The First Week

So we've officially been dog owners for a week!  We absolutely love Cooper already!  I'll admit I was a little nervous about him at first, especially when he wasn't sleeping and I was thinking, "Throw this dog to the curb! I need some sleep!"  LOL :)  But things have gotten better and he's beginning to adjust to our life here.


First of all, he's been sleeping really well!  A friend gave us a tip to put a blanket over the crate at night, and it worked like magic.  He usually does wake up once in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom (common for puppies), but last night he didn't.  We had to wake him up at 7am this morning!  He's actually starting to be fine being put in his crate, even during the day, and sometimes goes in there by choice.


Cooper is also becoming okay with the idea that he can't always be with us, even when we're home.  If we leave him in the kitchen (baby-gated in), he doesn't usually whine much anymore.  I wish we could let him loose in the house whenever we're home, but he has an obsession with peeing on carpet!  I don't know what it is - even if he just goes to the bathroom he'll definitely find some pee for the carpet, too.  It helps that we always keep the radio on for him I think - he likes the background noise.  He's also following us around and sitting on our feet a little less too.  I think he's getting more confident.


Cooper is also a really smart dog, thank goodness!  Hopefully he'll be easy to train.  So far he can already sit and is pretty good at lay down, too.  If he gets excited and tries to jump up on us, he knows "down" means to sit and wait for us to pick him up or pet him.  I'd also like to say he's pretty much potty trained, but not on carpet, of course.  He never has accidents in the kitchen, though.  I'll be curious to see how he does with accidents this week when I'm back at work.  Brad is going to go home at lunch for awhile and let him out, so that should help.


The one thing that's still sort of a problem (besides carpet peeing) is biting.  This guy LOVES to bite.  I know, he's a puppy, but still!  He never bites what he's supposed to bite (his toys and chews).  He loves biting and chewing on fingers, pants, leaves, grass, and especially newspaper when we're reading it.  We were outside a lot this weekend, so I hope he doesn't get sick from all the grass he ate!  It's just easier to give in and let him eat the grass than our hands.  The vet said it's normal for dogs to do this, but if he eats too much he might get sick.




I'm getting really excited about starting puppy school.  I'm so interested to see how Cooper does with other puppies/dogs!  I'm hoping by the end of the class Cooper will receive an AKC Canine Good Citizen certificate.  


So anyway, it's been a week and we're both really glad we got Cooper.  He's been so fun to play with, and seriously, I don't think I've watched more than an hour or two of TV since getting him!  (Which if you know me, you know I have my "shows" and usually watch an hour or two of TV a night!).  We just love having the little guy around.  So I guess you could say he's been a positive blessing in our life!  Hopefully he would say the same about us (we do spoil him)... :)