Annie's first month

A whole month (and then some) has gone by and I’ve been very restrained and not blogged Annie seven days a week. I can’t hold back any more.

The amount this pup has grown in a month is incredible. She’s quite a big bundle of mischief now. The cats are gradually getting used to her. One went AWOL for a few days, but we eventually found her in the kids’ ‘cubby’ house in the garden – a safe five feet off the ground. Now she’ll come in, but only if Annie is locked up for the night in the laundry. If she meets her in the garden, she’ll give her ‘the eye’ and if that doesn’t work, she takes off under the house. The other cat just sits and swats at her with her claws if she comes too close. Annie usually gives her a wide berth.
I’ve started training her, but so far we haven’t got much past ‘sit’ and ‘come’. She has a definite mind of her own. If she thinks something is silly, she just refuses. She had Dynamo and Sausage in stitches the other night. I was trying to teach her to ‘stay’. I’d make her sit, then say ‘stay’ and walk backwards away from her. But after two steps she was following me. We went over and over it until, at last, I managed to walk right across the room with her still sitting. I was thrilled. “Good girl, come!” I said. She just sat and stared at me. The look on her face was quite clearly “Come? Now you want me to come? What do you think I was doing all those times you made me sit down again?”

She’s the same about walking on her leash. I kept trying it on the farm and she would just sit down and refuse to move, with a look that said “All this space and you want me to stay with you? Funny one!” Yet last week I took her to town, put her on her leash and walked her along the river. She trotted along as if she’d been doing it forever. She didn’t pull, she didn’t sit down. She just padded along with her head in the air, wagging her tail at the admiring passersby and having a ball.

Some good behaviour has just seemed to happen naturally though. She has always just sat and watched as I filled her dish for dinner. She doesn't jump around and go mad like most dogs do at dinnertime. She's very well mannered. And house training was a breeze. She actually seemed to prefer going outside. That's not to say we didn't have a few accidents, but generally she's been really good.

We won’t mention her penchant for mud. I’m going to have to do something about that before winter.