Maggie's Training

[Stacy]

Maggie's trainer came back today and he was very impressed with how much improvement he saw. Go us! I also see improvement in her confidence, but I think being with her every day it's harder for me to see the changes. But I did notice when she got in bed with me a couple times last night! 

We are going to continue to work on crate training. I like his style. Now that she happily goes in and out of the crate for treats we are going to work on shutting the door for about 5 minutes at a time while throwing treats in. We will slowly increase the time that she's in there and work on being out of sight for short periods of time as well. Eventually the crate should become her safe spot and hopefully will solve the potty problems that we're having. The crate is sort of the key thing to address the other issues.

We're also going to work on going for daily field trips and letting strangers give her treats. We are going to slowly and carefully introduce her to the world. He also thought that our group training class is a good idea as long as we go into it with the idea that we might not learn anything, but that it will still benefit her to be out in a new place with people and other dogs (dogs are not her problem, she loves dogs!) 

Katie was in her crate working on a Kong while we were working with Maggie and at the end we let her out, and he said that Katie makes a huge difference in Maggie's confidence and that she's learning so much good stuff from her. What good sweet girls I have. It's really so rewarding to do the work to transform Maggie's life into the one that she always should have had.

[Amy and Annabelle]

They are cute together. Glad to hear things are improving.

[Stacy]

They are really sweet together. They play so hard! When they get a little too rambunctious they break apart and they both shake it off and then start playing again. Dog communication is so interesting. 

[Jane, Guinness and Murphy]

Great...sure sounds like things are moving in the right direction.

[Stacy]

Slowly but surely. I hope someday she is as confident as Katie and she thinks that the whole world was created just to love her. But I hope that she listens maybe just a tiny bit better than Katie does. 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

This is wonderful! Yay for you and Maggie! Keep up the good work! 

[Stacy]

You think Maggie read any of that book last night while she was munching on it? ;) 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Maybe the info was just absorbed, lol.

[Amy and Annabelle]

If that's what happens, then Annabelle should be a master gardner.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

LOL!!!

[Stacy]

My girls can help you garden! Just tell them where you want the hole. 

[Amy and Annabelle]

I will be planting some fruit trees when it warms up. They can dig those holes.

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Thank you for the update.  It sounds like you found a great trainer.  Keep up the good work!