# Welcome to Pepperland



## KiwiD (Jan 14, 2008)

Pepper is a very cute pup! To answer your question about restraint in the car we use a dog hammock and then she wears a harness that clicks into the seat belt. We have a Civic so a crate isn't an option for us. The hammock protects the seat and the harness keeps her as safe as possible in the event we ever got in an accident.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Thank you so much for the helpful answer! Is the harness a standard harness or something special for car-riding?

We have the hammock bookmarked on amazon. I think in combo with a harness, that'll work awesomely.

I'm so glad we're something like two weeks away from this being an issue. Have you ever noticed that with a puppy, two weeks like two years? It's so far in the future! Who cares?!


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## KiwiD (Jan 14, 2008)

You're most welcome. I believe the Sleepypod harness is the most highly rated one from crash tests they've done. It's not inexpensive and Pepper would outgrow it fairly quickly so that is something to factor in. We have a Sleepypod Sport and we also have one from Kurgo.

Time does seem to stand still when they are pups but it flies by the older they get!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Yikes! Today Pepper lost his first tooth! I thought I had another month before this becomes an issue. Time to order (even more) toys!


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## Sophie90 (Mar 22, 2017)

I love reading about your adventures! This gives me so many good ideas for socialization.


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## Audog (Mar 17, 2017)

What a cute pup! We have a car seat hammock that has zippers to allow it to be folded should we want to carry a human in the back seat. Nigel loves it, it's his own little dog house in a car!


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## sam and coopers mom (Aug 14, 2016)

What a beauty you have. Enjoy the journey


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

I'm baaaaaaack!

I was in the middle of a whole nice long post about Pepper and day care and updates, when our internet suddenly died and was gone for a week. By the time it came back, I was so deep into the throes of dogness (and also baking) that I totally blanked on updating here. I'm so sorry I never responded to any of those later comments - but thank you all for the advice about the hammock and compliments about Pepper (it's like I birthed him myself!)

Overall, things have been going really wonderfully! Pepper is 18.5 weeks and now attends both a local highly-rated daycare and an (also very highly-rated) in-home daycare. He loves both and became socialized so quickly it was like a miracle. Now he plays with big and small dogs and wrestles in an appropriate manner and runs around all day long.

Despite his very sweet and mellow nature, Pepper has a very very very high level of energy - everybody at the day cares constantly comments on just how energetic he is for a four-month old puppy. The kind of thing that wipes a puppy out for the entire day (a trip to the beach), knocks him out for an hour or so and then he's ready to go again. I pointed out to my husband that if I was in perfect health and he was retired and we both ran marathons, we *might* be able to keep up with Pepper!

This week, he went out with an organization called, "Dog Tired," which takes dogs in a pack to the beach for at least an hour. Since it was his first trip with them, they went to a small park and will be keeping him on a long line at the beach. The person who will be taking him out is a certified trainer and she loves him and he loved her and he got along wonderfully with all of the dogs in the pack. 

All of these places send pictures and videos (the daycare actually has webcams as well) and updates and it's so wonderful to see what a great time he's been having. He comes home nicely chilled out but not exhausted and we can work on grooming and training and playing with toys and just cuddling together. 

We haven't had an accident in the house since his first week and are no longer really worried about it. Once he started daycare, he started sleeping through the night and can go for eight hours in his crate. During the day, we average 1-2 hours between, depending on what he's been up to. He pees almost the second we hit grass and never on asphalt or pavement. We started getting him to pee on different grass (aside from the one patch) and have been very successful. He's also gone on the dirt at the park and the sand at the beach.

Okay, this is really, really long, so I'll update later with some of the fun socialization stuff we've been doing with him (escalators! malls! sea lions! beach! taco shops!) and some questions I've had (we're a little worried about his growth). I'll also post some pictures in the next comment.

BTW, we have a dog hammock all ready to go for the car and expect to need it in the next week or two. 

Do you guys know if there's any way to change my thread title? I realized it sounds like a one-off problem when it was just supposed to be a cute introduction to what I hope to be a long-running saga of Pepper's Very Important Life.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Here we have: 

1. Pepper's first trip to the beach. He had a great time, but right after getting this deep in the water (stomach wet), he decided he didn't like that part and stuck to sand after. We'll be going back every weekend and he'll go at least once a week with Dog Tired, so I'm not too worried about the long-run.

2. His last lap-nap. He's getting too big (although he's still really small) and now he curls up right next to me on the couch and puts his head in my lap.

3. Weighing him with a luggage scale. It was *hard* getting him into that bag the first time but now he submits unhappily and lets us bribe him with treats. Today's weight: 23.4 lb! That feels kind of low for an 18 week old do though. More on that later.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Whew, what a relief! I thought I was just exhausted because of having a new puppy plus allergy season, but actually, I have a bacterial sinus infection! That's probably the only time ever you'll hear that kind of news greeted with joy, but I won't feel this way forever and might even have a tiny bit more energy for Pepper again soon!

In actual Pepper news, we went to the beach again yesterday and it went even better than the first time. We picked an empty stretch with no other dogs and no sea grass to eat (he ate sand instead) and worked on getting him into the water. My husband finally carried him in (with lots of treats) and let him swim back to shore. Pepper seems to really hate being wet, which is kind of a mystery to us. Not getting wet, but *being* wet.

Right as we were getting ready to leave, two giant trailers parked on the sand next to us and NINE HORSES (and eight people) got out! Then they went swimming too! Pepper was *fascinated* and with lots of clicking and treating handled it great until the end, when the biggest male horse came too close to us. Then he started growling and it was time to go. My husband has most of the pictures on his phone, but I'm attaching one of him watching the smallest of the horses.

Pepper is finally growing and we're so relieved! Slow growth is not for the faint of heart. He's up to 25lb now (19 weeks old) and growing about a half-pound a day. We're aiming for 35lb at 5 months. His legs are super long now and his skin is all loose, so we're assuming that means more rapid growth is on the way. He's really close to outgrowing his two car crates (30") and even his sleeping crate (36"). We have a 42" ready to go and will move the 36" into one car and the hammock into the other - probably next weekend.

Due to a desperate request from our downstairs neighbor, as well as running out of room in his expen area (especially once that big crate will come in), we bought a dozen pool noodles and can now turn the living room into a temporary pen for him to eat with his feeder toys. He's especially passionate about the Kibble Nibble and Magic Mushroom. I'm also attaching a picture of him exploring the new set up. 

Now that I've started antibiotics, once I feel more human again, I can't wait to start going into some of the other puppy and dog posts here so I can tell everybody how awesome their own dogs are - especially the people who commented here! I'm really excited to become a part of this community.


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## CAROLINA MOM (May 12, 2009)

Pepper is such a doll, enjoying reading about him and his adventures. 

Hope your sinus infection clears up soon, they can be nasty.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

He really is a total sweetheart! Once we tire him out, that is...

BTW, I really liked your post about the dangers of the beach. It seems so innocuous that it can be hard to remember the massive amount of things to watch out for with a dog. We went at least once a week for eleven years with our last dog and so really know the drill, but for people just getting into it, it can be so overwhelming.


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## CAROLINA MOM (May 12, 2009)

Sorry I called Pepper a her.......


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

By the way, is there any way for me to change the title of this thread? It sounds like I'm having a puppy problem instead of just trying to set up a long-running thread about Pepper's life. Does this require moderator assistance?


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## CAROLINA MOM (May 12, 2009)

pepperthepup said:


> By the way, is there any way for me to change the title of this thread? It sounds like I'm having a puppy problem instead of just trying to set up a long-running thread about Pepper's life. Does this require moderator assistance?


It does after 24 hours for changing titles, 4 hours for editing a post. After that even the mods can't change or edit a post. 

If you'll send me a PM or post in here what you'd like the title to say, I'll change it for you.


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## SandyK (Mar 20, 2011)

Congrtas!! Pepper is adorable!!:grin2:


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Since I scheduled all of this before I found out about the sinus infection and have been on the antibiotics for over 24 hours, this morning, Pepper and I are going out together to Starbucks and my hair place. We'll park on one side of the street for the hair appointment, but then walk across to Starbucks and hang there for an hour so he can people and car-watch and get petting. 

Then, when he's a bit pliant from that, it's hair time. I've already cleared this with my hair place and they are very excited to meet him. I'm only getting a cut, so we'll be in there about 45 min. 

After that, around 11:30, I'm going to put him in the crate by himself and vanish into the bedroom (he haaaaaaates this and we're having a hard time with it) and at about 12:30, he'll be picked up for a group outing to the dog beach! He'll have an awesome time and I'll get in some rest. Then, it'll be me and him from 3:30 until 6:30, when my husband gets home, but he should be pretty tired from the beach. Hopefully a fun day for him!

Here's a better picture of him playing with his Kibble Nibble in his new arena. His legs are super long for his height, and this morning, his skin was extremely loose, so we're on the lookout for even more growing.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Pepper has had such a great day today! We hung out at the Starbucks for about an hour and after 15 minutes, I went in to get a drink. I tied him to a chair in the shade right outside the door, waited in line backwards and waved at him (some poor guy got really confused), went back out as soon as I'd ordered, and so on. Honestly, he's so good that I was mostly afraid somebody would try to steal him (people around me in line knew I might dash off at any moment). Some people came by and petted him, looked around for me, and left reassured when I waved. I'd say he was "alone" outside for about six minutes in total, over three visits. Each time I went out, I clicked and treated and gave lots of rewarding praise, but he pretty much barely even cared I was gone. It was time for a nice nap and petting from strangers! Once he saw me inside, all the worry went away.

When we sat to drink the drink, he saw himself in the "mirror" and started growling, so I clicked and treated, brought him closer so his paw could touch the glass and let him see there was nothing there. He licked the glass for a minutes and was over it (this turned out to be good prep for the hairdresser).

This morning, some tiny 1oz tupperware I'd ordered finally arrived and I made a mini treat container to keep in my handbag. What a game-changer! Taking it out and shaking it got his attention like nothing else ever has and he actually dropped three things out of his mouth to get a treat instead (this has *never happened* even once)! It also got him up and moving when he felt like lying around lazily.

The hairdresser was also great. He said hi to people, checked himself out in the mirror and then ignored himself and mostly napped right at my feet. At the end, we gently blew hair off of him with the dryer and he took it with a shrug.

We got home at 11:45 and he started getting antsy - right as Dog Tired showed up! And, my god, I have NEVER seen him get that excited! He ran up to the dog gate and started jumping and pawing at it.

He had a great time at the beach and romped around with all sorts of dog friends. He still doesn't want to go in past his stomach though. I really want him to figure out the joys of swimming and soon - it's summertime!

Now he's asleep in his crate. I stuffed a kong and he happily snacked it down for about 20 min and then whined for a minute, even though I was in the same room with him, but then he passed out. I'm going to take him out either when he wakes up naturally or at 5:15 and then my husband will be home around 6:30.

I am eternally grateful for antibiotics, without which, this day never would have happened.

Next post will be some pictures of his big day.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Snoozing outside Starbucks, admiring himself in the mirror at the salon and funtimes at the beach


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

This is clearly a dog who needs to learn how to have fun.


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## rosegold (Nov 9, 2016)

I love hearing about Pepper and all of his adventures! It sounds like you are doing such a great job socializing him. He is going to grow up into such a confident GR adult 


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Oh, wow, thank you! What a lovely thing for you to say!


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## KiwiD (Jan 14, 2008)

Looks like he had a great day today. What a lucky pup, and very cute too!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

He had an awesome day, but, man, he does *not* get tired out! After all of that, we still took him out to the big field for a solid hour of running after the bacon ball and wrestling with other dogs (long line for both) - he met another 4 month old golden and they really went for it! And yet, none of that was enough. He also raced around after his kibble nibble and chewed his brains out. why doesn't this dog get tired? Am looking into nose work - it's either that or whisky in his water bowl!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Some horse pictures finally showed up. My hand is weirdly above his head because I'm about to pet him, btw.


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## littlecreek86 (May 1, 2017)

pepperthepup said:


> He had an awesome day, but, man, he does *not* get tired out! After all of that, we still took him out to the big field for a solid hour of running after the bacon ball and wrestling with other dogs (long line for both) - he met another 4 month old golden and they really went for it! And yet, none of that was enough. He also raced around after his kibble nibble and chewed his brains out. why doesn't this dog get tired? Am looking into nose work - it's either that or whisky in his water bowl!


What a cutie! Been enjoying reading about his adventures! He sounds a lot like our pup Summer when he was that age (he was wild, just wild). He also looks very much like Summer at that age, btw. At 14 months now ours still has a lot of energy, but I can tell he's calmed down significantly, so there's hope! We did a lot of mental stimulation indoors to help with the energy issues - nose work (getting him to find treats), hide and seek and training, being some of it. Good luck, and keep posting


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

This early summer heatwave has put a definite crimp in some of our plans for this week and gotten me to do some serious wondering about how we're going to entertain and exercise Pepper this summer. Once he's a bit bigger (if that ever happens), the beach will be good, but for now, he's still so small and young that I don't want to overheat him there. If we do go this weekend, it's either going to be at sunrise or sunset.

I'm signing us up for a 3h Nose Work seminar next Sunday, in the hopes it'll tire him out and give us something to do together in the house when it's too hot to go outside. I'm hopeful but a bit dubious, because I keep seeing people here making comments like, "just ten minutes of training my dog makes them more tired than a whole hour of romping outside! and, "they sleep so deeply after obedience class!" and, "20 minutes with the kibble nibble and he panted for an hour!" and none of that is true for Pepper at all. We do *multiple* training sessions every day - both inside and out, give him stuffed Kongs, feed him only with interactive toys where he has to work at it and *nothing makes him tired*. In fact, most of these things ramp him up. But I'm really, really, really, really hoping Nose Work will help with this, because summer is ramping up and it'll make Sept and Oct (the hottest months for us) a whole lot more pleasant if we have an indoor way to tire him out (or can tire him out at all in *any* way).

Pepper went to his outdoor daycare yesterday and had the best day ever. I really wanted him to go back there or on a beach trip today but it was 92 yesterday and is going to be hotter today and I figured he'd benefit from indoor ac at his indoor daycare. A new 5 month old GR puppy has shown up and they're in heaven!

We've had Pepper home with us for six weeks now and something about getting him threw me into a baking frenzy. I think I've baked at least a dozen times. I've made browned butter chocolate chip cookies (still have a dozen balls of dough in the freezer, score!), a dense chocolate loaf cake, a lemon yogurt loaf cake, a strawberry and pecan loaf cake, brownies and the other day, browned butter blondies - which are some of the best things I've ever put in my mouth. Since it can't be all dogs 100% of the time, I'm adding in a blondie picture to today's batch.

Next up in baking: cookies! Peanut Butter Sables, some kind of German cookie with walnuts and jam, and so on. My new cookie scoop just arrive in the mail and I am very excited! I also kind of want to repeat the strawberry loaf and blondies. I think I'm going to start bringing baked goods to Pepper's various daycares.

For those of you still reading, I have a question about questions. If I have a specific question - like, for instance, I am worried both about Pepper's very slow rate of growth and if we're feeding him enough and also about his rough level of puppy play and what that will mean when he gets bigger - should I ask them here or start new threads? I don't think that many people are actually reading my Pepper thread or are here just to see adorable pictures (cause he's super adorable!) but there are things I've been wondering about and I think I could benefit from some forum feedback.

Pictures in next post!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

I mostly get videos from Pepper's outdoor daycare and the only pictures she sends are when he's taking a nap (and therefore not moving) or when he's crated (to help with his training). So, first off today, I have a group photo from last week - which I love, because he looks like he's laughing at the funniest joke ever. Then we have a picture of him finally settling down for a nap - look how dirty and disreputable he looks! And finally, some blondies, because, man, they are SO GOOD. SO SO SO GOOD.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

With one day to go before he turns 20 weeks, Pepper has officially hit the final slow growth milestone of 28lb! When they say slow growth, they really mean it! It's like having a miniature dog and we worry all the time that he's just not going to grow. I guess we'll see how the next few months go.

It's been a mostly good few days (I tell Pepper he's, "mostly good" all the time). He seems to be entering a second fear period and things that didn't faze him at all just a few weeks ago are now cause for concern. On Sunday, he actually barked and growled at a woman and we have no idea why. Maybe it was her big hat? So he's back out and about at the mall, meeting a large variety of people and seeing a large variety of things (trash cans being wheeled, kiddie train, etc).

On the good side, his last puppy kindergarten class went excellently, we're signed up for a 3h beginner nose work seminar on Sunday, and he's discovered the joy of frozen kongsicles! Oh, and he's started hanging out in his crate and napping there of his own free will!

This weekend, we installed the dog hammock in my car and he loves it. We've also upgraded him to the 42" crate, which also inspired love. It's pretty easy to make a GR happy! Today he lost a GIANT tooth and we've been giving him lots of frozen washcloths (he's not super into them though) to ease whatever discomfort he might have. He's a pretty stoic puppy about these things.

Also, this is a silly thing to be so happy about, but today he peed on the patch of artificial grass at the mall for the first time! He pretty much believes you should only pee on real grass ever, which is great for housetraining, but a bit more problematic at the beach or in a parking lot with some scraggly plants on the ends, etc. At the end of puppy training, we always need to drive him half a block to an elementary school lawn. So hopefully he's expanding his potty horizons!

As always, more pictures in the next post! I have some really adorable ones this week!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

1. Yesterday, at his outdoor daycare, Pepper discovered the joys of splashing around in the kiddie poll and then rolling in the dirt. He repeated this many times.

2. We've upgraded his weighing bag! He actually really loves this one and practically crawls right in.

3-5. These are all from this afternoon's beach trip. He does so much mugging for the camera! I think he'll be going back out either on Thursday or Friday.


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## KiwiD (Jan 14, 2008)

Pepper is just a lucky pup to have so many fun adventures and he's so adorable! Have fun with the nose work seminar. We've been doing nose work almost 3 years now and our girl just loves it.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Thanks, Maddie's Mom! Your nose work posts in the sport forum helped convince me it was the right thing to try. And I'm still super grateful for the hammock advice!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Whew, Pepper lost two molars last night - they were gigantic! We managed to snatch both of them up before he ate them - but since they weren't some form of plant life. he probably didn't care too much.

He's so fascinated with eating nature! He'll give a quick try to things in our house, but ignores them once we get him to successfully, 'leave it' once. But grass? Sticks? Leaves? Mulch? Snails? Seaweed? Sand? He *cannot get enough*. Nothing stops him. We can get him to drop something but he'll turn around and snatch something else up. And no matter what toy we bring, he'd honestly rather just graze on the landscape around him. He'll play and run for a bit and then it's salad bar time! I wonder if this is something he'll grow out of or not. It's really tiring to be constantly dragging his mouth away from grass. It makes me wish we had a private yard made out of that soft rubbery stuff they use on children's playgrounds now.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Pepper had a *weekend*! My b-i-l came into the States for a business trip and was able to come just for 48 hours. This was Pepper’s first experience with somebody in the house with him (besides us) for longer than a few minutes and after a bit, he decided the more the merrier! F came to puppy class with us on Sat and then he and J and Pepper went into J’s office to play with their virtual reality tech and had a long drive back down the coast. Pepper explored the whole office and napped enthusiastically.

When they stopped along the coast, they ran into the end of a large local music festival and Pepper was *swarmed* with people. He loved it and soaked up all of that petting. He also got another tiny puppy ice cream cone, but I’m kind of dubious about those. He looks redic adorable while eating them and they brought me home some ice cream too (Graham Central Station!) so I’ll forgive it 

Yesterday was his first nose work class and he loved that too! He went from normal puppy enthusiasm to crazed joy at the realization he could run around and the boxes would keep magically refilling for him. He is an extremely food-motivated dog.

Because there were only two of us in the seminar, the instructor (Jamie Bozzi, for those of you who care about that level of the nose work world) did a whirlwind overview of everything we need to know to practice at home for the next six weeks and then come back for the scent class in August. We learned about what to do with boxes, and levels of box complexity and throwing food into the one box with the reward inside to start training him to stay in place and alert (this one shouldn’t be practiced until he’s much further along though – it was just a quick demo). She also brought in her own dogs to show us what a successful find and alert can look like. We’re invited to come and watch one of her other classes in a few weeks and to send her update videos if we have questions or want to brag about success and she emailed a ton of info as well. I can’t wait for my next round of amazon orders to get here so I can start practicing! Bad timing with recycling last week!

Pepper was WIPED after the class but had a weird day after, so it’s hard to gauge the level of how much this will really tire him. He went with J and F out to a town 45 min away to meet up with a friend and slept in the hammock in the car the whole way there. Then he played with the house’s toddler, decimated a plastic bottle and passed back out for a few hours (more hammock sleeping). 

We figured, as long as we were blowing his brain with so much new stuff, it was time to practice leaving him home alone again, so we put him in his crate (where he willingly naps!) with a gigantic stuffed Kongsicle and went to Trader Joe’s. We were gone for 35 min and I don’t know what happened during the middle, but when we came back, he was enthusiastically going for the Kong still and while he wanted a minute or two of reassuring cuddling, he quickly returned to Kong nomming. Success!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Today we have some slightly older pictures, because I was too busy to take any myself this weekend and J hasn't uploaded the puppy ice cream cone photos yet. 

1. This is what happens when we're not quick enough to put the tables back down on the floor after morning breakfast.

2. This is from the last trip to La Jolla Cove (think we'll go again this week or weekend. Pepper met a 5 year old golden and they greeted each other enthusiastically and then flopped down for naps and child-petting.

3. This is the first day Pepper realized he loves sleeping upside-down. He does it all the time now, though he's in a bigger crate now.

4. The first Kongsicle! I put a plug of peanut butter at the bottom and a few treats I made oatmeal and stirred in a bit of peanut butter while the oats were still hot, so the whole thing would taste like that. Then I mixed in canned pumpkin and yogurt and piped it into the Kong. At the end, I took a chicken and rice jerky stick from Trader Joe's and stuck it in like a Popsicle stick, so it went all the way down but still gave him some immediate satisfaction. He went nuts for this Kong! I'm going to make up a whole batch today. We have one medium (he was eating that one), two large and two-extra large, so we can pick and choose as we go.

Time to go make some puppy oatmeal!


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

Pepper sounds like he'll be a fun puppy to train  Enjoy him!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Aw, thank you! I love reading your posts about Kaizer!

I have to admit, I was looking for more of the couch potato type of golden (although I still planned on weekly classes of some form for the first year of his life, just for general behavioral reasons) but that is not what we got, so we're doing whatever we can to make sure he's stimulated and happy.

I met some of his relatives of some form the other week and they were seven and five and I asked what they did to get through all of it and it turns out their dogs just liked (and still do) to go on long walks twice a day and lounge around the rest of it. Pepper did not turn out like his cousins!


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## CAROLINA MOM (May 12, 2009)

I'm really enjoying reading your posts about Pepper and seeing his pictures. He's such an adorable little guy, he seems like a very smart one too.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

What a sweet thing to say, Carolina Mom! Thank you so much! I admit, I always wonder if people are even reading my posts, so it's always so nice to hear that somebody enjoys reading about him and seeing some adorable pictures.

Beach trip tomorrow, so I'm hoping for more fun pictures!


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## rosegold (Nov 9, 2016)

That is great that he enjoyed his first nosework class! The photo of him under the table is just too cute. You guys are so creative about finding ways to get him out there, I will have to borrow some ideas for our own pup  Hoping that your beach outing goes well!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Pepper had a *fantabulous* beach outing and the whole day went really well! I finally came up with a schedule for beach days that worked better with his rest and play rhythms and we had a much calmer puppy that night. Of course, it's hard to tell for sure yet, because we also took him into La Jolla Cove that evening, so we'll have to see how a standard trip and day go soon.

In the morning, I took him to a very dog-friendly local coffee roaster and was able to walk inside and order with him. Dogs are usually left outside for that part but I was given a special young puppy exception. We spent about an hour there and it's interesting, because he was really wigged out when we got out of the car. He's definitely in a second fear period. So after I ordered, I'd planned to sit on a big wide bench thing while he laid on the floor at my feet, but he was so freaked that I hauled him up there with me, which made for a very happy puppy! He settled right in and by the end of the trip, was wagging his tail and walking over to new people to say hi. If I lived closer to this place, I'd go every day!

After doing a (very unsuccessful) Rover meet and greet, I got him back home in time for some serious rest before the beach trip. He went right into his crate and passed out for a full hour. When S got here, in the past few weeks, he'd bark and paw at the gate and jump around, but this time he just came out and went up to her and rolled over for a stomach rub - success!

As always, he had a great beach trip. I was a bit worried, because it was 91 degrees, but she kept them down at the water the whole time and hydrated them. He still isn't going in all the way but is having the time of his life splashing around.

Another great milestone is that when they got back, even though I was awake, I hid in my room (we'd planned this) and she set him up in the expen with a Kongsicle from my freezer. He had access to his water bowl, his crate for napping, a nylabone, but wasn't locked into the crate, just the expen. I figured I'd hang out and see if he could handle it and it was perfect! He didn't cry at all! When I came out, he was actually asleep again in the crate, even though the Kong wasn't finished! He came out to say hi to me, and went into hardcore Kong mode and then crashed again and had slept for a solid hour by the time J came home. After that, we were off to La Jolla Cove!

This is one of my favorite places in the world to go, and after the coffee shop thing, I realized that with his wider awareness of the world, we had to get him back there for some acclimation and desensitization. It's full of barking sea lions and low-flying pelicans and tons and tons and tons of people - flying frisbees and kids running around and music blaring and so on. He was definitively freaked at first, but slowly got into it and was really into all of the petting he got. We spent about 90 minutes there and at the end, he was still fascinated by the sea lions but not scared anymore and was loving all of the attention. J has some pictures of him literally surrounded by petters and soaking it all up. And it was so nice to see his worried tail go to a wagging tail as he realized the big world was a cool world!

Okay, this is a very long saga, so I'll stop for now. Pictures in the next post!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Here we have the latest tiny puppy ice cream cone, and a whole bunch of beach pictures. Look how hilariously feral he looks leaping out of the water there! He really loves wrestling and his two favorite wrestling pals at daycare are a five month old golden and a corgi puppy. It's so adorable to see how he plays with each of them. With the golden, he goes *hard* and with the corgi, he rolls around on his back while she mauls him. When she decides it's enough rough play for her, he lets her go and finds another dog. He's been losing at least one tooth every day he goes to daycare.


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

I love those pictures! Pepper looks like he had a lot of fun

Side note, I see that you have a harness that goes across his shoulders. I'd be careful with those because they tend to limit front movement and since Pepper is so active, I'd worry about potential injuries. If you're looking for a no-pull harness, the Balance harness is really great. There's a bunch of adjustment points so you get the perfect fit, it does not go across the shoulders (it goes between the legs and around the ribcage), and it has a front leash attachment and a back leash attachment. It holds up really well in the water too - even daily exposure.


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## rosegold (Nov 9, 2016)

I love La Jolla! Seeing him with the sea lions must have been too funny. He must have thought they were some new type of dog! A lot of the cafes around my area are dog friendly, just have to ask. A few even have free dog treats at the counter. Sounds like a great place for pup to meet new people!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Yaichi's Mom (Jul 21, 2012)

I am loving all of Pepper's adventures!! Brisby is a very high energy GR so I totally know what you are living with. 

He truly is one very lucky puppy and you are doing a wonderful job with him. Looking forward to more.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

aesthetic, We're actually in the process of getting another harness for him - the Easy Walk was just supposed to be for the first week or two, but he never grew! I'm torn between the Balance and the Freedom. I made a post but nobody has responded to it. Is the Balance really only sold on that one site? Is there any way to get a double leash for it?

We've done two rounds of nose work practice so far and he's loving it! I was only able to scrounge up a few boxes (we recycled everything before J's brother came to visit) but it's enough to give him an idea of what we're trying for. I've kept it to ten minutes each time but I think he's ready to increase. My main issue is when to do it. He leaves for daycare at 8ish in the morning and doesn't come home until 6:30-7 at night (and we do grooming and his dinner and petting and then he kind of crashes). Do you guys think I can fit in a few mornings before daycare? I'll obviously do it on beach days but I may also need to take him to daycare myself an hour later or something. That's kind of counter-productive to my original goal though, which is to have something to do with him that won't tire me out too much.

On Friday, Pepper went to work with J and it went awesomely! J tkok him out for an extended bunch of running around after the ball in the morning, so he was a tiny bit more tired out. He said hi to everybody and chewed on his nylabone and right when he started getting antsy, J pulled out a GIANT frozen Kong and he was in puppy heaven! He actually fell asleep on it. He also successfully peed on mulch and succulents (this is still a real struggle for us - he firmly believes in Grass Only outdoors) and then finally napped under J's desk for a few hours. He did get pretty hyper at the end of the day, but J ran around with him a bit and he was super happy. We're going to aim for about once a week. We really weren't expecting Pepper to need daycare like he does, and it's quite the budget-killer! A whole lot of plans got revised, really quickly.

Yesterday, we had his second to last puppy class and then we went to the beach! We went to the real beach instead of the little bay island he's been going to. The giant beach blew his mind and he loved it! We kept him on a short leash but let it go when he was running. He splashed around and learned about waves coming in and ran all over the sand and, of course, tried to eat everything. He's still way more interested in seaweed and even sand eating than playing with toys. Please tell me this will end! It will, right? Right?

He passed out after the beach and slept like a log for a few hours, but then he needed a really solid hour of serious running around that evening with another dog friend. There was running and grass eating and wrestling and grass eating ball retrieving and grass eating...how can he have so much energy? People talk about how tired their dog is after a training class and he also spent almost 90 min at the beach and used his Kibble Nibble that morning and worked on a frozen Kong! He's like the Energizer Bunny! Luckily, he makes up for it with a really sweet personality and absolutely no people nipping at all! After reading these forums for the last few months, I know how lucky I am on that front.

As always, pictures in the next post.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

There are no beach pictures, because we couldn't manage him and our cameras and the wet saltyness and sand all over. I have no idea how S does it. She's alone out there with half a dozen dogs and still managed to get great pictures!

First up, we have Pepper surrounded by love in LJ Cove. Sadly, no sea lions make an appearance in this picture but if you want to know where some of them are, they're right on the other side of that fence at the back of the picture. 

The other two pictures are from Pepper's Big Day At The Office. In the first one, he's nomming on his nylabone, and in the second, he's sleeping under J's desk on his feet (which is exactly what he's doing right now, as I type). Until we can be sure he won't eat them, instead of dog beds, we've been using towels and he loves that. As soon as I pull one open on the couch, he races over to jump up and cuddle with me. When I put on in a specific place on the floor, he knows it's brushing time and races over there as well. In the middle of the floor means toy blanket and so on. I wonder if we're giving him a towel complex for life. I like the idea of him always having a place where he feels safe and secure and it being so easily portable. If he wants something a whole lot more cushy, there's always the couch


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

It's funny you mentioned that thread, I just responded to it! I just love that picture of Pepper surrounded by all those people


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Well, your original comment is what inspired me to ask! I'd never really heard of the Balance Harness as a serious option until you mentioned it here.


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

I've heard it mentioned around on my facebook groups (it came highly recommended) but didn't give it serious thought until I needed a new harness. It was my dog trainer that recommended it to me after I complained about Kaizer's old harness (it was a good harness, it just kept slipping and sliding everywhere and that drove me nuts). Ours is brand new but I really like it so far.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

My 40th birthday is on Saturday, and we're taking a little mini-trip up to San Francisco for a few days, so today, Pepper is going back to the breeder through Monday night. 

My brain tells me this will be fine - he lived there until 13 weeks and loved it and her and her family and the two dozen goldens always running around, but my heart is less sure. What if he loves it there more than here? Pepper loves stimulation and having tons of dogs around and maybe Jan's place is more his style? 

What if he regresses in his housetraining? We don't have any accidents, because he has a strong bladder, but nothing we've done has gotten him to believe in *wanting* to go outside to the bathroom. Last week, he took a huge nap and then got up, walked past me, walked past j, walked past the door and started squatting to pee. He stopped when we stopped him (no liquid, even!) and then was able to wait for quite a while while J put on clothes and harnessed him and walked him all the way down the double flight of stairs and to the grass, so it wasn't an issue of not being able to hold it. He just figured since he had to go, he might as well go. *Right* next to his water bowl and crate, too, argh! I really don't want him to come back and start peeing in my house.

Otherwise, he had a nice, normal week. Thankfully, the fireworks didn't scare him at all, but on our walk down to the big field (he runs around down there trailing a 30' leash), we passed some guys playing some weird game with balls and maybe a mini-trampoline, IDK? Anyway, he stared for a minute and then started frantic growling and barking. We're at a loss as to what set him off, but he really saw them as a threat. He'd even met one of those guys before! Some of them came over to say hi and he was fine with it, but he cast a whole bunch of suspicious glances backwards as we walked away. And even though he spends every single weekday at daycare *surrounded* by dogs and people, he gets all freaked whenever we're out and he sees a dog or person. I'm sure not enjoying this second fear period!

We did another round of nose work practice this morning. I'm trying for three times a week and keeping it to 10-15 min each time, because he's just a young puppy still. Today, I started hiding the treat in only one box and then paying out by throwing treats in as soon as he found it and kept his head in there. He really loves it. I have a lot of questions for people who do more regular nose work practice, so I think I'll be posting in that thread when I return from SF.

Wish Pepper a great time on his vacation at Jan's and we'll see you on the flip side next week!


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## KiwiD (Jan 14, 2008)

Wishing you a very Happy Birthday. Enjoy your birthday weekend! No doubt he will enjoy his stay at the breeders but I'm sure will be just as happy to come home.


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## rosegold (Nov 9, 2016)

Wishing you a happy birthday and hope that Pepper had a great time back at the breeder's!


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## Neeko13 (Jul 10, 2010)

Love reading about Pepper's adventures!!!! What fun....hope you are able to enjoy yourself without him in San Frisco, I know the feeling..,Im heading to Ireland next month, and I havent told Neeko (trying not to bring out the suitcase either)... but I think he has heard me talk about it, and he's already moping.... cant wait to hear how he made out at the breeders....


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

I had a good trip, but traveling with a compromised immune system means spinning the luck wheel and this time, I lost out big time. I'm dealing with a combo of recurred sinus infection, cold, stomach flu and cough and the less said about all of it, the better. The point is, I'm barely functional and very drugged up on anti-nausea meds, so don't have a lot of Pepper updates yet.

He had a great time back at Jan's, grew another two pounds and remains as happy and sweet as ever. I have some awesome muddy pictures of him from his outdoor daycare that I'll post when I'm slightly less like a zombie.

Just wanted to drop in and thank everybody for the bday wishes and nice thoughts! I'm going to try to hop around now and congratulate people on their new puppies and so on, but I'll probably have to collapse pretty soon. Expect new pictures in the next few days!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Okay, I lied. Pepper is just too cute! Pictures must be posted!

1. Look at those grownup teeth coming in! I think possibly all of his baby teeth are gone.

2. Pepper's absolute favorite thing to do at ourdoor daycare is splash around in the kiddie pool and then roll in the mud. He repeats this endlessly and yet is always somehow clean when we pick him up. Dry mud and sand just fall off of him. What's annoying is he just spent five days at a house with a real pool and absolutely refused to go in. Why won't he swim? Why?

3. This is some of my birthday chocolate haul. Look at those truffles! I also picked up quite a lot of stuff from Recchiuti. I only wish I felt well enough to eat any of it. But soon!


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## rosegold (Nov 9, 2016)

Sorry to hear that you're feeling under the weather. What timing with the trip and the birthday! Glad Pepper had a nice time at the breeder's. He is just genetically blessed with that self-cleaning coat  That pic of him showing off his grownup teeth is too adorable. 

Your chocolates look amazing. They remind me of some gourmet chocolates we picked up during our trip to San Diego from Dallman Chocolates. At least they will be eye candy till you feel better. That'll make them all the more delicious once you are feeling well enough to enjoy them!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

I've recovered enough to hit a very low level of functionality and am working toward the goal of making it to Pepper's first adult obedience class. Since he's only 5.5 months old and has the attention span of a puppy, I think we'll be taking it more than once.

Since all I've done this week is be sick and sleep, here are a whole bunch of photos of Pepper sleeping! Sleeping at his outdoor daycare, sleeping under j's desk at work. . .you'd think he was a puppy of low-energy, but ha ha ha ha ha.

Puppies always look so angelic while they sleep. Like they'd never cause you a minute of trouble.

Pepper is up to 35lb, btw! He's growing about two pounds a week. I can really see the adult dog in him now.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

EXCITING UPDATE: J took Pepper to the beach while I attempted my first shower in a week (boy has it been a fun week) and PEPPER SWAM!!!! TWICE!!! He fell in love with that Kong soccer ball thing that somebody had and willingly swam after it! Twice! I can't believe I missed it but I'm just so happy! I'm off to buy that ball right now!

He also attempted to eat wet seaweed, dry seaweed, sand and sea water, but we're choosing our battles.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

We have finally achieved peak swimming! That Kick Fetch thing is like puppy crack for Pepper and he just went nuts for it. We actually had a problem at the beginning, because j threw it in and Pepper swam after it and tried to grab it with his mouth, but his mouth was too small and he just bumped it with his nose and it went farther out and he followed and you can see where this went. j had to swim in and rescue him - he was really far out by then but it was a protected river with a sea wall so we weren't worried about him being swept out. Anyway, we had our trusty long rope with us and lassoed up the ball and then Pepper loved it *even more*.

He swam and swam and swam and swam and the ball was sometimes even more exciting than eating seaweed! He had such a good time!

We upgraded him to the Freedom harness yesterday and I already love it so much. He's so much easier to steer with that double leash and it's surprisingly easy to attach. We didn't bring it to the beach, because I hated the idea of getting it so wet and dirty on its very first day, so the Easy Walk had one last beach fling. Now we'll wash it and donate it, along with the Tug a Jug, which is just too noisy for our second floor place.

Overall, I keep reminding myself how lucky we've been that he's such a sweet puppy. He's incredibly affectionate and never bites us ever and almost never tries to put anything in the house in his mouth that he isn't supposed to (I know that will change). He was kind of a demon dog at a Rover meet and greet I went to, which I'll write about in another post, but even with that, he still stayed sweet and loving.

As always, pictures in the next post!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

1. Napping after a beach trip. He's right next to my recliner in this picture. My cousin came to visit and meet him and took the picture. His favorite nap spots next to my chair and under j's desk while he's working.

2. How cute it this? An office park near j's building is owned by a guy who had some black labs and made a little memorial to them with some statues and a dog walking area. Pepper saw the statue for the first time and just *froze* and j brought him over to investigate.

3/4. As you can see, he's loving his group beach trips! I wish we could take some pictures ourselves of him on the beach, but we're always so overloaded with stuff and worried about the sand and water. Maybe we need to buy a go pro?


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Whew, quite the influx of new puppy arrivals this week! And they're all so redic adorable and fluffy!

Things are continuing to go really well with Pepper. He'll be six months old on Aug 1, but still only weighs 38 lb. We're now up to feeding him 1.75 cups of Natural Balance puppy kibble twice a day, which seems like a lot, but, boy, he burns it off! Maybe he's just going to be a really small dog - a mini dog!. His paws are huge, though.

We tried a new Rover daycare today and he had a great time. I'm working to build up options for when he loses access to his indoor daycare for a few months. They said they can probably stretch it to close to eight months. After that, I'm hoping to wait as long as possible, but we'll just have to take it as it goes. Pepper is a hugely social dog and really enjoys being out with a whole pack of them, running around and playing. If dogs start bullying him, that will make him miserable, and since we don't have a private yard, it'll also hugely limit his exercise and fun times. So, yeah, we'll see how it plays out.

It's been really great watching as he grows into stuff. We had such a hard time even introducing him to the Dremel, and now, while he doesn't even come close to loving it, he lies there calmly and lets me feed him treats while j Dremels down his nails. And he's gone for barely touching his paws to the water to straight out swimming in only a few months! We're currently working on the shower (sometime about getting and being wet just really freaks him out) and each time is easier. While having a puppy is hard (so hard) a lot of the time, I can see the foundations being built that will last over his entire life. Our last dog was a rescue and he had issues that he was never able to overcome. It's been really fascinating to go the puppy route this time around. I think this is my last puppy ever though - rescues from now on for me!

I know you'll be shocked to hear it, but pictures in the next post!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

1. Here he is playing tug with his new BFF at his new Rover daycare. They played all day. Pepper makes friends with every dog he can.

2. He had a great time on his group beach trip yesterday but didn't swim. Lots of running and splashing though! I may have to phase these back for a variety of reasons, which is a bummer, because he loves them, but 1h at the beach - even twice in one day - is just not enough to tire him out, as opposed to a full day of running around like a maniac at outdoor daycare. And the outdoor daycare costs $11 less and he comes home smelling a whole lot better!

3. Look at him running through all of these plants and *not eating them*! Personal growth! Ha, ha, just kidding! He still loves eating plants just as much as always! Now he tries to casually take bites of flowers off of their stems as we walk by.

That last post was my 100th post here! Go me!


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## SandyK (Mar 20, 2011)

Looks like Pepper is having so much fun!! He is growing up so fast!!:grin2:


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Happy six month birthday to Pepper today! I'm trying to enjoy this comparatively easy time with him, because adolescence is right around the corner! I know we've done everything we could to build up a strong foundation to ride it through, but I'm still really dreading it.

Pepper's outdoor daycare won't be offering Mondays anymore, which is the cruelest blow ever. He's always crazed after a weekend with just us (and trust me, those weekends are *packed* with puppy activity) and right now, he has indoor daycare, but that's going to become a problem, really soon. All of the other Rover options are nice, but don't offer the same amount of stimulation, or don't supervise enough. Argh! 

Anyway, Pepper had a *fantastic* beach trip on Saturday (with a smaller Kick Fetch ball this time) and enjoyed himself so much! He swam like a champ and rolled around in the sand and didn't even start trying to eat seaweed until the end, when he was super overstimulated (leash went back on at that point). He loves the beach, which is great, because we're dog beach people and not hiking people (well, j is, but I'm not. Nature, ugh), and we have tons of dog beach options here for him! I just wish I had the health and energy, or j had the free time to take him multiple times a week. It's such great exercise for a dog. We took our last dog to the beach pretty much every single weekend of the eleven years we had him, so we're used to it sucking up a giant chunk of our weekend time. The next few months might be too hot for me to go with them, but I'll certainly be there for all of the winter trips! And we bought a cheap go pro knockoff, so I can live vicariously!

Pepper had his third obedience class last night, and it's going so well! We realized shortly after the first class that we'd hugely fallen down on teaching him "come" and now he's got it down pat (on a long line, that is - we still have weeks to go before we try it without). We ran through all of the CGC test requirements, and he's pretty good on all of them. I'd planned to take this class a couple of times in a row, just for general training purposes, but I think that'll be boring for him, so now I'm trying to find another one. It's really hard, for some reason. Where are all of the good group classes in San Diego?

We took another trip to La Jolla Cove on Sunday and it was so much better than the last one. Last time was during his second fear period and all of the people out in the park freaked him out, but this time he pranced right through with a wagging tail. We practiced greetings and getting him to sit before meeting people. Honestly, he did fine; it was the people who were a problem. He's just so small and sweet and adorable that they're like a horde of shambling zombies coming toward him, moaning, "puuuuuuuuuuppy." I have to literally jump in between them and him and throw out my hands and yell, "STOP!" and sometimes they *still* can barely stop themselves! Can't fight the lure of the puppy!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Time for pictures, of course!

1. Here's Pepper, hanging out on the floor of the machine shop in j's office last Friday. They were having a bbq, but we didn't want Pepper to be tempted, so j brought in his antler and cut it down to expose a whole new round of marrow. This was extremely exciting for Pepper, who *adores* his antler. I'll be buying him a big one soon, but I'm not sure yet which kind will be right for him, so I'm still observing. He's mostly into the marrow, these days, but he's also a dedicated chewer.

2. Shaking it off after some serious grass rolling on a walk.

3. Saber-toothed Pepper! Ha! I told you he loves that antler! Check out his awesomely crimped ears, btw, They're like that even when he's dry. He's an '80s New Wave puppy!


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## KiwiD (Jan 14, 2008)

Happy 6 months Pepper! He is such a cute boy and gets to go on some great adventures. My landlocked girl is jealous of his easy access to dog beaches.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

You do get some awesome snow playing though!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Bleh, adolescence has definitely started and sometimes my sweet, sweet puppy is kind of a dbag. We're back to using the double leash on the freedom harness, because I feel like most of the time we're either dragging him places or keeping him from dragging us places. 

Beach trips continue to be a huge success. We brought our new camera last week and got some great videos. We even took a few of him swimming underwater! His legs look so cool in motion. There was another golden there with a go pro mounted on her back, which I know j is going to want to do someday. 

It was really great to show the videos to my parents. They were going to fly out here to meet him at the beginning of July, but then my dad needed double rounds of spinal surgery, so the trip has been tabled until at least late Oct/Nov. So we've sent lots of pictures, but a 2d picture isn't enough to make it feel like he's really real, if that makes sense. So showing them some videos of romping with a hound dog puppy and swimming after the ball and rolling in the sand turned him into a real puppy for my parents, which was awesome.

Tonight, for the first time ever, he alerted to needing to go out to the bathroom! For some reason, Pepper *never* lets us know he has to go, so we just keep taking him out on a schedule, which we try to stretch out a bit every week. But something we've worried about is (sorry about the bluntness here) if he was suddenly just going to take a dump on our floor. That's how they do it at his indoor daycare and the outdoor ones are (obviously) outside, so we were never really sure if he knew that wasn't something he was supposed to do. But tonight, after finishing with the kibble nibble, he went over to the baby gate we have set up for him and sat down patiently. Then he came over to me and asked for petting and repeated the action, and we took him out in a hurry. He came right over for the harness and actually went down the stairs first instead of us dragging him down behind us. We were so proud of him and it was such a relief to know this isn't something we have to worry about!

Otherwise, things remain mostly the same. He's started throwing up after his outdoor daycare sometimes, and I think it's because he's eating too much grass, combined with the heat and humidity and all his running around. We've moved him to the big dog room at the indoor daycare, which is great, because it's time for some bigger dogs to smack him down a bit and I don't want him turning into a bully. He had a great day there yesterday and crashed like a log when I brought him home.

A few pictures coming your way in the next post!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

1. Napping under j's desk at his office. He pretty much sleeps the whole day there and everybody thinks he's this incredibly low-energy puppy. 

2. More napping! This is him hanging out with his BFF, Boomer. They spend the entire day running around like maniacs and wrestling at outdoor daycare. 

3. Our first picture with our new outdoor beach camera! We tied rope around the Kick Fetch, and Pepper's towing it back in with the rope in his mouth. Look at how serious he is about it!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Okay, health stuff, blah blah blah. The point is, I'm alive, and so is Pepper and now he's seven months old! He's finished advanced obedience, started a rally class and will start a marvelous manners class later this month. He's a champion swimmer now and we have tons of amazing videos and pictures of him swimming underwater! He's just as sweet as ever, but definitely more willful and we can see adolescence lurking around the corner! We can't get him to get up and come to us yet, but weirdly, "touch" works and he *will* get up off the floor or couch or wherever and come right over and touch our palm with his nose. So whatever works, I guess. We never stop working on, "come", of course, but most of the time we make sure to do it with a leash attached.

He's still only 45lb and seems to be growing about 5lb a month these days. We're not sure when that will stop, but we're assuming he'll eventually max out somewhere between 55-65lb. He's super solidly built so he looks really small in terms of height and even length.

Pepper's favorite thing ever these days is his antler from Michigan Antler Art. He chews that thing for 30-90 minutes at least, every day and it's a month old now and holding firm. I'd be surprised if we got less than 3-4 months out of it. He loves it soooooooooo much!

The heat has been so insane recently that j went to home depot yesterday and bought some small cut-to-order wood blocks and attached them to the bottom corners of Pepper's crate. Now it's raised three inches off the ground and air can circulate underneath. We also have a fan pointed at him all the time (another thing he loves is pressing right up against a fan and is doing so right now).

Overall, he's just a very happy puppy. He loves his indoor daycare, loves his outdoor daycare and loves going to j's office. He has a ton of friends of all breeds and ages and loves to run around and play with them and then nap all day. He loves his antler and his food toys and practicing training because that's when the good treats come out and he has fun. He loves riding in the car in his dog hammock and goes right to sleep. He loves going to the beach. He loves chewing on his antler and nylabones and stuffed iguana and fluffy duck and cuddling with us on the couch or floor and dropping to the grass to roll around in ecstasy and meeting new people and...he's a pretty happy puppy 

I've reached a point where I have something like 20-30 great pictures I want to post, but that's just too many and so I hit analysis paralysis and post nothing at all, but he's so freaking cute! 

I'll try to catch up on the forum soon. I hope everything is going well with everybody's dogs and all of the people who've brought new puppies home in the last month are at least getting some rest. I promise, it ends and things get better! I'm living proof!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

1. Once again, napping at j's office. I love how smiley retrievers look when they're sleeping.

2/3. More napping! I don't know what Pepper and Boomer would do if they couldn't spend at least one or two days together each week. They're pretty much soul-bonded at this point.

4. The Golden Retriever Crew at the indoor daycare! As I'm sure all of you know, goldens are not so much a fan of the heat, and Thurs was crazy hot and humid, so all of the goldens in the neighborhood booked it for the ac! Pepper is the little one on the dog bed.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

So Pepper's mom just died today. She was only four and it was sudden and they think it was a heart thing (I'm not asking the breeder a lot of questions right now because I'm assuming she's heartbroken and this is really not the time).

She had all of her clearances (Pepper was covered back at least three generations), and so I don't know what this means for us. She has something like twelve offspring out in the world, and all of them are under 18 months old. Does this kind of thing stop the breeding line? Is Pepper is more danger than he was before? He's had physicals and checked out fine but is there something else we should have tested? I hate having all of these questions and I feel so sad for everybody right now.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

So, I got some more information about Xanny, Pepper's mom. Her owner was out of town for four days and when she came back, Xanny got super excited and then just keeled over and died 15 minutes later, which must have been beyond horrible. It seems she'd eaten a bunch of chocolate, so it might be that (I feel bad hoping that's what happened).

They're doing a necropsy to look for SAS. The breeder is very worried right now, because Xanny had been screened by a board-certified cardiologist for SAS and other heart defects and had her OFA clearance, so if they do find something, this puts all of the other heart clearances from this doctor at risk, in addition to pretty much nuking a lot of her breeding program. She thinks we'll have more answers by Friday, but wanted to give everybody a heads-up as soon as possible, so we could be informed and prepared.

I only met Xanny a few times, when looking for our future puppy, but she was such a great dog. She was so sweet and gentle and friendly and just one of the most mellow and well-behaved goldens I'd ever seen, especially at only 3.5 years old. She gave me a lot of confidence that in terms of temperment, one of her puppies would be a perfect choice, and so far, that remains completely true - Pepper is all of those things as well (except well-behaved). There are eighteen of her puppies out there in the world, I have confidence they'll do her legacy proud.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Here are some new Pepper pictures. All of that sadness definitely needs some happy puppy action to balance it out.


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## KiwiD (Jan 14, 2008)

Pepper is such a cute pup. Love the pics of him sleeping at the office and with his buddy!

So sorry to hear about his Mom passing away so suddenly. It is good that she is keeping all the puppy owners informed.


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

Pepper's a cutie!!

I'm sorry to hear about Xanny, that must be so heartbreaking. I think that question would be worth a new thread. There are so many knowledgeable people on this board that could give you so many informative answers. I'd be interested in hearing what they say.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

I figured I'd wait a bit until the necropsy results come in. It's possible it was just the chocolate eating or some other unrelated heart issue. It's just so sad.

I'm so glad to hear Kaizer is on the mend! Really not looking forward to it being our turn.


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

I agree, it's really so sad. That must've been terrible for the owner to have her dog pass away so suddenly and so quickly. My thoughts and prayers go to her.

When are you neutering Pepper?


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

We're trying to hold off as long as we can, but it's going to be much sooner than we'd like. We live in an apartment complex with no private outdoor space at all. Pepper turned out to be a very high-activity dog, who needs to run and play about 4-5 hours a day, every day and he's *extremely* social - spends all day playing with all of the other dogs at various daycares. He also loves to go to the beach and swim and play with new dog friends at least once a week. As long as he can keep doing all of these things, we're good (we know we'll lose the indoor daycare access soon but might still have the outdoor one - unless the male dogs there also turn on him), but as soon as other dogs start bullying him and he can't go to daycares or the beach anymore, we'll have a big problem. In a perfect fantasy world, we wanted to wait until at least 15 months. In the world we live in, with his high-level of activity needs and my health issues, we'll be lucky to make it past 8.5 months. It's yet another reason we'd wanted him to be a couch potato kind of dog, who loafed around all day and didn't need more than a few good hard runs in an empty field or whatever, but that's not the dog we got. 

Anyway, trust me, I read up a lot and talked to vets and breeders and trainers and other dog owners and read about 83473823487 threads here and I *know* how people feel about this. There's nothing people can say to me that I don't already know and it's really not the kind of topic I want to get into, because it's just not a changeable situation. It's not remotely what we wanted, but it is the way it is.

So, yeah. How's Kaizer doing? Did you try the frozen Kongs? How is he dealing with the conehead? We bought a soft one and we're going to try sticking it on Pepper soon to get him used to it. I don't have a good feeling about that whole thing.


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## jayp (Sep 6, 2017)

Beautiful and adorable!


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

I get it, sometimes life gets into the way. I didn't want to neuter Kaizer at all, but he ended up being cryptorchid and had to be neutered. You have to do what you have to do while making the best decisions you can. Kaizer ended up being higher energy than what we were expecting, so I totally understand.

Kaizer is all recovered! We're back to all our normal activities thankfully! I'm really interested to see if neutering has any kind of longterm effects on Kaizer's behavior/physical appearance, but I think it's too soon post-neuter to see any real differences. It's only been about three weeks, one week since he's been officially recovered.
I haven't tried the frozen kongs yet. I've been meaning to though. I keep forgetting to get the cheese.
We actually didn't end up using the cone for him. Ours was this huge hard cone and he'd freeze and refuse to lie down in his crate with it on. Outside of his crate, he'd prance around and jump around playing with it on his head. So we just didn't put it on him. My sleeping schedule at the time was all kinds of messed up (summer) so I was up all night anyway keeping an eye on him. He didn't go after it at all. You should definitely have better luck with a soft cone though! I think it's easier on them


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Yay for full recovery!

After writing the post to you last night, I did some thinking and talking to j about it and basically, we're going to see if we can stretch it until the beginning of Jan, when he'll be eleven months. I laid out all of the complications and we were able to work around each one, except for one, which will be if the dogs he's friends with at his various daycares start bullying him or attacking him. That's a dealbreaker. But the other obstacles are more doable, with some effort on our parts.

1. Pepper needs a place to go and play every day: once indoor daycare is gone, we still have two Rover options and I'm going to try to line up at least one more. j also worked his brains out during the first 2/3 of the year and actually has so much vacation time backlogged that he'll be taking a four day weekend in Oct and two in Nov. Add in Thanksgiving, a business trip sending Pepper back to the breeder's and a 10 day stay at the breeder's at the end of the year and we're looking at a very different and doable schedule than usual. There's actually only eight weeks left this year where he'll be at the office more than three days a week (and also, Pepper goes to the office with him at least one day a week).

2. Once we lose our indoor daycare, which is right near our home, all of our day care options are between our home and his office (North), but he often has end-of-the day meetings downtown (South): j is willing to suck it up and drive 20-30 extra minutes to pick Pepper up, if needed, and also, we could have Pepper do an overnight at his Rover daycare (this would be a cause of great joy for Pepper)

3. Indoor daycare is the only one not requiring advance scheduling, and also indoors, which is great for extremely hot days and/or rain: I'm just going to be a scheduling maniac and on rainy days, he'll either go to a more house-based daycare or to the office.

4. We'll lose access to the dog beach if hostility is an issue: we have a five-mile in diameter manmade island and the *entire thing* is a leash-free dog park. So, while there's an "official" dog beach on the island, we can go anywhere on the whole island and he can swim and probably barely see another dog. The water is dirtier and it's not as fun, but big whoop.

So there you have it! All we have to do now is cross our fingers that his favorite daycares will remain happy places for him and hopefully we can pull this off!

BTW, I just wanted to tell you how impressed I am with what an amazing and thoughtful dog owner you are. I loved my gr (Biscuit!) that I grew up with SO MUCH and I took a bunch of responsibility for him (especially during my college years), but it wasn't even *close* to how much you've taken on with Kaizer, and what a phenomenal job you've done with him.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Good news (well, good news for us, but still sad for Xanny and her family)! Xanny died of chocolate toxicity and nothing is wrong with her heart at all! While I feel so sorry for her family and everybody who loved her, I'm almost sick with relief right now. It's time to celebrate with some puppy pictures!!!!

1. Look at this underwater swimming puppy! How cool is that? That blue harness is his swimming harness, btw. Water-friendly and it rides on his stomach instead of rubbing under his legs.

2/3/4. Pensively enjoying the sunset and sea lions in La Jolla Cove.

5. I'm hiding in the tall grass!

6. Here I am!


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## rosegold (Nov 9, 2016)

Gorgeous shots! Goldens look so beautiful in nature. Pepper has grown so much since I last checked in. Glad for Pepper that mom's cause of death ended up not being congenital.


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

I hope hostility isn't a problem for you!! Besides a few leashed encounters (dumb people who wouldn't keep their growling dog away from Kaizer) we didn't really have an issue with other dogs. Granted, Kaizer doesn't get much strange dog interaction, but the couple times it's happened, we've had no issues. He gets to play with the dogs at my training school after classes and we didn't have a problem. If hostility with a couple dogs does become an issue, maybe try setting up playdates with the dogs who don't have an issue with him - that way he still gets his dog interaction, exercise, and it's all positive interaction. If you guys were closer (and like, not on the other side of the country), I'd offer up Kaizer and our backyard! I'm kinda jealous about all the options you have though, I have a generic daycare around but nothing as cool as what you have around.

Thank you!! That means a lot. I really can't take all the credit, I scheduled Kaizer's neuter for when I knew I'd be up all night doing summer work anyway. Kaizer's my first dog too so I didn't know how it was all gonna go down. Overall it was pretty smooth with a couple of little bumps in the road, but it turned out okay and I'm glad for that. Plus, getting a dog was my idea so everything concerning him falls to me. My parents do the important things like pay the bills and drove me and him until I could drive myself. But I digress, this is Pepper's thread

I'm really glad that there's no hereditary cause behind Xanny's death. It's really really heartbreaking, but I'm glad that Pepper and all 17 other Xanny puppies don't have to worry about a potential heart issue at such a young age. Those pictures are fabulous! I love the third one, he looks so fluffy!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Pepper has officially crossed the 50lb line! He's still slowly and steadily growing about 5lb a month and we're not sure when it'll stop. He could end up being 55lb or 80lb and we'll just have to wait and see (it's incredibly hard to be patient about this). Soon he'll be too big for his weighing bag and our home weigh-ins will be over.

It's funny, but he still looks so small. He's 50lb, yes, but he's super compact and sturdy looking, so instead of a that rangy look you usually see on early teen goldens, he looks more like somebody took a full-grown dog and turned a shrink ray on him. His second puppy coat has also been coming in, so now he looks like a little bear.

He's lost interest in huge amounts of grass eating recently, because there's a shiny new treat outside to root for instead - worms! Yes, Pepper now thinks he's an intrepid worm hunter and remains undeterred by how grossed out we are. We've survived grass, bark, leaves, flowers, sand, dirt, snails, seaweed and shells (shells is still ongoing), so I know we'll come out on the other side of this as well. 

He's loving his Rally class and is turning out to be surprisingly good at it (when lured by a treat, of course). We started "Superb Skills" last week and so far, so good on that as well. I was hoping "Marvelous Manners" would be a class dealing with things like jumping when really excited, but it was actually a starter class for people who had older puppies/dogs but had never done any training at all, so we were moved to the more advanced class. It's a great class, but I mourn the class that didn't exist. Pepper only jumps when really excited, but it's impossible to stop him, because he's so worked up. He also does that arm-biting thing.

He's such a little swimming champ now - I love it! He loves the beach so much and I'm so happy to live in a place where we can go year-round. He even got to go on a giant field trip there yesterday with his favorite Rover daycare person and seven other dogs (she kept him on a leash and somebody walked out in the waves with him so he could still jump and play). The only downside is when he decides he's done swimming, he also decides my dress is a giant puppy towel. Agh!

He's in another fear period and has started growling at things that are unusual for him when he's outside - a woman with an umbrella, some people standing behind a wall so they just looked like talking heads, a person coming up a curved staircase, etc. We put so much work into desensitizing him to these things, but I think his little puppy brain back then was just too small, so now we do a lot of clicking and treating and bringing him closer to the thing to see it's not actually scary. I wonder how many fear periods puppies end up having. Their world keeps expanding, after all, and he's not the sort of puppy who plunges in to things with no fear. But he's a very brave puppy and confronts his scary things, with us (and treats) there to support him!

My parents are coming next month for two weeks and I'm so excited for them to finally meet him! 

In case any new puppy owners are reading this, I just wanted to let you know, with a combination of quality training time and just plain patience, a lot of the things you're worried about will pass. Pepper loves his crate now (goes in there himself to nap or when he feels it's bedtime), loves to swim, picked up housebreaking reasonable quickly, grew out of his first fear period and his second, lies still while being dremeled (even though he haaaaaates it and needs constant treat bribing), sucks it up when it's shower time, leaves things in the house alone when told to the first time, etc. Some of it was because we worked super hard with him, but some things just happened on their own, as he grew older and felt more safe and secure in his life. It's incredibly hard at first, but I promise, if you go to classes and train at home and spend quality time with your puppy and just have patience, most of these things will pass! There is light on the other side of that tunnel!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Picture time!

1/2/3. This is Pepper's favorite place in the ENTIRE WORLD. I think he's legit asleep in that second picture. Seriously, his daycare person sends dozens of videos a day and he's in the pool for at least 3/4 of them.

4. After a rough morning of soaking in the kiddie pool and rolling around in the dirt, it's time for a nap!

5. Service, please!

6. This is how we weigh Pepper. We used to do it daily, but now it's about 2-3 times a week. He crawls right into that bag himself, and we use a luggage scale. You can also see a bit of our set-up behind j and Pepper there. We have a giant x-pen screwed securely into our walls, so he has a safe and closed-in space to hang and drink water and chew and go into his crate if he wants. We use this when we're both in the kitchen or just want him out of the way for a bit. We call it Pepperland. It's 48" high, so he'll never jump out and we threw our entire body weight at it and that sucker is *never* coming out of the wall) It unclips and folds back really easily too, for vacuuming or just being able to use our dining room table again.

His crate is inside, with a fan blowing on it (he loves fans). The crate was attached to wooden blocks for awhile, to help with air circulation below, but then we saw some termites, so j is rethinking that process. Maybe metal blocks next.

Those blue pool noodles are part of the arena we set up in the living room for using his Kibble Nibble or other feeder toys. This way, he doesn't make loud banging noises. It also comes up super easily, in case we have people coming over that we want to impress or need to vacuum or whatever.


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## rosegold (Nov 9, 2016)

I can't believe how much Pepper has grown! He has such a handsome face. 

Now I understand where the title "Pepperland" comes from, haha. He is really living the life!


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## rosegold (Nov 9, 2016)

pepperthepup said:


> In case any new puppy owners are reading this, I just wanted to let you know, with a combination of quality training time and just plain patience, a lot of the things you're worried about will pass. Pepper loves his crate now (goes in there himself to nap or when he feels it's bedtime), loves to swim, picked up housebreaking reasonable quickly, grew out of his first fear period and his second, lies still while being dremeled (even though he haaaaaates it and needs constant treat bribing), sucks it up when it's shower time, leaves things in the house alone when told to the first time, etc. Some of it was because we worked super hard with him, but some things just happened on their own, as he grew older and felt more safe and secure in his life. It's incredibly hard at first, but I promise, if you go to classes and train at home and spend quality time with your puppy and just have patience, most of these things will pass! There is light on the other side of that tunnel!



Thanks for sharing. We have a 5 month old at home and sometimes it seems like there are SO many little issues to work through (biting, heeling, handling, etc). This gives me faith that as long as we keep at it things will work out in the end 



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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Okay, for the two or so people who actually remember this thread, after three months of total radio silence (health, whee), I'm back! Less than a month to go until Pepper's a year old, so I've gotta get my puppy postings in while I can.

So first off, Pepper is now 11 months old and 63 pounds! It looks like he may end up being the runt of his litter, because his siblings are all well over 70. We were psyched for a really huge dog, but this dog is still excellent for us.

So far, adolescence has been challenging but not horrible. We spend the last three months of the year in doubled up obedience and rally classes and I think that really made a difference. We also learned that we're horrible at shaping, so we signed up for a Fenzi class and now need to find the time to actually do it.

Pepper mostly needs a bunch of incentive to do things, but with that incentive, he does do them and compared to what I've read on here and seen with other owners and teenagerhood, I'm counting my blessings and keeping my pockets stacked with those treats! No indoor marking and no destruction at all, so far.

Honestly, he's still pretty much the same - just a bit more confident, a bit more disobedient, a bunch more curious, even more social and friendly toward other dogs, just as sweet, etc. He's definitely stepped off of the eating nature habit, which is a huge relief to us. Toys are now much more interesting than grass and sometimes he even returns and drops one so we can throw it again!

We've managed to hold off on the neuter so far. We actually thought we'd be doing it today, but it's been going so well that with our outdoor daycare's permission, we're going to keep waiting as long as we can. I brought some chocolate to the indoor daycare as a thank you for last year and they were all, "OMG IS PEPPER IN THE CAR? WE THINK ABOUT HIM ALL THE TIME!" I felt bad letting them down but told them he'd be back for sure - just hopefully not for a few months!

My parents came out to meet him in November and it went well, but we timed some stuff wrong (strange apartment in the dark - which he was scared of back then - and loud strangers walking into said apartment) and it was not love at first sight. He warmed up eventually, but I definitely feel that in the granddog stakes, Pepper is running a distant second right now. That's okay though, because he's first with us! Anyway, they were here for two weeks and we took Pepper to the beach seven times. No matter how often we go, each time is just as exciting for him - he LOOOOOOOVES it there.

Every morning, when we go and open his crate, he's so happy to come out and see us and he wags and wags and pounces on a toy right next to us and then licks us extensively and there's a big petting session while he rolls around and he's just a super great dog!

So, yeah, that's all the Pepper news that's fit to print for now. We're looking into switching him to adult food (since it looks like his growth is stabilizing), looking for an obedience class to start him in again and wondering if we can just do Fenzi for the next six weeks or if it'll be a mistake. I have a gazillon pictures of him and they're all so cute, so it'll be a struggle narrowing them down to just a few to put in the next post!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Narrowed down to only five pictures!

1. As you can see, even though Pepper is now twice Boomer's size, they're still BFF. 

2. This was Pepper's first day back at outdoor daycare after a winter vacation with the breeder and five days home with us. She sent us that picture about 20 minutes after he was dropped off - how can one dog get so dirty, so fast?

3. Napping after a hard day.

4. Pepper In Motion!

5. He's actually completely asleep on j's feet there.

Happy New Year to all of you and your goldens!


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## KiwiD (Jan 14, 2008)

Happy New Year to Pepper and family! Great pictures of your almost 1 year old boy.


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

Here we are, in the last week of the first year of Pepper's puppyhood. I have such mixed feelings about leaving this part of the forum behind.

Pepper is still 63lb and is now 50/50 with adult food. He still needs a *minimum* of three *hard* days of running around in outdoor daycare and a serious trip to the beach each week (this is in addition to normal trips outside to run around a couple of times a day) in order to hit his bare minimum of quality exercise. I still don't understand how we ended up with such a crazy active dog.

I busted up my tendon early this year, so it's severely limited my ability to leave the apartment or even get down on the floor to roll around with Pepper. Thankfully, he's big enough to come hang out next to my recliner for some serious petting and we also do lots of couch time. I may need surgery, so there's no speedy fix for this issue 

We had our first and only rain storm of the season and we were worried about how he'd take it, but it was a non-issue for him and then the next day was full of *so much mud rolling*. I'll have a few pictures in the next post. He must've submerged his head like an alligator or something - it's so muddy!

New obedience class starts on 2/18! It doubles as a CGC class, so maybe we'll get lucky and he'll pass! I really wish we could start the class even sooner - I don't think this two-month break is the greatest for him.

We really just love him to pieces and he's such an unbelievably sweet dog. Somewhere around the six-month mark, we began seeing the future dog in him starting to shine through, and now he's even closer and he's a truly fantastic dog. I hope we have many many years of joy and happiness with him.

I have no idea if anybody even reads this thread anymore, but I want to thank everybody here for all of the support you gave me during this year. I'm not gonna lie, even with the *massive* amount of reading and preparation we did, the first few weeks/months were *rough* and I didn't know if we'd make it through. With a puppy, everything just feels so incredibly high-stakes (OMG he's eating nature - he's gonna DIE! If we don't train him this week he'll be a nightmare dog FOREVER! WHY WON'T HE GO IN HIS CRATE!!!! WHY WON'T HE SWIM!!!) and the forum really helped me calm down and keep some perspective. It was a hard year, but we knew if we made it through, we'd come out on the other side with an awesome dog, and we have! So again, thank you!

The final pictures of Pepper's first year of puppyhood are coming up in the next post!


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## pepperthepup (May 12, 2017)

The final round of puppy pics! This feels so nostalgic and the year isn't even over!

1. I just can't get enough mud! More mud, please!

2. Partners-in-crime and mud-buddies, Pepper and Bolt

3/4. However, nothing will take away the special bond Pepper and Boomer share. Pepper is well over twice his size now and for a bit, he spent much more time with Bolt, who is his age and his size and also a retriever, so they expend tons of crazy energy together. But after he calmed down a bit, he returned to Boomer and now they spend most of their days together playing tug and hanging out. Between Boomer and Bolt, Pepper is never lacking for BFF happiness!

5. But of course, the real pairing here is Pepper/kiddie pool. Their deep and true love will never be denied!


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## aesthetic (Apr 23, 2015)

Happy early birthday Pepper!! He's grown up to be such a lovely dog and you've done such great work with him. Sorry about your tendon, hope the surgery goes smoothly and you heal well.


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