When I first got a crate for Barbie she was downright afraid of it. I had gotten her to the stage now where she goes in there on her own and just chills out in there for a bit. Anyway, last night was her first full night in the crate. She whined for the first hour, then she slept for 6 hours and woke up at 5.15am or so. I let her out for a wee in the morning at about 5.30 after she had been quiet for a whole 5 minutes. She was very happy to be out of there. She is being crated at night for two reasons - 1. She still occasionally pees on the floor inside at night and I'm trying to eliminate that, and 2. I want to be able to crate her when we take her out camping instead of just tethering her like we used to do with Bender.
I think she'll be OK in a few nights. She will probably still whinge a bit. I want to get her to sleep until 6.50am in the crate and I will be happy with that.
On our walk last night, we had to walk over a piece of orange mesh that someone had strung across the footpath. Bender walked over it fine, but Barbie hesitated. I said 'over' and waited. Barbie thought about it for a little while and I didn't think she would do it, but then she executed a beautiful (if over the top) leap over the offending plastic and we continued on our way. We also stopped in a local park and I got them both to down/stay. I did two very short distance down/stays because Bender looked as if he was about to take off. Barbie never took her eyes off me.
