New build in South Texas

My wife Diane and I had planned on adding another dog to our family once our project was done. We had always gone to breeders for our dogs. Essentially the last four dogs we had were Great Danes. You had seen some of their pictures during the build. This time we wanted to save a dog from "death row". We went to the local animal shelter and adopted a young girl.

Meet Abigail (Abby)














 
How sweet is that. Good job!

How old is she? How did the intros go?

Kim

We think she is about a year old. It took about 24 hours for her and the Danes to adapt to each other. The cats were a different story. All is well now, but things would be perfect if we can get Abby to use the appropriate area to do her duty instead of on the travertine
 
okay this is going to sound SO weird but it has worked for me and others around here.

Poop Party-If she goes potty of ANY kind in the right area have a PARTY! Treats, loves, hugs, Dancing, good girling, ect. what ever she LOVES.

When she poops where you do not want her to do not say anything. Let your body do the talking. Make a sad body and face while you pick up the poop. She will know you are sad and may creep away or something like that. When you get the poop to where you want her to poop call her to you and the poop with a HAPPY body and voice. Show her the poop that you put in the area you want her to poop in. Have a poop party over the poop. It is so weird and your neighbors will KNOW you are crazy if they see you LOL

If at all possible you should walk her on a leash to the good area about 15 mins. after she eats. Walk her around and do the poop party.

Good luck!

Kim
 
At least the travertine washes off easily :). My husband and I come back and read this thread every so often to gain energy and stamina for our build. One foot in front of the other...and he noticed in this last read through that 1) you have done some amazing traveling (i.e. not home all the time when your pool was being built) and 2) you could claim that you had 2 vipers at one time....(so a great way to go out driving and let off steam ...which may happen occasionally in my CTS-V.) But my biggest question is - have the dogs been in the pool? - Karen
 
At least the travertine washes off easily :). My husband and I come back and read this thread every so often to gain energy and stamina for our build. One foot in front of the other...and he noticed in this last read through that 1) you have done some amazing traveling (i.e. not home all the time when your pool was being built) and 2) you could claim that you had 2 vipers at one time....(so a great way to go out driving and let off steam ...which may happen occasionally in my CTS-V.) But my biggest question is - have the dogs been in the pool? - Karen

Hi, Karen. This is Diane, Martin's wife. None of our dogs show any interest in going in the pool. Over the weekend we noticed our newest girl, Abby take a drink from it, but that's about it. We may try to coax her in, but that could invite more problems.

So you have a CTS-V? I have a CTS V-Sport. Not as fast as yours or Martin's, but fast enough for me! Now I know first-hand the fun Marty has when he zips around the pokey drivers.

Best of luck with your build. Once finished, the memory of the problems you experienced will fade away.

I think of the day I fell in the mud while feeding our wildlife during those endless days of rain and the frustration I felt, plus the shingles I developed shortly after that. Having Martin to share the aggravation with made all the difference.
 
okay this is going to sound SO weird but it has worked for me and others around here.

Poop Party-If she goes potty of ANY kind in the right area have a PARTY! Treats, loves, hugs, Dancing, good girling, ect. what ever she LOVES.

When she poops where you do not want her to do not say anything. Let your body do the talking. Make a sad body and face while you pick up the poop. She will know you are sad and may creep away or something like that. When you get the poop to where you want her to poop call her to you and the poop with a HAPPY body and voice. Show her the poop that you put in the area you want her to poop in. Have a poop party over the poop. It is so weird and your neighbors will KNOW you are crazy if they see you LOL

If at all possible you should walk her on a leash to the good area about 15 mins. after she eats. Walk her around and do the poop party.

Good luck!

Kim

kimkats, thanks for the suggestions. The issue with Abby seems to be she does not like the grass to get too tall. After it is first cut, she goes where she is supposed to without a problem. It's when the grass gets a little taller that she dislikes going in that area. We have our lawn cut every two weeks and have cut our sprinkler system days down to two (voluntary water conservation now in effect in our city), so that may slow the grass down a little. The height of the grass never concerned our Danes; of course they are much larger!
 

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At least the travertine washes off easily :). My husband and I come back and read this thread every so often to gain energy and stamina for our build. One foot in front of the other...and he noticed in this last read through that 1) you have done some amazing traveling (i.e. not home all the time when your pool was being built) and 2) you could claim that you had 2 vipers at one time....(so a great way to go out driving and let off steam ...which may happen occasionally in my CTS-V.) But my biggest question is - have the dogs been in the pool? - Karen

Get yourself a pulley and tune for that CTS-V and you will forget all about the travails of pool construction!!
 
How pretty! It looks like the plants are really taking off!

Is the Abby? Tell her she can come play at my house! What a happy doggy smile! It is a wonder she has not been in the pool yet with her being a lab! My mastiff/lab mix is in my pond all of the time. I keep him out of the pool.

Kim
 
Aww Abby is so cute! Love that happy face. I think she knows she landed on her feet in your house! Do you know if she was in the pound long? My coonhound we adopted would only do his business on concrete or on the driveway, I think he'd been kenneled for awhile. He got used to going on the grass eventually, but still doesn't like to get his feet wet if the grass is wet. Very particular. haha.
 
How pretty! It looks like the plants are really taking off!

Is the Abby? Tell her she can come play at my house! What a happy doggy smile! It is a wonder she has not been in the pool yet with her being a lab! My mastiff/lab mix is in my pond all of the time. I keep him out of the pool.

Kim

We actually are starting to see some palms start to die. I have the PB and landscaper coming back out. We all agreed that we would look at the plantings in 6 to 8 weeks and replace anything that died. We'll see
 
Hi guys, its been awhile. Diane and I just looked at photo proofs of our back yard. Ole Décor, a magazine showcasing Architecture, Décor, art and real estate did a photo shoot for their magazine. I'll see if I can get some copies of the pictures minus the Ole Décor watermark on the photo
 
Gorgeous!!!
Your pool design and material helped me convinced hubby to change the whole tile selection and to add additional lights to the deck area. We keep coming back to this post to look for design inspirations. So, thank you!
 

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