Waffles has had a busy week! He has met over 50 new people, visited his vet Dr. Jeff Krull and all the staff at Flying Cloud Animal Hospital, visited a local seniors apartment complex, the grocery store, and our city’s main firehouse.

Thanks to Assistant Fire Chief Dom Guzman and his crew for welcoming the little fuzzball for a rousing game of Muck-with-the-Puppy.

Training is coming along well. He’s doing great in his crate and with housebreaking, and is mostly sleeping through the night (sometimes with a potty break around 4am, sometimes not!) He’s learning how to Dog with his big brother Archer, and learning how to People-Dog with us during training outings and visits. Like all puppies his age, he likes to impersonate (indogsonate?) a piranha, especially when he’s starting to tire. When he gets chompy, we immediately turn to calming activities and know a nap is about 5 minutes around the corner. He now gets kenneled up before he gets sleepy, with a stuffed Kong, and passes out while entertaining himself. Bite inhibition is coming along very well, too.

This week also saw two baths (working puppies are expected to be clean puppies, and puppies sure do enjoy a good roll in the mud if the opportunity presents itself…who am I to deny him the joy of getting mud all the way up into his ears!) and a nail trim where we decided after two minutes that death was NOT coming for us after all. Every time we pick him up, his four feet and all his toes get handled and touched, we muck with his ears, and we “check” his teeth. The goal is to become totally desensitized to that sort of handling within a couple of weeks. He’s doing great!

Next week’s training plan goes up tomorrow. It’s going to be a very busy week for the humans and the dogs, so stay tuned!