I had a really heart-pounding, scary dream last night.
I dreamt that somehow, we were informed that surprise! We didn’t actually own Charlie… we were apparently merely fostering him. And the time had now come that we needed to turn him over to his “forever owners”. Who were not going to be us.
O.M.G. I felt this crazy sense of PANIC in my dream!!
My sweet snuggly puppy!!! Being ripped away from me!!! I couldn’t even handle it. In the dream I had to say goodbye to him and hand him to this other lady. He was looking at me like, Where are you going?? I was distraught. It was the worst feeling ever. I woke up and had one of those “thank-god-that-was-just-a-dream” moments.
Charlie has really turned a doggy corner lately and has overall been so much easier. I feel like he’s really fully bonded with us now and is definitely “part of the family”, 100% now.
He is getting happier and happier to just sort of chill wherever we are without needing to be entertained or even watched quite as closely anymore. He still goes into bitey shark mode for a little bit in the evenings, but that window is getting shorter and shorter (and some nights it doesn’t happen at all).
Yesterday I spent a lot of the day puttering around the house putting up Christmas decorations, and he mostly just hung out, like a “real dog” does! (I mean, an older dog. You know what I mean.) He is more content to wait upstairs while I disappear to another room or run downstairs to the basement, etc. too, assuming there is nothing much out that he could get into.
Also… we’ve let him sleep with us a few times lately. 😬 He still goes in his crate everyday for at least 1-2 naps, because it’s really important to me that he remain crate trained. We still definitely cannot leave him out alone when we’re gone, and I also just want him to be comfortable in his crate forever, should he need to go to the vet overnight, while staying at someone else’s house, if we have visitors, whatever.
But he LOVES to snuggle in our bed, and to be honest, I freaking love it too. He’s so soft and snuggly and just the sweetest thing!!! I can’t resist. He will curl up with his head on my chest like a baby for a while, and then eventually, when he gets too warm, he’ll move to the end of the bed and stretch out.
I don’t really see a big problem with it. We have a King sized bed, he’s potty trained, and he’s totally happy to just crash all night. Never tries to get down or into anything at all. He’s actually super lazy in the mornings. When I get up early, he sort of raises his head, watches me go, and then sighs and snuggles back in by Ivan to keep sleeping. I think he’d sleep in there until 10 if I let him. Hahaha.
I feel like I’m seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. We are not fully in the clear from all the hard puppy stuff yet; not at all. (He just turns 5 months old on the 30th.) But I am getting glimpses of it! And I already can’t imagine our life without him now! ♥ I love him soooo much.
Daily Gratitude:
I am grateful for Charlie snuggles. (*Again, I’m sorry if this is too much Dog Content…. I really do realize not everyone loves to hear about dogs all the time!! But I just had to share about that dream, bc it was so awful!)
GRATEFUL KAE 
I’m glad things are getting a bit easier! If only the baby/toddler curve was that sharp! 😉 We have a heat vent in a similar location and Paul used to lay by it, especially when he was crabby/feeling off! I tried to find a photo of it, but I can’t. My parents have heated floors in their bathrooms so the boys have also been known to kind of lay on the powder room bathroom floor (kind of gross but my mom is a clean freak so it’s pretty pristine).
What an awful nightmare, though! Those are hard to shake when you wake up!
Oh and when Oscar lived with us, she slept in our bed. But she mostly cuddled up with Phil.
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Right, haha! I guess on the plus side my boys never tried to eat my shoes constantly, even as toddlers. lol!
And ooh, heated bathroom floors sounds soooo nice.
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it just shows how much Charlie means to you!!! 🙂
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I thought that too! 🙂
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Oh boy what a scary dream. I am glad you realized upon waking up that you did not have to hand over Charlie to any strangers. He’s so cute.
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I know! It was freaky!!! And thanks. 🙂 I think he’s pretty cute too.
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Not too much dog content! Sigh, the fur kids grow up so fast and the next thing you know they’re little fur adults. I’m pretty sure that I had a dream once that our dog’s first owner realized that giving her away had been a mistake and wanted her back years later…thankfully it was just a dream.
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Yes, I have mixed feelings on it, because of course puppies are SO cute when they’re little…. but at the same time, I know life will be a lot easier when he’s an adult dog!
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Charlie is just the sweetest thing and I’m so glad things are settling down. What an intense month + for your family, but soon things will be so routine as Charlie gets older and more settled.
I HATE bad dreams. It can really shake me for a long time!
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Yes, I feel like we’re in that interim stage where it’s just *starting* to get easier, but we also definitely aren’t fully there yet. But it’s encouraging to at least see the light a bit.
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That dream!!! On the one hand I want to cry because it’s so awful- and on the other hand I want to laugh… because it’s so awful. And I would DEFINITELY not be able to resist having Charlie sleep with me. I mean if he’s not disruptive… why not? Oh, and there’s never too much Dog Content on your blog!
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I know!! Once I realized it was a dream it was almost comical how dramatic of a dream it was. haha.
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There is a heating vent right next to our kitchen sink, too! And the cat is almost always there and she has been accidentally kicked and stepped on more times than we can count and yet she still hangs out there. The lure of the heat is great!
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Hahaha- yes, poor Charlie has gotten a few kicks and steps already… I was trying to train him to “go to his mat” (and the mat = a different rug over by the back door, nearby but NOT in the middle of the cooking space!). But of course, he doesn’t like to lay on THAT mat….
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No such thing as too much dog content! What a sweetie Charlie is! I feel like our last dog, Mulder, really calmed down when he was 2 1/2 or 3. But we got him when he was 7 months old, so he was almost finished with the ‘chew everything up’ phase. He still got some slippers and books though!
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Oh gosh, what a terrifying dream! I have those kinds of dreams about my cats and I give them so many snuggles when I wake up!!
It’s amazing when you start realizing things are feeling easier with a puppy. My mom has had two – one of whom was HARD until he was maybe 2. He would never settle down and we always had to have eyes on him. Her second puppy was much, much easier.
I am Team Pets Sleeping on Beds because what’s better than a snuggly floof next to you?!
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