Meet Daisy

The smallest of the canine pack is Daisy our 3 1/2 lb Chihuahua. She was a birthday gift for my daughter's 3rd birthday. We had a neighbor who had a jack russell that they just let wander and he would visit us daily. They gave him away, which upset my daughter greatly. Then we rescued a toy poodle, until the owners were located. He slept in her crib with her. So we decided to buy a little dog she could pick up and care for.
Daisy is terrified of strangers and doesn't like strange dogs either. It took her two weeks to adjust to Kota after we brought him home.
We lost her for 5 days when she got out of the house unnoticed with Tanner. We posted signs in our rural community and a woman contacted me saying she had seen her. She thought she saw a rabbit in the corn field and then realized that she was a dog. Her family had tried to get her with no luck. We spent hours traveling around the cornfield with no success. After two days of searching I thought there was no way to locate her. The woman called back to say that her hired-hand had caught her down by the pond. Daisy bite him of course but she warmed up to the woman and her daughter.
She knows down and sit. She loves to curl up in a lap when its cold. She wears little sweatshirts, that I make her, out of necessity because she can get cold easily. I'd like to train her to get over her fear of strangers and some cute parlor tricks.

Meet Dakota

Or maybe I should just call him Kota. That's what we all call him. He is our drive-in rescue. We went to watch a movie and my daughter was petting a dog in the dark. My husband called him into the jeep with us and he looked so pitiful, his hair was so dirty. He had a small hole just under his ear that was infected. He barely moved for the first week we had him. We tended to his wounds and with the right nutrition he bounded back to good health. At first his coat was all a cream color and he immediately began to shed large amounts until his new coat revealed that he had brown spots. He is a generally calm dog. Unless we are in the jeep on the way to farm and he sees another dog and then he goes berserk. He chases some cars and not others when he is outside. If you catch his movement fast enough, you can call him off. He loves to howl with Daisy when I come home and no amount of coaxing can get them to be quiet. I call him my naturally obedient dog because in most situation he can be trusted off leash.

Meet Tanner

Tanner is the oldest dog in our canine pack. After the death of my beloved Dutch we headed to the Humane Society. We were looking at the dogs in the kennel when the cutest little puppy just went waltzing by. I showed my husband who hadn't seen him yet. We asked if he was up for adoption. At the time the boys were 6 and 4, so we thought a puppy would be a good choice for growing together. He was an eight week old puppy who was taken to the Humane Society because he cried at night, like all puppies do when they are separated from their litter. He came with a crate tons of toys, a bed, and dishes. They definitely had planned to spoil him rotten. I was able to carry him in one hand when we brought him home. Now at over 80 lbs that would be physically impossible.
Tanner is a lab mixed with something else. He looooves food of almost any sort, except celery. He is always looking to steal something edible. He loves at bolt out of a door and knock over the bystander. The french doors don't always close tightly and he is well aware of the fact. We lost him once for a few days. He escaped out of the house one night and never came back. My husband searched around and I called the dog warden. The dog warden had already placed him in a home even though he had only been gone 3 days.
He is a fairly obedient dog in the house but get him outside and his obedience disappears. Some of my training goals with Tanner would be to get him to come when called and learning to leave it.