Momo and Gyoza Day 6 Update
These two foster puppies are available via City Dog Rescue. Momo’s page is here. And, Gyoza’s page is here.
These two cuties went to the vet last night. We got stuck in traffic and they did SO well in the car. An 11 mile trip ended up taking us close to 1.5 hours! I guess that’s living in the city 😆
They softly cried for the first 5 minutes or so, but then they must have enjoyed the motion of the car because I didn’t hear another peep from them until we got closer and I needed to park.
When I got out of the car, Momo managed to get his collar in his mouth and was happily chewing away! Oh boy! Luckily, the collar is not severed. Normally, I don’t like to leave collars or harnesses on puppies for this reason, but when traveling, I always like to keep something on them just in case.
Momo’s collar antics! Don’t worry, he’s not stuck. As soon as I opened the crate door to take them out, he spit it out and was trying to climb over Gyoza to be the first one out 😆
At the vet, the puppies had their first elevator ride! They did great, just super curious.
Puppies’ first elevator trip!
When we got into the vet, everyone was happy to see them, and the puppies were happy to see all of the staff. They got their vaccinations and weighed. Momo weighed in at a solid 12 lbs! Gyoza was only slightly smaller at 11 lbs.
Gyoza getting some puppy snuggles from the staff :)
After their vet visit, I put them back in the car. Luckily, the return trip only took us about 45 minutes. They slept the whole way with no crying at all! They might be good travel buddies for their future adopters!
It was a beautiful sunset on the drive home, I love DC!
Other than the vet, yesterday we had a major breakthrough with the independence training. I left Gyoza out in the exercise pen, and I set Momo up in a crate in our kitchen (so Gyoza was uncrated, though they were still separate). Miraculously, I was able to feed them and Gyoza was QUIET! I seriously couldn’t believe it. She has barked loudly at me for every single meal time since I started separating them, and yesterday she didn’t!
That is Gyoza in the play pen! She’s just laying down chewing on her KONG while Momo is in a crate and they are completely separate. Wow Gyoza, great job!!!
Encouraged by this, I decided to take things one step further, and I set up a new permanent crate in their play pen setup.
For meal #3 of the day, I crated them both in the permanent crates and Gyoza was silent again. She is finally getting the hang of being crated and eating her KONG! I think she just realized that if she wants to eat wet puppy food (she does) she needs to seize her opportunity and eat in the crate!
Amazing!
Then, after the vet yesterday, I knew they would be tired, so I left them in their crates at dinner time and they took a nap. So, they were crated separately yesterday for well over an hour and, after some initial crying, they were calm! That doesn’t sounds like much, but it is a huge milestone! I’m so proud of these two. They are really smart and it is so fun to watch them figure everything out.
I’m also really excited about them accepting separate crating because they are almost getting too big to be in their indoor play pen together. So, it will be nice to have the option to rotate turns in the indoor play pen space and save high-energy play for outdoors.
These days, I’m setting up their play pen a dozen times a day. We start out looking like this…
And, within just a couple of minutes, they rearrange things to this…
You can see, one of their new favorite activities is shredding their potty pads into dozens of tiny pieces!
They are definitely growing both in confidence and energy level, so changing their setup will hopefully help them learn to be more calm and settled indoors, while still allowing them plenty of beneficial play and exercise outdoors. I’ll keep you posted on how this goes 🤞
They are still doing the stairs like champions.
Also, yesterday, they did 100% of their poops outside - yay puppies!
And, for one last moment of significance, this morning I did our usual wake up routine… I was up at 6:15am, let out puppies, waited for them to both pee and poop, picked up poop, crated them, made their breakfast, tidied their pen, and then STILL HAD TIME TO ENJOY A CUP OF COFFEE before I let them back out again.
That’s how much progress they’ve made with crate training! They would have never been able to handle that long in the crate before. So great! So, I got to enjoy quiet puppies, a tidy play pen, and a nice warm cup of coffee. What a great start to my day! ❤️ ☺️
