An adventure for the rain

For as beautiful as the weather was at the beginning of our week, the downpour of rain came in for the last half of the week. Yawn. Yucky weather really adds a level of creativity to puppy socialization. Not that puppies can't enjoy some wet on their fur, and Raisers put up with the smell of such combo, but it is not the excited "Yeah - Let's go on an outing!" scenario that many of Raisers get to enjoy in other parts of the country with cooperative sunshine.

Many times throughout our 20 months of attending classes has our Trainer mentioned Mall Sitting as a perfect puppy social outing. Just sitting. Nothing fancy, nothing extraordinary, nothing stressful, nothing intense or command-worthy.

The assignment of Mall Sitting:

*Hurry the dog outside
*Walk the dog inside
*Sit at the first available bench
*Sit, Sit, Sit, (reading is optional) and let the puppy observe while he/she is voluntarily sitting, standing, or doing down - doesn't matter so long as the puppy is behaving verbally and watching his/her tongue.
*When puppy shows signs of chilling out and being comfortable in his/her environment, then the assignment can commence.
*Pick puppy up, go outside, and command a Hurry.

We did this scenario today and it took ten minutes for Kolby to go from standing, to sitting, to doing an Under and Down by our legs.

Assignment completed.

We stayed longer than that - observing people ourselves - Ha! - but we were happy that he kept quiet, he kept checking in with his amazing eye contact, and he did not show his tongue during any part of our outing (minus the yawn). He did not solicit attention, nor lunge on his leash at adoring fans.

While strollers passed and groups of people with squeaky sneakers, high heals, and loud kids, not one person asked to pet the puppy, they made comments about the puppy, but did not ask to pet the puppy. That was fine for now and set the outing up for even greater success (he didn't have to learn more than one thing at once - acceptable greeting in a new, busy, loud environment). We are working on baby steps and that was the perfect set-up. Thank you, Public!

Per usual after outings, Kolby is now passed out on his bed on top of his toys.