Ruby.
Four legs, white face, chest, paw, tip of tail, everything else a honey brown. 15 weeks.
We have known each other exactly one week and are still adjusting.
It must be so overwhelming to find yourself in a new environment, living with a stranger and introduced to so many new things at once. I’m pretty sure she knows I’m her mommy now. At the very least, she knows I’m the person who feeds and walks her, cleans after her accidents and snuggles with her at night.
I’m starting to get a better sense of her energy cycles, when she’s up and when she’s down. The first night she stayed up until after midnight, but I think it must have been nerves because now she gets tired about 9pm and will sleep through the night.
Other changes: the first night I took her out for a walk she practically walked in circles. Now she walks in a straight line but the first 10-15 minutes continue to be challenging. She will just sit there, not budging, whimpering, and looking over her shoulder at the apartment building’s front door.
Honestly, I’m not sure she realizes what the point is (she’s not housebroken yet). It’s also very distracting and sometimes scary, especially at night. She stops every 10 feet to stare at a tree, a car, a shadow, a person approaching 100 yards away. Everything arouses curiosity and/or apprehension.
But once she gets in a groove she’s really good, trotting right beside me, glancing up at me periodically. She still tries to run up every set of stairs and down every driveway. I have to keep reminding her, “We don’t live there.” When we do finally get to our building, she runs up the stairs with such enthusiasm it totally warms my heart.
After walks she plays for about 20 minutes then passes out. She sleeps in all kinds of funny positions, and sleeps so much that I actually Googled “how much do puppies sleep” to make sure she’s okay. Turns out puppies sleep almost 18-20 hours a day!
I’m trying to gradually teach her how to be by herself. So far, she can handle about 20 minutes and, interestingly, prefers to hang out under my desk instead of the crate I bought her. This weekend we’ll try a little longer and see how she does. If she doesn’t destroy the apartment, then the crate will be used for discipline purposes only.
She’s amazing. I’m exhausted but feel incredibly blessed to have this happy, warm, furry bundle of joy in my house. I can’t wait for all the adventures we’re going to have!!