Dog boarding update + post-vacation diet (the dog, not me)

It feels good to be home! I’m always pleased to experience that sense of “ahh, home sweet home”, even after the best of trips. I feel like this speaks to the fact that we’ve built a life and home that is genuinely our happy place. No, our life is not perfect and I wish I could change certain things about our house and we badly need to replace our concrete driveway and work and family can be annoying and all the rest, but big picture- I really LIKE my regular, daily life, my home, and our routines, and that makes me happy.

Anyway, I wanted to give an update on the dog boarding situation! Remember how we had wrestled with what to do with Charlie when we travel? After looking at various options, including Rover dog sitters + other local boarding facilities, for our last few trips we stuck with the kennel-free boarding place we started with. However, it is EXPENSIVE – $57/day.

This latest trip would require 13 days of boarding, with drop off and pick up days. Doing the math, that’s $741, not counting tax or the almost required post-boarding bath, or any add-ons. Multiple that by multiple trips per year, and we’re talking several thousand more dollars per year on top of our travel expenses. Eeks.

Also, Charlie did not seem to love being boarded. He did ‘okay’, but I just never got the sense that he loved it. He always seemed to pick up weird bad habits, one time he got an eye infection, and he just seemed kinda off/ anxious. The place seemed alright but I just never felt fully at peace with all of it.

Recently, Ivan’s cousin and his wife, who live in Madison, offered to watch Charlie. They already have 3 dogs (they had 2, but just got a new mini-golden puppy not long ago- who is actually partially related to Charlie). (When Charlie was younger we weren’t sure if the set-up there would work so we hadn’t considered this option, but now that he’s older and much more laid back/ doesn’t chew on things/ etc., we felt good about it.)

Overall, it went super great!! I think Charlie was very happy there.

I will say, Ivan’s cousin is a pretty laid back dog owner. They don’t walk their dogs- they have a fenced in yard and they just open the door to let them out to run around and go potty. They said Charlie played a LOT with the puppy, and they were grateful to Charlie for keeping him entertained for them and out of mischief. Ha. His cousin and wife also like to snuggle with all the dogs on the couch, etc. (they sent pics of Charlie curled up next to them), so he was getting PLENTY of attention both from humans and his doggy cousins. When people were gone, the dogs all hung out in the living room together. (All the dogs get along great and their other dogs are older/ super chill.)

He seemed to be in 7th heaven! Ivan’s cousin said it was absolutely no trouble at all and he was a perfect angel- “we already have 3 dogs, we won’t even notice one more!”

From all practical standpoints, I am totally thrilled with how this worked out.

HOWEVER…. I think Charlie gained 5 lbs while there! 😳 I’m not exaggerating, he looks very plump.

They apparently “free feed” their dogs- just put a whole big bunch of kibble down in the morning and the dogs eat as they please throughout the day, I guess.

I was a bit concerned about this. First, Charlie has a rather sensitive stomach and doesn’t seem to do well with chicken, and I know for a fact that he would not think twice about scarfing down another dog’s food (which probably contains chicken). I was also not sure if the other dogs would take kindly to Charlie helping himself to their food!! Third, I knew this whole situation would lead to Charlie overeating.

Ivan’s cousin had asked us to just bring a big bag of Charlie’s food, and he said, “I’ll just feed all the dogs Charlie’s food all week so if Charlie eats any of someone else’s bowl, he won’t have any stomach troubles”. (I was a bit confused how his dogs would just abruptly change foods? But he told Ivan he normally buys all different foods depending what’s on sale and his dogs never have any issues. Hmm…. you’re supposed to slowly transition dogs to new foods, I thought…. But who am I to judge how someone else dog parents. 😆)

I really did not like the idea of Charlie overeating all week. (Because I know him. He will eat and eat and eat if he has the chance. He is highly food motivated.) I really wished they would just put food down for all the dogs, let them eat their prescribed amount at meal time and then take it away! (I feel this is standard?!)

It was a bit awkward though, because how do we ask someone to watch our dog but then also expect them to change their feeding patterns for their own dogs….

Anyway, Ivan finally said, let’s just see how it goes, I guess, and hope for the best.

They didn’t report any issues with eating, but let me tell you, he definitely gained weight over the past 13 days!! (In fairness, his hair is super long right now so he looks extra fluffy, but he absolutely feels fatter. I weighed him, too, and it’s the highest its ever been.)

Honestly, his weight was already creeping up even before the trip this winter. When he was little, we never gave him any people food/ table scraps at all, because he’d always get loose stools. We barely gave treats either, for the same reason. But as he’s gotten older (he’ll be 3 in June), his stomach issues have settled down dramatically. He now seems to tolerate all sorts of “snacks” (🙄). I think what happens is that everyone gives him “just a little bit”, but multiply that by 4 people giving him little bits at different times, and pretty soon, he’s eating a LOT extra.

I also partially blame the “treat house”, lol. This is Charlie’s FAV house on the block, where the owners have a pail hanging along the street and it is always fully stocked with Milk Bones. We tend to walk by at least twice a day, and it’s hard to go past without stopping! (I used to feel funny about taking a treat every time we passed, but the owners literally push the treats on us if they’re outside! And trust me, Charlie knows it’s the treat house…).

We also got more lax about walking him as much this winter. We definitely still walked him, typically daily, but just not as often or as long as in good weather. We got in the bad habit of sometimes just doing the “short loop”, and sometimes only once a day…. It’s cold! As a puppy, it felt much more necessary to walk him a lot, but now if weather’s crummy, he’s happy to just run out to go potty and then chill on the couch most of the day. I know for a fact his exercise has been decreased some this winter.

So, all of these things combined have likely contributed to an upward tick in his weight.

It’s really important to me that Charlie not be overweight! It’s so unhealthy for dogs!!

Therefore, as of yesterday, he is officially on a DIET. Haha. NO MORE TABLE SCRAPS. A strict portion for his meals. And cutting way back on all the treats! (I was probably overdoing treats a bit on our walks, also, because after being at the boarding places, Charlie would always come home more reactive (barking/ overexcitable/ pulling at other dogs while out walking), so I was using more treats as a distraction and for training on walks…).

We are also back to strictly enforcing at least 2 walks per day, and doing the “longer loop” whenever feasible.

Hopefully we can get him his summer body back soon. 😅

(I have been calling him Chunky Charles which he does not seem amused by. 🤣)

I told Ivan we’ll definitely need to better address the feeding situation before we leave him with his cousin again. Maybe we can say the vet put him on a strict diet or something, so this is really important…. ? I’m also thinking I may portion his food out into baggies or something – I could see his cousin just pouring a big heaping scoop in, even though I told him the amount.

It’s always something! Thankfully, food issues aside, it all went great,and I felt so much more content knowing he was there instead of being boarded.

Daily Gratitude:

I am grateful for Ivan’s cousin watching Charlie for us! Even if they fattened him up… lol. I’m also just so grateful to back home with Charlie! I always miss him so much when we’re away.