Getting ready

So over the last few months, Ryan and I have wondered how our beloved dogs would do when their home is invaded by a noisy, smelly baby who would steal all of their attention. We have read several articles on the subject and have asked many friends how they integrated baby into the family without upsetting the dogs too much.

Here are some of the things we have done and plan to do:

1. At the moment I am playing a CD of baby noises for the dogs. The first track is cute happy baby noises, the second track is slightly louder noises of squeals and such, and then the last track is fussy baby crying noises. They really seem to be most interested in the toys the baby is playing with on the CD since they have squeakers in them, otherwise they have slept through most of the rest of it. I'll take that as a good sign.



2. We plan to bring home a blanket or hat that the baby has used in the hospital so the dogs can smell her before we bring her home. That seems to be on all of the lists that we have found.

3. We put up the baby gate well in advance so they could get used to being separated from us while we were in the kitchen or living room. We also had friends over with babies and used the gate to keep the dogs separate from them. They seemed to do very well with this so far.



4. We changed the rule of "ok to get on the couch" to "not ok to get on the couch" well in advance of baby's arrival. We happened to get a new couch that helped us be motivated to really enforce that rule. Now the dogs are used to it, mostly.



5. We changed the normal sleeping arrangements in advance as well. Usually the boys slept in our room on their beds on the floor, but it will just be too crowded with the pack and play in there as well, so now the boys have been relocated to sleeping on the purple chair in the living room. This hopefully also will limit the amount of times during the night when we are awake for night feedings that the boys will suddenly decide they need to go outside to investigate/pee.



6. We have tried to have as many babies and toddlers around the boys as possible so they can get used to not jumping and just being gentle. There is still a lot of room for improvement in this department, but boxers as a breed are supposed to do very well with children, and one of my coworkers wives just happens to be a dog trainer just in case we need some help after the little one comes.


Overall we are excited to see how our growing family does all together. If you have other ideas that worked for your family, let me know!