The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

We planned for months before finding Brinkley and had a lot of ideas on the things we were and weren't going to let him do.

What are the rules that are long forgotten and which have you kept the whole time?

Rules kept:

Not allowed on the couch
Not allowed on the bed
No begging at the table
No overage of treats during the day

At least a half hour of exercise every day
Grooming weekly - teeth brushing, hair brushing, ear cleaning, nail checking/trimming.


Rules that failed miserably:

No people food. We don't feed him from the table but he gets snap peas and apple slices every day as snacks instead of bagged treats. Also ice cubes and pumpkin ice cubes if his stomach is upset.

No licking of the face. Although I know it's unsanitary, my face is washable. It makes him happy, and I ignore the grossness.

No tug of war. I heard this could cause problems with aggression. But we practice a controlled tug of war and if I say "drop", the game is over immediately, so I'm ok with that.

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

Uhhh- my pup has no rules really

He sleeps on the bed with us.

He lays on the couches.

He begs (only to me) at the table- and i'm not even the one who feeds him people food!

He licks everyone's face.



He is the biggest, sweetest mush ever. And he has his "sad" look down pat. When you yell at him, he tries to crawl on your lap.

He does listen very well when/if we yell and he KNOWS when he's in trouble.

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

well, we've only had Hershey for like a month lol but so far the ONE RULE that DH is INSISTING on keeping is NO people food

so far we've been keeping that rule!

Hershey is still to small to jump on the bed or couch by himself lol

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

No people food - we were loose with this rule with our previous dogs. And when we first got Maddie we had a road trip down to my mom's ... we stopped for fast food and it was a new world to have the dogs stay in the back completely disinterested in our Hardees!!
At that point I knew, *I* was not going to cave on the people food rule.


Not allowed on couches - but this has been a challenge. I plan on sticking to this one too because one of our other dogs was so obsessed with getting on the furniture (hmmm ... choc lab too!!) that we had to keep all the cushions up so he wouldn't get on them. Not that we ever have company but I vowed we would not have our living room look turned upside down anymore.

We let her in the bed sometimes on the weekend because she still wants to get up & get going around 6AM like during the week and letting her up with us, gives DH & I more sleeping time!

I wanted to be good with brushing her teeth but have failed miserably.

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

Rules - what are rules?!

The only thing we really stuck to is no feeding from the table. I hate when dogs beg and we taught Misty from the beginning that if she waits in the other room she will get some food when we are done. We put the tiniest leftover in her bowl, and everyone is happy.

Other than that, she sleeps with us and has complete run of the house. She does sort of ask permission to come up, though. She will come by the side of the bed or couch and wait to be invited....if we are home.

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

All of our rules went out the window. Our pups rule!! They do everything but relieve themselves in the house. But, if we do see them doing something we don't want them doing, for ex: they jump on guests and bother them or begging at the table (only 1 of the 3 does this), we say no and they listen. Even with no rules they are pretty well behaved.

I'm afraid to have kids, if I can't make rules for my dogs!!

Message edited 3/27/2009 4:39:55 PM.

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

Message edited 11/23/2011 7:11:16 PM.

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

DH and i kept the no people food rule. Porter has colitis and Lucky we just dont want him to have it. However, when they are around "Grandpa" they both get a little treat cuz my dad won't listen to me.

The rule we recently let slide, and i mean recently was staying off the bed. It was good for 2 years, then we stayed at my moms house for a week and it was cold in our room so i let him up and under the covers with me. So now we not only share the bed with our 8Lb Poodle, but now our 80LB pit mix.
no other furniture though

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

I pretty much got rid of all the rules

it was obvious from day 1 who owned who

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

I am the worst with rules. Petunia pretty much does whatever she wants but I must admit she is a very good girl!!!

Re: The "rules" you let slide and those you kept

the only rules are only "go" outside and dont bite anyone.

so far, so good!