I've learned that Savannah does not like to eat alone. If her food dish is in its usual spot in the kitchen and I'm in the breakfast room or the TV room, Savannah will walk up to her food bowl when she's hungry, give it a slight nudge with her nose, and then walk back to me and sit there. And then she gives me that "woe-is-me" puppy look. Just like Gracie used to do when she wanted her food but didn't want to eat by herself in the kitchen. (Do all puppies know this trick?)
So of course, I go and get the food bowl and bring it to where I'm sitting and Savannah is waiting... the food bowl goes on the floor and Savannah begins to eat. And yes, I'm guilty of spoiling this dog, but we spoiled Gracie as well and she turned out just fine.
I've just about come to the end of the puppy rope with Savannah barking at my husband, though. Every single blessed time he comes down the stairs from the second floor, or up the stairs of the porch when he's been outside, Savannah greets him with her now-famous roaring bark. I've suggested to my husband that he not ignore her at times like that, as he had been doing. I think he needs to walk up to her and say her name, and let her know for certain that yes, it's him and he lives here and he was here first and while we appreciate her barking, we don't want her barking at us. Surely this puppy is smart enough to know by now that we both live here.
My husband said that it was "depressing" to be barked at by one's own dog. Well, I guess it is, if you have nothing more horrible in your life to be depressed about, and I went through this very same thing with Gracie so many years ago. When my husband went to work, Gracie would mope around the house as if the sky were about to fall on her puppy head. It took so many hours and days of encouraging her and making her believe that while my husband was at work, I was her only hope for meals, for walking, for play, for training, for anything and everything that a puppy could possibly want. Gracie finally accepted that situation, but she wasn't ever thrilled and happy to be with just me. Honestly, I think that dog lived for the moments she could spend with my husband.
Well, the paw is on the other foot now, and it seems that Savannah has latched onto me as her main person. And being that I'm doing most of the walking, and all of the feeding, training, mopping up and cleaning up, I don't see that as a surprise. For whatever reason in Gracie's little puppy mind so many years ago, she bonded with my husband and just barely accepted me, no matter how much time I spent for her or with her. In my mind, that's just the way the dog biscuit crumbled with Gracie and it wasn't "depressing" to me. It was just the way it was. I have suggested to my husband that he find a way to bond with Savannah the best he can so we can have puppy peace in this house. And I have told Savannah to cut out the barking and roaring when her daddy walks into the kitchen. Simple requests to both, wouldn't you think?
JAS up the road called me late this afternoon and wanted to know if Savannah and I would like to walk with her and Bella (J's little Chihuahua). I had already taken Savannah for her afternoon walk and she was sound asleep when JAS called, but I know that the more time Savannah spends with other people and other dogs, the more it will benefit her. So I changed my shoes, got her leash, and woke up the Puppy Princess. She was slow-going at first, and clearly didn't want to be disturbed, but when she saw JAS and Bella coming towards her on the road, her tail started wagging and her face broke out into that puppy smile of hers. An added bonus for Savannah was that JAS had a bunch of bite-sized treats in her pocket and Savannah was happy to Sit! for JAS, right there in the middle of the road. Savannah has taken to Bella as if they've known each other since their very first puppy days.
After dinner tonight, both my husband and I walked with Savannah up and down the road, with my husband taking the leash right from the porch and I was just tagging along. Savannah looked up at him a couple of times but didn't pull at the leash like the first time he walked with her. To top off a good puppy-day, tonight after dinner while my husband was watching O'Reilly on TV, Savannah jumped up on the sofa and managed to get herself right between us (we both had to move to the ends of the love-seat-sized sofa) and then Savannah laid down and put her head in my husband's lap and went to sleep. Once in a while, we heard a very content and exaggerated sigh coming from her. My husband looked at me and smiled, and once again I told him that we need to get a bigger sofa for that room.
We're thinking of letting Savannah have the kitchen and the breakfast room at night so she can pick out her sleeping space, rather than enclosing her in the crate every night when we go upstairs. She clearly behaves herself in these two rooms during the day, whether I'm right here with her, or when I go upstairs for a little while, or when I go outside for the mail. Savannah already knows that the night-time is for sleeping, and even with her favorite toys in her crate, she has never played with them after lights-out. She just sleeps at night, and sleeps well except when she hears the coyotes howling or some other unfamiliar noise coming from outside. She promptly wakes us up with her roaring bark at those sounds, but I think she's getting used to the coyotes out in the woods because she's been ignoring them these past two nights. There was a raccoon on the porch one night last week and Savannah scared it away with her barking roar and that raccoon is probably still running.
So, we may just leave the door of her crate open, point her towards her $80 puppy bed, say good-night like we used to do with Gracie, and hope that she sleeps through the night without having to be crated and without us waking up in the morning to find something rearranged or damaged. So far (knock wood) Savannah has proved to us that she only chews her own toys and rawhide bones and nothing else. Sweet Pea sleeps in the TV room with the door closed at night, so I wouldn't have to worry that Savannah would bother the cat at night. As I told my husband, though, once we decide not to crate her at bed-time, it would be hard to change our minds and go back to enclosing her. Once Savannah has discovered late-night freedom in the kitchen and breakfast room, she's going to dig in her puppy heels and resist being inside that crate. Honestly, though, it would be nice to not have that big crate in the kitchen... and replacing it with her very nice dog bed would be much better indeed. But we'll see... the puppy jury is still out on this one.
To be sure, today was a good puppy day for Savannah and Bella, and for Savannah and my husband. My only hope for the morning is that when my husband comes down those back stairs and into the kitchen, Savannah will greet him with a wagging tail and her best and biggest puppy smile.
No comments:
Post a Comment