Back Packs, Visiting and Sunny Days!

Daniel has finally succumbed and purchased a special doggy back back. Milo and Millie are not impressed! The idea is that, in the summer, Daniel will take Milo out on his motorbike but, in actual fact, Millie was more comfortable when we tried them out in it. Personally, I don't think this will ever happen and more likely will be used when going on long walks. Watch this space......!

A couple of weeks ago Daniel and I made a flying visit to see Granny & Grandad and we took Milo and Millie with us. It takes about an hour to get there, mostly motorway but Milo did not settle - if he had been a child I'm sure he would have kept saying, "Are we there yet, are we there yet, are we there yet"! As before, to run off some energy before they descended, I dropped Daniel and the dogs off a mile or so before we got there so they could walk across the fields. They duly arrived but absolutely filthy as it had been quite wet and Millie in particular loves puddles - each one has to be explored and waded through. Fortunately, we had bought towels with us so much cleaning had to be done before they could go in the house. Granny and Grandad were very pleased to see them and had to suffer many kisses during the hour or so we were there. At least the journey home was a lot quieter as both Milo and Millie were flat out for the whole time. 

We have had some lovely warm days lately (as well as some horrible cold ones too!) and Millie and Milo have thoroughly enjoyed the freedom to wander in and out of the house at will as we have left the back door open. They do prefer it if someone is out there with them so we have spent a lot of time enjoying the sun as they mooch around. Unfortunately, the lawn has suffered badly over the winter having been trampled by two energetic Jack Russell's but it is starting to make a come back.

We are still struggling to teach Milo and Millie any tricks and they look at you as if you are stupid if you try to get them to offer 'paw' or lie down. I have never known dogs be so stubborn in learning anything. Even our old Akitas who are notorious for not doing as you ask unless it is on their terms were happy enough to be bribed with a treat. Walking has improved a bit and we are continuing taking them separately. If they have been in the garden all day they are even happy to go without a walk at all which suits us after a long day at work but is a rare occurrence.

Training, Treats and Funny Little Ways

Millie and Milo are very fond of keeping warm, Milo in particular. They like nothing better than lying in front of the fire when it is on or finding a patch of sunshine to lie in (a bit few and far between at the moment). Milo loves a jumper and will often leap up and pull one down if he spots one on the back of a chair - Millie is not so keen and her long coat keeps her warm so Milo is inheriting lots of fetching pink outfits (he doesn't care!). At bedtime there is quite a ritual with both of them pumping, pulling and nesting their blankets to get just the right position before plonking themselves down for the night. Milo is a dab hand at using his teeth to pull a blanket right over him and we often think he has gone astray when he is actually fast asleep under his covers. The domed donut bed is very popular although it is often more fun to hide balls and toys in it and then drag it around the floor than to sleep in it.

Milo under the top blanket
and Millie on top

We have had some problems in teaching Milo and Millie new commands. They know sit but that seems to be the extent of their repertoire. We have tried paw and lie down with an ample supply of treats at hand but they just look at you as if you had gone mad as if to say "we are sitting, this is our trick, now give us a treat!" Millie just loves tummy rubs and will sit on you lifting her leg and pawing at you until you do so we have tried to capitalize on that by saying "paw" every time she does it. The other day she was asleep at the other side of the room and I was making another attempt to teach Milo. As soon as she heard the word "paw" she leapt off the chair, rushed over. leaned against me with her leg lifted ready to have her tummy rubbed. She has trained me well!

Millie wearing the cap
Daniel bought for Milo
(who won't wear it!)

The majority of our garden is surrounded by 7ft fencing but there is one panel against the house that is trellis on top of a four foot wall with a small border with ferns and heathers in front of it. Through this trellis Milo and Millie are able to commune with Jenny, our next door neighbour who is very fond of them. Every morning she places a biscuit for each of them, propped up against the trellis. Millie has very quickly cottoned on to this and now every single time she goes in the garden her first port of call is to jump up on the border to see what goodies await - if none are there she will sit and stare at Jenny's kitchen window, willing her to put in an appearance. Needless to say the poor plants are not fairing well and Daniel is threatening putting scrunched up chicken wire over all the borders. In fact the whole garden is a bit of a quagmire and our beautiful lawn is no more, just a mud bath curtesy of two excitable terriers!

There is definitely some sibling rivalry between Milo and Millie and they are equally as bad as each other. The other day Daniel was giving some fuss to Millie which I happened to catch on camera. I then looked at Milo on the other side of the room and you can see the jealousy in those eyes!

Yesterday was beautiful and the sun was shining, a vast difference from the weather of late so I took Millie up on Minchinhampton Common where she made friends with a lovely cockapoo called Goose. Daniel took Milo off on a much longer walk through several fields and was able to off-lead him with no one in site. Needless to say, he was absolutely filthy when he got home and I had to put him in the sink to wash him off. As he was a bit shivery I put one of Millie's older jumpers on him but he preferred sitting on my shoulder to dry off!    

Sleeping, Playing and Walking

We are now well past the three month stage which they say is the time you should allow for rescue dogs to settle in and get to to know you and I would say that Milo and Millie have well and truly got their feet under the table.

When they are in the house they can be absolutely lovely, very affectionate and often falling asleep. They are a little clingy and like one of us to be there with them, preferably all three of us so they have a choice of laps to sit on. Millie is quite funny as she will sit staring at us until we use the foot recliners on our chairs so she can jump up and have plenty of room to settle on. Milo, on the other hand, doesn't care how much room there is or who else might be sitting on you, he takes a flying leap and lands on the top! The have no concept of personal space at all and have the wettest, lickiest tongues I have ever know in a dog - they don't care if they know you or not, you will get kissed!

On a couple of occasions we have bought some bones for Milo and Millie to chew on and they have had hours of enjoyment from them - not so for us as everywhere we go we are stepping on chards of bone (very painful when you get up in the night and unsuspectingly tread on one) and we frequently find they have left a big chunk of one on the bed for us as a present.

Milo and Millie are very typical terriers and like nothing more than to shake and rag a toy, pulling it between them and generally ripping it to shreds. The hoover is taking quite a battering at the moment as there is constant stuffed toy fluff everywhere. So far, they have been very good and only done this to their own things, although i did find a pair of chewed trainer laces the other day! They are also extremely nosy and often use Martin as a springboard to look out the window - usually when they are waiting for one of us to come home or, in the case of the above picture, supervising the bin men. 

The main issues we have with Milo and Millie is when we are walking them as they both pull quite badly on the leads and Milo in particular will scream with excitement when we set off or if he sees another dog, a cat, a person, a leaf - in fact anything that moves. It can be very embarrassing when we walk around the estate as you can hear every dog in the area starting to bark in response so think we are getting quite the reputation. The worst is when we see a cat - and there are many on our estate (one house a few yards away from us has 9!). We are working on all of this and have had some success with different collars, harnesses and training techniques but have found the best way to calm things down is to walk them separately - no competition seems to be the key. Martin and I normally walk them during the week (going opposite ways around the block) and then Daniel will take them on longer walks when he isn't working late. He and I also take them to the enclosed field we found and they seem to be learning well to come back to us, especially if a raised hand containing a treat is shown. It is fantastic to watch them flying through the grass to get back to us, sitting as soon as they arrive for their treat and they come home filthy and exhausted but very happy.

We have also tried a special collar on Milo that you can use a remote control to release a spray of citronella when he is very bad. Daniel used it the other day and just one spray was enough to make him walk nicely and stop barking at another dog. After that he was just shown the remote and he instantly obeyed. Hopefully he will soon get the hang of this and we won't have to use it for long as, to be honest, it's not a method I totally approve of. The little video below was taken the day after this walk with Daniel and he behaved beautifully even though he didn't have that collar on.

Festive Fun!

Just before Christmas, Daniel and I drove up to the Midlands to introduced Milo and Millie to The Grandparents who are both in their 90's. To try and get rid of some of their energy before they came into the house, I dropped Daniel off with them a mile or so before we got there so he could walk them across the fields and arrive slightly after me.

They had a wonderful time and Granny and Grandad were very happy to meet them. Milo and Millie thought they were a bit grubby though so insisted on giving them a good wash to help them out.

Just a couple of hairy moments when they spotted a squirrel outside the window on the bird feeder so you can imagine the excitement that caused!

We have all eaten far too much over the festive season but we've also had some good walks and plenty of rest too. Milo has discovered a new place to take a nap (on the back of my chair where he is hidden from view) and Millie is on the constant look out for food! She and I have had some lovely walks together up on Minchinhampton Common, even though it was a little misty at times, while Daniel has taken Milo off on their own adventures. 

Toby and Steph came round with Misty on boxing day and Milo and Millie were delighted to see them (although Misty wasn't so keen on them this time and had to have time out in the car). Once again, they thought Steph needed a good wash and jumped in to help her.

Milo and Millie were very spoiled over Christmas and had lots of presents and special food. Milo was definitely more into ripping open Christmas presents whilst Millie watched on, although she has played with everything since. They seem to go from one extreme to the other, firstly being super-excited and the next collapsing in exhaustion. Certain toys have already been confiscated as they cause a lot of squabbling - it's honestly like having a couple of naughty children again. They are both equally guilty of starting a fight and seem to know exactly what buttons to push to set the other off - seemingly with the intention of getting the other into trouble whilst they look innocently on. I am not fooled!!

Getting to Know You

November has been a busy month with mixed weather ranging from Storm Bert to hard frosts and even a bit of snow (although nothing settled here in Gloucestershire). Milo and Millie are getting to know us and us them. After a week or so of them sleeping on Daniel's bed at night we have encouraged them (with the aid of a child gate) to sleep downstairs and they have very successfully done so, only complaining for about 5 minutes on the first night - oh, and another night when Milo managed to break through the extension that had been added to the gate at four o'clock one morning so had a lovely time very excitedly licking everyone until we were all awake and had to be shoved down the bed to quieten him down. The gate has now been fixed! They seem to love their old beds that came with them and snuggle down happily as bedtime approaches, Milo in particular liking to be covered up so only his ears show.

The cold weather has meant new jumpers are the order of the day and Milo very proudly wears his and even asks to have it put on. Millie is not so keen and stands looking miserable if one is put on her so we think it will have to be very chilly before she is happy to wear it. We are not ones for having the heating turned up high but we have had to put the gas fire on in the living room on a couple of occasions and Milo and Millie seem to rather enjoy that! 

They are typical terriers and like nothing better than a game of tug - sometimes the noises they make sound quite violent and, like a naughty pair of children, have to be told off and separated until they have calmed down. On other occasions, butter wouldn't melt in their mouths and they are extremely loving and affectionate. Milo, in particular likes to play at Parrot-Dog and sits on the back of chairs to get the best view whereas Millie likes close contact and prefers a lap.

One of the main problems we have with them is they will both pull terribly on the lead and we have tried an assortment of harnesses and leads to try and overcome the problem. The best method seems to be to walk them separately so Daniel will take Milo one way and I will drive Millie up to the Common and they are both fine so we suspect it is a bit of rivalry going on when they are together. After they had been with us for about 3 weeks we decided to see what they would be like off lead so Daniel walked them both to a field about a mile away which we know is totally secure. When he was there he gave me a call and I drove to the opposite end of the field from where he was and entered it from the other end. Once Daniel could see me I started whistling and calling and he let them go - they instantly raced towards me and you can see from the attached video this first successful attempt. Unfortunately, they do not have a particularly good recall for general walking and love to charge up to other dogs. Having had Akitas who had to be permanently on a lead we know from first hand experience what a nuisance small off-lead dogs can be so we are making sure there is never anyone around when they are let off. A work in process!

We haven't seen Toby and Steph for a couple of weeks so they have had no contact with Misty, their Miniature Schnauzer. In fact she has been in doggy hospital for a couple of nights this week with pancreatitis and was very ill but is now home so Toby bought her round on Saturday. Initially there was a lot of snarling and barking but they quickly settled and, at one point, all three were sitting on Toby so actually not too stressful at all. We are hoping that the more they meet the more they will come to like each other so we will keep persevering.