We are too young a blog to be nostalgic! But if you insist Weekly Photo Challenge, here are some pictures from Donna’s first home visit.
There’s her plastic basket bed with some towels from the shelter. She did not seem too attached to that though. We were advised to let her sleep in the room with us, which has its pros and cons.
Go to sleep Donna.
Think she slept?
NO!!!
The whole night I hear her nails clattering here and there as she couldn’t sleep and kept pacing about the room. Either that or she must be clattering in her sleep. I’ve noticed that she twitches frequently and sometimes lets out little yelps in her dreams.
I could not sleep at all. So out she goes the next night. :P
I later read that dogs are not nocturnal, but unless they are crate-trained, they are likely to wake up at several points in the night and move to different beds throughout the night. Apparently they like to have a variety of sleeping places. But if they are crate-trained, they can stay asleep in their crate for the whole night. That’s also why we made sure non-crate trained Donna has several different types of beds in the living room :D so she has options. Hah!
Although on hindsight, if you do have a new dog in the house, it would not be a bad idea to keep the dog close to you at the start. Leaving it alone for long hours may lead to mischief since the dog will be naturally curious and explore its new surroundings with happy licks and nibbles here and there. We were lucky she did not deal any significant damage to herself or to the property outside the bedroom the first home stay.
What pictures I have during the first home stay showed a very bored dog.
Because you see, we were spending time with her, versus spending time taking photographs of her. So the only time we did take pictures was when she was in repose, because we needed to send some pictures back to the shelter to show we have not murdered her! :P
But the photo challenges and just keeping this blog did encourage more interest in phoneography for me, so yay more pictures to be nostalgic about in future!
Buddy2Blogger
Reblogged this on Sherlockian's Blog.
weliveinaflat
Thank you for the reblog, hope your having a good weekend!
Sonel
Awww..she was and still is so adorable! I know about the sleeping patterns for sure and after 14 years Simba still sleep with us on the bed in the winter or should I say, we sleep around him..hehehe. Great shots of a beautiful Donna. *big hugs* to both of you. :D
weliveinaflat
Dear Simba is well loved and toasty in winter, blond dog and all! :D
Sonel
Indeed! Just like sweet Donna. They do make a cute Black and White couple, don’t they? hehehehe
weliveinaflat
Indeed! We met a feisty little white dog yesterday night. Both dogs were leashed but wanting to play and were dancing from their leash like… well.. dancing tiger, flying dragon. I;m always worrying Donna may accidentally hurt a dog smaller than her in her excitement. Haha, Simba may be more sedate at age 14 and couldn’t stand boisterous young adults :P
Sonel
LOL! Bet that was quite a funny sight! Oh, you are so right…at his age my little man can’t stand it. He gets that attitude of : “What? Don’t you dare show me what I can or can’t do and stop that wriggling and jumping around..you’re not a damn horse! I am the horse here!” and he would give a little growl and walk away very offended. LOL! But he does tolerate it when he is in the mood. But they do say doggie kids are just like their owners…:D
rubytheblacklabrador
Sounds like the slowly, slowly approach worked though and she settled in well. Ruby was crate trained when we got her so we continued this for the first 6 months. Now she sleeps on a blanket thing or on her stretcher bed at night but in an area restricted by child gates! With her cuddly toys too :)
weliveinaflat
Oh yes, with Donna we really have to take a lot of things slow and methodically, which can be hard because she can be so smart that we forget we have to be slow!!! And then of course we have to clean up and start all over again :P
Does Ruby still have her crate in her “bedroom” but she just prefers her other beds? That’s cool :) But I do want to get Donna crate trained, just so she has the option of hiding in her crate when it storms and there’s no one at home!
How goes the cuddly green hedgehog, surviving well? :)
rubytheblacklabrador
After 6 months we stopped using the crate. It was really good though and she never minded being in it. She used it at night and during the day and when say small kids came over and we didn’t want her to lick them to death. We then moved house and had an area we could barricade her into at night. It’s a small area but she just sleeps there at night. During the day she sleeps anywhere and everywhere! Crates obviously look hideous to us but they are a source of familiarity and comfort to dogs. Green hedgehog has also been disembowelled – probably no surprise there :)
weliveinaflat
Totally agree that crates look hideous!! But when it storms and we’re not around, that’s when we find her trapping herself in the kitchen. She seems to find it comforting to be in a small space that’s barricaded then, but the kitchen is just to dangerous for a dog to be in. So I thought a crate will still be a good solution for her at this point. But its great you guys have a small area for Ruby, lucky her! Not so lucky for green hedgehog :P
lensandpensbysally
Keep up the Phoneography and your stack of nostalgia will grow tall and wide.
weliveinaflat
Thank you for the encouragement :D
Paul Grignon
Did you mean ‘houndsight’? :-)
Great photos there, and it’s nice to know Donna has adjusted (somewhat) to the new digs. I’m glad we opted to crate-train Andi, though.
Take care!
Paul :-)
weliveinaflat
Oh yes houndsight! :D We probably would have tried to crate train her, if we had known about crate training back then :P although being dog idiots, we are just as likely to make her fearful of the crate instead, so maybe it was a good thing we didn’t. :P How’s Andi getting on? Have a great week ahead!!