We gots no troubles, life is the bubbles!

Hey guys!

So the title of this entry is from "Under the Sea" from The Little Mermaid, which is appropriate since Juliette got her second bath this week! I thought I was going to get a reprieve because Petsmart offers this amazing puppy package for bathing, and Juilette's sister, Bailey, who is loved (I hate to say the word owned, since they really are members of the family) by a friend of mine from high school, got it done a few days ago, and I just thought that it'd be great. They do the works -- shampoo, conditioner, blow dry, brushing, removal of shedding hair and that good undercoat brushing, trimming of hairs around the paws, nail clipping, and a bandana all for $15. I thought this would be a steal, and I also thought I'd get to avoid anymore battle scars (the one from her first bath is still visible on my elbow). But, when I called to set it up, they told me that once she's four months old (which she just turned) they require a rabies vaccination certificate. Well, my vet and the entire practice of veterinarians don't believe in giving the rabies vaccines to puppies before they are six months, since it usually doesn't take and they end up needing it again, and besides that, there are some health risks. So, I couldn't get it done. I think it's really silly that they have that policy when many vets don't give it before six months. Neither of our other dogs had theirs before six months, and they were seeing a different vet at that time than we do now.

So, anyway, last night, I hunkered down in the bathroom with Juliette and luckily, I had my mom around this time to document the experience with pictures. Most of them are on my Facebook, but I'm gonna post a few below. In general, though, it was much better. She's adapting to it, and I don't have any scratched except for one little surface scratch on my neck that I can barely see now. She really does like the water, and once she was out of the tub, she was fascinated by watching the water drain in the tub and actually tried to get back in. I'm hoping that it'll start to get nice and warm soon, and when it does, I'll be getting her a kiddie pool that she can chill out in in the backyard with me while I read and stuff during the summer, and I'm definitely planning to try and get her to some lake at some point to play around. Her paws have this amazing webbing and I can just tell she's going to be a great swimmer!

Anyhow, here are a few pictures from the experience! Overall, it really wasn't bad and I'm actually a little glad I couldn't get her professionally groomed because now I have pictures of me bathing her as a puppy, which I think is kind of a monumental experience!

:) More later this week!

--Heather

The Land Before Time, Part II

When I was little, there was this series of dinosaur movies out called "The Land Before Time." Initially, the first few movies were good for kids movies, and my brother and I both loved them. But after awhile, they started adding so many sequels (I eventually lost count) that it was more comical than anything -- especially as my brother and I were graduating high school and they were still adding more movies.

On our very first full day with Juliette, more than seven weeks ago now, my dad went out on errands and came back with this bright green dinosaur that she became enamored with. He's fluffy and soft, and instead of squeaking, he's got this roller-ball thing inside him that makes a rattling/rolling noise. She loves to shake things, so this provides much more entertainment for shaking. Here she is when she first got that dinosaur:

Then, the dinosaur was about half her size.

As she's grown, this dinosaur has slept with her every single night and is by far her favorite toy. She isn't a destroyer when it comes to toys, but he naturally started getting some holes from wear-and-tear. So last weekend, my dad went out to run some errands and decided that, after we'd sewed the dinosaur up several times, it was time to just buy a new one and swap it out -- which we did. But while he was there, he saw another dinosaur as well: A blue triceratops. He gave the triceratops to Juliette last weekend, and she just loves him -- he's a little furry, too.

As you can see, she's just as in love with this dinosaur!

Week before last, Juliette went in for her third round of boosters with Dr. B. She's doing very well, and as of them, weighed about 24.5 lbs. I'm guessing that she's closer to 30 lbs. now, and she sees the vet again two weeks from yesterday.

In other news, today, Juliette lost her first tooth! She was especially bitey after we'd gone outside for a bit, which isn't usually normal, but I noticed that one of her bottom from teeth was loose, and sure enough, after dinner, it was gone. We've learned as she's chewing that she, like our other dogs, loves ice cubes and thinks they are a great treat, so she's been eating a lot of those and sucking on them, and that seems to help with the teething. My dad also found these great dental care chews at Costco that are the same as a large Milkbone in length, but they are a little harder, and also a little thinner. They are great for her to chew with on her back teeth -- her mouth doesn't open wide enough yet at the back for some of her favorite bones, so these seem to help with that a lot, and she really likes them.

Today is the first time it's really rained since we've had her and that she's also gone out in it. It's sprinkled a few times, but today we got a very heavy rain. Her reaction was to chase the rain and run all over the yard in circles biting and pawing at it.

Otherwise, Juliette is doing very, very well. She's incredibly smart, and she's learned the "down" (lie down) command and hand signal. She has also learned out to catch, and she's learning, however hesitantly, the command "leave it." We practice "leave it" with treats and she isn't supposed to take them when we practice unless I give her permission. This will be really useful for going on walks when I don't want her to go after something. She's most hesitant about this skill, but she's getting better each day!

I'm so glad I have this cute little golden girl! :) She's definitely the best decision I've ever made and, in times of stress, she really seems to be in tune to me already. For example, I found out yesterday that my big sister from my sorority (who is basically my real sister) is moving, and I was very sad. She was very subdued and calm most of the morning and wouldn't leave my side.

She is now curled up in the pillows at the corner of the head of my bed. We are getting close to the point when I will let her sleep outside of the crate at night, if that's what she wants, but I will still keep a gate up in my room.

For now, I need to go get her crate situated for bed and get to bed myself -- I'll update more soon!

May the force be with you ...

Hi everyone!

I'm happy to report that Juliette is, per usual, doing incredibly well and getting bigger and smarter by the day. On Tuesday, she goes for her sixteen week booster shots and will be in her third week of puppy classes!

Since my last update, we have discovered a few new things about Juliette. As I've talked about, she's really into music and has been very interested in TV. With all the Oscar-buzz that was generated about Natalie Portman before and after she won, many of the Star Wars movies were on over the past week and a half or so. My family is really into Star Wars, and they have been playing in the background or we have been actively watching them over the past two weekends.

The first time that we realized Juliette had really noticed the sound was last weekend when Kyle was home. She was in my room with me while I was doing homework, and the computer generated sounds of R2-D2 caught her attention and she perked up immediately, jumped up, did an about-face, and ran down the hall! Now, when R2-D2 makes noises on the screen, she starts wagging her tail and wiggling and gets very happy. She will also lay on the couch and seriously watch what is going on on the screen. The sound effects and again, the music, really catch her attention.

She'd never seen the start of one of the movies before, so I put one in for fun tonight to see if she got excited about that music as well. My TV is on a dresser that stands about two and a half feet higher than my bed, and the dresser itself is at the end of my bed. When the music started with it, she was immediately entranced and put her paws up on the dresser and put her nose to the screen to watch, just like Lucky in "101 Dalmatians."

On Friday, Juliette made her first visit with me to my counselor's office. They are used to having therapy dogs in the office, and several patients bring their pets -- cats and dogs -- so I had permission ahead of time. She behaved very well and was mostly just anxious. Once my counselor decided we should just open the door and let her roam and explore for a bit (which was fine since I have an evening appointment outside of the offices and the its doctors normal operation) she was fine. I was mostly relieved that she didn't have any accidents!

On the topic of potty training, we are now going thirteen days with only two accidents, and they truly were accidents where she'd just woken up and suddenly had to go, and they were several days ago. I feel she's really getting the hang of it. We're also having to take her outside less, so she's getting used to it.

Other than that, over the weekend I was able to spend a night out for the first time since I got Juliette. I loved going out with my friends, but I really missed her, and couldn't wait to get home. I missed her not being there when I woke up. I'm so glad I have her in my life. However, my parents did enjoy a night to themselves with her and my dad brought her crate in their room voluntarily, which was nice since she sleeps in it in my room and can hear me breathing and sleeping all night and hasn't slept a night here without me feet away. She truly enjoyed "camping out" with my mom and dad, as my dad said, and tonight, she went into the bedroom with my dad when he went to bed early and really wanted to hang out in there for a little bit, which I think is great.

For now, she is sleeping soundly in her crate and I'm finishing watching the movie we started. :)

Until the next time, may the force be with you. ;)

Puppy see, puppy do

Hi everyone!

It's been awhile since I've updated. In the past few days, we've marked four weeks since I brought Juliette home, and her three month birthday (Feb. 21).

We've had a few really big events going on here for Miss Juliette.

The first of these is that we started puppy classes on Thursday. We go to Petsmart at 10:30 a.m. and our trainer's name is Craig. There are four other dogs in the class -- a Shiba-Inu, a Poodle-Shih-Tzu, a boxer/terrier mix, and another mix rescue puppy. Juliette is easily the most talkative person in class -- I guess that's not surprising given that I'm her owner and I'm a talkative person. She really wanted to get to know all the other dogs and have lengthy conversations with them while Craig was trying to instruct us. He first tried a water bottle, which works on most of the dogs, but Juliette likes water, so she thought it was a game. His second tactic worked much better -- he has something called bitter apple spray that he sprays just on her teeth, and it is sour, so it keeps her distracted and she doesn't bark at much. When he did it, he'd say simply and firmly "Quiet." By the end of the first 20 minutes, he didn't even have to pick up the spray to say quiet, and she now does it on command, no spray needed around the house for us 80% of the time!

Craig is a really cool trainer. He himself has seventeen dogs at home, ranging from five and a half months to sixteen years. He has a full range of breeds, including several pure-bred Border Collies (another breed I love), and he brings a few dogs to each class to demonstrate and it's very, very cool. Juliette already knew how to sit, so we were a little ahead in the first class, but one skill he's teaching us is "Watch," so that whenever I call her and get her to sit, she knows she's not just sitting, but that she is to be watching me for an indication of what to do next. We practice these things outside the room through the store, and she really made improvements. I was impressed with how fast she picked it up, even though she was surrounded by aisles and aisles of treats and toys, not to mention other pet owners who wanted to meet her and other dogs outside of her class. Craig also teaches some really cool frisbee classes for dogs once they get a little older, and I'm definitely going to sign her up! She's definitely a runner and a jumper and I think she'd really benefit from it. Craig himself holds several world records for some of the sports he competes in with his dogs (mostly frisbee throwing sorts of things that would be timed, or tricks). He's very inspirational!

On Wednesday night, I gave Juliette her first bath with me. The Howells obviously bathed while she was with them, and from what I've read, I'm not supposed to give her a bath more than once every three to four weeks because her skin is still sensitive. So, a couple times a week, I freshen her up with puppy wipes and spray and brush her (her hair is so light, something I'm not used to, so I'm determined to keep her clean!). But this past week, I wanted to give her a bath before her first class (yes, friends, I am a nerd in puppy class just like I am in my own classes -- I get really excited for the first day!) and I decided to embark upon this quest -- and it was a quest -- while my mom and dad weren't home, thinking there'd be less distractions.

Initially, she was a little nervous in the bath tub, and she really couldn't figure out why I was getting her wet. Eventually, she made friends with the faucet and realized how cool it was that water was coming out and she got all wiggly and happy with it (just like she does with the vacuum, as long as it isn't on) ... But when I turned on the shower head, that was a whole different story. That scared her a bit and she really tried to get out and left me with some battle scars. But twenty minutes washing time plus an hour to really get completely dry, some shampoo, a lot of Golden hair, three towels, two t-shirts, a pair of pajama pants, some blood, gauze and Neosporin later, she was clean and fluffy!

Finally, I am proud to report that Juliette is now potty-trained -- at least I hope I am not speaking too soon. As everyone knows, when I got Juliette home, she was mostly house broken, and she really didn't have any accidents for four days. Then, on and off for the next few weeks, it became more frequent. Several times, we could tell it was out of temper -- for example, she'd been told that she couldn't chew on a person or, no, she couldn't eat my boots. Sometimes, it was out of sadness -- like when my brother went back to school. But over the past couple weeks, she's gotten very consistent in her signs and how she tells us she needs to go. Aside from one little accident yesterday, she hasn't had any accidents now in almost eight days! :)

Otherwise, I am just still so thrilled with this little girl. She is growing immensely, and I get so many compliments on how pretty she is. Of course I'm biased, but I've had lots of Golden owners come up to me at Petsmart and say she's just so pretty. And she really is a sweetheart. I'm not much of an early-bird, though she is, but she is starting to get used to coming back up in bed and just cuddling or loafing with me while I sleep.

Kyle came home this weekend, and we took tons of pictures with his fancy camera, which is a digital SLR. I will be posting them soon, but for now, here's this pic -- one of my favorites from the weekend: