Well, we made it! We've been up for 20 minutes or so and she has already peed and pooped outside.-I have been trying to get a picture of her playing with her blue elephant-it's so cute-but she won't slow down long enough for me to get one that isn't blurry. I took one of her outside with my 9yo when he got up.
Last night went surprisingly well! I had the night shift-we slept in the family room because it was the farthest away from the family without going down to the basement. The breeder had warned us that she gets noisy in the evenings and she did have a little barking spell, but she really took to the crate well. I put her elephant inside (we had left it at the breeders' so it had her mama's scent on it) along with a couple teeny pieces of dried liver. She went in it several times during the day and when we closed the door last night she was mostly ok. She cried and whined for a minute or two, but that was just when she couldn't see me. Then she settled down and went to sleep.
She woke up at 3:30, whining a little bit, so I took her out and she pottied right away. I would like to pause here and say how THANKFUL I am that we live in the South and that we are having an unusually warm December. It was actually pleasant outside in my jammies at 3:30am! Anyway, after she peed, she wanted to run around the yard and play. She LOVES being outside. And she is almost obsessed with attacking every leaf she sees. I didn't want to let her get too awake, though, so I brought her back and out her back in the crate. She stayed awake for a little while, but didn't cry. And the next time she woke up it was 6:08.
I didn't sleep as well, because I was listening for her, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I feared.
Of course, as I am writing, she is in her crate in the other room and just started this pathetic whining/howling thing...
oh well....
We have a pen type of thing set up in the kitchen and it has been so helpful. While I cook or clean, she can hang out in there playing and she's perfectly content. She has kind of self-policed herself to stay in the kitchen mostly anyway. I think it's because there is usually a cat sitting in one of the doorways watching her. She's used to cats b/c the breeder had one, and she clearly knows that the cat is her boss. She takes one look at them and just goes the other way.
We did have an accident in the house last night, which was totally my fault. Everyone had gone to bed (we have one sick kid here) and I decided to move her crate into the other room at the last minute. It was time to take her out (she had finished her dinner and had a big drink recently) but I just thought I could get it done fast and get back to her. I left her in the pen and when I came back she had pooped. I just moved her into her crate in the family room and cleaned it up. My bad.
I suppose that's all the time I have to write now-
I'm so sorry Peaches isn't sleeping! Is she crying or just staying awake?