Her first bath at "home"!A little itty bitty puppy came to live with us on March 21, 2008. She was a gift to Dewayne from his mother, Ruth, for his birthday last year. She was only a month old on March 7th, the day after his birthday, so we didn't get her then. We knew what Mom was planning but we didn't know what kind of puppy or when we would get it. After much discussion and deliberation, we finally named her Kohl.......because she is black, we were tossing around names that meant "black" for a few days. When we got her, she weighed about two pounds and was six weeks old. She seems so tiny and fragile. She couldn't climb the stairs and she would cry because they scared her. Her breeder said she was a full blood toy poodle and she'd get to be about 6 pounds when full grown. She slept in the bathtub to start with. She had a little bed in there, a potty training pad and some toys, along with her food and water dish. Soon, she was too big for the bathtub and figured out how to jump out. She moved into the bathroom. We soon figured out that the toilet paper wasn't safe on the roller. We'd come home and all the toilet paper that was on the roller would be shredded all over bathroom.
But it didn't take her long to grow. She grew and grew and learned how to go up and down the stairs. Pretty soon, she learned how to jump up onto the couch, then up onto the bed. When she was 9 weeks old, we met with her breeder and she showed up how to give Kohl her shots. She had her first one at 6 weeks, the next one at 9 weeks and the last one at 12 weeks. At 12 weeks, when she was due, Heidi (my niece, who lives in NC) was here and with her help, we managed to give her her shot. It was quite an ordeal.....I don't like needles used on me, but I really don't like using a needle on a dog. She will then need booster shots every year.
As she learned how to use her "potty pad" instead of the carpet or the rug by the door, her area expanded. As her bedroom or confinement area (or "jail"), she now has the bathroom and the hall and sometimes the back room. If I accidently don't get the computer room (or spare room) door latched, she expands her area a little bit. When one or both of us are home, she is usually free to run amok about the house. Unless we are eating something tasty and she is hard to fend off because we aren't at the table, then she goes to "jail".
With her "mommy" & "daddy"!
Showing off her "show dog" haircut!!She is a good dog. She is trained completely to use her "pad" in the bathroom for going potty. She will go outside but we haven't trained her to tell us when. Which is lucky for me, because I am confined right now and she goes on her own into the bathroom whenever she needs to relieve herself. We make sure she comes into the bathroom with us if we are showering or the door is going to be closed, because that is her "potty" area and it wouldn't be kind to block her path and then punish her if there was an accident due to our negligence. We can now have the toilet paper roll on the roller by the toilet. AND we are planning to train her to go potty outside when the weather warms up! :-) As a big dog person (we always had big dogs when I was growing up), I must say that this little dog has made me love her like no other dog has. Since Kohl has been our "baby" for a year now, I hope when our baby arrives she will be able to adjust to having a new kid on the block!!
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