WARNING This Post Contains Cute Puppy Photos

Having a pet definitely changes your life for the better. After going about quite a few years without a dog (I have had two dogs before), in September last year my family decided it was time to get one.

 It took so long because the last dog we had was a border collie; an absolute working dog to its core. This didn't end so well, because we didn't have enough time in the day to walk her as much as she needed (which was a lot!). This meant that she used to tunnel out of our back garden, which backed on to the woods, and we would have to spend countless evenings running around the woods looking for her. My parents decided it would be unfair on her if we kept her, as we could not give her the attention she deserved. The day they tried to take her to the Battersea dog's home, I remember running up my street with no shoes on, with the dog in tow, saying to my parents that I would look after her on my own. I was a dramatic child, but I had grown so attached to the dog that I couldn't imagine life without her.

The dog we had previously, my parents had owned before I was born, so I grew up around her. This was useful, as I grew up not being scared of animals and made friends with my neighbor because ours mums walked their dogs together. This dog died of old age when I was relatively young, but I don't think I understood the concept of death yet. This is because, when we buried the dog's ashes in the garden, we marked the grave with a bamboo stick, through which I used to drop spaghetti to "feed" the dog.

Schnoodle puppy

My mum was determined to do her research on types of dog this time around, so that we didn't end up with a dog that didn't suit our lifestyle. While at first, my mum and sister wanted to get a schnoodle (a cross between a schnauzer and a poodle), I wasn't so sure. It turned out that such breeds were quite rare in the area in which we lived. In fact, it was very difficult to find anything that wasn't a Staffordshire terrier, which probably shows how rough the area I live in is. Eventually, we decided that we liked the look of spaniels, specifically cocker spaniels rather than their lively springer counterparts. 

After endless Google searching we found a couple of spaniels we liked. The first time we actually went to a seller's house, they were very convincing. They had previous experience with breeding their dog and the puppies were unbarably cute. However, when looking at the situation again, the puppies were locked in a cage on top of a bin, outside in the heat, with no water, and a large portion of the garden "where the mother dog lived" was blocked from view and we weren't allowed to go back there. We resolved that, while we felt sorry for the puppies, we had in fact just visited a puppy farm and were not going to encourage this, so didn't buy from them.

Puppy farms are regarded as cruel by a lot of people because dogs are used for breeding again and again and the breeders often have little regard for the dog's health. It is very easy to not realise that you are buying from a puppy farm because they hide it well. WHen selling multiple puppies from the same litter, they usually advertise the puppies seperately and occasionally lie about when different puppies are born. The best way to tell whether or not an online advertisement is a puppy farm is by looking to see if any different advertisements are from the same location or have the same contact details. You could ask how many litters the mother has had before, although of course, the seller could lie.

Finally, we found a local seller who seemed safe, so we went to visit them. There was only one puppy left when we got there. She was very small, very scared and quite tired. When we picked her up, she quivered so much I was scared. We all were so endeared to her, even though she seemed of a dangerously nervous disposition. We all turned to look at my dad, who would be paying for her, and of course he agreed. She shivered in the car the whole way home.

When we got home, we expected the puppy to be excited to explore her new environment, but she just laid down and looked sorry for herself. She let you stroke her, she didn't back away from you, but she didn't seem thrilled to be stroked either. We were worried when she didn't leave the corner of the room all day, but left her to it to settle in by herself. The next few days she mostly spent asleep. She didn't cry like the other dog did when we first got it. She just seemed sad in the way she looked at you. It made us feel guilty, but obviously it wasn't really our fault she had been separated from her siblings.

Finally she seemed to perk up a bit, actually moving from her corner. She was scared of going through doorways for some bizarre reason, so if we wanted her in the living room with us, we had to pick her up and carry her. The first time she actually seemed interested in exploring is when we took her to the vets the first time. She obviously smelt the familar smell of dogs, and actually wagged her tail. Hurrah, we haven't got the saddest dog in the universe! It's funny, most pets hate going to the vets, but so far, my dog loves it!

 

 

Tiny puppy

She has grown a lot!

 After the trip to the vets and a couple of weeks of absolute sleepiness (apparently normal for puppies, as they're like babies and are doing the majority of growing at this age), she finally started acting like a stereotypical puppy. She now plays with her toys, throwing them up in the air and trying to catch them before they hit the ground. She always loves meeting people, often dragging me halfway across the park to go and see someone else out for a walk. As she was still refining her senses at a young age, she would often do really stupid and hilarious things, like run into cabinet doors or fall on her face after jumping over something. She still sometimes makes funny noises to herself, as if she is trying to talk like a person. She also steals underwear and socks off of radiators.

Making friends with other dogs

 

Being an elf at Christmas

She barely fits on my lap now!

She is now about seven months old, and now that I am at university, I miss her. I might drive the two and a bit hours soon, just to go and see her. I am absolutely her favourite, as I spent the majority of time with her (and I let her on my lap on the sofa, which she isn't supposed to do). She definitely has developed a personality and I am so glad of the progress whe has made from the whimpering little thing she once was.