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King Louie

Mama's crazy

I am going crazy spoiling my puppy to death. I bought him a Juicy Couture sweatshirt, a PetFlys carrier, some fabulous snacks and chewies... and I just keep buying more stuff! I'm out of control!

"Sit!"

Louie and I have done a bit of work on "sit."

First I praised him a few times when I found him in a sit position on his own. I guess sitting is a natural position for puppies (as they look up at you anxiously) so it's easy to find them in the position and encourage it.

I hand-fed him his dry kibble a couple times, luring him into a sit with each piece, saying "sit" as soon as his tush hit the ground. He learned frighteningly quickly!

Next while playing with him, playing a bit of "chase the toy" I was holding, I held it above his head and said "sit" -- when he sat, I gave him the toy for a bit of chewing/play-killing

He quickly made the leap to sitting on command -- no lure or hand signal necessary!

Funny story: While telling this to my boyfriend on the phone, Louie was napping in his pen. My phone kept cutting out while I was telling my boyfriend what I had taught Louie to do: "You taught him what?" Me: "Sit!" Him: "What?" Me: "Sit!" -- after about three or four times I looked over at Louie and he had gotten up from his nap and was SITting, looking at me like "What do you want?!"

Octopus!

About a week ago, I bought a little squid looking puppy toy for Louie. When I introduced it to him the first time, I said "Octopus!"

After that, every time I handed him the toy, I'd say the same thing, "Octopus!" My boyfriend even started saying it :)

Today he was playing with the octopus, then, after a while, was sitting looking up at me with the toy at his feet. I said "Octopus!" without doing anything. He sorta looked halfway down towards the toy, then back up at me... I said "Get it!" and he immediately grabbed the octopus and started playing with it!

I laughed and told him he was a good boy and let him play for a while. A few minutes later, he looked like he was settling down for a little nap. He was in one corner of his playpen with the octopus in the other corner where he had left it. I wanted to check to see if it was just a fluke, so I said it again, "Octopus!"

He looked right at the toy, I said "Get it!" -- and he went up to it, put it in his mouth, then dropped it and looked up at me like "Yeah, I got it, it's an octopus!"