At School And At Play

She is getting so big!

At my parent's house on the 16th, our play-date with Max did not go too well. He wanted nothing to do with her.


When we got there, we went for a walk so that they met on neutral ground. Max was afraid of her because she was so bouncy and playful. He is a much more laid back dog. He is older, too. He was 2 or so when my family adopted him for my youngest brother's 16th birthday. He is now a 21-year-old marine currently serving in Iraq, so that would make Max about 7 or so.

By the time we left, Max was tolerating her just enough for her to walk past him without Max running away but not enough to let her touch him...

At the vet on the 18th, she weighed 28 lbs. We went to my MIL's after to play with Taz and Bandit:

Bandit wanted nothing to do with the tomfooleries.


Taz was as playful as ever.


I think Bailey knows who is playful and who isn't, though. She will walk up to Bandit and lick his face, then turn around and pounce on Taz. It is really very sweet how she shows Bandit such respect.

Puppy class was canceled on the 17th due to weather. When we got to class on the 24th, all our classmates were there:

Bella the Shih Tzu:


Garcia the Sheltie:


Gracie the Australian Shepard:


And Brutus the Neapolitan Mastiff:

At class, Bailey weighed in at 30.5 lbs. That's 2 1/2 lbs in 7 days!!! She is growing so fast!

She is learning fast, too. She already knows how to sit both with the verbal command and the hand signal. At class this week she learned "down" which is to lay down, and "settle" which is to shift her weight to the side from the "down" position. It is the first step toward rolling over. We also worked on "leave it" and, although she did better than I expected, it still needs a lot of work.

My in-laws have adopted another boxer. His name is Geronimo. I will try to have pics of the play-dates with Taz, Geronimo, Bandit, and Bailey for my next post.

Catch-Up

So the potty training is coming along. We still have a few accidents but we are getting there.

At our class last Sunday, Bailey weighed in at a wopping 25.3 lbs. She'll be checked again on Monday at the vet so I will be interested to see what she'd gained this week.

I think I've strained my back lifting her on to and off of the bed. I still take her out whenever I wake during the night to prevent accidents on the bed. She is not always thrilled about being woken up so I just grab her and carry her to the back door which is kinda far from our bedroom.

Last Saturday, Bailey and I spent the evening at my in-law's. My FIL and my husband went to a truck show while my MIL and I vegged out and watched a movie while the dogs played. Taz was pretty rough but Bailey gave back everything Taz brought on her... and if Taz stopped, Bailey instigated a new battle. She slept really well that night!

She will have her first visit to my parent's house on Saturday. They have Max, a 7-year-old beagle mix who was adopted from the Humane Society for my baby brother's 16th birthday. He is not the most dog-friendly, partly due to some horrible neighbors who had big, mean dogs who barked at him and partly because he pushed Gizmo a bit too far once and she snapped at him and got his tail. It was funny to see how scared he was of her considering he is easily at least 10 times her size.

Anyway, I hate that Max gets left behind when we have holiday functions which involve the in-laws and their dogs and such so I am determined to introduce him to Bailey while she is still about his size to get them socialized to one another.

I'll let you know how that goes... hopefully, I'll have picks of Taz, Max, and her classmates from puppy kindergarten for the next post.

Socializing

Bailey had her first play date on Saturday 2/2.

We visited Bella, a cocker-maltese-poodle mix who is about 1 1/2 years old. They are about the same size for now so it worked out well. They played a lot in the back yard and when they were inside, Bailey was very well behaved. She didn't have any accidents and didn't try to chew on anything. And she slept like a log that night.



At Bella's house, the step up to the deck from the yard is kinda big. If Bailey could get a running start, she could make it. But most of the time, Bella blocked her way. Not on purpose, though. She was just excited to have a puppy friend to play with.

So without even knowing she was doing it, Bella was the alpha dog for the day. Which is good considering Bailey was the alpha of her litter at the time we brought her home and she needed to learn that she would not always be the alpha in her canine relationships.

On Sunday 2/3, we had our first puppy class. She did very well considering she hadn't really been on a leash before. Some things were new, like making eye contact on command and the introduction/loading of the clicker. But there were a few things she could already do, like sit on command.

The other puppies in the class were playful and social with her. There was Garcia the Sheltie, Gracie the Austrailian Shepard, another Bella (a shih tzu), and Brutis, a 5-month-old, 60 lb Neopolitain Mastif, who had no idea how big he actually was.

The potty training is coming along. As long as we watch her close and take her out often, she does well. It's when we slack off or get distracted with house hold chores that she has accidents. At present, I am just happy when she goes outside or on her puppy pad. Hopefully as she grows, she will gain more bladder and bowel control so she can do both in one outing so we can reduce the amount of times we go out.