Personal Play

I have been reading Denise Fenzi's blog and watching her training videos with her puppy.  I have learned a lot about playing with a dog.  Sometimes I want to slap my past self!  I really, really didn't know how to speak 'dog' when Tibby was a puppy.  Sorry Tibs :(  I'm trying to do better though! 

I love watching a whole string of the videos of Denise Fenzi's puppy Lyra and see the progression.  It's neat to see how her puppy learned and changed.  I like the way Denise interacts physically with Lyra.  When Tibby was a puppy I (extremely unfortunately) took the advice that any time Tibby tried to play with me physically - jumping on me, mouthing, pulling on my clothes - that she was trying to be dominate.  When in reality.....she just wanted to play and needed some redirection.

I'm still learning and I don't understand it all.  It being playing.  So I don't want to write like I'm some authority on it.  My attempts to play with Tibby are pretty hilarious.  I'm sure Tibby thinks I'm a little....slow.  But we are having A TON O' FUN!!!  We play a lot. 

Last night I tried personal play without a toy.  Tibby LOVED it!  She was better playing with me than with her favorite tug.  She played with me and I have the scars to prove it!  LOL!  Nah, not scars, just little scratches.  We wrestled and she chased me and I chased her and Tibby ran around like a crazy beast.  And then tonight we played again!  Even better - Tibby offered banging the teeter to start our play game.  Every time I would start to slow down, she would bang the teeter again - like a restart button!  Because OF COURSE I go crazy when she bangs the teeter!  Hee hee :)  She loves it :) 

So as a re-cap:  My hard to motivate dog likes to play with me :)  No toys or treats in sight.