Picky Eater

For some reason, Maya has decided that she will no longer eat out of her bowl.  I have no idea why, but about 2 weeks ago, she decided that food tastes better when eaten off the floor. 

If I put her food in her bowl, she won't eat it until she's absolutely starving.  And even then, it's only after tipping it over.  If she can't knock if over, she'll bark or whine until I come to the rescue.  If I put some of it on the grounds, she'll gobble it up immediately.  I've tried washing the bowl, using a different bowl, etc, but she just decided that she's rather eat off the floor. 

Strangely enough, she'll eat out of other dog's bowls.  I find this especially strange because she won't drink after other dogs.  I have a weird dog.

Not My Shoes!

One of Maya's favorite places to hang out is my closet.  For some reason, she loves laying on my shoes.  I always let her because she never chewed on them; she just liked laying on them.  And for the same reason, I never worried about leaving shoes lying around the living room.  Unless there were three or four of them together, she ignored them.

That has changed.  Two days ago, she discovered that shoes were fun to chew on.  She started with the shoe laces.  When I moved shoes with laces out of the way, she decided that chewing on a shoe was fun too, even if it didn't have laces.  So now all my shoes have moved into the closet, and the closet door stays closed. 

Right now Maya is teething, so I'm hoping that she'll outgrow the chewing stage.  In the meantime, I'm keeping my fingers crossed and my closet door closed.  Until she figures out how to turn the knob, my shoes should be safe. 

Bees, Butterflies, and Baby Teeth

I haven't written in a while, but that does not mean that we haven't been having adventures.  :)

Maya has recently discovered bees and butterflies, and by discovered, I mean she chases them now.  She can't catch the butterflies, so it's cute to watch her chase them.  The bees, on the other hand.... Well, I'm just scared she's going to get stung.  Part of me wants to protect her from that, but the other part of me know that she won't learn not to chase them until she gets stung.  I'm not looking forward to that day.

I've also recently learned another puppy lesson -- they have baby teeth!  I don't know why this was such a shock to me, but I never thought about puppies having baby teeth.  I've been finding teeth in the carpet for about a week now.  The latest was this morning when I stepped on one.  It's kind of gross, but kind of cute at the same time. 

Dog Park

Yesterday, Maya had her first trip to a dog park.  One of the groups from school sponsored a Dog's Day Out, and since one of my friends was running, I decided to stop by.  Since this was her first time, and since she's so shy, I decided not to traumatize her by taking her to the big dog side (which is where most of the group was).  Instead, we said hi to everyone and headed to the little dog side. 

I have to say that she's gotten a lot better with other people.  Other dogs, on the other hand.......  Well, let's just say she's still really shy. 

Eventually, the group headed over to the little dog side.  All of the dogs beside one are borderline size, but are still allowed on the little dog side.  The one big one is really old and has arthritis, so she just likes to lay in the sun chewing on her toys, so none of the owner complained about a big dog in the little dog area. 

There are benches and tables set up under a canopy for dog parents, and that's where we were hanging out.  Initially, I left Maya on the ground to hopefully entice her to play with the other dogs.  She spent her time trying to get away from them and hiding under my legs, so I eventually picked her up.  There was another small dog on the table that was scared of the other dogs too, so it wasn't long before him and Maya were buddies. 

She eventually got brave enough to explore, but not until most of the other dogs were gone.  I think she just got overwhelmed.  And even though we were on the little dog side, she was still almost the smallest dog there.  I'm not sure if we'll be going back anytime soon, because she really didn't seem to have a good time.  We'll see.

We left Dog's Day Out with a goodie bag full of treats and a toy.  She absolutely loved her new toy.  I gave it to her when we got home and she refused to put it down the rest of the day. 

On a side note, she was almost puppy-napped a few times.  My friends thought she was adorable and kept wanting to take her home with them. 

New Trick

I've been teaching Maya a few commands over the past month or so.  She had mastered "sit," "down," "off," and "come."  I was going to teach her "shake," but that's pretty boring, so I taught her "pound it" instead.  After that, "high five" was a piece of cake. 

However, her latest trick she learned all on her own -- she can take off her leash.  What I learned while teaching her those commands was that she is really smart.  What I learned after she got off her leash is that she's a little too smart for her own good. 

The first time she did it, I figured it was an accident.  She likes to grab the leash in her mouth while we're out walking.  This time she grabbed it by the latch.  She was biting it as we walked, and it opened.  She realized she was free before I did and took off running after something (a cat, a leaf, her shadow?).  Luckily we were in the parking garage and no cars were driving around.  The next day, she did it two more times.  I was pretty sure these were not on accident.  As soon as we started walking, she grabbed the latch in her mouth and went to work to get it off.  I figured that the first time was a fluke and she wouldn't be able to get it off again.  I figured wrong.  She got it off twice. 

I went to the pet store that night and got a new leash with a different type of latch.  As long as she doesn't have opposable thumbs, we should be good. 

Eat This, Not That!

I haven't written in a while, but that doesn't mean we haven't had any adventures.  Lately, I've just been struggling to keep Maya from eating everything as we take our daily walks.  Here's a list of the things I pulled out of her mouth yesterday:

• Ball of foil
• Plastic bag
• Paper towel
• Styrofoam (twice)
• Cigarette butts (three times)
• Paint chips (too many to count)

I posted this on my Facebook, and here's the very creative response I got from a friend:

"That would tell me that you went to home depot today. Huh??? Allow me to explain. You went there to buy new burner drip covers for your stove and you had to pass by the new fall colors in paints. So you grabbed them both. When you got hom...e you emptied the bag and your ceiling fan blew the empty plastic bag onto the floor. You started with the paint and realized you could use some help when opening the sample resulted in a drip on your floor. You grabbed a paper towel to clean the drip and went to toss the towel into the plastic bag but didn't see it had fallen onto the floor. Puzzled, you placed the paper towel onto the same countertop. it suffered the same fate via the same fan. Since your neighbor just finished painting her bathroom, you called her over for an opinion. While waiting for her to stop by, you took the foil off the stovetop to put the new drip covers on the stove. That's when your neighbor showed up and, on your way to the door, you missed the counter and dropped the used foil onto the floor. Maya sniffed the paint and ended up dipping her nose into it. Instinctively, she retreated and backed into the plastic bag, paper towel and foil. In self defense, she attacked these foreign objects by gnawing on them. The styrofoam cup that was holding your guests' cigarette butts by the trash can was merely in the wrong place at the wrong time and received Maya's defensive attack as well."

I had to laugh.  So my question is, why will she eat all this crap, but not her food?

Dog Tired

Maya after a tough afternoon of playing with the neighbors' dogs, playing keep-away from me, and chasing birds and her own tail.

Poor puppy.....

Soft and Fluffy

Maya follows me into the bathroom and hangs out with me whenever I'm getting ready for school or work.  I used to think that it was because she wanted to keep me company.  I'm pretty sure it's really because she likes the soft and fluffy bath mats.

Trustworthy Puppy?

When I first got Maya, I put her in her kennel whenever I couldn't keep my eyes on her, even if it was just going to be for 5 minutes.  Little by little, as she earned some trust, I've started leaving her out.

I no longer put her in her kennel when taking a shower, but I leave her outside the bathroom.  At first, she would cry at the door until I finished and came out.  She doesn't cry anymore, but she's always at the door when I close it, and waiting at the door when I get out.  I've never been quite sure what she does for those 20 minutes, but I guess a part of me figured she waited outside the door.  Well, today this is what I had waiting for me when I stepped out of the bathroom:

   

So apparently she does not sit at the door and wait for me.  At least she's entertaining herself.

Sweet Sleep

This morning was first for us -- Maya let me sleep in.  :) 

She normally wakes me up sometime between 6:00 and 6:30.  When I woke up this morning, I didn't hear Maya, so I figured it was still night.  I put on my glasses and check the clock -- 7:23 am.  Weird. 

I laid in bed for a minute, and that's when I heard her.  Maya sleeps in her kennel, and I always put a toy in there with her to give her something to play with in case she doesn't want to go to sleep right away.  This morning, she was playing quietly with her toy, waiting for me to get up.  Good doggy!