Wait.... what? Yup, We Got A Dog!

Her name is Ruby.

Ruby!!!!

She is a Labradoodle, a cross between a Labrador Retriever and a Poodle.  Mary did a bunch of research to figure out what kind of dog should be the best fit for our family.  Long story short, Labradoodle is it.

Happy with her new puppy.

We picked her up the first weekend of August, at the ripe young age of 9 weeks.  She was somewhat potty trained and had been socialized to some extent.  We were excited to see how a puppy would get along with Simone and Jupiter.

What's this camera thing?

We began puppy play classes pretty quickly to socialize her with other puppies, and started with the joy of potty training.

Simone loves her puppy.

Simone loves Ruby and they get along well.  We're not sure if Ruby thinks Simone is more alpha than herself, or if they're siblings.  Time will tell.

You have a treat for me?

Ruby potty trained pretty quickly, she began sleeping through the night in just a few weeks (yay!), with really no accidents after two months (ignoring the two pees at the beach house this past weekend).  We've been doing daily walks, playing with a flirt stick, and lots of training.

The first week or so of sleeping in the crate was a little brutal - she would whine for 10-30 minutes, and finally settle down.  But we've been fortunate as she is a quick learner and has adjusted real well.

As she is a Labradoodle - she doesn't shed, so we need to trim.  You can see in the picture above, her eyes are kind of obscured by fur... so we trimmed it the other night.

I have Wallace & Gromit eyes, don't I?

The trim looks fine - we think she can see a lot better now as she's picked up an annoying habit of barking.  She must not have been able to see anything before, and now, gee, there's a whole world out there to bark at.  Or, it could be that she's right in the middle of her (equivalent) teen years.