Lessons Learned

So, even though we are on our 5th puppy now, we are still learning new things all of the time. Here are a few of the things we have learned recently.

1.) If you are going to let your puppy sleep on the bed, always have a back-up set of clean sheets just in case. Puppies are like lightening. They can go from a muddy yard, straight past the foot wiping area into the house and up onto the bed in the blink of an eye if you leave the doors open in between.  Also, upset tummies  usually come on unexpectedly, and having a puppy throw up or worse on your bed in the middle of the night is not cool. Having that happen with no clean sheets to put on would be far worse. Now that I think about it, I think I need to go check my closet and make sure my sheets are clean.

2.) When you are traveling with your puppies, always make sure you have something for them to chew on. Otherwise, the inside of your car is in grave danger. Puppy teeth are sharp and leather, wood and plastic are irresistible. Unfortunately, most of the inside of your car is made up of these materials. Apparently, plastic cup holders, seat belt buckles and door handles are particularly tempting.

3.) Squeaky toys are good. Really good. Whatever preconceived ideas you have about how annoying squeaky toys are... forget about them. If you hear your puppy squeaking a toy in the next room, you know without a doubt that she is not chewing on something she shouldn't be chewing on. Plus, you know where they are. We love the ones that are long and skinny with plenty of squeakers. That way several puppies can play at once.

4.) Avoid toys with lots of stuffing. Our puppies usually don't pull larger teddy bears apart. Several of them sleep with teddy bears in their crates and use them as pillows, but in general, stuffing is a bad idea. Maybe it's just because we have pit bulls, but stuffing is a waste of time. If it is a toy they don't play with all of the time, sometimes they will leave it in tact. The toys without stuffing though, are so much easier because they can chew and chew them without stuffing ending up all over the living room floor.

5.) When it looks like your puppies don't have any toys left, you have a tendency to rush over to Petsmart and buy new ones. Before you do that, clean out from underneath your couch. Over time, toys seem to just disappear. Just the other day, I was wondering what had happened to the red and green teddy bears that were filled with rope instead of stuffing. I thought they had just gone the way of the dodo. Then we decided to move the couch to sweep. I found two missing slippers, a pair of canvas shoes that I thought had been accidentally thrown away, and tons of toys. Some of them were mangled, but a lot of them were still in good shape- just a little dusty. There were toys I didn't even remember I had gotten. The red and green rope teddy bears were there, along with two others in tan and brown that I had completely forgotten about. It was amazing. Our puppies were super excited. New toys everywhere.