The Fun is About to Start!

     Raising Cinder has it's awesome moments and some less than.  The awesome ones are pretty much when she's being cute, learning new [good] things. The less awesome things include: chewing things, snooping, and getting into things she shouldn't.

 

Buzz & Cinder

   This week I'm trying to keep the older boys out of the bedroom to interact with Cinder more often and longer each time. However there comes the time of understanding their agonies and building frustrations with her and opening that door to their escape. Gilley's at a loss to interact with her much because she seems to prefer Buzz. She essentially mauls Buzz leaving Gilley alone most of the time. However, it doesn't take much before Gilley's on overload and rather than snapping at her, he'd rather leave-he's a lover not a fighter. Buzz is somewhat amused at least part of the time-when he's not snapping at her about jumping on him and biting him (which is a LOT).  Since we've been doing it more often, Cinder is improving at not being quite as aggressive about the jumping and biting, but she has a LONG way to go before either of the boys will give her much quarter. I think once the weather breaks enough to be outside more we'll begin to see more interactions and ultimately, settling into a threesome. I think they boys will always reach a point at which they want to retreat for peace  and respite from her chaos, but they will mellow and she will become another member of the family-eventually.

 

     Cinder's getting much better at sleeping or being quiet in her crate for longer periods at night, if only she'd get on OUR bedtime schedule instead of hers!  Right now she manages to stay up playing until about 9:30PM and then we make a dash for bed soon after she crashes in order to get enough sleep to function. This morning, her wake-up call was at 2:30AM, so I was eating a spinach salad lunch at 9:40AM!

     Cinder's learning to get her toys out of her milk crate toy box. We modified a full-sized milk crate so it has a false bottom, elevating her toys to a level she can reach.  She's funny to watch because she has two methods for getting the toys: sneak up on the crate, jump up on the edge, and stretch to reach over and grab the toys; OR, climb into the crate, sit down, pick out the toy she wants, then jump out with it.

  

 

     This week, Cinder's much bigger than she was last week which means the fun is about to start! She's already figured out how to climb onto the loveseat and jump down, so I'm working at discouraging that until she's older. She can reach more things such as the tops of end tables, so now we have to be sure to remove things we don't want her to have-like the TV remote! Goodness knows we neither want her changing channels in the middle of our shows or eating the remote and thebatteries! On one hand, I'm glad she's getting bigger fast; on the other hand, I almost wish she'd stay a cute little puppy for a while-if she didn't have such sharp little puppy teeth and know how to use them!

      Overall, things are going about as we expected.  So far it's about Cinder learning to handle life in the house and the rules of order with the older boys. She's learning some tricks to help her learn to focus on me and keep her little brain busy. All of us are learning to adjust life daily as needed for raising Cinder. 

Cheers!

Chris