No I am not THAT KIND!

I have wanted to get this out of my chest for sometime now so here I goes ranting!

A girlfriend once commented,'Oooooh you are that kind of Dog parents.'

She was meaning to say that I was 'that kind' that show off my puppy by teaching him tricks so that I can show it off. I was actually a tad offended by this comment althou she did not meant it to be malicious but ...

Anyway, she has a Chihuahua who escaped from her house, ran into the streets and was knocked down by a car. I told her if your dog is trained, this won't happen.

Training your dog teach your dog; How to learn, How to understand Human, and most importantly teach the dog SAFETY! TOto has been 'learning' since he join our family, so now we just have to give TOto an expression, a hand signal or a noise and TOto knows whether it is an 'Approval' or a 'No'.

A well mannered dog will be a well-loved dog, which makes a Happy dog, so he can blend well into OUR HUMAN's Environment. Ultimately TOto is living with us and not us living with him in his Kansas Farm!

Safety wise, TOto has learn not to 'DASHED' out of the door. Even if we allow him to go out of the door first, he will still wait for us at the staircase. So please train your dog to 'SIT' and be the last to walk out of the door! THIS IS SO IMPORTANT! My Hubs even goes to the extend to teach TOto to sit when a car is approaching and only move on when the car is drivng away; this teaches TOto not to panick when he sees a car. And TOto learnt to 'Down' when he sees a dog approaching from afar so the other dog won't panick and attack TOto! All these are basic survival skill in the 'Human' world which is not in their Basic Animal Survival Instinct!

I don't know about other dogs but TOto loves it when he can 'Understand' us. And the only way when TOto can totally understand us is through all the tricks we trained him to do. When he does something right, our 'Approval OK' makes him SO HYPER and HAPPY! So part of Teaching is giving him our Love, Attention and Approval, and of course all the TREATS and praises! Although Training sounds so harsh but for TOto, 'Training' means 'Treats', 'Biscuits' and Daddy's attention!

So NO I AM NOT that kind of Dog Parent because I have 1001 other reasons why I want to train my dog! And Safety is the first and foremost most important reason.

The other 'Benefits' I get out of it is BONUS!