Introducing....Sherman

So Miguel did it. He got himself a puppy. Wait, before Miguel gets defensive, Miguel got Josh a puppy. A little boy black lab puppy - very possibly a pure-bred. We found him on Craig's list and they wanted $50 for each puppy. I guess the dad is pure-bred, AKC registered, and has no family history of hip displaysia, thank goodness. The mom they aren't so sure about. She was a rescue who was supposedly spayed - HAHA - and also supposedly pure-bred. Regardless of blood-status, I wasn't about to pay for a puppy. Haven't you heard the saying, "There's no such thing as a free puppy?" So I said no. Miguel eventually talked the guy down to $30 and Miguel is paying for everything - shots, neutering, etc - out of his own allowance (yes, our budget gives each of us an "allowance").

Anywho - after 3 days of namelessness, I suggested Sherman. Miguel wanted something which started with an S to go with the other dogs (Sarge and Sadie), but we couldn't think of anything we both liked. I remembered Rocky and Bullwinkle and the "Mr. Peabody and his boy Sherman" cartoon. I thought it would be funny to have a puppy named Sherman, and Miguel agreed. His reasoning was different from mine, though. He wanted to name him Sherman after General Sherman, as a slap-in-the-face to any Southern-pride rednecks. This makes me laugh, at least. Regardless of our reasons, we finally decided on a name and it's Sherman.

Sherman follows Josh around and pulls at his clothes. Josh thinks it is great to have an animal smaller than him. It hasn't taken Josh very long to learn to be gentle, so he hasn't tried to pick Sherman up by the hair (yes, hair, not skin) recently. Josh pets him nicely and loves it when the puppy "plays" with him, though the little needle-teeth come out sometimes and Josh occasionally ends up crying...oh well. They'll both figure it out. It's fun to watch Josh carry the dog toys around and the puppy chasing him with his little puppy run.

Sadie loves the puppy. She licks him and makes sure he is safe. She comes and gets us when he cries. She plays with him and lets him play with her. Sarge, on the other hand has taken awhile to warm up to the puppy. He would growl at him at first, but has since started playing with him and even allowing him to sleep next to him, so long as it isn't on his bed. He won't allow the puppy to take his toys either. It's pretty funny to see the 70lbs dog growling at the little 3.5lbs dog; and funny to see how stubborn the puppy can be. Sometimes it takes Sarge grabbing him by the neck and knocking him over before Sherman will belly-up.

Sherman is taking very well to potty training. As long as we're paying attention to him, we don't have any accidents in the house. He even lets us know he needs to go out sometimes, whining at the back-door. He's only 7 weeks, so we know we have a while of inconsistency to go, but we're pleased so far.

So no more dogs for us. At least, not until we have a bigger house...

Like a creepy cat lady, but with dogs...

Our house has recently been a foster home to random animals within the neighborhood. Miguel jokes that we are becoming "that family with all the dogs" and we'll end up with a huge pack of them and end up destitute. Ok, so we're not seriously that insane. We do like to help out animals when we find them or even foster for a few days when we discover or suspect mistreatment. We haven't kept one...yet...but I know it is coming, as Miguel seems to be on the prowl for another dog. I'm ok with our getting another dog, but I'm not interested in helping to house-train another puppy. We'll see what happens.

So our most recent acquisition has been a yellow-lab mix named Bella. She is awfully cute, has short short hair and is very energetic. Miguel found her on craigs' list and thought she would make our fun little family a bit bigger. She is about 14 weeks old and was kept from having to go to the pound when her owner was deployed to Iraq. The family who took her has 2 small kids and must not have had any idea what it would be like to house-train a puppy without a fenced yard. They decided as much as they loved her, it was time to pass her along because they couldn't handle her.

So our crazy-family enters the picture. Bella seems to get along with the other dogs ok, but she seems to be quite high maintenance. She won't submit to the older/bigger dogs (stubborn little thing), she gets upset if she is not able to sit on the couch and she has no concept of the word No. She doesn't act as though she has ever been disciplined, she digs and she is aspiring to become Houdini - she attempts to leave the yard at every available opportunity. She also proved her previous owner exaggerating when he said she is just about potty trained, as she gives no indication of needing to go outside, and when she is outside, she won't do her "business" until we've come back into the house. We kept her for about 3 days before Miguel decided he didn't want her and passed her along to someone new - someone without any other dogs and with older kids to tire out the high-energy animal. Bye Bye Bella, as cute as you are, I won't miss you.

We handed Bella off to her new owners on a Saturday morning. The following Tuesday, Miguel was in Petsmart and had both Sarge and Sadie with him. He sees Bella, but doesn't think it is really her because the owner is not who we handed her off to. Miguel is a bit puzzled because our dogs aren't going crazy, it's as if they know this little yellow thing, and Miguel mentions to the lady that we were fostering a dog who looked exactly like the dog in her possession. She looks a bit embarrassed and admits her husband found the dog with no collar and after having her for a couple of days decided they love her and want to keep her - but asked us if we wanted her back. Bella looked extremely pampered and happy, so Miguel told her the people we gave her to don't deserve her if they can't keep her in the yard and he let it go at that (and no, Miguel isn't heartless, but this dog was such a handful that I'm sure it's better this way). So Bella has hopefully found her permanent home.

Life at a Year and 5 Months

My son doesn't watch much TV. He is usually much too busy pulling all of his toys out of his toybox and spreading them about the part of the house he can get to. Occasionally he stops and will look at the TV - especially if he hears Elmo. In the mornings it is usually childrens' shows on TV or the news, depending on whether Miguel is watching it or not.

In addition to Elmo, Josh also likes a show called, "The Big, Comfy, Couch" which is about a clown and her doll who hang out on the Big, Comfy Couch and talk about various child-friendly, educational things - like having a bad day, or being rude, or sharing. There is usually a song (my fav being about your belly button), or dance routine of some kind and the main clown usually reads a story at some point. At the end of the show, she always cleans up after herself (my favorite part), claiming, "I made the mess, so I have to clean up, it's only fair!." But I digress...

This was the first TV show Josh ever showed interest in, so whenever we think of it we'll turn it on in the mornings. At the beginning of the show she always does a stretch routine on this big rug that looks like a clock. Recently, Josh has taken to joining in. When Loonette says she is going to do her clock-rug-stretch and lays down on her rug, he'll lay down and put his legs in the air. He doesn't really follow along, but when Miguel and I realized what he was doing we cracked up. I guess he does it whenever the show is on now. It makes me laugh. I have only ever seen 1 other set of kids "interact" with the TV and I don't remember doing it when I was a kid. He also will wave to her when she waves at the beginning of the show.

As for what he does the rest of the day - he eats 'Banananas' and carries his toys around the house. He usually has cars strewn everywhere. He talks ALL the time, in this Josh-gibberish that we can't understand. He practically runs everywhere he goes, which can be pretty entertaining when there are toys all over the floor because he trips and falls over things all the time. Then again, he trips and falls over nothing at times too...

Here is a little video of Josh just being Josh. Sorry it's a bit blurry, but he's talking and running around like he does every day, so I thought you might enjoy:

Josh Loves the Dogs

I'm very excited about this post - I'm a nerd, regardless of if I try and hide it. I love technology.

I found a way to post videos of my kid on my blog.

So here it is - the first one. This was last Sunday after church.

Josh has learned a few things about the dogs. He knows he can push them out of his way. He knows Sadie will just sit there and let him use her as a step-stool. He also knows the signal to get Sarge to speak. The other night I was changing Josh's diaper. He was not where he could see Miguel, but he could hear him; Miguel was telling Sarge to speak. What does Josh do? He started making the signal! I laughed pretty well with that one.

I laughed again today. Miguel took Sadie to the vet (her eyes have been weeping and we can't tell why, though she is not acting sick). Sadie barked while they were in the waiting room and Josh told her to, "Shut up!" What terrible parents we are that we have told the dogs to Shut up enough that Josh knows...And sadly, there was no way for any onlookers to know that we don't actually tell Josh to shut up! Thankfully he didn't say it again. I suppose we get to really start thinking more about what we say before we say it now, here we thought we had been being pretty good about teaching our kid manners. I'm sure this is just the beginning...