Oy!

Yesterday was the day I was supposed to go straight to the barn to ride Ashke. Instead, I got called home to clean up the disaster that is current state of affairs at home. See, we hadn't expected (okay who am I fooling - I wasn't prepared) to bring home two puppies and had forgotten how much we needed to do to puppy proof the house. I thought I had devised a decent plan with three child gates and the dining room table to keep the puppies contained. But no. Bad plan.

T was a trooper and cleaned up the larger piles of poo, plus most of the pee that was all over the house. Puppies can't just pee in one spot. No. They must pee in a lot of spots. And also poo. Which they then walk in and track every where. Which T discovered when he was ambushed by playful puppies and got poo in his hair. He decided to wash off their feet and that turned into a complete disaster, when the water got a little overwarm and Lily let him know in a shrill, puppy voice. (She was not hurt, just a touch uncomfortable until he got her out of the water. However, she sounded like she was dying.)

I am at work with a screaming puppy and a hysterical son on the phone, trying to calm him down while also trying to assess how serious the damage was. Thankfully, the puppy calmed right down and had no signs of burn and was back to her happy bouncy self in a matter of moments. The boy child did not bounce back as easily, and cried himself to sleep at the imagined injury he could have caused to his puppy. (In his defense, he was in the master bath, with the jacuzzi tub and he really doesn't know how to adjust the water temp like he knows in his bathroom. He had tested it when he put the puppies in the water, but didn't double check it a few minutes later. The water was about the temp I like for my shower, however, it was definitely too hot for Lily.) I skipped going to the barn and headed home.

Our evening was spent cleaning the house, walking two puppies who had never been outside before we brought them home, shopping at Lowes and then building this wonderful cage for them to exist in until they are through the "chew on everything, pee everywhere" phase. The cage cost us about $40. It took about an hour to cut and put together the wire and although I wish the gauge were a little heavier, I think it will do the trick. (I sold all of our kennels about a year ago! I really thought we would be done with dogs when we lost our boxers, but I was wrong. It really was too hard without them.) The cage is on top of a water-proof tarp which is covered with pee pads. That way the cage will hold the pads and the tarp in place preventing them from becoming puppy chew toys. They have a dog bed in the corner and bully sticks and rope bears to chew on.

Last night I went to bed at 10:45, got up at 12, 1, 3:20, and then up for work at 5:45. It's a lot like having a baby. The puppies have to be carried from the bedroom to the back patio, since they have also never been on leash, and they have a tendency to drop and piddle if they aren't carried. (However, they did follow me down this morning and outside without being carried, which is pretty impressive on the second day.) We are using the same verbal cue of "find a spot" and "hurry up" to indicate they should go now. (This worked really well with the boxers and I expect it to work well with the new pups as well. Sure makes traveling so much easier.) They get lots of praise for doing their business and we ignore the mistakes. They have to be a lot bigger before they are going to have any control.

Guinness has adapted to the puppies. She is much bouncier and seems to be much happier than before we brought them home. She is also eating better than she has been since Spike passed over. She got bounced by Lily this morning and I don't think it will be very long before they are all playing together. The puppies love to lay with Guinness at night. One of the only issues we had last night was between Lily and T. T talks and sometimes yells in the middle of the night. He was very vocal last night. Everytime we heard him Lily got up and stood at the gate in the doorway and barked. A lot. And whined.

Oy.