So as I mentioned before, we have some guests coming to stay with us tonight. They are the same people we were travelling with in Italy and although the house wouldn’t have to be spotless for them, I still want it to look nice. So I have been cleaning some things up around here and I was taking the wine bottles which we bought in Italy down to the cellar. They have been sitting in the living room since we got back because we entered them in our cellartracker.com account and then didn’t get around to moving them the rest of the way. Actually, I think the intention was to take them to the new wine cellar already but since we haven’t been to the house since we got back, that would be a bit difficult.
So they are in 3 cardboard boxes and since we’ve gotten home, Ayla hasn’t tried to devour the boxes any further which was almost a miracle in itself. Most people who have Newfs also have found that they are just “drawn” to cardboard like they are to water.
I took the boxes down to the cellar which is a room we rarely go in. The water heater is also located in this room and it has a special heater that pulls the heat out of the air and somehow converts that to heat the water for the house. The problem with this heater is that it also pulls the moisture out of the air and deposits it in a large container via a little plastic hose. I guess the container holds about 30 or 40 gallons of water and weighs about a ton when you have to empty it. Unfortunately, even after living here for over a year, we still forget to empty these things regularly. We have yet to figure out just how long they take to fill up and so on.
So I get downstairs and notice there is some water on the floor. Ayla noticed it too and while I was getting some towels to soak it up, she decided it would be a good time to play in the water. Since she had also just come in from outside, her paws were caked with dry, very dark soil and of course she redecorated the floor with her footprints on the cream colored tile. I can say I am extremely thankful she stayed downstairs and didn’t go up to the carpet in the living room…but I was again not amused. She has already been rather wild this morning and I already need to clean both leather sofas and the chair in the living room because they are covered in dark mud from her antics today. So then I got to add on cleaning up the floor downstairs.
Naturally, trying to use towels to clean it up (or anything else really) with Ayla around is next to impossible. So I sent her upstairs, closed the baby gate behind her and went to the clean up. Just as I was finishing up and coming back upstairs, I heard her in the kitchen with something. So I walk in there and she’s gotten the carton of coffee creamer off the counter and is licking the contents off the floor. Let me again state that I was not amused.
She is now in a time out in her crate and will be in there for 15 minutes. Then I think I will vacuum the house, with her “assisting,” since she usually barks and jumps around at the vacuum and at least that should wear her down a bit. I know my batteries are already running low so I can only hope a nap is quickly approaching in her future. I am rather certain now that she will not accompany when I go to the pet store and grocery store today as I fear what the interior of my truck will look like when I come out.
We seem to recall something about a 7 month testing period when the dogs are going through more growth spurts and start testing their limits again? I really hope that this is what we’re experiencing and that it will be ending again in a few weeks. I know female Newfs are supposed to be the more stubborn ones and she’s definitely showing her true colors these days. God please grant me the sanity to survive it and the time to clean up after her 😉
