Arnie receives a present

Arnie is really doing great! Since I last posted, he is mostly sleeping through the night. He gets quite sleepy around 8PM, goes outside around 10PM and then usually sleeps until 6AM. He's also getting very used to the crate and goes right to sleep. With Bob being home mostly full time, Arnie is getting lots of attention. When Bob goes out for a few hours and can't take Arnie, Arnie has been doing well in the crate.

We have started clicker training and Arnie is responding quite well. We are also training him to walk on the left with his leash when outside. He is also responding well to our loud and schrill yips when he grabs us with those littler razor sharp teeth.

Arnie is getting along great with the other dogs. Ada, our black lab, in particular plays very well with the Arnie. Coco will still get overly curt if puppy pushes too many boundaries with her. Ada on the other hand can take quite a bit of abuse from Arnie. The most fun is when Arnie tries to get Ada to chase him. He lowers his butt and takes off like a crazed hyena.

Christmas Eve we leave for a week in Honduras. Arnie is going off to stay with Chris, one of the Occupaws trainers.

Coco plays tug with Arnie

This morning we woke to quite a bit of snow. Took Arnie out and he enjoyed running through the deep powder! We are doing well keeping on track of getting him outside regularly to pee and poo. He is getting to know his way around quite well. He knows exactly where the door is when it is time to go back inside. We took Arnie over to the neighbors house to watch the Packers game on their large screen. Arnie did a bit of exploring and then slept through most of the game. Later in the afternoon we had a bit of a break through with Coco and Arnie -- they played tug with one of the stuffed chew toys. It was fun to watch. I love when Arnie fake attacks and then runs away and dives under the table before the big dogs can get him!

Ada plays with Arnie!

On Saturday, December 11th, we went to visit a friend would would be taking care of Ada when we are on vacation at the end of December. We put Arnie in his crate and loaded all the dogs in the car and headed to Fitchburg. Ken has one older dog and when we arrived, he was dog sitting a young golden retriever. We brought in Ada and Arnie. Ada immediately hit it off with the two older dogs, and ran around the house exploring. Arnie too was excited and was doing some exploring on his own. David stuck with him carrying a spare towel in case of an accident. While there, we had a bit of a breakthrough in relations between Ada and Arnie -- Ada actually started to play with Arnie! Arnie would take off running and Ada would chase after him. It was great to see them actually starting to communicate in this fun playful way.

Later that night, we were participating in the neighborhood holiday progressive party. About 40 people descended on our house and Arnie was the center of attention! He got so worn out from being passed around that he fell asleep in the middle of the floor amidst the forest of legs! Because it was a progressive party, everyone left and went to the next house and Arnie went into his crate for a good nap. We checked on him periodically and let him out a few times. He did very well in his crate. A good tip from Barb that we didn't know -- peanut butter inside the kong will keep him occupied and happy in his crate!

Meeting Arnie and his family

Bob, David and Andrew traveled to Cross Plains on December 8th to pick up Arnie and meet his family. His brothers and sisters are all adorable! We had a good time playing with the puppies while Bob went over the guide dog training details with Barb, the VP of Occupaws. We said our good byes to Barb and Arnie's family and loaded into the car. Arnie rode in the back in Andrew's lap. He did very well -- just a little bit of whining. Andrew kept him calm and comforted. We were very excited to see how Arnie would be greeted by our two labs. Coco is 7 and a chocolate lab. Ada is 5 and is a black lab. Well, it turns out, they didn't want to have anything to do with poor little Arnie. Coco growled and barked, and Ada ran and hid. Oh well, we figured it might take some adjustment. We went through this before when Coco was a puppy and our older dog didn't want to be bothered.

Arnie spent the first night in our bed. I think we had to get up 3 times to take him out. Luckily, there were no accidents on the bed!

Arnie comes to live with us!

Arnie is a puppy we are raising for the Occupaws guide dog association. Arnie was born on October 13, 2010. He was the 8th born of 9 puppies. All the puppies were given a different color collar. Arnie was Mr. Purple. We brought Arnie home with us on December 8th. This blog will chronicle our time with Arnie.