life with Gracie...

A little word association on that title: never dull, funny, sometimes painful due to her teeth, snuggle buddy, learning curve...

Life with Gracie is always changing. We are learning something new about her personality or our lack of knowledge in the area of blindness nearly every day. Let me explain what I mean...

A couple of weeks ago, Gracie had to be de-wormed again. I was not happy and thought about how she had gotten them. The answer seemed so obvious I was kind of embarrassed for having missed it! She poops in the same area all the time. This area happens to be right off of our patio which, incidentally, also happens to be her running area. This is where she does her circles. She will poop, start running around and inevitably step in it. If we see her do it or it's bad enough to smell/see it, we will clean her feet. Otherwise, we just let her in. Well, she also has a habit of putting one paw in her food bowl when she eats. At that time, she was still too short to use an elevated feeder. We have her using one now and that's a whole other issue that I'll get to. Anyway, of course she got worms if she has been stepping in poop, stepping in her food and then eating that food! Like I said, it's so obvious with all this hindsight! We were so concerned with weight and health that we didn't even think about that. And I keep up with the poop-scooping in the backyard. We now have a small trashcan, the Walker version of a diaper genie, with a pop-up lid designated for dog poop in the backyard and when Gracie goes it is immediately picked up and disposed of. Problem solved...hopefully.

Next issue...I love my Ikea elevated dog feeders. They are metal and have three prong-like things that hold the bowls in place. It all folds down into itself. I was happy to get her into using this so that she couldn't put her foot in the food anymore. However, she goes into a frenzy when mealtime rolls around and literally can't control herself. She is so busy trying to get to the food that she hits the bowls with her foot or body and tips the bowls over, dumping contents out all over the floor. I've cleaned up tons of water and picked up thousands of pieces of dog food due to this. And, once she hears the dog food hit the floor, it's on. She switches into high gear and you can't hardly stop her. Then, if the bowl comes off the prongs, she will step into the feeder itself in her frenzy. This makes me nervous. I can just see her getting tangled up in that and snapping a leg. We are working on this issue. Maybe if we weight the bowls or attach them to the prongs somehow. Or, maybe we could figure out a way to keep Gracie from going into her hyperactive mode all together! As usual, any suggestions would be welcomed!

Teeth...thank the Lord above! Gracie lost her two bottom canines! All of our legs will be so grateful. She lost them both this past weekend and David said her adult teeth were already pushing through the gums. That's fine, at least those teeth aren't tiny needles. She is pretty mouthy right now, especially when she's tired but won't give up and go to sleep. We are working on this but it is a slow process. I know I shouldn't, but I feel bad disciplining her due to her blindness. Plus, I'm not sure of the best way to discipline her for the same reason. Thoughts?

Busy...this is her to a 'T'. She loves the refrigerator and the pantry. Go figure, they both store food; her favorite thing. She has the sounds of either being opened memorized and can hear it from across the house. If it's the pantry, she's there trying to climb into the bag of dog food. If it's the refrigerator, she's just trying to get whatever she can. Yesterday, I opened the refrigerator and she got past me before I could catch her. She tends to stretch her front legs out when she's unsure of where she is to 'feel' her way. She did this and caught the edge of a plastic pitcher with no lid on it that was half full of lemonade. Before I could catch it, she pulled it over on herself and it spilled all over the refrigerator shelf and floor. Then she's trying desperately to get into the refrigerator and I'm trying to keep her out without slipping in the lemonade. She's already slipped and has lemonade all over her. I yell for Addison to come help. What do I hear? "Just a minute" is lazily called out to me. "I don't have a minute!", I respond. Needless to say, I had a mess to clean up and a dog to wash but it all worked out. I'm sure we looked like a bad slapstick comedy. Just another day in the Walker home.

So, life with Gracie is a learning curve. Just when we have the 'kinks' worked out, another one pops up. We are taking her to an opthamologist on September 4th to get a good evaluation of her eyesight. I am not anticipating any miracles nor do I need any (more). Just the fact that Gracie is here is good enough for me. She more than makes up for these 'issues' with her puppy kisses and sweet nature. Gracie is Gracie...what else needs to be said?