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Wow, a lot has happened in the last three days. Saturday the animals went to the vet for their shots, and Kitty got to have her anal glands expressed, boy, that was fun. She *really* enjoyed that. Jilly weighs 4 pounds now.
We've been working on sit, down, and stand more. We spent a whole training session on Saturday working on doing it off of just hand signals and just voice. Jilly is excellent at doing them based on hand signals but not so good at doing it based on voice. We also worked a bit on crawling. Sunday we worked more on the regular stuff, and added rolling over into the mix. It is *really* hard to get her to roll over! I watched a video on youtube showing how to do it, but she doesn't want to follow it over with her nose like the video, so far I've gotten her to roll over a few times, both yesterday and today. Then we work on sit and down a lot because getting her to down without a treat confuses her a lot. I can't give her a treat after down because then she sits after she gets the treat, so I just have to get her to down again anyway.
But, no more working on rolling over for a while, because we're going to Puppy Class!!!! Starting Wednesday, I'm soooo nervous, what if we do badly? What if we're behind with Jilly? What if she goes insane and won't focus? She needs her harness and leash and treats and toys. Apparently the puppies get to play during class. We'll see how Jilly is sharing her toys. She never growls anymore when we take one from her, and she doesn't bark like she used to whenever the cats played with them, but she'd never had to share a toy with another dog.
And final good Jilly news, she has taken to standing by the door when she needs to go out. It's only if she's been playing on the floor, sometimes she'll go to the door and we take her straight out, but she potties every time. We also still take her out as soon as she begins to leave the couch and if she doesn't potty she goes in her crate and is taken out every 30 minutes until she does go. It seems to be working. And she's loving her free time in the back yard whenever she does go potty.
And the last of the preChristmas pictures, or at least the December 22nd and earlier pictures.
These next two are Elphie and Kitty watching Jilly play with the spinny thing.
My sister came to visit for a couple of days, and Jilly was very excited to see her Auntie Jackie. We went to the mall today and I finally got to shop in Fetch, the pet store that basically only has stuff for dogs. I didn't realize they sold dogs until we stopped in, but there they were, most likely puppy mill specials. There were two Papillons, but they looked more like Papillon/Jack Russell crosses. It was weird, the ears were right, as far as shape and size, but there was very little hair in the ears, and their bodies weren't furry. They also didn't have the refined muzzle that Jilly has. Something was very "wrong" about them, though their tails did curl over their backs the way Jilly's does.
Kitty and Jilly are playing more and more, it mainly looks like Jilly running around the living room while Kitty kind of walks after her, Jilly seems to like it though and Kitty must not be having a bad time, or else she wouldn't be on the floor with Jilly. Jilly doesn't really chase Kitty, though she does walk towards her and bark.
Jilly got her first greenie today, my sister was telling us that the Japanese Chin my parents had while I was in college would take a month to finish a greenie. Jilly polished hers off in just under 15 minutes. She *loved* it. It was the smallest size available, and I watched her the whole time she ate it, to ensure she didn't get any big pieces. The box says to give one per day, but I don't think she'll be getting nearly that many!
I've been reflecting on how much I think Jilly will like agility. She already runs up the ramp made of pillows laid on boxes, dives under couches and legs, jumps over legs, and has no problem standing on the hole box while it's upside down and laying on a long toy so that it shifts around as Jilly moves from edge to edge.
Oh, and the biggest news of all tonight??? Jilly went to the door twice to signal she wanted to go out. She doesn't stay at the door long, but she doesn't really venture onto that side of the living room when playing, so it usually means something when she does. And in those two cases tonight, it did, woohoo! I also discovered that she will sit and lay down based solely on my hand signals, with no words, as long as she's focused on me already.
I almost forgot, I clipped the nails on her front paws with hardly any struggle. I was impressed by how still she stayed and how quickly she settled down when she did struggle. I'll probably try her back feet again tomorrow.
Cats may be better at hunting, but dogs are better at entertaining themselves. Jilly loves this box with holes in it that we had for the cats. We put her tennis balls in it and she would get them out. Then she started doing the oddest thing...after getting her tennis balls out, she would put the balls back IN! Not only that, but the next day, and following days, she would be playing fetch and take her balls over to the box with holes and put them in one of the holes. She would also try to put some of her stuffed toys in the holes as well. It was pretty amazing, and cute, to watch.
Yesterday Jilly went on a half mile walk, she loved it. We ran part of it and walked (well, I walked, she trotted) most of it. She's doing good on the leash, but one line of the walkway was stop and go because there's a line of trees that drops leaves and sticks and stuff on the asphalt. I can't wait until she's better trained on the leash, then we can do a real jog and actually get her tired out.
It's kind of funny watching the difference between dogs and cats in play. Jilly is smart, but Kitty is a much smarter hunter. It'll be interesting to see if that changes, the way Elphie got smarter as she matured. Right now Jilly doesn't anticipate where a toy is going, she just goes after where it is. It's a big change from Kitty, who will watch the toy move for a few seconds, until she *knows* where it's going, then she pounces.
Of course, the cats can also do some crazy midair acrobatics as well, and Jilly mainly stays on the ground (we also don't ask her to jump at her young age, so keep the toys on the ground too). Last night we started working on getting Jilly to touch the bells we got for her to use as a signal that she needs to go outside. It was kind of surprising, because she really didn't seem to like touching the bell. But we'll keep working on it.
