A while back, before Derek and I decided we were getting Ferdinand, we decided we were going to go to Wrestlemania with our friends, Toyia and Mike. It's in Miami and it's next week, so we decided now was the best time to introduce Ferdinand to Lily, my parents Old English Sheepdog. Ferdinand will be staying with my parents during the week we are gone, and we wanted him to be comfortable with being around Lily. My grandparents live down the road from my parents, and they have a Carin Terrier, the Toto dog from "The Wizard of Oz," named Honey Bear. We assume that Honey Bear may be over at one point, so we figured we would also introduce Ferdinand to Honey.
The day started with us giving Ferdinand his Heartgard medicine.
These ones were given to us by Lynn, the breeder, and then by the first vet we went to see. Each chewie is good for a month. Ferdinand had no idea what to do with it. If you saw the video of him trying to figure out what to do with the carrot, this was very similar. It took a while for him to chew it all up, but he seemed to enjoy it.
This particular Heartgard came in a "puppy kit" so it came with coupons and an ID tag.
The ID tag is similar to the AKC tag. If you register the ID number to the Heartgard site that they provide, if your dog gets lost, they will scan that number to find you. It's pretty cool.
Since Ferdinand is microchipped and has his AKC registration on his colar, I think he's pretty safe.
After giving him his medicine and packing a bag for him, we decided to hit the road. Generally, Ferdinand is a quiet car rider, but he likes to move around a lot and chew my car up, even with his chew toys sitting right next to him. Since there was two of us I figured the ride may be better. We haven't decided yet if he would need a crate for the car or one of those harness things that click into your seatbelt. We were kinda hoping he would just sit there like our other dogs did. For now, he's still small enough that he could still sit in the box we brought him home in. Well, that didn't go over with him too well.
Reluctantly, I let him sit on my lap. He stopped barking and was trying to fall asleep, he just couldn't get comfortable. Finally, he found comfort on the floor.
Of course, he can't go anywhere without his frog.
We made the trip to Greensburg in no time. He did great in the car. He wasn't bad like he was the last time I had him in the car. We pulled up to my parents house and we decided it would be best to let Lily and Ferdinand meet outside where they could run and Lily wouldn't feel like he was intruding on her space right away. Ferdinand was nervous around Lily. Honestly, Lily is like a small horse, galloping and jumping and sprinting all the time, she is the sweetest dog, just crazy. My only concern was Ferdinand being stepped on. Lily was awesome with him. She came running up to him, sniffed him and ran away to get her ball, which is an old soccer ball. She kept playing with my sister, Gabby, and then she'd come over to smell Ferdinand.
She was a lot more gentle than I thought she was going to be. She would lay down so that Ferdinand would come over to her, but then she would get super excited and want to play right away.
For the first bit Ferdinand was scared and would hide near anyone. He was particularly fond of Gabby.
Or my dad.
But then he got brave and when Lily would leave him alone, he would go looking for her in the yard.
Once he got comfortable, which took all of 5 minutes, he was down in the yard letting Lily roughhouse him. Then he would let her know when enough was enough by either growling, barking or nipping at her. He never hurt her and she never hurt him, they just felt each other out.
After they played for a while, Ferd got super tired. I took him in the house and let him nap while my sister painted my toenails. She thought it was the perfect moment to paint Ferdinand's nails.
After he woke up, and before we had dinner, we decided to take him to my Grandparent's house to meet Honey Bear.
Ferdinand was a lot more confident around Honey Bear, probably because Honey Bear was more his size. I would say that Honey Bear was a little more nervous around Ferdinand than Ferdinand was around Honey Bear.
My Granddad and Grandma had a lot of fun watching Ferdinand and Honey Bear play together.
Something that my Mom and Grandma taught their dogs to do was to ring a bell on their door when they needed to go to the bathroom. My Grandma gave me a cow bell that my high school football team sells. Ferdinand ended up taking that, new food bowls (old ones that Honey outgrew), and a few of Honey Bear's toys that she no longer played with.
All Ferdinand has to do is hit it and that will let us know when he needs to go out. That's if he feels like doing it. To make him learn that he is to use it, every time we take him out, we would use his head or foot to knock the bell. He associates going outside with making the bell make noise.
Once we got back to my parents house, my mom said that my neighbors wanted to meet Ferdinand. Growing up, my next door neighbors had 2 boys, Chad and Josh. Chad was the oldest, he was quite a bit older than me. Josh was only a few years older than me. Basically when I was 5, they were in late middle school / early high school. Anyways, Chad was visiting home with his two sons, dogs and wife. It had been at least 10 years since I had last seen him, and he still looked the same. His two boys were adorable. Sam, the oldest boy, is 3-years-old and wanted to see the puppy. Here are the pictures of them together.
Ferdinand was awesome with Sam and Sam was good with Ferd. This was the first time that Ferdinand had met a small child since we had gotten him. He sat down and let Sam poke and play with him. It was almost like he knew he had to be gentle. He didn't even try to nip at him once. I was so happy that he was being so good.
When we walked down to the house, it was time for dinner. Ferd wasn't that interested in eating his food, and Lily wasn't interested in eating his food either, which will be good for when we go to Wrestlemainia. For the most part, Ferdinand slept under Derek's chair or my dad's chair.
After dinner, while we were still sitting at the table, Ferd and Lily decided to play under the table.
Lily loved having Ferdinand over.
They loved each other so much, that Ferdinand gave Lily kisses before we left.
Of course, my Dad had to give Ferdinand kisses too.
All-in-all, Ferdinand's big trip out was awesome. He was a good dog and seemed to handle the car, meeting new people and dogs very well.
P.S. This is the first time I've used the gift that I got Derek for his birthday. On March 12, Derek turned 29-years-old, and I got him a 27-inch iMac. Using it to upload these pictures and videos is awesome!
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