Look Ma, one of each color!

We've had Austin for almost two weeks now and we're going to be moving him tomorrow to get Simba. I meant to blog about him earlier but since I never got around to taking any pictures, I kept putting it off. Mike finally took a couple of snapshots of him last night so I have no further excuses.

Austin is a 1.5-yr old yellow lab, surprisingly calm for a puppy. He is extremely cute but his face doesn't seem quite labbish. His face is rather wide, the eyes are a little further apart then most labs, and his ears are too small and they don't lie flat like the typical lab. We're not sure if he's mixed with something or if he was just a badly bred lab. Either way he is still quite cute.


He's a relatively easy foster except that he's a bit skittish about noises and new people. He'll bark like mad when he meets new people and takes about 5 minutes before he'll approach them. He'll also bark at various noises in the house (heat turning on, door closing, noises from the other room). Thank goodness he's finally settled down a bit and doesn't bark quite as much as he used to. Austin does love to steal toys/bones/balls from other dogs. It doesn't matter how many identical toys are on the floor, he wants the one in the other dog's mouth. Max seems to actually enjoy that game and will play keep-away by swinging his head away from Austin. Strangely enough Austin is the first dog that Max has actively played/wrestled with in a long time. They had some nice bang-up sessions around the family room, right up until Max lunges onto the couch (usually with one of us already on it).


So things were moving right along, then we got a call on Monday from Pete's family. They were giving Pete back to LRR because he started suffering from separation anxiety (eating the crate, the carpet, anxiety, etc). Since none of the foster homes ever noticed the problem, we're assuming it's because Pete needs another dog around if no one is at home. Pete's family knew they could not get a second dog, nor did they want to medicate him. Lastly, separation anxiety is so tough to work on, they knew if it continued further Pete might have permanent issues. So as difficult as the decision was, they gave Pete back because they knew it was the best thing for Pete. We felt so awful for the couple, they loved this little guy so much. So Pete is now back here with us.


Since we liked Pete so much the last time he was here, we're giving some serious thoughts to adoption. We have two weeks to make a decision before anyone else can see Pete. We plan to take him to the dog park and see how he does. He's adjusted to our household (and our couches and our bed) pretty quickly. We've noticed he does have some touches of dominance with other dogs (not with Max....yet). This will be new for us since the last three dogs we've had were all quite submissive.

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