I alluded to the fact that SOMETHING happened right around the time Penny turned eight weeks old. That SOMETHING was that she went to sleep a baby and woke up a full-fledged toddler.
When we picked Penny up from the breeder, we weren't actually intending to take her home with us. She was only seven weeks and a few days old. We wanted to meet the entire litter before picking our puppy, so we had driven nearly three hours to the middle of Amish country in Ohio to do exactly that. But it turned out that she was close enough to "ready to go" and had fully transitioned to solid food and blah, blah, blah. Basically the breeder didn't see any reason for us to have to make the trip again the following weekend.
I think he KNEW.
Seven-week-old Penny was the epitome of perfection. You guys, she slept through the night that first week. The WHOLE night. I can't say that about my six-year-old kid. In fact, the pup loved sleep so much that's pretty much all she did. She was a cuddly bundle of sleepy fur who wanted to sit in your lap and nap all. day. long.
PERFECTION.
But then that magical Sunday morning came around and suddenly our cuddly bundle of sleepy fur was all OMG! THERE IS STUFF! HERE! AND THERE! AND LOOK AT THIS STUFF! AND OMG OMG OMG OMG! OUTSIDE!!!!!! STUFF!!!!!!
Overnight she went from almost housebroken to What? Am I supposed to be doing something when I'm outside? Because all I want to do is play and chew on this rose bush and have you seen this light and I want to play and what's that over there and wow this shrub smells really good and hey! You! Can I come inside now? Oh, good! I need to pee! The carpet is delightfully boring, so I'll just go right here!
Ergh.
At the same time, she figured out how to get off the couch, up the stairs, down the stairs, through the baby gates, over the baby gates, under the baby gates, around the baby gates and did I mention that she figured out how to go absolutely wherever she wanted whenever she wanted? Because she did.
Penny began spending her waking hours looking for trouble. No power cord went unchewed. No cat went untackled. No toy went undestroyed. I refuse to even talk about what she did to our carpets. Let's just say I'm REALLY glad we own a steam cleaner because when we couldn't find the food she started out eating and had to change? HOOBOY DID THAT DO FUN THINGS TO HER BELLY.
So, you know, typical puppy stuff is going on at our house. No big deal.
It's a good thing she's cute.
(P.S. She is *easily* the most trainable dog I've ever encountered. It took all of about ten seconds to train her to sit in that chair while I take pictures of her.) (I've been trying to train Cody to do the same thing for three years. Still no luck.)