I took Lana out immediately after she woke up and then went upstairs to get Luci to take her out. When I came back there was a big old poop on the pee pad! Go Lana!
Pee spots on the hallway too - double sigh......
Making breakfast was the same old story - Lana on her feet interrupted by chasing a cat or two. Treat trick worked for a while, then we went out into the yard and it didn't work anymore.
The cats are starting to become annoyed, albeit unimpressed so I figure they'll get used to it.
Today was a relatively warm day so we took all dogs on a longer walk - whatever long is when you're walking a chubby chihuahua and two seniors. We're talking like 20 minutes :).
Lana likes the walks, but is slow. Weird, considering all the energy she puts into constantly being up in the kitchen and running into the living room and back.
I had some things to do in the kitchen during the day and Lana just wouldn't settle down. Finally, after about 2 hours, she proceeded to lie down on a bed so there's hope!
She loves the chicken stew I cooked for her, and I managed to dig up a bottle of enzymes and micronutrients to add to the food. She and the other dogs also get an oil mix and glucosamine treats which she devours.
I tried to give her a Bach Flower Essence mix to help her with the change in her surroundings, but she hates it. And I thought it was hard to get the cats' mouths open to administer medicine! The other dogs like it, licking it right off of the eye dropper.
Twice a day I try to get some Petzlife Oral Spray into Lana's mouth. I've had great success with it on the chis, who have had real tooth problems before they came to me.
I think the damage in Lana's mouth is too great to be remedied by the spray, but it might give her some relief before it can be attended to.
The shelter said they'd arrange a tooth-cleaning, but given her age and low weight I don't know when that'll be - hopefully I'll find out next week.
All the education I have about poodles is a 20-minute feature on Animal Planet that I watched by accident. According to them poodles are the second smartest dog breed, the first being border collies. They also require a certain amount of grooming so I tried the brush on Lana. She let it happen without a hitch, but I'll have to find out from the shelter who does the grooming, if Lana's ever been seen by a vet and what vaccinations she has.
I then hit up the internet for information on the canine heat cycle since I've never had an unspayed female dog. I might be looking at buying diapers since dogs apparantly don't go through menopause - darn!
Since Lana didn't have a collar, Tom decided that a lady like her needed some bling. He tried to find a rhinestone collar at a well-known box store, but couldn't find one in her size so he got her a snazzy pink one along with a matching coat.
We got Josephine from a rescue group and I email the lady that runs the group on a regular basis. She works in a pet boutique and had sent me gorgeous rhinestone collars for Luci and Josi a few weeks ago. She also made necklaces for the two and they look so pretty! When she heard that Lana needed some bling she offered to look at her store for a collar. She also immediately made a necklace for her too - how nice is that?
Thank you, Barb, for all you do!!!!
Tomorrow is a work day for both Tom and me which presents a whole new situation. We had to figure out who was going to take Lana on a walk when. The chis only want to go for a walk a.) when the weather is perfect and b.) it involves a car ride, but, having read some poodle stuff online, Lana needs daily walks, no matter what.
I volunteered to take her out before school, meaning around 6.30 a.m., and Tom will take her before work, meaning around 2.30 p.m.
We live on a circular road without much traffic, but there's traffic on the adjoining streets. Whenever we go for a walk we have a procession of cats following us, especially Messerschmitt, our youngest.
She'll follow us anywhere, so we basically have to sneak out of the house when we walk out of the circle to avoid her running on the street after us. That'll be quite a challenge!
When it was time so settle down on the couch, Luci and Josi came up the doggy steps and got themselves comfortable - and Lana went right on her dog bed next to the couch and fell asleep. Amazing!
As of now, Lana hasn't peed in the house for the last 4 hours, but the day hasn't ended yet.
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