Our subject line would read: Who is Training Who?
Max has learned to ring the bell to go outside and he is having a great time ringing it every 2 minutes just to see if we will open the door for him. We open it every time. Sometimes he goes out to poop or pee and he gets a treat, other times he just wants to run (he loves the fresh snow) and then other times he sits at the door and decides, nah, he'd rather stay inside.
Over the last few weeks we have had several visitors and Max has done a great job with meeting them. Both of our parents have been by several times and just love him. Yesterday we had a dinner for 7 adults and 7 children and he was very charming for the crowd. He is a little shy at first but then warms up pretty quickly. Next weekend he will meet most of the Honan family (Pat is oldest of 5, so there are 24 of us when we are all together) and our nieces and nephews are really excited to meet him.
Max is sleeping through the night, waking at about 7 am and is ready for full on play as soon as he wakes up. It is great, both our kids come into our room to play with him as soon as they wake up at the same time.
He is travelling very well in the car - we take him on small rides every few days. For March Break he will be travelling 3 hours up North to a cottage for 5 days so I hope he does well on a longer trip (with many breaks).
We start obedience training at the end of March (unfortunately not with Pippen and Matteo - they picked daytime classes which we cannot attend).
Other than that he is a wonderful and happy addition to our family and we cannot imagine life without him.
Take Care,
Michele and Pat
This is Pippin!
Hi Nathan and Darlah
So good to hear from you. I have been watching your blogs and know how busy you have been with 12 pups so didn’t want to add to all the things you are doing.
Pippin is doing really well, we have settled into a routine that works for all of us. She is still sleeping in the sherpa bag on our bed and goes to bed around 10 and wakes up when the alarm goes off at 7. Never any issues at night. I am thinking of transitioning her to the crate in the bedroom, we’ll see how she does. Bottom line, i know she will sleep on our bed without the sherpa bag at some point. I am just afraid she will fall off the bed during the night or have an accident.
Daytime training is going excellent, she occasionally uses the pee pad but ALWAYS goes outside when we take her (which is frequently when she is awake). A few oops, but not many and I know she will get better.
The only issue we have is with lead training. For some reason when we put her on a lead she just freezes, won’t move at all. If I let the lead go she will usually pick it up and walk away. I have even tried walking her in the house with the lead, but she resists. Today, with the weather being a little warmer, I walked down the street with her and put her down. She walked a little way heading home, but then refuses to move again. We will continue to work on this several times a day until she gets used to it.
We have a large yard, Pippin has so far only been in the area where we cleared snow. This morning I took her to the back of the yard (can finally wade through the snow, and she can run on top). It was like a lightbulb going off in her head, ‘Oh, there is a large area to run around out here’, and now we are chasing her all over the yard to make sure she doesn’t eat pine cones, leaves, branches, etc. It’s priceless to see her so excited!
We have enrolled Pippin in puppy school, starting in a couple of weeks; Mateo will be taking the same class. We hope to get together with Max and Mateo at a puppy play date at the school in the next few weeks.
have attached a couple of pictures, from a few weeks ago. I have taken many since then, but haven’t downloaded to my computer yet, will send some later. One of these pictures is Pippin draped on Meredith’s neck, where she seems to be very comfortable. BTW, Meredith is very pregnant with their second baby, due in a few weeks. Another playmate for Pippin eventually.
Finnegan is coming along in this friendship thing, but Pippin is persisting in trying to get her to play. It will come eventually.
Talk soon, Marlene