Tommy settles in for a long winter's night

Tommy has discovered that while having pee out in the freezing cold is not a whole lot of fun, sitting by the fire in his warm sweater and comfy bed is the ultimate relaxation.

Tommy decorates for Christmas

Tommy put up the Christmas tree and decorated the house today. He had a lot of fun rolling in front of the fire and playing with the tree skirt and sitting in Mark's lap while Mark put the hooks into the christmas ornaments. It was all fun and games until Tommy discovered that a nutcracker soldier had somehow infiltrated the house and set up camp on the DVD shelf. He would have NONE of that. Tommy was happily cleaning out Jill's bowl of cream of mushroom soup when low and behold, Tommy looked up to see the soldier and let out a stream of barks and howls. As soon as Jill and Mark realized what Tommy was barking at so ferociously, did they remove the offending intruder from Tommy's sight? No. Instead they brought the nutcracker soldier down onto the floor and pretended to make him bark back by moving his nut cracking mouth up and down. Tommy went into hysterics. Barking and howling and running in circles, and jumping backward and growling. Tommy hates Mr. Nutcracker. To make life even worse for Tommy, Jill put a peanutbutter treat inside the nutcracker's mouth to try to gt Tommy to come close to the soldier so the puppy could see that he wooden toy wasn't scary at all. It took Tommy 10 minutes to work up the courage to grab the treat and run away with it. Eventually, Tommy was able to approach the nutcracker, sniff him and knock him over. Heh, the nutcracker soldier isn't so scary afterall, is it?

Tommy goes shopping in Aspen

Tommy spent the weekend at Avalanche Ranch in celebration of Mark and Jill's first wedding anniversary. It rained. But we still had fun :) We stayed in an adorable little cabin with a sleeping loft and a tiny kitchen. We played ping pong while it rained, watched part of O, Brother Where Art Thou, and played a game of Trivial Pursuit. Tommy caught the ping pong ball for us whenever we dropped it. Tommy really enjoyed playing with Ruby, a 6 month old yellow lab. Ruby was nice enough to let Tommy win every now and then :) Tommy also enjoyed the Apple Festival where he watched Mark and Jill eats lots of food and listen to bluegrass.


On Sunday, Tommy went Oddball Colorado hunting again. This time he went in search of oddities in Glenwood Springs and Aspen. He found the Hotel Colorado where the teddy bear was invented, the world's largest hot springs pool, Doc Holliday's grave stone and Ted Bundy's first and second Colorado prison escapes.


Then, Tommy went shopping in Aspen. He found a very fun soft frisbee that squeaks and a $60.00 sweater. Yes, Tommy bought a $60.00 sweater. But he looks very distinguished in his sweater...much like Sherlock Holmes. Now we just need to find Tommy a Holmes hat and a pipe and he'll be solving mysteries up and down the Front Range.





The sweater came in very handy as we decided to take Independence Pass home. It was 32 degrees and snowing at the top of the pass. While we were not dressed for such weather, Tommy was.

Tommy graduates from puppy obedience school

Tommy graduated from obedience training last night! He had a final exam that consisted of walking on a leash and then obeying several commands on demand with lots of distractions. Tommy now knows how to Sit, Lay Down, Sit and Stay, Lay Down and Stay, Drop It, Leave It, Front (coming to us when we call) and he walks on a leash without pulling. He's not perfect and sometimes he can be stubborn but he's learning. :)

Here are some pictures from the graduation!


Tommy tests the sit command














Tommy's graduation swag














Tommy practices walking on a leash














Tommy is starving after graduation!

Tommy searches for the brotherhood of the white temple

Tommy was supposed to visit a cornfield maze and help us navigate through it with his amazing hound sniffing capabilities. However, the cornfield maze didn't allow pets. How annoying is that? What kind of OUTDOOR cornfield maze wouldn't allow dogs too? Very discriminatory if you ask me. Then we decided to try the Castle Rock Art Festival in the middle of downtown Castle Rock. They also didn't allow dogs! No dogs?!? No dogs in the middle of a downtown STREET festival? Who are the people who make up these stupid rules? They are obviously cruel, hateful people with cold, bitter hearts.


So, after driving to Denver AND Castle Rock all for nothing we decided to head to Sedalia to hunt for the Brotherhood of the White Temple, which is in the Oddball Colorado book. This was a rather uncomfortable trip. The paved road ended abruptly. Then we turned off the nice wide dirt road onto some mountain roads that were washed out and very, very steep and narrow and that took us to someone's home...someone who could very well step out onto the porch with a shotgun when they saw us turning around. We only bottomed out once on these roads. When we finally got to a sign that read, Brotherhood of the White Temple College and Church, we snapped a picture and got the heck out of Dodge. Driving around a secluded mountain looking for the church of a cult isn't exactly like navigating a cornfield maze at a city botanical garden, you know?


Tommy is back home safe and sound and none the worse for wear although I'm sure he would tell you that driving around in a car all day is not very much fun. He would have much rather helped mommy and daddy through a cornfield maze. He's taking a siesta. Napping all day in the car is exhausting.

Tommy rings the bell!

In house breaking Tommy we have learned thatas he is so small we don't always realize that he has gone to stand by the door to go outside. A few times Tommy has waited by the door and then given up and just gone right there. And he is a rather quiet dog so we needed a way to help him make some noise when he needs to go pee. We bought a call bell from Office Depot, the ones that sit on hotel desks and have a sign beside them that reads, "Ring bell for service." We have been making Tommy hit the bell every time he goes outside. Mark said that this morning, he was trying to train Tommy to hit the bell by holding a treat right at the bell popper so that when Tommy tries to get to the treat he rings the bell with his nose :)

I was sitting by the door reading emails and out of nowhere I heard the call bell ring! Tommy is so quiet that I didn't realize he had come to stand beside me wanting to go out. But he rang the bell to get my attention! He's such a smart little puppy :)

Tommy goes Oddball Colorado Hunting

Today we decided to take Tommy on a little day trip adventure to search for Oddball Colorado landmarks. So, we packed up our Subaru and our Tommy and headed north to Ft. Collins and Estes Park. In Ft. Collins we visited the Swetsville Zoo. As Tommy soon discovered, this was no ordinary zoo. Instead, it was a zoo filled with industrial art created by former farmer Bill Swets. Bill has created two-headed dragons, a dragon rock band, a beetle spider and many other fantastic pieces. Tommy, Mark and I took a stroll through the zoo, which is actually Bill Swet's property. We wanted to see the Bungled Jungle, which is a faux museum of papier mache artwork also on the Swet property but as it was Labor Day all of the buildings were locked up. Hopefully, we'll get back to Ft. Collins sometime soon to see this jungle of paper aliens. I'm sure that Tommy would have enjoyed it.


After Swetsville and a lunch on the roadside (Tommy loves gala apples), we headed for Estes Park to see the famous Stanley Hotel, the inspiration for Stephen King's, The Shining. We had just recently watched the 2nd episode of Ghost Hunters featuring the Stanley Hotel so we were all pumped to see it. (OK, maybe not Tommy as he had to stay in his backpack for the self-guided little tour.) We were also disappointed to discover that the Stanley charges $5.00 for tourists who want to visit the hotel but are not guests there. We were not prepared for this and had to scramble for some cash. We came up with $4.00 before the guard got tired of waiting on us and let us go on through (a 20% discount!). We were pretty disappointed all around with the Stanley. It was a lot smaller than we had imagined and the grounds were not very well kept up. It looks like it could use some new management, in my opinion. We didn't stay long, mostly because we wanted Tommy to be able to be somewhere where he could get some exercise.


Next, we visited the Estes Park River Walk. Tommy was amazing on his leash! He walked with us for quite a while saying hello to other doggies and letting small children pet him. He had his paws dipped into the Big Thompson river (but only just! It was cold!) We was the star of the river walk. Everyone thought he was adorable and cute and tiny and fun :)


After the River Walk (not included in Oddball Colorado, we were just letting Tommy run around for a bit) we headed up to the Bald Pate Inn to see their famous key collection. They have thousands and thousands of keys from all over the world. They have the key to the Frankenstein Castle, a turkey, the key to My Old Kentucky Home, the key to room 217 at the Stanley, the key to Hitler's house and many, many more. After the key collection, we had dinner at the Inn. They had a gorgeous view of Estes Park from high up above and a beautiful old dining room.


Tommy had a very full day of driving up and down Colorado! But he doesn't seem to mind one bit as he just climbs into his backpack in the back seat and curls up...or rolls out on his back (pictures to come) and goes to sleep :)

Tommy pooped

in the middle of Petco. Tommy and I got there early to practice walking on a leash with lots of distractions. I didn't even realize that he had pooped until he had left a trail of it halfway the length of the store...little pebbles of poop down the whole center aisle. Way to go, Tommy. I spent the next 15 minutes cleaning it up and was late getting Tommy to class even though we were a 1/2 hour early to the store.

In other news, Tommy aced his test! He did his puppy push-ups perfectly! And he walked with daddy in a square sitting and about facing and stopping and turning on a dime! He watched Mark's every move and was great!

This coming week we are working on "Stay" from the sit position. We are also working on "Front" which is a command to make Tommy come immediately to wherever we are the first time rather than the 2nd or 3rd or 10th.

Tommy learns to walk with a leash

One of Tommy's first homework assignments was to learn to walk on a leash without pulling. Tommy had to learn to walk beside us and not out in front pulling as hard as he could. This was a difficult assignment as Tommy's punishment for pulling was an "about face" during which we would suddenly turn and start walking in the opposite direction and Tommy would get yanked around. Now, Tommy is a very small dog. Currently he is 7 1/2 Ibs. so whenever he came to the end of the leash running at full speed he would often go spinning through the air or get pulled on his back or even do a cartwheel. You should have seen us outside a little while ago. We were out in the park practicing his walking and he was just going everywhere. It ran like a bad comedy movie where instead of seeing the bad stuff happening you watch people's faces as they cringe and then cringe again.

We finally discovered that Tommy doesn't give a flying flip (pun intended) about the "about face" maneuver but he hates getting a shot of water to the face. So, instead of doing the "about face" we say, "NO!" and spray his face with water from a water bottle. Tommy got that almost immediately. For the whole trip around the park Tommy walked beside us and NOT in front of us! He would even catch himself getting ahead and would do a stutter step in order to slow down. He's such a good puppy!

I'm quite relieved as the next obedience class is tomorrow and I didn't want Tommy to fail his first homework assignment! Unfortunately, he'll probably only get a B- for the second part of his assignment which was the "puppy push-ups" He'll go down into the "lay down" position but he still won't go into the "sit" position from the "lay down" position. C'est la vie. We can't always get everything right despite being over-achievers, ay?

Tommy goes to the vet

Tommy went to the vet this morning for his Rabies shot. He met a German Shepard and a Brit (the technician giving him his shot) so Tommy had a pretty international morning. Then he went to Petco to return his treat bag that was ripping and we all discovered there was a doggy rescue fair going on. Tommy got loads of attention and treats and samples and free toys! He met other doxies from a doxie rescue but one of them nipped him on his nose so Tommy wasn't a fan of that booth. Tommy also met a corgie and a very odd looking dog that could have been an alien, we're not sure. He got to spin the Petco wheel to get a free toy (an orange tennis ball) and he got to see the Nutro lady who always gives him treats and gives us coupons! Outside at the fair he met a little poodle who was the sweetest dog I've ever met and he met a bull mastiff! The bull mastiff layed down to get on eye level with little Tommy :)

Later in the day, Tommy helped mommy weed the backyard and then we took a nap on the sofa as Olympic rythymic gymnastics droned on the tv. We're all up now watching the tornado warnings for the county and watching the black sky get closer and closer (well, Jill is. Mark is working on genealogy.)

Tommy goes to obedience school

Last night was Tommy's first night in obedience school. There's only one other puppy in the class, Aman, a 10-week-old golden lab. Tommy started learning to sit and to walk on a leash without pulling. I like practicing the sit command since Tommy gets treats and praise for getting it right. I hate practicing the walking on a leash because he gets punished instead of praised. Well, he gets praised when he's doing it right but he gets punished when he starts pulling. Whenever he starts pulling on the leash we do an "about face" and go the other way so that Tommy gets yanked on his collar. This apparently teaches him to pay attention to the leash and to stay with Mommy or Daddy so that he doesn't get yanked. Poor Tommy is so small that he whirls through the air when we do an about face. I'm hoping that he learns to walk with us quickly so we don't have to keep up the "about face" routine for very long. I feel cruel and mean when I do it.


Tommy's other command last night was "down," which gets him to lay down. We've already trained Tommy to do this as neither he nor the kitties get their meals until they lay down. This keeps them from getting under our feet when we're getting their food ready and it keeps the kitties from meowing for their food. The trick, however, is to get him to do puppy push-ups which is to get him to go from the down position to the sit position and back again over and over :)


As for house-breaking, today I started leaving Tommy in his crate while I go to work so that he won't pee or poo in the kitchen. I feel mean doing this. But I guess part of training is being strict or else the training won't work. And, really, it's about time a 4 month old puppy stopped going to the bathroom in the house.

Tommy goes camping

So, Tommy got a life vest for lake kayaking but we ended up not taking the kayaks as it was going to rain all weekend long. We still went camping though! Mark actually said that it was the funnest day we've ever had which is amazing considering that it was cold and raining and we were struggling to stay dry and warm. Tommy loved sleeping in the tent with us as he stayed cozy all night long. He hated sitting at the picnic table as he just shivered and whined from the cold. He loved hiking though. He did a lot of hiking for a 4 month old mini dachshund!

More about Tommy

We got Tommy at the end of June when he was almost two months old. He came from a respectable breeder but, unfortunately, he came with Coccydia and Giardia. We had a hell of a time getting him healthy and these issues definitely slowed down his housebreaking. He's better now and he's happy. He still has issues with housebreaking but we were ready for this as we both work during the day so poor Tommy isn't getting very consistent housebreaking patterns from us. But he'll get there eventually, it's just going to take a little extra time. He has learned to lay down! And he has learned to stay when he lays down until we give him permission to go to his food bowl so he's a very smart puppy!
Tommy starts puppy training classes next week to help get him socialized around other dogs and people. We don't want him barking at every dog and human that he sees. We also don't want him barking at the other dogs in our backyard barking extravaganza (just a lot of backyard fences meeting and family dogs barking at each other through the fences).
He doesn't care one twit about riding in a car. He just falls asleep in his crate until we get to our destination so he could be in a car or not. Whatever, it makes no difference to him.
He loves Kosher, the mouse puppet. Or, rather, he hates the mouse puppet as he does his best to rip it apart. He loves le chat his furry stuffed cat. He sleeps with it. He wants to play with our two cats, Simon and Natasha but Natasha runs away to the safety of upstairs and Simon retreats to the stairs where Tommy can't get to him. Simon would like to play too, I think, but they just don't know how to play with each other. Tommy wants to wrestle and Simon wants to stalk.
So, there's the background on the puppy. More to come later :)

Tommy gets a life vest?

So, Tommy is almost 4 months old. We're going camping next weekend and the state park has two lakes, which means we're taking our kayaks. I've heard a lot about dachshunds not liking water at all but we can't leave Tommy on the banks or in the car or in the tent so we're taking him in our kayaks with us! I'm not sure how he is going to enjoy this little adventure being a puppy and being a dachshund but unfortunately he's not getting a choice. Hopefully, we will find a doggy life vest this week that will fit him and also hopefully he won't mind hanging out in the belly of a kayak for a few hours. Unless, he totally freaks out he shouldn't have to get wet at all. I'll let you know how it goes.