Last March we got our first family dog. Sasha was a one-year-old lab/german shepherd mix who was very sweet. We were told that she was good and very gentle with kids, but might not know what to do with men since she belonged to a single woman. What that turned out to mean was that she was gentle with kids, until she got to know them, and that she peed whenever men talked to her. Or at least, she peed whenever the dear husband talked to her. The not so gentle with kids meant that she would pretty much run full force at my two year old and maul over him. It didn't take too long before Noah was afraid of her, and would put his hands up defensively even if she was holding still. Can't really blame him since at almost 70lbs, she would just about knock me over when she would jump up on me, which was eh, about once ever other second. I tried for 2 months to train her not to jump up on people, and it just seemed to be getting worse. Obviously, I couldn't let her be around kids, as much as she loved them, so that meant that since it's not to often that I'm not around the kids, that left a very limited amount of time I could spend with her. Added to that was that I couldn't have her around Josh because she peed evertime he'd look at her which meant that she couldn't be around me when I was with Josh either. I loved her though...as difficult as she was, she was still very sweet, and wanted to do anything to please me. Except of course, not jump on me. This week we made the decision to take her previous owner up on her offer to take Sasha back if for some reason she didn't work out. Her owner was very gracious and came to pick her up the next morning and appologized for not knowing that she isn't good with small children, and had no idea that she would pee around men.
All that day I was pretty bummed, but was looking forward to finding a new and improved dog for our family. After all, until Sasha started knocking Noah over, he loved dogs. Back to the inernet I went, looking for a new dog. That evening, this little citter popped up on CraigsList.
All that day I was pretty bummed, but was looking forward to finding a new and improved dog for our family. After all, until Sasha started knocking Noah over, he loved dogs. Back to the inernet I went, looking for a new dog. That evening, this little citter popped up on CraigsList.
He'd wandered into a family's yard up in Madera, and they'd plastered their neighborhood with flyers and called the SPCA multiple times trying to return him to his owner. Now two months later no one had claimed him and their landlord wasn't too happy about them having a 3rd dog in the house. They'd put the ad up that I'd found, which I responded to right away. I asked a buttload of questions (to try to avoid our last situation), and then set up a time to go visit him.
We walked in and he came running up to Noah. The familiy had a little girl, so they'd had two months to watch how he was with little kids. He'd never nipped at her, which is impressive since she carried him around the house all the time. I'd nip at someone if they tried to carry me everywhere.
He's been great so far with Noah. We haven't had any warming up time at all like we had with Sasha. He made himself at home right away. He's even got his favorite sleeping spots picked out.
On the 40 minute drive home from Madera, we'd put the dog in a cat crate (he's only about 15lbs or so) and stuck him in the back of the van. He started whining really loudly pretty quickly. Noah got pretty upset and said that Mommy needed to go and help the dog. Hehe....what a sweet kid. We pulled over and we put the crate on my lap and the dog was quiet the rest of the way home. The family he came from said he hadn't ever been yippy, so here's hopping that he stays that way. We haven't had any problems with him yet...even when the yippy dogs on the other side of the fence starting going at it this morning.
We named him Bob after one of our favorite childrens books, 15 Animals, by Sandra Boynton. (There's a song based on the book if you wanna hear it.) Noah can say "Bob" easily too, so that's an extra little perk. :) Noah got up this morning and they played fetch for a little while, and then later this afternoon played tug of war.
On the 40 minute drive home from Madera, we'd put the dog in a cat crate (he's only about 15lbs or so) and stuck him in the back of the van. He started whining really loudly pretty quickly. Noah got pretty upset and said that Mommy needed to go and help the dog. Hehe....what a sweet kid. We pulled over and we put the crate on my lap and the dog was quiet the rest of the way home. The family he came from said he hadn't ever been yippy, so here's hopping that he stays that way. We haven't had any problems with him yet...even when the yippy dogs on the other side of the fence starting going at it this morning.
We named him Bob after one of our favorite childrens books, 15 Animals, by Sandra Boynton. (There's a song based on the book if you wanna hear it.) Noah can say "Bob" easily too, so that's an extra little perk. :) Noah got up this morning and they played fetch for a little while, and then later this afternoon played tug of war.
Noah has a new best friend. It's pretty fun to watch. This afternoon Noah brought out his favorite blankie, and his favorite orange kitty stuffed animal to give to Bob. :)
As I'm writing this Bob is sleeping on the fireplace, in what used to be one of our cat's favorite spots. By the way, the cat isn't sure what to do with this fluffy little barking thing. Sasha, the 70lb dog was terrified of her, yet this one just stands there and looks at her wagging his tail. What's a cat to do?
He looks Corgi/Pomeranian-ish. If anyone has any ideas as to what he might be, let me know. He looks like a very miniature version of my dog growing up, but that's really no help since I didn't know what he was either.
No comments:
Post a Comment