waited at all

As a little bit of a funny story... I dreamt last night that we give the puppies m&ms for a treat. Must have something to do with how we potty trained Vince with m&ms. Sometime in the dream I realized that m&ms were chocolate, and I started freaking out, trying to find the puppies and make sure we hadn’t killed them with m&ms. I promise I will never feed my puppies m&ms. Cross my heart and hope to die.