Bringing Up Puppy – Cleaning House

Who would have thought it would take a puppy to finally get my house organized? (Not that I haven’t tried before. But I’ve actually lost the get-organized books I’ve bought in the past, so that gives you an idea of the challenge ahead of me.) Now that we’re bringing a puppy home, I’m cleaning like the Queen of England is coming to stay for a long weekend—and planning to post pictures of her accommodations on facebook. Once you open your eyes and take a floor-level look at everything a puppy could get into, well, let’s just say you get to know the folks at the Salvation Army loading dock real well.

There are so many things to clean up! I’ve been working on it all week. My kids’ mounds of toys live on the family room floor: stuffed animals, trucks, army guys, plastic animals, crayons, craft supplies. A bunch of books and magazines are within biting reach of a puppy. So are dozens of DVD’s. And what about all those electrical cords? Yikes. And this is just one room! Will we ever be able to let her into the rest of the house? Not until I clean up those rooms, too. Things are really going to change around here.

My husband already relocated two antique tables and a chair upstairs to the attic for the next few years until the dog’s past the chewing stage. We had to rearrange the rest of the furniture to make room for her crate in the family room, and we dragged the baby gates back out of storage for the new baby. We’re going to confine her to the kitchen and family room to begin with. The gates will be great fun to climb over 13 times a day for the next year. The cat’s food dish and box had to find a new home, and so did door draft stoppers. We’re turning the house upside down for this itty bitty bundle of joy: no more shoes left in the kitchen, no more recyclables by the garbage can, no more coats hanging off the back of the kitchen chairs. Puppy proofing is serious business.

I’m sure I’ve missed something that she’ll sink her teeth into. But it’s becoming clear that deciding to get a puppy requires a lot more work than just picking out a breed and finding the right puppy. It’s been hard work already, and she’s not even home yet! That’s when the real work begins.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve not another pile of toys to sort through. We’re expecting a very special guest soon.

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Have you missed any of the articles in this series?
If so, you can find them at:
The Bringing Up Puppy Series page.

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3. Bringing Up Puppy Series – Tricks and Treats
4. Bringing Up Puppy Series – Chew on This