Selective Hearing & The "Treat" Counter

Barry can be the best listener. Sometimes I just take it for granted how well behaved he is. I think I dwell too much on the times he's in squirrel mode. That, of course, is no one's fault but mine. Our amazing dog trainer once told me something along the lines of, "You're flunking him before you even give him a chance to pass!" That has stayed with me. I have to remind myself of my attitude and how it affects Barry. The training was mostly for me. Husband too but mostly for me I think. Barry was just along for the ride and the treats. He already wanted to do whatever we told him, he's made ready to please.

All that to say, there are the times when Barry loses our voice. He gets in this mode that is hard to break. His attention is no longer on us. He can't hear us. It's not often. We see it fleetingly with squirrels he finds on our walks or a dog that is just too interesting to not sniff. There are also the times that he's searching intently for a squirrel or critter. He is on high alert. He barely listens. He'll sit down next to us but won't look. We have to wait for him to snap out of it. He's listening, though, that's the thing. Otherwise he wouldn't sit. He's only half listening, though. Still searching for critters.

Then there's the front desk area. Barry thinks of this place as the treat counter. The front desk guys love Barry and Barry loves them. Barry takes on their energy and he's crazy, pulling us to the desk and he jumps up to peer over the counter and get a treat. We've started making Barry sit before he can receive one of those front desk treats. For some reason those treats are the best thing he's ever eaten. I'm sure whatever it is they have isn't the sort of treats we're giving Barry. It can't be as delicious but for some reason he goes nuts over the milk bone type treat. Even though Barry has a sensitive stomach we allow him to have one in the evening because it's one of Barry's favorite things ever!

As soon as we get anywhere near the front desk Barry pulls his hardest so he can get
there fast!

Then he jumps up to the counter to see over the side. This is our doorman walking
around to make Barry sit so he can give him a treat.

Barry sitting and licking his lips.

Now that he's had his treat he's trying to go behind the desk to sniff out more!

Sometimes I'm not sure who's happier to see whom. The front desk man to see Barry or Barry to see the front desk man. Either way, Barry gets excited like a kid when we near the "treat" counter.

Doggie Play Date

On Sunday we headed out to the burbs to meet up with some friends and their dogs. Barry gets a little bit of socialization but he always relishes the moments that he's allowed to play with another dog like he did on Sunday.

Muddy paws = a good time.

This is Kasia. All of the dogs (besides Barry) belong to her. She is holding Anya and
in the foreground is Pancho.

Little Anya.

Barry has met these dogs before but it was on the first day we adopted him. I briefly mentioned a sweet girl dog named Lizzy that we wanted to adopt in one of the first posts I wrote. Well, Barry got to hang out with her (as much as she'd let him) on Sunday as well! I was thrilled to see Lizzy too, she's doing so well and loves her home.

This is the lovely Lizzy.

Lizzy prefers to hang out by herself  (this is why there are not as many pictures of Lizzy)
but we were able to get this picture of  Barry & Lizzy together. 

Barry got snacks and treats, and lots of love, not to mention he got to hang out with some cool dogs. It was a good Sunday.

Pancho followed Barry everywhere. His nose was nearly glued to Barry's bottom!

It is exactly what it looks like. Barry is peeing on the bush while Pancho
is taking in the scent as closely as possible. Hopefully without getting peed on.

Barry chewing on a grass blade while Pancho (in the background) reclaims the bush
Barry previously marked.

We can't wait for our next visit - which we already planned out. Great company and awesome dogs!

Selfie Saturday!!

Just some gorgeousness to get you through your Saturday!

Happy Saturday!

What's For Dinner?

We all know too well about Barry's digestive troubles. Pinpointing the exact issue may never happen. We can just help by eliminating certain things and staying consistent. Consistency isn't always easy when you eliminate one thing and add another in order to find the culprit of his issues.

Hold me Daddy. My tummy hurts.

I recently posted about giving Barry probiotics, kefir specifically. We have been doing the pumpkin thing as well, that has been something we have been mixing in his food pretty consistently since the beginning. Then once he seemed better we'd stop putting it in his food. Then we'd start again once he had diarrhea. See the pattern? So we've decided to continue giving him pumpkin with his food. It's relatively inexpensive and it's healthy for him so there isn't any harm in giving him the pumpkin each day regardless of his stools.

Since adding and keeping with the Kefir we've noticed he has had pretty normal poo. We give him about a quarter cup in the AM and that's it. Just once per day. Another relatively cheap addition that we can continue giving him that won't hurt. Now, his poo has been on the mushy side a few times but no diarrhea so I am hesitantly optimistic that this stuff is helping him. Time will tell but so far so good.

We also recently started  noticing small patches along his belly and thigh and through his side on the backs of his legs and near his bottom. Dry, round patches where there is some hair loss. Barry didn't seem too bothered by them but he has been sort of chewing and scratching at them infrequently. I looked up a few possible things that could cause this and one of the first things that came up was a food allergy. The more I looked into it the more I have become convinced that Barry has a food allergy. Obviously his main source of food is the kibble we feed him. We've been feeding him Blue Buffalo Wilderness Chicken. Blue Buffalo is a decent food and is well ranked with very few questionable ingredients. We don't know what he could be allergic to.

Since I get into everything who knows what is causing me to be sensitive!

We have started to slowly introduce him to a new food that is ranked very high and is all human grade with great ingredients. It's called The Honest Kitchen: Love. It's a little more expensive (it's dehydrated and a 10 lb box makes 40 lbs of food) but only by about twenty cents per pound. We will see how he does on the new food. It will be a while before we completely switch over as we're doing a slow incorporation.

So far he seems to enjoy the taste of his new food and he sure was excited to open the package when it came!

Happy Camper

Our camping weekend was great. Barry was an excellent camper. Everything was ideal for camping. The weather was right on and the bugs were nearly non existent.

The first evening when we arrived we set up the campsite and put Barry on a 30 foot cord hooked to the picnic table. He stayed pretty busy while we set up camp. At first I didn't know if 30 feet would be long enough but it was more than perfect for our site. He was able to get just into the edge of the woods all around and couldn't get to the road in front or too far beyond any boundaries. When it was time for bed we brought him into our tent with us to sleep. He didn't sleep well that first night. He was nervous and up at every noise. There were a lot of other campers with their dogs and it sounded to me like many of the dogs were sleeping outside. Also the raccoons were out and about. Barry has likely never experienced anything like it. At about 4:30 in the morning the birds started loudly singing and chirping and Barry was ready to start the day. At about 6:30 I reluctantly put Barry's harness on and decided I could put him on the long cord so he could pee and I also needed to use the bathroom. I knew that if I tried to get out of the tent there was no way Barry was going to be okay with staying in the tent. Then of course Husband woke up and we were all up bright and early with only a few hours of sleep under our belt.

Barry doesn't want to miss out on a thing! Each morning we had to hold onto his harness
to make him stay so he wouldn't zoom out of the tent. All dogs were to be leashed at
all times. The only time he was off leash was in the tent for his safety.

First day at camp and Barry is loving it. He was so curious about everything.

We did a 3 1/2 - 4 mile hike the first day. It was beautiful. The sites were just lovely. Barry loves hiking and he did really well. Even after our hike, when we got back to the site Barry was still a bit amped up. He was still getting used to everything. I gave him a few calming chews (we use these) and he was still quite excited. Once our friends arrived that afternoon I gave him a couple more so they could set up their tent and unpack relatively peacefully. Finally Barry laid on his travel bed and began to snooze a bit. Also giving him a good bone helped a lot.

Now THIS is a stick!

The mosquitos weren't a nuisance really. There were a few gnats that were bothering Barry. I sprayed him with the home made essential oil bug spray and it didn't keep the gnats away. Most other bugs seemed to not be interested in Barry. Husband and I also used the natural bug spray on ourselves. I don't know how well the stuff works due to the lack of bugs but I can say the stuff smells really good and I have hardly any bug bites on myself and Barry only seems to have a couple of bumps. I will continue to use the blend and see if it still works as summer goes on.

**For those of you curious as to what I used here is the recipe:
Young Living Purification essential oil blend (citronella, lemongrass, rosemary, melaleuca, lavandin, & myrtle)
Young Living Thieves essential oil blend (clove, lemon, cinnamon, eucalyptus radiata, & rosemary)
Peppermint essential oil
Witch hazel
Oil of your choice (if using oil)

In a 12 oz bottle I poured about 5 oz each of witch hazel and grape seed oil. I put about 20 drops of each essential oil (I don't know if this is a good amount or not but it seemed to be an average amount from what I've read). Shake and you're ready to go. When using witch hazel along with oil there is no need to shake the bottle over and over like if you were using water and oil. The blend was moisturizing and smelled delicious!**

The next day we did a longer hike, probably close to 5 miles. This hike was very hilly and some parts were quite jagged and steep with rocks and no where to move out of the way of oncoming hikers except to sit in the rocks. Still, Barry did well. We all trucked along at a good pace. For much of that hike our friend's teenage daughter wanted to walk Barry and so we let her. I knew Barry would be pulling her along at a much faster pace than would be comfortable for the rest of us to walk. Much of the trail was wide and grassy so it was not a big deal but I still wanted to have them in my site in case Barry caught sight of a small creature. We also had a young child with us on the hike, who, on our way back ran most of the way. I think he must have run and walked by himself for about a mile and a half. Once we got back to the car we were quite tired but feeling the natural high you get from being outside in nature. Barry slept for most of the evening, curled up either on his travel bed or in Husband's camp chair.

Before we packed up and left for home we all went to the dog beach. Barry got in the lake right away but then got out just as quickly. He wasn't very interested in hanging out in the water. He prefers to hike.

I can't wait until our next camping trip and from the looks of it, I'd say Barry can't wait either!

Camping with Barry: The Prep

Tonight we'll be camping with Barry and some friends. We're so looking forward to it! Getting out of the city and into nature. We'll do some hiking, swimming, hanging out by the campfire, s'mores, tent sleeping, the whole nine. That includes bugs and whatnot. Last year we had a great camping trip in a beautiful part of Wisconsin, but that was without Barry. There were TONS of mosquitos. Swarms of them. Flying into my eyeballs, landing in our food, buzzing by our ears, in my hair and they even got a few bites in. We were drenched in the toxic, supposed cancer-causing, amazing product called Repel which is 100% deet. It works. Even though our chairs, hair, skin and clothing was drenched in the stuff the mosquitos were still trying hard to get in on the smorgasbord of us humans but they mostly didn't dare land on our bodies due to being covered in poison. I am never ever for using a toxic ingredient like deet anywhere near my body UNLESS I'm getting eaten alive by mosquitos. Then it's cool. I'm willing to forsake my somewhat healthy and toxic free lifestyle when camping - how strange is that?

Unfortunately we cannot be drenching everything in deet this time because we have Barry. I will still be using some of the strong stuff on my body and I'm assuming Husband will as well (if needed) BUT as for spraying the area of our campground and spraying Barry we'll be trying something more natural. Ugh. I hate the idea of it even. I keep just imagining it all being totally useless. I have a number of recipes for safe and natural mosquito repellents for dogs. Many call for a combination of essential oils, lemon, and witch hazel so I think I shouldn't have any problems with ingredients. I'm just worried it won't work. Even though there are tons of recipes out there I've not heard once about how effective they are or if they even work. That makes me seriously doubt the effectiveness of the natural route for this particular scenario. I don't want Barry getting all bit up. I also have to keep in mind that even though I'm using a natural repellent he still will be licking his fur so I can't totally drench him in it like I'd want to in order to keep the little buggers away. Hopefully there won't be tons of mosquitos. Maybe our spot will be dry with a good breeze as well (that helps with the mosquito issue as well). I will be reporting back with my recipe and the level of effectiveness.

Husband bought a nice outdoor/travel bed for Barry as well. It's pretty nice. We use it indoors too (yet another bed for Barry). So aside from us packing our own essentials we now need to make sure we are packing Barry's essentials too. I love that we are bringing Barry. I think he's going to love it!

Another exciting thing happening this week is that my mom, step dad, and sister will be coming to visit! They will finally get to meet Barry. Though, they aren't coming all this way just to meet Barry but I think they'll just fall in love with him. So Barry is going to be extra spoiled this week with lots of love and attention from three extra people :) Lucky dog.

This will be the only post this week as I'll be too busy to do any updates but fear not! I'll be back next week with updates and pictures of our camping trip.

If anyone has any advice for me please let me know. I can use all the camping-with-dog advice that I can get.