We've been getting really frustrated with Ariyah's sleeping arrangements. She treats her beds like she treats stuffed animals: they must DIE.
First, she shows them who's boss. Lays on them. Rearranges them a little in her kennel. Gives them a low grrrrrrowl or two. As they start to fear her, she reassuringly licks them to draw them in and make them think she loves them and will never hurt them. Then, when they are least expecting it, she really gives it to them. This is the skinning process. A little hole is chewed, an eyeball or other embellishment removed, and bit by bit ALL the stuffing MUST come out! AS.AP.
The only way to keep a bed alive with her is to keep it out of her kennel. Which defeats the whole purpose of a bed. We've scolded. We've punished. We tried wrapping the last one in two old sheets to protect the layer before the stuffing, but it did nothing. She ripped right through those sheets and every morning or time we came home to her, new amounts of stuffing would be scattered all over her kennel and bursting through the holes to the outside.
We are going out of town this weekend, and I was so embarrassed to show up at the kennel with her bedding in the condition it was. We had to figure something out as buying her dog beds has proved to be worthless and expensive.
SO, we zoomed off to Discount Thrift USA - the classiest of all thrift stores, I must assure you - and found some blankets! Nice big, ugly colored, slightly worn blankets. For $2.52 each. She will tear a little hole in blankets here and there, but doesn't have the drive to destroy them like stuffed beds.
We brought them home, threw out alllll of her old messy bedding and washed the new blankets in hot water with some bleach, just to kill any lurking little critters that might enjoy their new found home at our house. Last night she slept just fine in her new nest, and doesn't seem to mind the change at all.
We also found this treasure, which the girls have been thoroughly enjoying, as I will let you see for yourself:
1 comment:
We had the same problem with Thatcher. We ended up buying one of the expensive orthopedic beds that are like memory foam instead of fluffy stuffing and he hasn't tried to destroy it!
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