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BJ, how's your little Toby doing?

He's improving thank goodness and he would get a much better report if he hadn't munched up my new overly expensive glasses last night
I want to take him to the FL GTG with me so I've been working a lot on refreshing his obedience training and not barking in the car when I leave him. I have a lot of work ahead of me to get him road ready!
I read some of the Dog Whisperers suggestions on how to let the dog know who is alpha. Now he has to sit for his food, go out the door after me and for awhile he couldn't sit on the furniture. I'm still working on the barking but he is better with strangers now as long as they ignore him at first and let him come to them.

It is so fun to watch him run across the yard, he runs and then leaps like a deer. He's was a good snuggler earlier this week when I spent a lot of time on the couch with this cold. I think we'll keep him

Bless your heart! He didn't mean to tear up your new glasses Momma! I know it's not really funny. We had a puppy one time who took my glasses off the end table during the night once. I had to make emergency run for new glasses the next morning. All we ever found was one of the lenses. Chuck always said he thought the rest of the glasses were under the deck where the dogs could get, but we couldn't.

Cannot wait to meet Toby at the FL GTG, so I hope he does good with his training. Yes ma'am, you are the pack leader, the alpha dog. Wish I could get that concept through Mom's head with her dog from Hell. She begs him to mind in a whiny voice and cannot understand why he minds me and not her. I think she is going to give him to my niece and I am not going to talk her out of it this time. She is really too old to take care of him and his needs. She dislikes having to get up and take him out.

BJ, I think the plus is that he needs someone else to be in charge....he will feel much safer in the world. For dogs that are not alpha by nature, the pressure of their hoomans not stepping up stresses them even more. Dogs appreciate structure in their world, when a human takes charge, it isn't as if they will get their feelings hurt, but they will feel much more comfortable and happy with clear expectations of the rules....

And there is hope for all...Remi went to the dog park with Stuart yesterday and actually tried to play with a sweet Sheltie....

When I first brought Phoebe , a mini pin, home, she had her own way of not listening. I was trying to let her know that she had to let Sandy, a shepherd/lab mix, alone when Sandy was doing her business. Of course Phoebe didn't listen and you guessed it, received the full effects of the "dirty bomb" on top of her head. After our "talk", all I had to do was say her name firmly and she would leave the area immediately. I still chuckle over that incident. Linda