How Hunny Celebrates a Pretty Day

We had a couple of gorgeous spring-like days here in southern Ohio. I think Hunny enjoyed them even more than I did. She celebrated the sunny day by rolling around in the dirt, scooching down the hill on her back, and laying in the sun ALL DAY. I mean, this dog loves her food, but I could barely get her inside at dinner time!

The day ended with a bath. :-)

Its raining today, but still unseasonably warm. Bring on spring!

Labradors and Mud Puddles

This picture will be a very common site around here for the next few days. Lots of rain in Southern Ohio, and although Hunny isn't exactly fond of rainy days, she does love playing in the mud. :-)

She was also very excited to receive a fun gift from her doggy blog pal Abby. This cute Pooch Pouch for her treats and a Key Leash to take with us on our walks.

Abby's mom is the talented Stephanie of Loft Creations. Stephanie has generously posted tutorials for both of these items, plus lots of other fun projects, on her blog here. She also sells PDF patterns for her fabulous bags in her Etsy Shop.

A Dog's Life

Our dog Hunny…I know I haven’t written much (or anything at all) about Hunny since we first got her nearly a year and a half ago. Honestly, I wasn’t sure how long we would have her. To say this dog has been a challenge would be an extreme understatement.
We were not unaware of the perils of adopting a Labrador puppy. She’s not our first. We fully expected irritatingly boundless energy, destroyed furniture, chewed shoes, food snatching, behavior problems, and many trips to the vet due to ingesting any number of potentially harmful substances.
But, what I didn’t expect was to be constantly bullied, bruised, attacked, and bitten (sometimes aggressively so) by my year old puppy!
We did basic command training early. She is extremely smart. We tried to establish our dominance from day one by letting her know that we control the food, by not letting her sleep in our bed (re:photo, She knows she's not suppose to be up there.LOL)and by making her wait until we enter or exit the door first. We provided plenty of exercise; lots of play time and 2-3 mile walks every day, rain, heat or snow. But the biting and dominant behavior didn’t stop. So we finally contacted a private trainer. He confirmed that, yes, we had a difficult case on our hands. She was probably the “alpha dog” of her pack and was very reluctant to give up that title to us. He also suspects that she was separated from her mother too early and never learned what “too rough” play was. Surprisingly, she is submissive to other dogs and is fairly good around kids. With some of the techniques that the trainer showed us, things are slowly getting better. The biting incidents are getting fewer and farther between. But she is still too rough for me to trust her unleashed around small children or the elderly. After seeing some of my horrendous bruises, friends have asked why we haven’t gotten rid of her. Don’t think we haven’t thought about it! But, we take our role as pet owners very seriously. We adopted this dog and it was our responsibility to make her a good, stable pet citizen. And we knew that with our personal circumstances,it was possible.
I have high hopes that as she gets older and past the stage of the wild energy bursts that seem to be the cause most of the problems, she will be a wonderful, intelligent, gentle, and loyal dog.
And I have to say, to this dog’s credit, she has not destroyed any furniture or possessions with the exception of a few shoes, has never gotten up to the counter to steal food, and doesn’t beg at the table. She rides in the car like a dream, loves to play with other dogs, is friendly (although rough) with people, and is very good on walks. And let’s face it, she is a beautiful dog!

So, that’s my tumultuous year with Hunny. Here’s hoping the next year will be less painful.

Oh, and in that last photo you can see a bit of the new fence we had installed. More on that in the next post.

Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

...Especially when they are active puppies. ;-)

Hunny plays hard and can fall asleep pretty much anywhere. Such a sweetie!

I also just made her a new dog bowl mat out of Amy Butler laminate fabric. I'll get some pictures taken and show you that in the next post.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

A New Addition to the Family

I'd like you all to meet our new little puppy, Honey. She's an 8 week old yellow lab with a very sweet disposition. We drove down to a farm in Kentucky to see her and her mom and dad yesterday after work and brought her home that evening.





I wanted to name her Daisy, but hubby seemed to settle on Honey and was going to be calling her that no matter what I named her, so I finally gave in. I think I may have to insist on spelling it with a "U" and double "N", though. Hunny just looks cuter. :-)