Ten months ago we brought home these two cuties…
Checking out the noises beyond the balcony
They have acclimated into our family quite nicely… the first 5 months was a bit of a challenge while we tried to keep Penny low-key while she recovered from heartworm treatment, and Duke has come a long way from being the scared little boy, he is much more trusting of us now. Duke fell in love with Penny right away which really helped him, because he gave her the confidence to be fearless… the two of them are very bonded now and they don’t like to be separated, even for a quick walk.
I have a ton of photos from the resent couple of months that I haven’t had a chance to post yet… Enjoy!
Penny is my velcro dog, she follows me everywhere, even into the bathroom… occasionally Duke will be brave and follow Penny… but as you can see from this photo, he’s not sure he made the right decision. I’ve been trying to make the bathroom a non-scary place for him, he is afraid of baths and spray bottles… so I invite them both in the bathroom as much as possible, without giving them baths so that it is just another room…
Since Penny is usually such a social pup (she loves all dogs and people and pulls really hard to meet them), I’ve taken her to the dog park without Duke* twice, both times she became super velcro dog and very shy (which leads me to believe that Duke gives her courage… or she is showing off for him 🙂 )… I was sitting talking to another dog owner for awhile and then once that person left the area Penny started to roll around and relax a little… I know that she was probably rubbing boy-pee on herself here, but I allowed her a bit of silliness, I wiped her off with a babywipe once we got home. 😛 (*We think Duke was attacked by a big dog, given the way he reacts to some dogs, especially big ones. So his introductions to new dogs is always after Penny, our ambassador, meets the dog first. And then it’s still a slow introduction, if at all. We are still working on his courage.)
Penny
Duke loves Penny so much he always tries to be as close to her as possible… Penny doesn’t really like to be touched while sleeping, so Duke is near, but not touching on this evening…
Other evenings he gets away with sleeping right next to her (TV time)…
It took us a little while to figure out the perfect sleeping configuration. Duke was terrified of being confined, and Penny sometimes has nightmares where she cries, then growls in her sleep — so we didn’t want Duke to disturb her accidentally. I fenced off an area of the bedroom next to our bed, it’s big enough that Duke doesn’t feel confined, and it also holds Penny’s crate. This week I stopped zipping up Penny’s crate to see if she would like that better in the mornings when she wakes up before me. I think it’s working out pretty well, Duke won’t try to enter her crate with the flap down, and Penny knows she can get out if she wants to… Good morning pups! In the third photo, Penny is napping on Duke’s bed while I take an afternoon nap, she’s as near to me as possible (they aren’t allowed on the bed given their reactions to being awoken, that way we all sleep soundly)…
They’ve gotten pretty good walking on a coupler leash…
It took me a little while to figure out the perfect configuration of the Coolaroos on the balcony… now they can both look out or lay next to each other… most importantly, they both have the chance to get all the sunbeams in the morning…
When Duke curls up, he reminds me of the stereotypical dog curled up at the hearth, he’s so cute. 🙂 Penny can be all.the.energy if she wants to! 🙂 …
I took the pups for a walk and found a nice little bench to take a break on… for the first time that I can recall, Penny actually relaxed enough out on a walk to lay down! I offered treats for the last two pictures to get them to look at the camera, haha! 🙂
Until next time…
~nic
Photography by Nic 