Amber at 9 Months

Amber is 9 months old today. “The Baby,’ our yellow labrador retriever, weighs 81 lbs and is the proverbial ‘bull-in-a-china-shop’ lumbering through the house, running over sweet Molly (our cocker spaniel/schnauzer cross) regularly.

Amber is learning to respect Molly – at least somewhat – especially when Molly has decided she likes one of the toys. Molly doesn’t want to play with it or chew on it. She wants to guard it. Ferociously. When anyone comes close, she growls. I will put up with this for a bit because I’m pleased she is no longer trying to be invisible in her own home, but a little bit goes a long way. I’ve actually had to swat Molly with a newspaper when she snapped at ME about the toy.

Amber has learned a lot and has become a real member of the family now. She minds pretty well – particularly when she knows we have the shock collar remote in hand. We hardly ever have to even make the warning sound anymore, much less shock her. She anticipates us on many things now, so we don’t even need to give the command.

We’re pleased at the amount of words she knows: NO, OUT, DOWN, SIT, COME, NO, TREAT, BALL, CAR, STICK, NO, AMBER, OKAY, PLACE, GOOD DOG, NO!... :0)

She sits and waits for us to put her food bowl down and say, “OKAY” before she eats. She goes to her PLACE when we’re bringing plates into the living room. She comes and stares at us, saying, “whine, whine, ” when she wants to go out. (as she just did)  We’re trying to teach her to bark when she would like to come in.

She walks up my husband’s front as he sits in his recliner, wanting to cuddle. Our chairs are just a few feet apart in the living room. I look over at her when she’s playing ‘lap dog,’ and suddenly there is a gleam in her eye and she’s sitting up straight, rather than cuddling. This is the signal that she’s thinking of jumping from his chair and lap to mine. Since I really don’t like the idea of an 81 pound dog landing on my lap and chair, I leap out of my chair and go sit on the couch. She now takes that as an invitation to crawl up on the couch and sit beside me. We don’t allow her on the furniture, but in this case, I give in and give her a good cuddle.

She loves the cooler weather (it’s 36 degrees F out there right now), and since she readily comes at our call or the shock collar warning, we can let her out by herself to romp, sniff and otherwise be a real dog.

All of these good words about how much she’s learning go out the window with a sucking sound if someone comes to visit. She is so busy trying to get close to the visitor that she no longer sees or hears us. I can imagine what our friends think after meeting ‘the maniac.’  They probably think we don’t work with her at all. We are arranging play dates with other dogs, taking her with us in the car when we have a short list of errands, and having people over, but this will be a steep hill to climb.