Week 16 and 17

It's been a busy last couple weeks as I haven't been blogging as much as I wanted to. But here's a few things that have happened during those times:

• YOYO's learning to consistently fetch. We've been throwing his tug toy, Kong Frisbee and ball. Of course, he only started doing it after he fetched the first time and received a treat. Now, he goes off and fetches every time knowing there's a treat waiting for him. So smart! 
• We've been training YOYO to do the fun ol "bang bang". It's proving more difficult than I thought. YOYO is able to lay down on his side with no problem, but still doesn't get what we mean when we say "bang bang". Our approach is "down" and then bring his treat over his shoulder so he turns and brings his head down. By this time, he would be on his side, patiently waiting for his treat. He'll get it eventually!
• I think YOYO's lost his pee pad training knowledge. He's been peeing everywhere on the floors. Will have to train him on that again. 
• We brought YOYO into Petsmart for some pampering (light trim around the paws, nails, bath and blow dry). He looks great!! 

• YOYO is now 3.5 months (17 weeks) and weighs 21 lbs! At 9 weeks, he was only 11 lbs.
• YOYO met a new friend today, Pancake. Pancake is a mix between a Chusky and a Border Collie.
• He was suppose to attend his first puppy training class last Monday, but unfortunately his instructor was sick so we'll be starting it tomorrow!
• Tuesday will be his rabies shot day! Then, he would have all his vaccinations! Wooot!

Martha Stewart Training Dog Harness Review

PetSmart had a sale today on leashes and harnesses, where if you buy one you'll get 20% off with PetPerks. We've been shopping around for a while now to find a suitable harness for YOYO. We've both read that leashes could hurt dogs if they constantly yank and pull.

Out of all the harnesses we looked at, we felt the Martha Stewart training harness was the best choice to go with. For YOYO, we got him the medium size harness. There's two straps that go underneath his front legs, and each have a really soft cushion so it's not as hard on him. Unlike other harnesses we've noticed, there isn't a padding on his chest, so it'll let in some wind to his chest, without pressing down on his hair. The buckling was also one thing we looked at - how easy it was to strap on and strap off. Overall, we've been pretty happy with this harness. The only thing is the thickness of the strap that we buckle in with our leash is a little thin. YOYO's been turning his head and have teared a bit of it already. Hopefully that won't keep up.

Where to buy the cheapest Poop bags for dog? ($0.02 per bag)

Before we got YOYO, we bought 3 boxes of Cesar Millan's doggy waste bags at Canadian Tire for $1.99 each. When it came time to look for more poop bags, we did some research and made some purchases that we thought were fair prices at the time. We later discovered that from buying $0.05 per bag, we were able to get them for as cheap as $0.02 per bag! If you multiply that out, that's some significant savings in the long run... let me show you.

If you dog eliminates 3 times a day, then in 365 days you would have used 1,095 poop bags (wow that's a lot of poop bags!). Take that, and multiply it by the difference of $0.03 per bag, and you're left with $32.85. This means, every year, you will have saved $32.85 on just poop bags!!

This is what we found from our purchases:

• Downtown Pet Supply - 920 bags for $42.99 on Amazon ; this averages out at around $0.05
• Earth Rated Poop Bags - 300 bags for $9.99 at Winners ($15.00 regular price) ; this averages out at around $0.03
• Poops! - 400 bags for $8.99 at Costco ; this averages out at around $0.02 per bag

We found that Costco (in Canada) offers the best prices for doggy poop bags compared to all the other places we looked. Would love to hear from anyone who's been able to get them for even cheaper! If you know, please leave a comment below and tell us where and how much :)

Downtown Pet Supply (920 bags)

Costco Poop! Bags (400 bags)

Earth Rated PoopBags (300 bags)

YOYO Meets Rhino, Rhino Meets the Gang

Kristy and I went shopping and stumbled across this cute Rhino in the dog section at Winners. The Rhino makes 2 sounds - a high pitch squeaky sound and a lower tone sound. We thought this would be a toy he's enjoy as he's growing up really fast. He's already outgrown his duck a bit, but still loves it at heart! At first, the Rhino scared him, because he wasn't used to the low tone sound that it made. He loves it now :)

 Here's YOYO with his friends :)

Puppy Samoyed Dancing to EDM - Go YOYO Go!

Me: YOYO looks bored
Kristy: Let's teach YOYO how to dance
Me: OK, what kinda music should we put on?
Kristy: Let's put on EDM
Me: This is going to be good :)

Result:

A Little Scare Got Rid of YOYO's Hiccups

Today was the first time we've ever year YOYO hiccup. His hiccups were very faint, but noticeable when you're up close enough to him. Kristy tried the typical, turn around and turn back with a scare to see if the hiccups would end. And IT DID! Funny enough, a dog who has a hiccup can go away with a tactic like scaring someone.

Kars Dog Competition, YOYO Goes to Visit his Mom Uka!

Karyne, our breeder, told us that she would be competing in a dog 'beauty pageant' this Saturday and so Kristy and I planned our day to visit the dog show in Kars, ON. Kars is about 20-25 minutes out of Ottawa. This dog show was a smaller one, but Karyne had some competition up her sleeve as another Samoyed breeder also showed up to compete. Their dogs were really fluffy! Karyne has brought Maggie and Saku. YOYO got along with Maggie very well, while Saku was more in the distant and didn't really get a chance to be around YOYO. Here's a few pictures from that day:

Kars Dog Show