What Is Normal?

Things are settling back to normal. Barry is back in his groove. Routine is mostly back in order. Since getting or floors done we've switched up a few things and Barry has different preferences. We are just going with the flow as far as his preferred time to eat goes. Wake up, walk and bathroom, then eat. No big deal. That's easy to deal with. Barry is happy to see his KONG again. Last week he wasn't interested in the KONG - at least his interest wasn't visible. This week he's been jumping off the couch at site of the KONG and starts chewing at it while I leave for work. It's such a relief to have him tail wagging and chewing on his KONG when I leave rather than ears back with big sad eyes watching me as I leave for work.

We still have residual dust from the floors getting put in. Husband and I have dusted but it continues to settle. So we have some housekeeping to do still. Also, the biggest change for Barry is having the back room off limits while we're gone. He seems okay with it and no accidents makes us happy.

His paw pads are pretty much all healed up now and his scrapes from Memorial Day weekend on his front and back legs are looking really good. He's definitely back to squirrel hunting when we're outside.

I'm glad we're all getting back into our groove. Barry switches things up all the time but our basics are almost back in order. It's so important for your dog to have a good routine, just like it is for children. It sounds boring but it keeps everyone sane, including Barry. He knows we're leaving and he's okay with it because he's used to the routine. After approximately 25 weeks of the pretty much the same thing each day (apart from the weekends) a routine becomes, well, routine. Barry gets it.

I'm sure as we go things will naturally progress as that's what happens in life. We're just happy that things are resettling.