training pad use

John got up about 5:30 and tried to get the shih tzus to go outside, but only Candy would listen to him. When I came down an hour and a half later, it looked like the other two used the training pad.

I had about an hour to sit on the couch with Dottie before I had to get ready for church. I took the time to go through the iWork Pages tutorial at Lynda.com and drink coffee. Gabe and Crystal were riding to church with us. When they came in, only Flower growled, but the shih tzus mainly just sat in their corner, waiting for the company to go away.

I stayed inside with the girls all afternoon, while John and Gabe tinkered with the rototiller in the garage. It hasn’t worked for weeks, so the weeds are overtaking us in the backyard. They are especially high down the middle of the yard, where the water flows down. The girls seem to love jumping the water and the weeds. Candy and Flower jump pretty high for small dogs.

While I worked on my laptop, Candy amused me by doing stretches across the carpet. She’d stretch out, walk a few steps, stretch out, then walk a few more steps. I think she is bored. Later, she amused herself by taking bites out of the newspaper I put under the training pad.

How to get them to do their business on the training pad still remains a puzzle. Since we took our large area rug out to the backyard and drenched it with cleaner and rinsed it well, it doesn’t have that lovely urine scent. Still, I know that the girls use it at least occasionally. I had tried setting three training pads out next to each other, but only two training pads ever got use, so I stopped that. I started trying to put newspaper under the training pad, sticking out at the edges, since they seem to like to squat at the edge. Candy still prefers to run upstairs to our bedroom or the spare room and relieve herself, however, instead of using the training pad.

I have more ideas. We might roll up the big rug at night, to remove that temptation. Also, I am thinking of trying doggie litter in conjunction with the training pad.