Yoga at your own risk

On weeknights it can be so difficult to find time to go to the gym. I usually rush out of work and head home right away, to where the dogs are usually pretending they've had an even rougher day than me. I hate leaving them to go work out after I've already been gone all day, but I also need to do something after sitting in front of a computer all day. So to tackle this dilemma, my sister and I decided to try out a home yoga dvd. Yoga is all about relaxation and meditation. We knew in order to get any quiet time, we've have wear the dogs out first. After work, we took the Newfies and her Rottweiler for a swim in our pool to get some energy out. We always throw the ball all the way across the pool and make Thatcher and Blaise take turns bringing it back. Blaise used to be able to keep going much longer than Thatcher, but Thatch has been getting back in shape with this new form of exercise. He's been bouncier, happier and has much more endurance. We've been counting how many times they each go after the ball, and tend to lose track around 25. Boden will fetch a couple of times in the shallow end, but doesn't enjoy swimming far distances. Instead, he prefers to sit on the pool ledge and watch the other two. So after they finally got tuckered out of swimming, we went inside to set up for our yoga time.

Because Boden's front leg is still bothering him and he's gimping around, we allowed him to stay in the room with us while we did yoga. We can't leave him and Blaise alone unsupervised because their wrestling gets pretty wild, and I don't want Boden's leg getting worse. We gave Blaise and Thatcher bones and blocked them out of the room with a baby gate. With all the dogs seemingly settled down, we started the dvd and tried to get into the zone. We got about two minutes in, when Blaise started whining outside the door. We told her to hush and pressed on with our "relaxing" flow. She then proceeded to cry for the entire 40 minutes. Nothing would stop her. Every 30 seconds or so, we would just hear this sad, pathetic crying. And that's just what was happening outside the room. Mr. Boden thought my yoga mat was placed on the floor for specifically for him. He kept rolling around happily, right under my legs, forcing me to awkwardly stretch around him and fight for my balance. At times he would playfully bite my hands or ankles, assuming that I was on the floor just to entertain him. So I can't quite say our yoga practice was a success, but at least we have plenty of room for improvement. Making through five minutes without having to scold a dog would be a good start. Until next time.

Night owl

Boden sleeping. A sight that is rare these days.

Boden has turned into a little monster at night. He wanders up and down the stairs clunking bones and toys around, looking for trouble. I don't know what's gotten in to him, but I feel like the parent of a newborn baby. Every couple of hours, he'll come over to my side of the bed and shove his face in mine to wake me up. When he's certain I'm awake, he'll hop up part way onto the bed to be pet for a few minutes. Sometimes he has a toy in his mouth, sometimes not. The first few times he did this, I assumed he was trying to tell me he had to go potty. So I begrudgingly trudged down the stairs to let him out, only to discover he just wants to play and has absolutely no need or desire to go potty.

Well last night, I let the dogs out at 11pm for the last time. After I climbed back into bed, I heard him banging around in the living room downstairs. Really loudly. I figured he was probably just dragging around a bone or knocking something over, so I tried to fall back asleep. The loud thumping continued for awhile, then stopped. Just as I was starting to drift off again, the noise started. I decided to go check on him downstairs and at least make sure no one was breaking into our house or anything. I get out of bed and accidentally step on Thatcher, who's sleeping on the floor next to me. I walk downstairs and into the living room, and Boden is nowhere to be seen. Then I hear the thumping again. I stand there, puzzled, until I realize he has accidentally shut himself in the bathroom. Not the first time this has happened, I might add.

I open the door and let him out of the prison he created. He sprints into the living room happily, and I see his cheeks are bursting because he has something in his mouth. I reach out to grab him , and he dances away playfully, clearly proud of himself and whatever's hiding in those jowls. We've caught him running around with toothpaste and shower gel (separate occasions) before, so I wanted to make sure whatever he had in his mouth wasn't going to harm  him. I finally catch him, only to discover it's just the empty cardboard tube from a roll of toilet paper. I throw it back in the bathroom garbage, shut the bathroom door, and head back to bed. He was already attempting to wake me up again about an hour later. I should have just left him in the bathroom, then maybe I would have gotten a full night's sleep for once.

Tasmanian Devils

Boden's little digging-through-the-bathroom-garbage incident the other night did not hold a candle to what I came home to yesterday. I can't prove it was Boden, but I'm fairly confident he was the ringleader. The entire house (all three floors) were such a disaster, I didn't even have time to document it all with photographs. The funniest part is that the dogs were home alone for one hour total the entire day. J left for work at 3pm, and I was home by 4pm. It makes me laugh, thinking of how fast the dogs must have worked to cause that much damage in just one hour. It's actually impressive. Here's how my night went.

I arrived home and immediately switched to snow boots to take the dogs for a walk while it was still light out. We tromped, through drizzling rain, to the park up the street and I let the dogs run in the fields for a while. We got back home, and as I began taking off my boots I noticed Thatcher was acting kind of strange. He sat unmoving in the kitchen and seemed frozen in place. I walk into the living room to find torn apart books littering the carpet. I scolded the dogs and told them they were naughty, then cleaned up the mess. But even once the mess was cleaned up, Thatcher still looked worried, which was unusual. I headed upstairs and immediately found out why Thatcher was being so weird. 

The entire hallway, bedroom, guest bedroom and bathroom floors were covered in shredded remnants of tissues, leftover Christmas gift bags, magazines and bathroom trash. I immediately called the dogs upstairs, and at first they wouldn't even come. I could see them waiting at the bottom of the stairway, hiding in the shadows. I called them again, and they slowly tiptoed up the stairs, trying to avoid my angry glare. I had to pull out my camera and snap a few shots before I scolded them. They are pretty easy to punish, and are much harder on themselves than I am on them. All I usually do is say, "Thatcher, what is this? That is so naughty," in a stern voice (trying to keep from smiling), and both of the dogs drop to the ground apologetically, wagging their tails meekly. They acted sad until the mess was completely cleaned up, then it was out of sight, out of mind. They're good at pretending to be sorry at least, what more could I ask of them.

Pre-scolding

During scolding

Pre-scolding

During scolding

During scolding

After scolding. No remorse :)

Vote

Not the most pleasant morning. I woke up to the dogs jumping onto the bed and smothering me. We went downstairs, and while they usually sprint down the stairs ahead of me, they trailed behind this time. I knew something was up. I entered into a living room full of potty accidents. Five, to be exact. I kept myself calm and continued to the back door to let the dogs out. We then made it to the entry way, which was covered with shredded garbage - coffee grounds, paper towels, banana peels, etc. The entire garbage can had been completely torn apart. I know who the guilty party is. Thatcher hasn't done anything like this in at least a solid year. But of course, when I scolded them, he acted just as distraught as Boden. So I spent the next 20 minutes cleaning up garbage, opening windows to air out the smells and scrubbing the carpet. Fun way to kick off the day. But on another note, we're very excited it's election day! I'm getting ready to head to the polls and am interested to see how close this race turns out to be.