Just Ellie The Awesome Foster Dog

Ellie is going back to the rescue today.  It's a sad, sad day.  She's going back, because Catty (the cat) does not like her.  And Ellie likes her too much. 

Catty is such a push over cat - I think if she were more growl and hiss - Ellie would leave her alone and realize that she isn't a furry toy that runs.

Catty has been living in the basement since Ellie arrived.  She is not a happy cat.  I bring her upstairs for visits, but she is very nervous and clingy (read: claws stuck into my chest/arms/neck).  I thought Catty might adjust and get used to Ellie.  After all Catty is BFFs with Tibby, but Catty's behavior has gotten worse every day.  She sits and cries in the basement.  Sad Catty.

If I didn't have a cat......I would be VERY tempted to keep Ellie.  She is THE PERFECT dog.  She's a dog dog.  If you can think of a thing that dogs do (good things ie. play with toys/swim/loves belly rubs) Ellie does it.  She is awesome.

She has tons of drive for food and toys.  She can switch between toys - not so much food to toys, but when the food is gone she will play and play and play.

She tugs like a maniac.  Loves to play tug.  She will play tug until your arm falls off.  She will play with anything - work gloves?  must be a toy!  plastic bag?  must be a toy!  orange cone? must be a toy!

Her favorite toys have squeakers.  She will do ANYTHING for a squeaky toy.  If you get tired she'll happily lay around squeaking the toy and wait for you to come back.

"I do tunnels right?"

Nothing scares her - not tons of people or loud noises.  Anything that looks different, is just a toy she hasn't discovered and it needs to be investigated right away! 

Her favorite thing to do: just be next to a human.  You don't need to pet her or pay attention to her.  You just need to be there.  She would like some scratchies, but it's Ok if you are busy....she'll wait until you are ready to pay attention to her again.  She might lean up against you, but only so you don't forget that she's there :)

One neat thing she does - she NEVER poops on the lawn.  She'll try to get as close to the fence as possible before she poops.  Smart dog!

She's 100% potty trained.  A couple times there were some could-have-been-an-accident moments, but she woke me up or told me that she needed to go and she made it outside every time.  She's quiet in her crate and is getting a very solid drive into the crate and wait to be released from the crate.

We did some heeling/reinforcement zone playing around last night.  She did really well off leash.  She likes to work.  A lot!  I think she would work for play with out any problem.  Treats and toys aren't even needed, because she loves interaction with people SO much.  But she also likes treats and toys, so she's the whole package! 

I was seriously very tempted to keep Ellie.  Even though I chose to foster her because she was the farthest from (what I thought) was my 'ideal' dog.   Instead of what I thought I was getting I found a funny little sweet doggie that wanted to play with me.  I'm not sure how much Ellie has learned from me, but I've learned a lot about how a normal dog acts and plays.  It was a fun experience.

I will miss you Ellie!

Living The Summer

"You hang up first....no you....no you hang up f..i..r..s...zzzzzzz"

It's a pretty good life for the puppers (and me too!). 

A day in the life of Tibby and Ellie: 

get up early around 6am to potty and a quick game of fetch (Ellie)

Go back to bed for snuggles and get up for real around 9 (or 10.... :)

Play with the flirt pole/whip toy (see below) until Ellie's tongue is hanging all the way out

Tibby and Ellie play chase games and wrestle until Tibby's tongue is hanging all the way out

Go inside to rest up for 1/2 hour

Go outside for more playing

Inside to rest up

Outside for playing

Inside to rest up

Outside playing

Eating time

More playing outside

Play in sprinkler to cool down

Inside to rest up

Outside to play

Inside to rest

Outside to play - getting dark now....more fetching games and less chasing games.

Inside to escape mosquitoes

Last time outside to potty and play a quick game/pick up 5,000 toys from the yard and put sprinkler away

Sleeping time - very quiet in the house....just little snores from 2 tired doggies

And then just a quick little video showing Ellie's nice crate manners.  She's really, really improved a lot!  She's a smart puppy and she wants to be good/do the right thing SO bad.  She is really improving on her self control.  In the whip video you can see how she is able to wait and hold a sit (most of the time!) while I re-tie the toy on to the end of the whip.  A few weeks ago she would have just kept jumping at me.  Trust me....I have the scratches to prove it!  She has the sharpest claws I have ever seen on a dog.  I keep trimming them and they are STILL sharp, but in the last few days she hasn't scratched me once.  OR bitten me.  Before she would be so excited to get the toy that she would bite me as well as the toy.  Now she sometimes still gets my skin/fingers/arm, but she doesn't bite down as hard.  And she's stopped bite kissing me.  She use to run at me full speed, jump up, nip and lick me.  Ow.

She did that to my nose one time.  I thought that I might have a pierced nose.  :P

Happy Hot Dogs

"I chased a Border Collie and I won..."

"I got chased and she won..."

"I could have run all day..."

"So embarrassed....my tongue was holding me back!  She has an unfair advantage!"

We'll have a re-match later.  I would place my bet on Tibby :)

Fighting With Friends

Ruff and tumble play = ruff and tumble hair cut. 

Ellie went all border collie stalky on Zoe here.

"Look at my feet!"  How to judge fun - amount of dirt on dog's legs. 

Ready....Set....

GO!!

Zoe, "Tiny legs don't fail me now!"

Tibby, "Run shorty!  Run!"

Someone adopt this awesome dog!  She's great!  Very sweet, very smart - loves to be with people! 

Minnesota Border Collie Rescue

Ellie Almost Dock Diving!

Ellie fetching at the lake!  She had a lot of fun, even with the big waves. 

Tibby was not involved in this AT ALL - she doesn't DO unfiltered water LOL!!

At the Lake

We spent most of Sunday and some of Monday at the cabin.  Friends and family.  It was fun.  Beautiful weather!

Ellie/Squeakers likes watermelon.

"Yum!"

Tibby likes posing on furniture.  If it's soft, it must be a Tibby bed.

Ellie didn't want to show off her superdog cape.  She was wet from swimming.

Tibby and me.  It was a windy day!

"Gimme treat?"

Tibby and Zoe played some zoomie games in the cabin.

Tibby enjoyed lunch!

And relaxing.

Ellie thought ice cubes were pretty tasty.

Zoe and her Mom napping.

Ellie's spot on the deck.  She just relaxed and watched everyone.

Fun day...makes for sleepy puppies! 

Tibby and Ellie Playing

My favorite part is when Tibby sits on Ellie's head.  Classic Tibby move.

They are playing all the time now!  I think Tibby must have been sore, because now she is constantly asking Ellie to play.  Tonight Ellie was rolling around playing with her ball, Tibby kept going up to her and putting a paw on Ellie's back or neck and then running away.  She finally got Ellie to chase her.  After a few minutes she decided that she wanted a break, so Tibby jumped in my lap!  I was like, "Hey I saw you bugging Ellie, you asked to be chased!"

They are very cute - they make me laugh all the time with their silliness.

I bought a few different toys to try with Ellie today.  The wubba was fun, but the squeaky Frisbee and the other squeaky toys are just okay.  There is something about the kong tennis balls that she finds really, really fun.  Glad I had a few laying around!

Ellie likes to tug!  We played with the wubba and she is an excellent tugger.  We had been tugging with the kong ball, but that is a little difficult!  My fingers like to stay away from her teeth ;)

She had a little noisy complaining about being in the crate after we came in this evening from playing.  She settled down after 15 mins.  Sorry Ellie freedom to counter surf is not an option.

She is doing SO much better with door manners.  I wish I had a video of her the first night to compare to now.  She waits to be released out the door and back in - without rushing the door.  BIG improvement.  Door entering and exiting is -Tibby, me, Ellie in/out last. 

She also has learned to go into her crate without a fight.  At first she would put the brakes on BIG TIME when I told her to go in her crate.  Now I say 'crate' and she runs inside - and waits for her snack. 

I bought her an Ellie strength bone to chew.  It made her very happy.  

In Tibby news - she needs to get groomed and I think she might have to go short.  Just for a while.  Between rolling in the dirt and running through the dew/rain with Ellie plus it's growing REALLY fast right now.  She just has too much coat.  I think she would be more comfortable short.  It's such a thick coat to carry around in the summer.

Bark In the Park

We survived Bark In the Park!

I didn't get to pass out my fliers with Ellie's info.  Everyone that stopped to pet her said they had enough dogs.  But I tried!  They were both good.  Considering the situation - tons of people, tons of dogs, outside, noisy, food every where. 

My Dad with Ellie.  She how cute she is in her vest?

Tibby sees a dog going down stairs.

The girls.  I think it's funny they looked a little bit like that elderly couple in front of us.

This is when we were waiting for the dog parade.  The Bark In the Park was hosted by the local humane society.  They had a lot of adoptable dogs there.  They were jealous of Ellie's cute vest!  You can see the ones that they made for the adoptable dogs - upper left corner.  They are green vinyl adult bibs with "Adopt Me, Please" written in magic marker.  Some of the Humane Society volunteers asked about Ellie's vest and I told them how to make one.  They are going to make some for a parade on Sat.

Ellie!

While we were waiting I taught her a new trick.  "Jump"  She can jump straight up in the air now on cue - about 5 feet up.  I have to get it on video.

While we were waiting Ellie decided that this was the perfect time to try playing with Tibby.  Tibby was not pleased.  I had to separate them a few times.  It's hard for me to tell what is playing and what is going toward fighting.

Ellie is so relaxed in this very stressful environment.  Nothing scares her.

Zoe and her Mom.  They are now an official Hospice therapy team!

At the end of the doggie parade.  SO MANY DOGS.  Wow.  If I wasn't trying to get Ellie adopted I would have never done that.  It was "slightly" difficult to navigate 2 dogs through that crowd, but we managed.

Full stadium of people and dogs.

"I'm cute and friendly!  Adopt me!"

"Wa' baseball?"

She liked to rest down underneath the seat.

Tibby sat on my lap.  She didn't want to play with Ellie.

Tibby is huggable!

Ellie and Zoe say "hey".

They had little events on the field between innings with different dogs.

Zoe and her Mom.

Zoe's Mom had a squeaky toy for Zoe and Ellie was OBSESSED with stealing it.

She is also very good at finding ANY dropped food.

Relaxing.

Tibby!

"I like baseball!  Balls!"

She's resting her little feet on the seat in front of us.

Watching the game

"Is that an old M&M?  Food!"

"Don't forget I'm cute too!"

Ellie watched the people behind us for the longest time.  She was very interested in the little boy sitting a few seats behind us.  She likes kids a lot!

Now I have 2 very tired dogs.  After we walked home I let the girls run their stress out in the backyard.  Zoom!  They had a nice long game of chase.  Ellie also played some fetch. 

Now unfortunately she is in a covered crate.  I gave her a treat of a frozen turkey neck and she had an issue of growling/snapping at Tibby.  Tibby was just walking by Ellie's crate - she doesn't like turkey necks.  I covered the crate and she stopped, so I hope that will be OK.