Early morning games

Harley stayed in his kennel until 4:30am when I let him out to go do his business but the sprinklers were on so he came back in the house. I put him back in his kennel and went back to bed. At about 5am he woke me up barking or whining (I was asleep so I'm not sure which it was). After he quieted down I went out and let him out of his kennel. It's 5:30am now and he's been playing for the last half hour. We played retrieve the duck, exchange (a piece of hot dog for my flip flop) and belly rub (I rubbed his belly with my foot). Now he has his bison bone and he's happily chewing away on it. In his exuberance he did bite me once. He got me on a place that was scabbing up so it's open again. Those baby teeth are just too sharp!

One of the reasons we play the belly rub game is to get him used to feet being on and around his body for a good reason so he doesn't continue to see feet as something to attack. He's pretty good about not going after our feet (unless there are shoe laces involved) but any extra work we do with him will benefit us all in the long run. I'd like to put him back in his kennel (so I can go back to bed) but I'm not sure I'm up to listening to him howl. I really should do it though so he learns to be away from me. The world doesn't end when I go away and I always come back. I want him to really know that to be true.

Okay, so I'm going to put him back in the kennel and see what happens. Hopefully I can get a few more hours of sleep.