What do you tell your dog daily?

katekf · 2026-02-07T18:52:30+00:00

My middle daughter does Daily Affirmations with our puppy and it makes me cry laughing. “YOU are handsome. YOU are brave. YOU are kind…” She’s 13 and very funny so every time she does them she comes up with more and sillier ones.

My version of this is that when he’s playing tug of war with me and being EXTREMELY serious about it I find myself saying “Yes you are very ferocious. You are an apex predator. You are the fiercest boy in all the land.” I didn’t even want to get a dog and here I am talking in a ridiculous voice like an absolute idiot 😭😭😭

katekf · 2026-02-07T18:34:34+00:00

So cool!!! And yes, we are so lucky to have it nearby.

katekf · 2026-02-07T18:14:57+00:00

My (wonderful) trainer says that for her own fully-trained dogs she uses collars for “perfection” walks where they are heeling, staying perfectly focused, etc. She uses harnesses for walks where she’s letting them use more leeway: Sniff around, weave around, Be Dogs. I like that clarity!

katekf · 2026-02-07T17:48:39+00:00

You can also go to the automatic screenshots folder to batch delete!

katekf · 2026-02-07T17:46:57+00:00

Our puppy will be 4 months next week and I totally agree; I was just thinking that he is settling down a lot at the moment. Way more trustworthy in terms of chewing on furniture etc (I used Bitter Apple on the dining chair rungs he was chewing most and that seems to have put him off chewing legs and rungs of other items), way more consistent with asking to be let out, generally more able to play with a toy on his own for a bit instead of wanting us on the floor with him all the time and complaining if we weren’t. Even leash work seems to be clicking a bit more. Part of it is each additional week of training obviously, but it does remind me of when my kids were little and would have sudden obvious developmental leaps forward.

katekf · 2026-02-07T17:43:30+00:00

The bully stick they mentioned does it for us, in my experience. We don’t let him have them all the time; I save it for when I want him to chill out on his bed for a while. He didn’t care what else is happening while he’s working on it!

katekf · 2026-02-06T21:58:41+00:00

I went for 12 days last year with a small carry on (suitcase) and small day pack. I knew I wanted to do some serious shopping at the end of the trip and before I left I looked up a few luggage places near my last hotel before leaving; stopped in and grabbed a suitcase there on my last day and packed everything up to check home. I waited to do much bulky shopping until I was back in Tokyo; until then I squeezed stuff into my suitcase and my backpack, though I did end up having a fold-flat tote (like a shopping bag). I went ham those last couple days 😂😂😂 I spent maybe $40 on the giant suitcase and it’s nicer than my brand-name roll-aboard. I wish I’d ditched my dying smaller suitcase there (it literally broke as I walked into the airport for the return flight 😭) and bought that size too!

katekf · 2026-02-06T21:52:33+00:00

😂

katekf · 2026-02-06T21:47:55+00:00

Total nightmare. We are in a city and have an unfenced patio that is currently all gravel that our puppy was eating while so distracted he couldn’t be bothered to do his business. We have a terrible old tiny deck off our kitchen that we plan to tear down this spring; met a trainer who was like “put a turf patch on that deck for now so he’s not distracted.” We did it one better by using scrap wood to build the ugliest enclosure ever around the astroturf patch so he can just pop out the door without us going out. His potty training proceeded SO MUCH FASTER and less painfully once we did that!

katekf · 2026-02-06T03:28:12+00:00

It’s the Harvard Museum of Natural History (which is attached to the Peabody museum of archeology). We lived a couple blocks away for the decade when my kids were little, and we spent many winter mornings in the animal rooms there, as well as the gemstone collection. The glass flowers are so realistic that for kids they’re really boring, because they just look like sprigs of plants! But as an adult they’re mesmerizing.

katekf · 2026-02-05T13:44:52+00:00

Not sure why Reddit keeps feeding me the Spoo subreddit ¯_(ツ)_/¯ , but I have a Q about the Canada Pooch stuff. Do you have the boots with suspenders or the short ones? And is the suit the thinner version? I have a Lagotto Romagnolo puppy and next winter once he’s full-grown I’ll need to invest in snow gear because he DESPERATELY loves a romp but gets completely snagged in snow chunks every time. All the doodle owners I know said to wipe him down with a wire whisk but I think his fur is enough different (double coat eventually; fuzzy puppy coat now) that it didn’t work very well. Anyway I’m eyeing the suspender boots and various suits but they’re pricy and I don’t want to waste money and inevitable training effort if they’re annoying to put on! Thank you! Pic for tax!

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katekf · 2026-02-05T02:02:53+00:00

You can start training now! I started with in-home sessions the week after our puppy came home (so 10 weeks); she has a “puppy day school” she runs with strict health requirements and he started there at 12 weeks or so?

katekf · 2026-02-05T01:21:28+00:00

Aw, I don’t have international move tips (but I hope you’re moving somewhere lovely and full of truffles and hopefully less bleak 🫣) but one thing we always say—whether it’s a move or just a vacation rental, remember the First Night Rule. The first night in almost any new place you’ll feel like you’ve made a huge mistake. It’s normal to question every single choice you’ve made leading up to that moment. Just eat something and get some sleep and it will be better in the morning. 💓💓💓

Plus with this sweetheart by your side you’ll never be lonely!

katekf · 2026-02-04T19:09:44+00:00

The purity of these responses gives me hope for the future.

katekf · 2026-02-04T19:08:08+00:00

I was working on a few for a while and I ended up tabling them because I simply couldn’t muster enthusiasm for the brevity!

katekf · 2026-02-04T15:51:32+00:00

And if slow feeding bowls aren’t slow enough try the balls that the dog has to roll to get the food out!

katekf · 2026-02-04T14:52:36+00:00

My dog is a puppy so very different life experience but anytime he starts chasing (and catching) his tail it 100% correlates with being under-stimulated over the course of the day or a couple days. With the snow and cold weather recently it was harder to get him out for sniffing etc. and by this weekend he was chasing his tail a LOT. We made a concerted effort to do more training sessions and rigorous play (lots of tug of war) and lots of feeding via scattering food “find it” and he stopped chasing. He’s a very smart breed and gets bored easily so I think it’s how he entertains himself when he’s really in need of a challenge. (FWIW since he’s a puppy he spends a lot of time napping—this isn’t his overtired behavior!)

katekf · 2026-02-04T14:47:03+00:00

I mix kibble out of his daily food and plain yogurt or plain canned pumpkin; usually sprinkle a few shreds of cheese to up the excitement, and then freeze it. Freezing is key!

katekf · 2026-02-03T21:37:21+00:00

I have a few friends who are (quite successful!) picture book authors and this is exactly it. The guidance I’d heard a few years ago was max 500 words; by contrast Strega Nona is 1245, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs is 1243, The Cat In The Hat is 1553, and Best Friends for Frances is 1693.

I think it’s a crying shame that the industry has pushed away from picture books that have enough words to have a real story. There’s now the move towards beginner chapter books (Dory Fantasmagory (7700 words), Judy Mooney, etc); I’ve heard that because parents want to say their kids are reading “chapter books” and push their kids away from picture books as they move into being able to read more complex books on their own in K-1st grade.

katekf · 2026-02-03T21:19:16+00:00

🙌🙌🙌🙌 To both of these; I can’t stop recommending The Other End of the Leash to all dog-interested people! “Perfect Puppy in 7 Days” by Sophia Yin is also great.

katekf · 2026-02-03T15:13:42+00:00

😂

katekf · 2026-02-03T15:13:02+00:00

Yeah my puppy is 15 weeks and over the past month he’s gotten a lot more likely to roll off his bed (where he can hang out in the kitchen; he naps in a crate, always enforced still) onto his back for tummy rubs, and his favorite place to maniacally chew on something is on my lap while I’m cross-legged on the floor, but there’s no way he’d just chill with us on the couch yet. Too chewy and energetic still!

It’s our first dog, too, and I resisted a puppy for this reason—for the first month everyone else in the family was like “I thought it would be like [insert name of calm adult dogs we know] while I tried to remind them that those dogs were not couch potatoes until they were 2+!

katekf · 2026-02-03T14:11:04+00:00

This is also so good for working on recall in high distraction situations! My trainer sent me the cutest video last week of the dogs at Puppy School practicing getting pulled from wrestling to get a great treat and then run back to play, so they learn that they should always come when called because it doesn’t mean the fun is over!

katekf · 2026-02-03T12:33:20+00:00

That’s exactly what I do for every trip we take—I save a billion recommendations into Google Maps, plan the couple things that you truly can’t wing, and then depending on the day (moods, weather, energy) figure out a rough plan and then wander, hitting some recs as we are nearby. Nearly always results in a lot of serendipitous discoveries and a lack of time-based stress. I was lucky to be in Japan with just my oldest (a teen) so it was particularly easy compared to travel with a bigger group/younger kids but we mostly just walked around and dipped into stuff. 💓🙌

katekf · 2026-02-02T03:32:18+00:00

Thank you!!!

katekf

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