Wow, it’s been so long since a Stanley update. He’s just turned 5 months old so that seems like a pretty good time to give some updates. A lot has happened since the last post, both good and bad. I’m happy to report it’s mostly good.

The good:
• Stanley graduated from Petsmart Puppy Kindergarten in January. It was great fun to see him socialize with the other puppies and we had fun trying to train him amongst the distractions in the store. Although I wanted him to be valedictorian of his graduating class, I think he was more class clown. Nothing’s cuter that watching his bunny butt running all over the room and trying to steal the trainer's much larger German Shepherd’s bone. In the end, he learned a thing or two and so did we. We’re looking into his next training class but I think I want something a little more involved than what Petsmart offers.
• He’s gained a lot more freedom in the apartment. We used to tether him or crate him often throughout the day because he was still potty training and used to get into everything. But now we never have to tether him and he’s free (mostly) to roam around our place.
• He’s getting so big! He’s at about 18 ½ lbs now. Whenever I see corgi puppies that are younger than him, it’s hard to imagine he was once that small too. At first I thought he was getting too heavy too fast but he seems very healthy and the vet thought he looked great.
• Everybody loves Stanley. He brings a smile to people’s faces. I always hear people excitedly saying “CORGI!” wherever we go. And Stanley loves the attention. He hasn’t met a person yet he didn’t like!
• His mouthiness/biting has gotten A LOT better. It’s still not 100% though but we’re still working on it. Playing with him a few months ago was so difficult because he used our hands as chew toys. Now things are much improved in that department.
• Potty training is going great. He still tinkles every now and again inside but those moments are few and far between. And he has not pooped inside for weeks. I can’t even remember the last time, it was that long ago.
• He’s UTD on all his shots so we’ve been able to take him to dog parks and his first Corgi meetup. That’s been fantastic! I’m really pleased with the way he interacts with other dogs. He’s extremely playful though so that might not be a great match for every dog but he’s pretty chill sometimes too. I like that he doesn’t bark or get aggressive like I’ve seen some other dogs do.

The bad:
• Shortly after we brought Stanley home, he got very sick. I attributed it to transitioning his food too fast. He had loose stool, very low energy and loss of appetite. It was terrifying and I thought he had parvo or something equally horrendous. Long story short (and about $400 in vet bills later), turns out he had Coccidia. After a couple of weeks on his medicine, he was back to his normal self. He’s now living parasite free.
• He still won’t go up or down stairs. This is really bad because we live in a 2nd floor apt. He used to bounce up the steps like a pro but I think the heights now get to him. He had a couple of missteps and guess he figured it wasn’t worth it to him to climb them anymore. We thought we had made progress because for a brief period he would start to go up them again as long as we physically moved his back legs to help him up the first couple of steps. But alas, he stumbled a couple of times and has since reverted to not going up. And he pretty much won’t even attempt down. Did I mention he’s 18 ½ lbs now. I can’t continue to lug him around every time we go outside.
• We need to work on recall with him. If I let him roam around off leash and call to him, he’ll pretend he doesn’t hear me and just carry on. Occasionally he’ll come but 9 times out of 10, he’s just refuses.
• He loves to dig now. I guess that’s not such a bad thing but sometimes I wonder why he chooses to dig at the dark park vs. playing or running with the other dogs.
• We’re looking into doggie daycare for him every once in while. We want to find the best place for him and having been looking into visiting some local facilities. One day when Robin took a tour on his own of a daycare facility downtown, he got bit on the face by a dog there. The bite sent him to the ER where he ended up with 9 stiches – 6 on his upper lip and 3 on his lower. He’s healing nicely now but it sure was scary. And poor Stanley was at home alone for hours in his crate waiting for us to get home and feed him. Luckily he didn’t seem to hold it against us. Of course now we worry that everyone assumes Stanley bit up daddy’s face!

And the snugly:
• He loves to sit in my lap and give me puppy kisses.
• He likes to sit at our feet when we’re on the couch
• He’s so cute when he’s sleepy and I love when he stretches after waking up from a nap.
• He such a great lil pup and we love him so much!