Teaching Bow

Last week, I posted this video of Hurley successfully "bowing".  Jodi wanted to know the best way to train and, while I cannot necessarily share the best way ('cause I'm not silly enough to think my way is the best), I can share what worked for us.

When I start training any new trick with Hurley, the first thing I do is break out the clicker.  He seems to understand that clicker = learning new trick and he's less likely to offer his same old arsenal of tricks at first, which helps me to shape or lure the behavior that much faster.

I chose bow because I thought it would be easy for Hurley to learn.  He already lowers himself into a down front legs first from a stand and he's always offering play bows.  My job was just to shape and capture a movement that he already does on a regular basis. 

I lured him with a treat into a partial down.  I was careful to never use our hand signal for down because I didn't want him to be confused about down as a separate command.  It would be easy to accidentally confuse him since I was essentially starting to teach bow the same exact way I started to teach down.  By sticking my foot out and doing a little hand flourish (ie, bowing to him), I was able to ensure that bow was not confused with down.  I didn't add the foot and flourish to the lure until I knew he knew what was expected.

As soon as he had his front elbows down but before his back end hit the ground, I clicked and treated.  The difficulty in this step was preventing a full down.  I either tossed the treat away from him or stepped into him to reset his position after I gave him the treat.  I was able to do this because Hurley's a slow-moving dog.  I would probably just start with the next step for Maggie & Sadie who both would plop down faster that I could mark the halfway down.  Plus they both tend to sit and then slide into a down.

We did this for a couple short training sessions over the course of a few days.  I noticed that Hurley wasn't really maintaining a bow so much as he was just slowly lowering himself into a down.  If I reset his motion by tossing the treat or taking a step into him, he wouldn't go all the way down but he didn't really stop in a bow on his own.  I decided he needed more help in maintaining the bow so I added a step and once he started lowering his front end, I stuck my arm underneath his belly to prevent him from going into a full down and we had a little treat party.  It took only a couple times doing this before he was maintaining a bow and any time he maintained that bow without my arm in the way, he would feast on treats.

Then I stopped all training on bow.  I have noticed that doing 5-10 minute training sessions until he "reasonably" gets it and then giving training a rest for a period of time works best with Hurley.  It's like it sinks in better.  I always resume training, thinking it'll take us a training session or two to get back to where we were but he always surprises me and does it even better than where we left off.   In this case, I didn't revisit Bow for a month or more but when I'm trying to pack in a lot more training in a shorter period of time, this break is 5-7 days long.

Hurley's Bow isn't perfect.  I would like to get him to a point where he never goes into a down from the bow and where he can follow using the verbal command only.  Hurley's much more reliable with hand signals than verbal commands.  I use both because I want to have the flexibility of both (what if he goes blind? deaf? can't see me?  too loud of an environment to hear me clearly? etc).  There are a ton of tricks he knows where he can't do it on verbal alone and because they're only tricks, I don't worry too much about cementing the verbal.  Besides, if Hurley has to bow shouldn't I have to bow back?  It's really only polite.

Hurley, Puppy Protector Extraordinaire

As all truly great Hurley stories go, it happened on a trip to the dog park with the Hubster.

Hurley encounters a 10lb Shiba Inu puppy soon after arriving at our favorite dog park.  Hurley loves him some 10lb puppy but the dog's person initially freaks out, telling the Hubster that Hurley's too big and that he will hurt her.  Though we know that one of Hurley's best qualities is how gentle he is with small dogs and puppies, the Hubster calls Hurley to walk on, understanding that not everyone wants to play with a 90lb dog.  Hurley disobeys (because he loves him some small breed puppies) and after witnessing his gentle play bows, the Shiba's mom starts to relax.

Good thing she does because soon after, an altercation at the dog park breaks out.  Now, when fights happen at the dog park, Hurley's M.O. is to run and hide, usually behind our legs. He gets as far away from the fighting and as close to safety (us) as he possibly can.  This is another one of his best qualities.

But not today.  Today he crouches over his new-found friend.  He growls each time one of the dogs involved in the altercation gets too close.  He protects her.  The dog who normally gets as far away from confrontations as possible stays in the middle of a fight to protect his tiny new friend. 

So we now have a new nickname for our lil hero, Hurley the Puppy Protector. 


This week, instead of focusing on the Really, Hurley? moments (and he did have a couple doozies this week), I'm going to bask in the glow of Hurley's moment of heroism.  He's one helluva dog!

This dog = awesome!

A Lesson in Tolerance

This is Quincy.  Here's what you need to know about him:  12ish years young tripod Chessie.  Yes, he's adorable - in that stinky breath'd old geezer sort of way.  He's pretty much a breeze to dog sit except for a teensy issue:  he doesn't share well.  And we're dog sitting him for 3 weeks.

M-O-M, why doesn't he want to play with me?

Unfortunately for Hurley, Quincy mostly hates sharing Mom's attention with him.  See, Q spent the first week at our house doing everything in his power to not allow my dogs to receive any of my attention.  Laying in doorways to prevent them from entering?  Check.  Body blocking them from getting closer?  Check.  Bared teeth?  Check.  Snapping?  Check.  Having to spend lots of time separated from us due to his behavior?  Check.


Fortunately for Quincy, my three are being exceedingly respectful.  Maggie's told him what's what a few times but has been more tolerant than I would have ever expected.  For her to ignore a dog who is snarling in her general direction is huge progress!  Sadie plays the peacemaker, continuously trying to make friends with Q.  She can't comprehend why he doesn't want one of her famous tongue baths.  Hurley ignores him, whining and pouting about his sad lot in life.  Q enforces a strict no-fun policy in his presence - no wrestling, no chasing, no fetch, no toys, no fun. 

Quincy's starting to chill out halfway through his stay with us.  He's much better with the girls but still struggles to allow Hurley close to me.  Hurley gives Q the widest possible berth.  He won't look at him, won't play with the girls when Q's around, squeezes himself as close to the wall and as far away from Q as possible, has given up his regular spot at my feet and, due to all of the above, has been perfecting his pouty face.

Why doesn't he like me, M-O-M??

Poor Hurley, right?  Actually, I'm glad he's having this experience.  The girls let him get away with murder.  Seriously, he continues to murder my tomato plants!  Why don't they stop him??  Sorry...got sidetracked.

Hurley's learning a lot of things by being around Q.   Tolerance.  Patience.  Respecting one's elders.  Letting bossy dogs be bossy without getting all upset about it.  All good life lessons. 

 

Even if he won't stop giving me this look.

Am I The Only Dog Parent Who...

Am I the only dog parent who expects a higher understanding of action/consequence than is possible from her dogs? One who totally understands they're probably not going to get what I'm trying to lay out for them but doesn't care?

Let me set the scene.

I had chopped up some zucchini from my garden-with-a-squash-problem and realized, though I do love me some beer battered fried zucchini, that 2 whole large zucchinis' worth was probably a bit too much for me and the Hubster.

So I chop 'em up further for an impromptu, let's practice 3-dogs-taking-turns-with-commands training session.  I zucchini'd each of them for sitting in turn.  Then I zucchini'd Sadie for a high five (Hurley & Maggie also offered one up).  Then Hurley (got another high five offered from Sadie & Maggie - 3 dog training is going so well).  By the time it was Maggie's turn, she was pretty excited and her high five knocked half of the zucchini from my hand.

Hurley & Maggie hoovered the floor.  Sadie just maintained her sit & looked at me for permission (I had been telling the two who weren't supposed to be high five'ing to stay).  That's my girl!  So I slowly fed her every remaining zucchini in my hand as Hurley and Maggie watched. She got about twice as many the other two stole from the floor.  I actually said to them "Look at Sadie getting all the rest of the treats because she's good."  I did not add "neener, neener, neener" and for that I am proud. 

Am I the only dog parent who does this?   While it was powerful for Sadie as she was amply rewarded for her behavior, Maggie & Hurley were also rewarded by the food they scarfed up.  Probably more rewarded than they felt punished by not getting the rest of the zucchini.  I mean, it is only zucchini after all.  I don't think Hurley even drooled over it.

Am I the only pet parent who does this?  In the moment, my sole (and snarky) purpose to teach Maggie & Hurley a lesson but it was Sadie who got the most out of it (unintentionally).

I really hope they learned their lesson. Seriously.

And this girl?

She's Awesome!

He's Ba-a-ck!

While we've had some good times poking fun at the Hurley Badger over the summer, it has and continues to be my goal to get him back into shop dog shape.

Classic Hurley in the shop montage starts now!

Quite frankly, he was probably ready a month or two ago...right at the time the Hubster was starting his 6 weeks off during the summer (he's in education, anyone who's married to an educator knows the vacation jealousy that's suffered by spouses all over...sigh).  Anywho, the choice was to start Hurley back in the shop and relegate him to his kennel for most of the day to control his introductions and interactions with each entering dog; or I could, and did, leave him home for the summer to continue their male bonding and so that he could enjoy kennel-free days with the Hubster around the house. 

The boys had a great summer but it's back to work time...for both of them.

Big head on a little body!

Hurley started back at the shop today!

The plan is to go slow and have lots of patience.  I can't expect him to magically not react to every dog who comes in.  But what I can do is set him up for success.

Sweet puppy Hurley

It starts with spending the day in the kennel at the shop.  He's still kenneled when at home alone so this is not a huge change for him in terms of how he spends his day.  I've got the kennel just at the edge of my storage room so that I'll be able to click & treat calm behavior every time a dog enters the store.  We'll stay at this level until I feel that he's demonstrated not getting bothered over hearing/smelling a dog in his territory.

Can I haz treat?

Then we'll graduate to public kenneling, ie his kennel being out on the shop floor and not back in the storage room.  I anticipate this being a really hard step for him and plan on requiring customers to keep their dogs in the front half of the shop while his kennel is set up at the back so as to give him tons of space.  As he gets more comfortable and less excited by the dogs in the shop, we'll move him forward or allow them closer.  During this time, I will allow him to interact with the dogs he already knows and loves.  Slowly and surely, I'll let him out of his kennel to say hello as he demonstrates he's ready for that next step.

Fluffer nutter - also, can you believe Hurley was ever small enough to fit in a basket???

After that, he'll progress to being tethered to me or an area of the store floor where he's less likely to react. Hanging out with me behind the counter, performing any training not related to his acceptance of dogs and free rein of the shop are big no-no's for now.  I'll only use the clicker and treats in relation to the use of the crate and to reward calm behavior around other dogs.  No more training fun tricks during the day for us.  Maybe I'll be able to lift that rule in the future but for now, I want Hurley to be crystal clear that in the store, him accepting other dogs in his territory is the only way he can earn food.

Christmas decorating is boring business

Over the summer, Hurley's had multiple trips to the dog park, attended dog walks & street fairs and spent 4 days at our favorite boarding facility, which is more doggie camp than kennel.  He spent those days romping in fields with other dogs and got an A from the folks there when he left.  He still is influenced by his sisters' reactivity but is getting better.  I've noticed since we boarded him that there is much less joining in the barking at the window.  We've started using the Leave It command at home when the dogs get all riled up about a dog or person who walks by our house and this seems to especially hit home with Hurley.  I would call him a rock star Leave It'er at this point.  He listens to me 95% of the time when I tell him Leave It (his current obstacle is the hundreds of crab apples falling on the sidewalk from a neighbor's tree).  All in all, his canine interactions outside of the shop continue to be stellar.  The issues he had are steadily improving - while he will react to another dog who started reacting first, he and I are both getting better at seeing those dogs coming and ignoring them. All in all, he's demonstrated that he's ready to be given a second chance at shop dog.

My personal favorite: Dog in a box

I've missed that dog in a box.  I'm so glad he's back!!

The Great Pool Experiment

One of the things I was most looking forward to on our recent vacation was introducing the dogs to the pool.   I had predicted that Sadie would be the first in, last out and would fully embrace the pool with little hesitation.  I predicted that Maggie would struggle with the pool at first and not want to go in, but that her desire to fetch her ball would trump any uncertainty and she would gladly jump in.  I had no idea what to think about Hurley.  Would he show his Hurley Badger Don't Care personality and not let the deeper water bother him?  Or would he refuse to go in at all costs?

Here's how they did.

I love Sadie.  She's my sweet, wants to please type of girl.  Smart, she is not.  She loved the pool.  She just couldn't figure out how to get in or out by herself.  It started with the Hubster "helping" her in.  And by helping, he pretty much picked up and tossed.  She loved it!

Round in circles she swam.  We soon realized that she had no idea how to get out of the pool.  Thankfully, Maggie was there to show her the way.

Then she couldn't figure out how to get back in.  Round the pool she ran.  Bark, whine, crazy Sadie sounds?  Check.  Then she came up next to me, put her front paws in and looked back at me with an expression that definitely was asking "Please?"  I obliged and pushed her in with a laugh.  And for Sadie, that is apparently how to get into the pool.  Ask Mom or Dad for a little help. We tried and tried to encourage her to get in on her own but she was having none of it.  So pushed into the pool she was for the rest of the day.

Maggie was pretty predictable.  All it took was a ball.  She did take a little bit of time to warm up to the whole jumping in thing but quickly embraced the dive.

And Hurley?

Hurley Badger Don't Swim.  The Hubster was able to get ahold of him once to toss him in and after that, forgettaboutit.  He kept his distance from both of us (c'mon Hurley!  Mom didn't do anything except take pictures!) and would have nothing to do with it.

For the record, I would not advocate tossing your dogs into a pool to introduce them to it.  We knew Sadie's love of water and Maggie's love of ball would set us up for success with the pool so the tossing was mostly for our amusement. Hurley was never meant to be a swimmer - getting him in the pool that one time showed me that if he ever falls in somewhere, he can figure out how to swim and that was my only goal with the pool and Hurley.   

Vacationing with the Dawgs

Last week, the Hubster and I celebrated our anniversary with an Anniversi-cation (n. a vacation occurring around/on one's anniversary).  We rented a cabin on the Southern Oregon Coast and spent a few days exploring the beautiful coast line and the Redwoods.  It was a perfect few days away from Portland.  And we brought the dogs.

You may think I'm craisins for taking my rambunctious trio on a vacation including an 8-hour road trip. There were moments when I agreed with you.

But overall, we had a great trip with few issues.  Here are the keys to taking a wild pack o' dogs on vacation:

1.  Plan a stop to tire them out shortly into the roadtrip.  Don't stress it when the dogs are terribly behaved at the first stop.  Even if it elicits this expression from the Hubster.

This photo cracks me up.  And he only half-meant that expression.

Our dogs know that when we all pile into the car, they are about to have the time of their lives.  I'm happy to say that Maggie & Sadie seem to be calming down a bit in terms of their excitability.  Sadie actually sat and paid attention to me before I took her harness off and let her run free on the beach.  Hurley was a jerk an overly rambunctious teenage dog and developed an awesome new habit of barking out of control upon exiting the Jeep just for this road trip.  

In every picture I took, Hurley is at the back of the pack.  You are all welcome to make fun of the slow poke who can't keep up with his middle aged sisters.  He deserves it.

But that's OK - we won't ever see the 30 or so people on the beach who witnessed our dogs completely melting down on the walk to and from the parking lot.  Ever.  That's a good thing.  But our mission was accomplished and they were calmer the rest of the drive.

2.  Bring something to calm your dogs down while in the car.  Hurley does not like long car rides. Actually, I think he would be perfectly OK if he could sit in my lap the entire way but that's not gonna happen.  So I brought along an herbal calming remedy to help with the constant whining and drooling.  I also made him a little bed on top of our suitcase so he could be more at our level and able to rest his head in between our seats.  All in all, he did a fantastic job tolerating the long car ride.  Sadie & Maggie are great in the car and don't need any extra help chilling out.  Though Sadie does has this magical ability to get her seat belt attachment to her harness and a leash entwined about a bazillion times.  It's quite impressive.

3.  Rent an uber dog-friendly place.  If we had been hoteling it, we would never have considered taking all 3 of them.  The potty breaks, the worrying that they would bark and disturb neighbors?  No thank you!  Instead, we rented a dog-friendly cabin with a large fenced yard.  The dogs loved an extra large yard to romp in and had fun exploring the cabin.  We took 2 kennels to keep them in during the day when we took excursions that not all 3 went on.

4.  Give yourself a break and don't try and take the entire pack everywhere.  We decided before we left that our day trips would include only one dog.  Though there was lengthy debate on whether or not Hurley could be trusted not to bust out his kennel and destroy the cabin, ultimately we decided that it was Maggie & Sadie's turn to have some special time with us.  Sadie accompanied us on our trip to tour the Redwoods.

While Sadie enjoyed her day trip with us, I'm pretty sure she missed her sister.  Either that or she was bored with being in the car most the day. 

The next day we took Maggie on a short hike, some fetch at a Secret Beach (actual name of the place) and a tour of the highlights of the Oregon Coast right where we were staying. 

I don't think she missed either Sadie or Hurley - fetch is apparently more fun without all the tackling.

5.  Bring Vacation Bullies, Chews and Bones.  Besides just being a nice treat to make vacation even more enjoyable, these can be instrumental in calming your dogs down when you leave them in the car to take a picture at that gorgeous viewpoint (our dogs are barkers when we leave the car) or to give them right before you leave them in their kennels at a new place.  Hurley is the one most likely to freak out about being left in a new place and the special treats really helped distract him when we left him at the cabin.

6. Vacation is for breaking routines & rules.  Since we don't allow dogs on the couches at home, I immediately allowed them this luxury at the cabin.  It is vacation after all and that means some special rule breaking.

Hurley loved the new rule until he realized that it meant being our foot rest. 

7.  Take at least one picture of the 3 of them sitting nicely.  It surprisingly took us one try to get this picture.  And Hurley popped up the second the shutter snapped.  But they did it!  All three of them stopped romping for one second and humored the Mama. 

8.  Appreciate the ways in which vacation challenges you and your dogs.  We definitely learned where we need to pick it up in terms of training.  Hurley & Sadie need more practice exiting the vehicle calmly and all three need a Settle Down type command to remind them to keep calm during exciting adventures.  Our biggest challenge is their behavior as a pack - individually, they are awesome - but when Hurley's egging on the other two to get excited and not pay attention to us, it gets challenging. 

Hurley had to literally be put to bed like a baby by the Hubster on the first night.  We put them in the kennels at night so that they would be accustomed to being in them at the cabin when we had to leave them behind during the day.  This very much disturbed Hurley who cried and cried.  The Hubster had to tuck him in and sit by his kennel until he fell asleep the first night.  Dude is such a baby! 

One of the things I took away from this, our first real vacation with the dogs, is that they do not understand vacation.  The second day, when we took them to a beach close to the cabin, they were all remarkably calm in the car.  We realized they thought we were going home.  When we did get in the car to go home, they were all jacked up, thinking our vacation was just going to get even more awesome.  Vacation is confusing to dogs and though ours had a great time, I was sensitive to the ways in which it was also stressful for them.  We don't take awesome road trips encountering beach after beach and stay in a cool cabin with a pool and deer who run along the fence every day.  Maybe we should.

Hurley Badger Don't Care: To Mom's Advantage

Most of the times, Hurley's alter-ego Hurley Badger Don't Care means that he's getting into mischief.  Things like busting out of screen windows and destroying dog tents are par for the course around our house.

But there are times when the Hurley Badger's personality can be used to his parents' advantage.

Like with training gear.  Hurley Badger Don't Care about wearing harnesses, halters, packs.  Don't nothing bother Hurley Badger!

Until now, my walking gear of choice has been the Easy Walk Harness.  Back in the day, before I knew anything about training dogs, we tried almost every type of harness & training collar under the sun to get Maggie to walk nicely on a leash.  On that list was the Gentle Leader.  She hated it.  Hated it. HATED IT.  So much so that one day, she just chewed the darn thing up and that was the end of the Gentle Leader.

Then we found the front clip harness and our lives were forever changed.  Both Maggie & Sadie walk so well on it that I'd never considered using a different type of harness with Big Boy Hurley.

That is, until the front clip harness started losing its effectiveness.

We've been working so hard with Hurley walking with one of his sisters.  On his own, he's great on a leash.  Add in one of his siblings and you'd think the Dude had never walked loose leash style before.  It's a little bit jockeying for front position but mostly just trying to get to that thing on the ground that might be yummy before his sister can get to it.  And playing bitey face.  He really loves bitey face walks.  He's so strong nowadays that even with the Easy Walk, he can easily drag me down the sidewalk in his quest to reach a pine cone before Maggie. 

We are taking a vacation with all 3 dogs next week so getting them to walk nicely together is paramount to us enjoying our vacation and the dogs getting to explore places with us rather than being stuck in kennels at the rental cabin.

Earlier this week, the Hubster asked me to bring home the Gentle Leader head halter.  Recalling Maggie's hatred of this tool, I was a little skeptical that it would work for the Hurley Monster.  But when the Hubster asks and asks to use training gear that I have no strong objections to, I leap to obey. 

Home came the Gentle Leader.  Out came the clicker.  My only goal the first time was to get him to accept a loose loop around his snout for 5-10 seconds.  That's acceptable progress for the first time a head halter goes on a dog and many dogs take much longer to accept it.  (Maggie's hatred of it definitely stems from our lack of knowledge when she was a puppy and forcing the halter on her too quickly.)

2 minutes into it, Hurley was sitting nicely with the halter hanging loosely around his snout.  5 minutes into it, it was tightened and secured around the back of his neck.  8 minutes in, I left it on for 30 seconds and he didn't tried to get it off.

10 minutes after starting to introduce the halter to him, we went on a walk around our block.

Gentle Leader success!

Is it because Mom knows her stuff now?  Or is because Hurley Badger don't care 'bout no harness around his snout?

I'm going with the latter.

PS.  The Hubster was right about the Gentle Leader working for Hurley.  So far, he's amazing on walks.  Granted, it's only been 2 walks and the real test comes tomorrow morning when we add one of the girls to the walk but so far so good.  Enjoy being right, baby!  'Cause you know how often that happens. ;)

Monday Fun Day: Sunset Beach

The Hubster and I recently loaded up his Jeep for a trip to Sunset Beach, just north of Seaside, OR.  We love this spot because we can drive out onto the beach and find a nice open spot before unleashing our demons our much beloved and always perfectly behaved pooches.

Who you talking 'bout, Willis?

This was the first trip we have made with all 3 dogs in the back of the Hubster's Wrangler with the top off.  Because I'm a worry-wart, we have a system by which we attach each dog via a harness and by leash & collar.  The harness is either connected to a zip-line at the top of the Jeep or via belt buckles on the floor.  This is the primary attachment and the leash attached to collar and frame of Jeep is our backup system in case the harness fails, or with Sadie, in case she sees water, we are at a stop and she jumps out wriggling out of the harness (yes, it's happened which is why we have the two attachment system).

Jumping Waves

I was super happy with how the dogs did.  An hour and a half drive is a long way and they were stellar.  Well, except for whomever decided to poop in the back of the Jeep 10 minutes before we arrived at our destination.  That was not so stellar. 

It wasn't me, Mom.  I swear!

But after cleaning up the Jeep, I had one of these:

And found one of these:

And all was right in the world again.

As always, the dogs had a great time at the beach.  And spent the next couple days completely tuckered out.  Thanks, Beach!

Wordless Wednesday: Gravel Lipstick

Hurley Badger Don't Care: Inaugural Post

We have a saying around our house....Hurley Don't Care.  It's a saying that perfectly encapsulates his personality - he takes what he wants and doesn't give a shit.   He is not affected by the world around him, nor influenced by others' disapproval.  He goes about his business, doing what he wants and with little regard for his own safety.  'Cause Hurley Don't Care.

It's always said in the same voice you say in your head when you look at all those "Honey Badger Don't Care" internet meme's.  This is important. 

So say it with me now:  "Hurley Badger Don't Care".  Give it some sass.  Hurley deserves it.

Hurley Badger Don't Care is making its internet debut, right here, right now:

Every so often, I'll share stories that showcase his Hurley Badger Don't Care personality.

For today's inaugural Hurley Badger Don't Care post, we bring you the 4th of July.  While most pet owners safely ensconce their precious dogs inside, possibly drugged up and certainly chewing happily on a Kong, we knew that Hurley wouldn't have an adverse reaction to the fireworks.  You could shoot a gun, set off a fire cracker, blow a fog horn, etc right next to this dog's head and he wouldn't even turn his head to look.  'Cause Hurley Badger Don't Care.

So what did we do when the fireworks started going off?  We went for a walk.  For an hour and a half, we wandered around our neighborhood.  Did Hurley get startled by the fireworks? No.  Did he even acknowledge the explosions occurring a block away?  No. 

Why?

'Cause Hurley Badger Don't Care.

Maggie's Torment

This is a scene from our backyard.  A scene that plays out identically day after day, in the backyard, in the house, anywhere really.  You see, Hurley loves to torment play with Maggie.  Lucky for him, she's a pretty tolerant big sister.

Laying in wait...

Someone approaches...

The takedown

M-O-M, put down that contraption and help me!

Seriouslys.  He's soooo annoying.

I'll show you buddy!

Oh crap! Now they're ganging up on me.

Thanks, Sadie, but barking isn't helping.

A Weekend in the Woods

We spent the past weekend in the Mt Hood National Forest doing some serious car camping.  The forecast was all gloom & doom with temps barely surpassing 60 and rain, rain and more rain.  Y'know, the usual Pacific Northwest forecast.  Oh, and it was our very first camping trip with all 3 dogs.

The stream next to our spot.  It was pretty fast especially to the right of this picture but Sadie heeded my first few requests for her not to go too far and then was great not venturing far the rest of the weekend.  (Pardon the smugdy spot in the middle of this and every subsequent photo.  Girl needs to clean her lens!)

Despite the forecast and some serious misbehavior on the part of the dogs, we had a great time.  We drove out on the South side of Mt Hood to the small Forest Roads in the National Forest.  There are tons of roadside campsites that are perfect for car camping with a wild pack o' dogs my three wonderfully behaved pooches.

Looking angelic huddling underneath the EZ Up and out of the rain.  Don't be fooled.

The drive out to our regular spot is one of the most beautiful drives in Oregon and that's saying a heck of a lot.  Of course, I didn't have the foresight to take one darn picture of the drive so you'll just have to trust me on that one.  And if you're ever in our neck of the woods, we highly recommend taking Highway 224 past Estacada.  You won't be disappointed.

I hope this adorable picture of Sadie will make up for no pictures of the drive.

One of the things that I love most about where we generally go camping is the freedom our dogs have.  They don't have to be tethered as we would have to do at a campground.  There's almost always a stream next to our spot and it's easy to find a spot that is sufficiently far away from the road so that I'm not too* worried about them and the road. 

Looks cute and sedate, right?  Looks can be deceiving.

The freedom they had, that is.  Hurley, who heretofore has rarely influenced his sisters to be truly bad, was the king of bad influence.  You see, 60 degrees, rain and the Great Outdoors is apparently Hurley's kind o' camping trip.  To say he was invigorated would be an understatement; his rambunctiousness reached a really special level this weekend.  We evidently camped a bit too early in the season; a bit too early, that is, if you don't want to camp surrounded by a fish graveyard.  Yup, we were apparently in a prime spawning area and though the fish had returned down river, the bones left by birds of prey and possibly bear were still in abundance.  And Hurley was in heaven.  Keep away with a fish skeleton is just about the most awesome type of keep away, he would like me to let everyone know.  So we spent most of the weekend figuring out new ways to steal fish backbones from the Hurley man.  To be honest, I had fun out-tricking him.  :) 

Fish Skeleton.  My nemesis.

The fish issue wasn't the only source of Hurley's fun.  Our last morning, he had an epic case of the zoomies and decided to lead his sisters on a merry chase.  One in which they didn't respond to our calls.  After a half hour of near panic, we found them a half mile away.  Yup, new camping rule.  Tethers.  We've never had a problem with Sadie & Maggie.  If they're out of my direct line of sight, they respond to calls within 30 seconds.  Always.  And I'm religious about them checking in with me every 5 minutes.  Now with Hurley, we'll need to keep 2 of the 3 tethered at all times, if not all 3.  I'm kinda bummed that Sadie & Maggie won't have the freedom they normally do but nothing's worth the feeling of thinking, for any amount of time, that they might be lost.   

No one's enthused about the new rule.

Not even Sadie, who is happy 99% of the time.

Actually, I think Maggie was relieved with the tethering.  She was most harrassed by the Hurley Monster this weekend.

Oh wait.  Never mind.  They found a new way to torment Maggie.  Tug on her tether rope.  Endless trouble, I tell you!

Other than that, our camping trip was a relaxing few days in one of our favorite spots.  And we camped for the first time in our super duper ginormous new tent, which I love!  Despite having all the room we could want, I was happily snuggled by 2 dogs on one side, the other as my pillow and the Hubster by my side.  What more could a girl want?

A gratuitous 'Sadie's my pretty girl' photo

Getting her revenge.  That's what more a girl could want.

I promise never to be bad again.  I promise.  Can I please get out of this tub now?