Time Flies When You're Having Fun!

My goodness! I can't believe how fast time has sped by this winter. Can't say that I'm wanting it to slow down exactly, since the weather here in Texas has been colder than normal. Spring can't get here fast enough!

A quick update on Ms. Tula: She is still looking for her forever home. Seems the right one has not come along just yet. I never give up hope - her family is out there. In the meantime, I'm quite enjoying her company while she's here. She is a sweet soul and as I've come to discover, a bit of clown, too!

Ms. Lisa has made some interesting new progressive leaps in her behavior. Her favorite pastime of scratching has dramatically reduced in recent weeks. Yay!!! In fact, her scratching at her crate pan has completely vanished: she no longer does it in either of her 2 crates. Even, the frequency of her wall scratching episodes has also declined. Now, she will scratch once or twice then, come to me. Of course, if I'm standing right next to her favorite scratching spot before she starts, she just looks up at me and then comes over or follows me as I lead her away.

In other recent Lisa news, her downs have become more consistent. She often would require me to repeat the hand signal a few times before she would lay down, but now we're down to once or twice. One other change has been her willingness to just sit on her own, just cuz! I love it! It's a behavior that she rarely offers and one that when she does I try to reward. If I'm especially lucky, she may even lay down and relax on her own, too! For a dog who never sat or laid down at all, these are huge milestones.

Her health has been great! She's been doing well and completely recovered from her ordeal in December. I did a bit of trimming around her face to allow her to see better and wow! she was like a new dog. It wasn't like I had never clipped the hair so she could see before, I just did it differently so it would stay out of her face. I guess it made an impact. :-)

Lisa's hearing has been playing cruel tricks on her. When the other dogs bark or a loud noise happens, she gets startled very easily, more so than she has in the past. When this happens, she wants to scatter and get away from the area quickly. Perhaps, her increased awareness of her surroundings has also led to this. I combat the situation by going to her, telling her she's okay and petting her a few times in a calm, purposeful way. I don't console, just steady her and let her know everything is fine. A few times now, she's actually turned to me when she's gotten freaked about a loud noise and that's what I want ultimately. Defer to me and I will let you know what's what. Speaking of increased awareness, she still sits and watches the activity outside her crate. Even if I think she's asleep, she gets the scent of me, my husband, or the other dogs walking past and she wakes up and looks around to see what's going on.

Again, all positive signs that we still are waking up even more parts of her sleepy brain!

Photos are of Lisa & Tula sharing a snack as I was refilling the food bin. They took turns each grabbing a bite! Naughty grrrlz! LOL