Our Puppy — Page 14 — You are in My World Now

Walks in the park

January 29, 2008 by Tricia

The weather finally warmed up enough over the weekend and today that we were able to take our puppy to the park for the first time.

We’ve had her since the end of November but because she still had two sets of shots and a rabies vaccination to get we weren’t officially able to take her to parks or other places frequented by a lot of dogs until about a week ago. Trouble was we were in a deep freeze here in Toronto when we first would have been able to take her to the park that I can see from my front door!

Sunday evening, after a busy day, we brought her to the park. We’d wanted to get a long lead but given how she still likes to taste everything that crosses her path we decided to take her to the park on her normal 6 foot leash.

She loved the park! Her nose was down to the ground most of the time as she smelled all the others dogs that had been there previously.

We met a couple of other dogs and their owners too.

After we left the park we realized that her leash had actually broken. The rivets that held the handle together had fallen out! All four of them! We also noticed that the little plastic trash can that holds the poop bags was missing.

Around that time we heard a man coming. He was calling out a name, lets say it was “Morty” … he was yelling “Morty get over here” … “Here” … “come here!” As he staggered along. We looked up and saw quite a large dog heading our way. It stayed away from us as it was just walking peacefully to the park it’s leash dragging behind it, as it ignored his probably drunk owner.

We waited for the man and dog to pass and then headed back to the park. The man and loose dog made us nervous. Our puppy is small and Chris is actually a little bit afraid of strange dogs. Never the less Chris went into the park while I waited outside the fence. We figured it would be safer to keep our puppy away from the loose dog.

Chris ended up having a very strange conversation with the drunk or maybe schizo man. The man really made Chris nervous and I was getting weird vibes from him too.

Chris came out of the park and we walked to another entrance. We then tried to retrace our previous path to try to find our poopy bag container. We found it way on the other side of the park where I thought it would be. Where we should have walked in the first place but the weird man with the loose dog was in that area so we retraced our steps from the beginning.

The next day we went to Petsmart to return the broken leash that we’d only had for about three weeks. We also returned a few other items like treats that we’d given to our puppy that had given her diarrhea. She’s got a very sensitive tummy! With our refund we got a new leash and a 30 foot lead.

We figured what the heck. She didn’t try to pick up anything in her mouth while in the park the night before as she was too busy smelling everything and or playing with other dogs. So on Monday we took her to the park on the long lead and she had a BALL.

That night she met a dog named Cooper … a mix that looked like it might have had a bit of Golden Retriever in it, and a Black Great Dane called Luna. The Great Dane was only 7 months old. We have two Great Danes in our Puppy class that are supposed to be about 5 months old and both are huge compared to the 7 month old that we met last night.

Anyway, we had fun and going to the park will become a regular part, hopefully, of each day. At least one walk will be to the park … well unless it’s freezing cold out!

Can you say Couch Potato?

January 16, 2008 by Tricia

Wordless Wednesday

Midnight watching TV while on the couch with my husband:

A few minutes later – fast asleep:

Our puppy likes to spend some quality time with my husband each evening.

They play some ball and then Midnight will often climb up on the couch with him and chew on her toys while she either sprawls in his lap or lies at his feet.

Notice that she has her favorite squeaky toy and her chew tire beside her? She loves those toys and they’ve held up fairly well to her sharp baby teeth and constant chewing.

There are more cute photos of Midnight on my main blog Tricia’s Musings and also a funny sleeping pose of hers on Odd Planet.

I need to keep my guard up when walking my puppy

January 16, 2008 by Tricia

Yesterday when I was walking our puppy a man crossed the street to come over and pet her.

I had a strange feeling about the man as he approached. He was very short and looked like some of the patients I’ve cared for many times in the ER. I have no proof but I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d just come out of our drug rehab or possibly the psych ward. Remember I live only three blocks from the hospital so there are patients that are currently being treated for a disorder walking around at times as well as those that have been recently discharged.

The man turned out to be nice. He said he really loved Labs and that they always loved him. Judging from my pups reaction what he’d said was true as she greeted him as enthusiastically as she would anyone else.

Still … the whole encounter got me thinking about safety. Walking up to someone with a small or young dog could be a good way to get close to someone when you have bad intentions. I mean, most people that have approached me when I’ve been walking my dog are very friendly and I’m sure they are just dog lovers who want to meet my puppy, but it would be a good way for someone that wanted to mug you or perhaps even steal the dog to get close.

I think I’ll keep my guard up a bit more when I’m walking Midnight – well at least until she’s fully grown and hopefully a bit more protective (or at least might intimidate a would be robber). I know labs aren’t known for being guard dogs but I’d hope someone with bad intentions would think twice before approaching someone with a mature lab.

I walk the puppy at all hours and for the most part I feel very safe walking around. This was the first time that I felt really uncomfortable when we’ve met someone that wanted to pet her. I guess that was a little wake up call.

Raise your activity level and lose some pounds

January 13, 2008 by Tricia

I was saying on my other blog that I’ve lost some weight in the last two months. Ever since we got our puppy in November my activity level has gone way up and that’s resulted in me losing a few extra pounds.

Since I hadn’t been all that active prior to getting the puppy I’d gained some weight. Also, being on steroids didn’t help either! That’s the trouble with having a chronic illness, Crohns, you can’t do much when you feel lousy! But when you have a puppy you have to go out no matter how bad you feel.

I’ve never been a big eater. In fact, in the last year I generally only finish half or less of my meal when we go out to a restaurant and obviously my portions at home have gotten a lot smaller. So food was never the problem. Lack of activity was! I can’t eat that much because of the Crohn’s either. Rice, boiled or broiled chicken, baked fish, some steamed veggies and nutritional supplements tend to make up 90% or more of my regular diet.

I’d say another month of going on several daily walks with my puppy and I’ll be back to my normal weight or better.

Have you set any goals to become more active or get in better shape this year? If so, what are you doing to achieve your goal?

Collateral damage?

December 14, 2007 by Tricia

I just love my little puppy, Midnight. She’s only been with us for about three weeks now, but she’s definitely grown on us!

That’s probably because we have to constantly watch the mischievously little girl. If she disappears from our sight for a minute or two she’s bound to be found trying to jump up at something she shouldn’t be trying to get or trying to get into something like the garbage.

Yesterday morning I was upstairs and my husband was in the basement getting ready to have a shower. Midnight was safely tucked away in her training crate. We always put a few chew toys in with her and it sounded like she was going nuts playing with her toys, but as it turned out she was up to no good.

You see, on top of her training crate is the box the crate came in. My husband put it there just after he put the cage together and we’ve been using that area as a place to put our winter coats since we go in and out with the puppy several times each day. Remember we don’t have any closets on the main floor. We usually keep our coats on coat hangers in the basement hallway, but leaving them on top of the crate has been working out just fine … until Thursday morning that is.

The hood of my winter coat, with it’s faux fur trim, fell victim to our playful puppy. I guess when Chris took the puppy out in the morning he must have moved my coat a bit when he got his own and the hood must have been hanging over the edge just enough for our puppy to reach it with her inquisitive little mouth. She probably latched onto it and pulled it down enough to really start chewing on it!

In the end … my hood was still intact but some of the buttons that had held it onto the coat were gone ( we found them) and oh … about a handful of faux fur littered the bottom of her cage. Hopefully she didn’t swallow too much of that stuff!

I imagine that she was probably looking up at my coats hood just like she is in this photo. Of course in this photo she’s looking up at my husband hoping he’ll give her a treat … but a coat hood to tear apart is yet another treat to a silly puppy too isn’t it?

That’s the first item of either Chris or I’s that she’s managed to damage in any way. We’ve probably been lucky so far. I’m sure by the time she’s a year old I’ll have a list as long as my arm of things she’s destroyed!

If you’d like to see more pictures of our puppy and hear more about how playful she is check out the post I wrote titled Sheâ€™s not chewsy at all and a great photo of her on my photoblog.