u/ElectricAliens

Hello all,

I have a 13 week old lil baddie (in that she's cute, she's actually really well behaved for a baby) named Thelma. She's due to get her final round of shots next week and I want to get her started in some training classes. She's a really good girl, and we've already got her to "sit", "shake", "lay down"...working on "come", "potty" and "settle". Curious what people's experiences have been with the puppy classes offered at both Petsmart and Petco.

We might try to do private lessons once she's a little bigger and we can save up the funds for it. We live in NYC and would be either going to the Petsmart at Flatiron or the Petco at Union Square. Thank you in advance for any/all advice <3

Hello all! I have been lurking on here for weeks since I rescued our new puppy, Thelma. She's a super sweet little girl. Not our first dog but she is our first puppy together, so was feeling overwhelmed wanting to give her the best start to a life full of love.

She's getting her next round of vaccines soon and will finally be able to walk outside. Yay! My partner and I got a patch of sod for her to go potty on and she has had only a few accidents inside. Overall, she's been doing great going to the grass. Nervous/excited for how she'll do when we transition to walks outside for her potty needs. But potty training has been easier than I initially thought.

We've been crate training her. The first night she screamed so much, but read on here that someone suggested sleeping on the floor next to the crate so that I could put my fingers in to comfort her throughout the night. That worked great! She slept through most of the night and after that goes to her crate to relax. This last week we did all her naps in there with it completely covered..it was a few days of her screaming herself to sleep (we started with small increments of time so she wasn't panicked for very long...10,20,30 minutes - up to 1.5 hours) but she now is so happy to go in for her naps and doesn't make a peep...In fact I'm waking her up and she's content to stay in longer. More than anything I want to make sure she can go potty and get water every 1-2 hours, since she's still so little. At first I felt like the worst person in the world but it has been so rewarding. I can tell she's way less stressed and finding her independence!

Next on the docket is getting her used to wearing her little harness and being lead by a leash. She is not a fan! lol She lays down and looks at me like "Why?!" but hoping it'll be the same pattern of 2-3 days of her fighting it and then realizing it's not so bad.

All this to say, any tips from this community for the next things on the horizon? Any training tidbits you swear by OR wish you had implemented earlier? Feeling like we've made it over a few really amazing hurdles and excited to keep having her learn about the world.

ALSO for context, we live in a NYC apt with no balcony. So been teaching her to go potty in our walk in shower lol Figured it would be helpful if ever she was feeling sick or we had really bad weather haha.