Jasper the Schnoodle Puppy

Guest Post by Ian Davies

We have now had Jasper for three weeks and I must confess it seems much longer. That’s probably down to how well he has settled into being part of the family.

It’s been two weeks since my first blog post about him and there’s been lots going on during that time.

We’ve become regular visitors to our local branch of Pets at Home, and if we continue to go as often as we have done there is a very good chance we will be given our own set of keys to the store! Sarah, the Manageress is a mine of information. We have such confidence in her as she’s a real dog lover and seems to know everything there is to know about dogs. We’re looking forward to enrolling into her puppy training classes very soon.

After his first week with us, Jasper was weighed at Pets at Home. A healthy 1.9kg. He was weighed again 10 days later and he’s now 2.5kg. He’s definitely growing right in front of our eyes.

Over the last few days the toilet accidents have become less and less, and I’m confident he will soon become completely house trained.

Last week we took Jasper to Olney for a couple of hours. Olney is on the banks of the River Ouse, around 7 miles from our home in Milton Keynes, and is most famous for its pancake race, which has taken place every Shrove Tuesday since 1445.

Olney has an upmarket feel to it, with good restraunts, expensive clothes shops and plenty of excellent cafés and coffee shops too. I am attracted to the latter.

As Jasper hasn’t had his second injection he couldn’t be put down on the floor and had to be carried everywhere. We spent half an hour sat outside one of the coffee shops where he quickly became the centre of attention.

“Oh, isn’t he cute.”

“What a beautiful puppy.”

“Is he a Yorkshire Terrier?”

“How old is he?”

As we walked through the town we were stopped every few steps by people wanting to stroke him and generally make a fuss of him. He absolutely loved it and took every available opportunity to lick as many well-wishers as he could. There’s no doubt he was the town’s celebrity for the day.

The highlight of last week was going along to a Puppy Socialising Class at the local vets where he met several other puppies of a similar age. A boxer, a labrador, a doberman, a German shepherd and a cocker spaniel.

He didn’t know what to make of it and spent the first few minutes under “mum’s” chair, whilst the other dogs enjoyed play-fighting as the vet talked about various aspects of puppy care.

He gradually became a little bolder, peeping at the activity going on around him from under the chair, before immersing himself in the action. The other dogs welcomed him into their games and enjoyed the rough and tumble along with the others.

I wonder what will happen over the next few weeks? I’ll keep you posted.