growing pains

I'm A Good Girl I Am (Annabelle's fancy given name) still has some work to do before she can back her title up with her lifestyle. She's been a bit naughty over the past few weeks. I should have taken pictures along the way, but the one below will have to do.

Uh oh.

Bad girl, Annabelle, B.A.D.!!!!!!!!

It all started when we came home two weeks ago to find only traces (on her dog bed) of a medium sized cardboard box I had left near the front door. The contents, thank goodness, were in tact along with the protective plastic bubbles, but the box itself was nowhere to be found. Annabelle had a tasty cardboard snack that evening.

I came home a few days later to find bits and pieces of our mail strewn across the house. Every day the mailman puts our deliveries through a slot that falls into a box inside our wall, and then we open a little door in the wall to get it out. Well, the mail must have been heavy and fallen through the door onto the floor. Maybe Annabelle thought the envelopes were a predator trying to get into her home? Whatever she thought, she clearly took the victory over our mail that day. And we were left guessing on the totals of a few bills.

A couple of days later I went to Target. As often happens there, I went in for a birthday card and left with a birthday card AND a really cute jacket. I tried it on for Brian and then draped it over the back of a chair in our dining room. The hanging tags were just too much for a little girl dog to resist. The next day I found my coat in the living room, covered in dog hair and lying on top of Annabelle's bed. All of the tags, as well as the plastic bag housing the extra button, had been devoured. Brian convinced me that the button would pass (not that I wanted it back), so I checked her "passings" for days afterward... but I never did find it.

Lastly, the incident pictured above. Why, at nearly 11 months old, is she chewing on wood now? WHY?!?!?!? She has been SO good up until this point. We have no idea what is going through her little brain, except that she's going through some sort of hormonal phase. Or so we hope.

After hearing a terrifying story yesterday from a guy at Brian's school whose 6 mo. old golden died after eating a sock, we finally got out the crate last night. Back to confinement when we leave the house. We HATE putting her in there, but as our parents told us when they disciplined us, so we now tell her: "It hurts us more than it hurts you. We do it because we love you!" :)